Picture History : Anniversaries

Anniversaries

To illustrate the depth one can access in our collections, we have compiled relevant archival imagery to frame a diverse cultural, political and chronological retrospective of noteworthy anniversaries. Be sure to bookmark this section as the calendar is a work in progress and will continue to expand.

December	Year	Anniversary	Event
1	1862	151st	Ten weeks after his Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln's State of the Union Address advocates moderation in slavery policy.
1	1971	42nd	The war in Cambodia worsens, as Cambodian troops lock in a doomed fight with the Khmer Rouge and their North Vietnamese allies.
2	1917	96th	Led by Vladimir Lenin, the Bolsheviks arrange an armistice with the Central Powers and withdraw from war.
2	1881	132nd	Pauline Canissa, a U.S. opera singer, attempts to sing at a benefit in honor of the late Pres. Garfield, but breaks down
2	1961	52nd	Fidel Castro announces he is a Marxist-Leninist and will lead Cuba to Communism.
2	1892	121st	Jay Gould, unscrupulous U.S. financier who joined Daniel Drew to fight with Cornelius Vanderbilt over the railroads, dies.
3	1776	237th	George Washington arrives at the banks of the Delaware River during the Revolutionary War.
3	1826	187th	Birth of George McClellan, Union general whom Lincoln promoted to Commander in Chief and then soon demoted
4	1861	152nd	Lillian Russell (Helen Louise Leonard), American vocalist and actress, is born.
4	1892	121st	Francisco Franco, Spanish dictator, is born.
4	1942	71st	FDR orders that the Works Progress Administration - which provided jobs during the Depression - be dismantled.
4	1816	197th	James Monroe becomes the 5th president of the United States.
5	1831	182nd	John Quincy Adams, former U.S. president, becomes a member of the House of Representatives.
5	1791	222nd	Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer, dies.
5	1876	137th	President Ulysses S. Grant apologizes to Congress for mistakes he made while president.
5	1792	221st	George Washington is re-elected president and John Adams is re-elected vice president.
5	1782	231st	Martin Van Buren, 8th U.S. president and first president born in the United States as a citizen, is born.
6	1917	96th	The Bolsheviks imprison Czar Nicholas II and his family in Tobolsk.
6	1941	72nd	A day before Pearl Harbor, Pres. Franklin Roosevelt asks Hirohito to "prevent further death and destruction," but to no avail.
6	1492	521st	Christopher Columbus lands on the island of Santo Domingo.
6	1877	136th	Edison makes his first sound recording, "Mary Had a Little Lamb," on his newest invention, the phonograph.
7	1916	97th	David Lloyd George becomes prime minister of Britain.
7	1796	217th	John Adams is elected the second U.S. president.
7	1862	151st	At Prairie Grove, AR, Union Gen. Herron's swift march with 7,000 troops helps Gen. James Blunt hold off Conf. Gen. Hindman.
7	1987	26th	Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev arrives in the U.S. for a summit meeting with Reagan.
7	1836	177th	Martin Van Buren is elected the eighth president of the U.S.
7	1941	72nd	Japan attacks the U.S. Pacific fleet home base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.
8	1542	471st	Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, is born on this day.
8	1886	127th	The American Federation of Labor or AFL is born in Columbus, Ohio.
8	1941	72nd	The U.S. enters World War II, as Congress declares war on Japan.
8	1776	237th	General Washington retreats across the Delaware River, from New Jersey to Pennsylvania, to flee the British
8	1987	26th	Gorbachev and Reagan sign the first treaty between two world powers to reduce their arsenals of nuclear weapons.
9	1847	166th	George Grossmith, English actor, is born.
9	1982	31st	Leon Jaworski, special prosecutor in the Watergate scandal, dies.
9	1621	392nd	The first sermon in New England is delivered at Plymouth, Massachusetts.
9	1641	372nd	Anthony Van Dyck, Flemish painter, is born today.
9	1861	152nd	The Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War forms to monitor Lincoln's Administration after the Battle of Ball's Bluff.
9	1862	151st	Captured Confederate officer Benjamin Carter is incarcerated in Rock Island Union Army Prison, in Illinois.
10	2002	11st	Former president Jimmy Carter accepts the Nobel Peace Prize for his diplomatic efforts in the Middle East during the 1970s.
10	1906	107th	Pres. Theodore Roosevelt is the first American to win the Nobel Peace Prize, for his mediation efforts in the Russo-Japanese War.
10	1931	82nd	Jane Addams is the first U.S. woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work with the poor.
10	1917	96th	The International Red Cross, founded in 1863 by Henri Dunant of Switzerland, receives the Nobel Peace Prize.
10	1872	141st	P. B. S. Pinchback of Louisiana becomes the first African American governor of a U.S. state.
10	1817	196th	Mississippi is admitted as the 20th state in the Union.
11	1941	72nd	Germany and Italy declare war on the U.S.
11	1781	232nd	Sir David Brewster, Scottish physicist, inventor, and writer, is born.
11	1862	151st	The Union Army occupies Fredericksburg, Virginia.
11	1872	141st	Buffalo Bill Cody makes his first stage appearance.
11	1777	236th	The British delay General George Washington's march to his winter camp in Valley Forge.
11	1792	221st	Louis XVI goes before the revolutionary Convention to face charges of treason.
11	1961	52nd	Pres. Kennedy orders helicopter crewmen to South Vietnam to provide training for South Vietnamese forces.
12	1896	117th	Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist, gives the world's first public demonstration of radio in London.
12	1806	207th	Stand Watie, Cherokee chief and Confederate general of the Cherokee Cavalry, is born.
12	1901	112nd	Nobel-prize winner Guglielmo Marconi sends the first wireless signal, from Great Britain to Newfoundland.
12	1947	66th	The United Mine Workers Union withdraws from the American Federation of Labor.
13	1776	237th	Gen. Charles Lee, fond of women and wine, abandons his Patriot troops to go to Widow White's tavern in New Jersey
13	1991	22nd	North Korea and South Korea sign a peace treaty, ending the Korean War, 38 years after the fighting stopped.
13	1862	151st	Lee's vastly outnumbered Confederate troops defeat Burnside from their position on Marye's Heights at the battle of Fredericksburg.
14	1897	116th	Politician Margaret Chase Smith, first U.S. woman elected to both the House of Representatives and the Senate, born.
14	1961	52nd	Pres. Kennedy steps up U.S. involvement with South Vietnam.
14	1861	152nd	Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, dies in London.
15	1791	222nd	The Bill of Rights goes into effect when it is ratified by Virginia on this day
15	1831	182nd	Franklin Sanborn, U.S. social reformer, abolitionist, and journalist, is born.
15	1916	97th	The French defeat the Germans at the Battle of Verdun, in WWI
15	1961	52nd	Nazi official Adolf Eichmann is sentenced to death by an Israeli court.
15	1832	181st	Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, French engineer who designed the Eiffel Tower in Paris, is born.
16	1961	52nd	Young Pres. Kennedy begins his South American tour to enthusiastic cheers in Caracas, Venezuela.
17	1991	22nd	Boris Yeltsin's supporters declare the Soviet Union will cease to exist.
17	1797	216th	Joseph Henry, eminent U.S. physicist and first secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, born.
17	1807	206th	John Greenleaf Whittier, U.S. poet and abolitionist, founder of the Liberal Party, born.
17	1862	151st	Ulysses S. Grant expels the Jews from his Department when he learns that friends of his father's are cotton speculators.
18	1892	121st	Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker Ballet" is first performed, by the Russian Imperial Ballet.
18	1956	57th	Japan is admitted to the United Nations.
18	1886	127th	The Battle of Verdun, in France, ends.
18	1886	127th	Ty Cobb, U.S. baseball star and first man elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, is born.
18	1862	151st	At the Battle of Lexington, Nathan Forrest, ordered by Bragg to cut Union supplies, routs Robert Ingersoll's forces in Union territory.
19	1941	72nd	Hitler takes charge of the German army.
19	1842	171st	Hawaii's sovereign independence is recognized by the U.S.
19	1817	196th	James J. Archer, Confederate brigadier general captured at Gettysburg and imprisoned on Johnson's Island, Ohio, is born
19	1777	236th	Gen. Washington leads his army of 11,000 to Valley Forge for the winter, during which nearly 3,000 troops die.
19	1732	281st	Benjamin Franklin begins publishing "Poor Richard's Almanack."
19	1776	237th	Anglo-American political theorist Thomas Paine publishes "American Crisis", which says: "These are the times that try men's souls."
20	1862	151st	In a raid on Holly Springs, MS, Van Dorn attacks Union supply lines in order to thwart Grant's efforts to capture Vicksburg.
20	1881	132nd	Branch Rickey, the U.S. baseball executive who will hire the first black players, is born.
21	1811	202nd	Archibald Campbell Tait, Archbishop of Canterbury, is born.
21	1861	152nd	President Lincoln signs into law a Navy medal, the Medal of Valor.
21	1861	152nd	The Trent Affair escalates during the Civil War and England nearly goes to war with the U.S.
22	1807	206th	Jefferson's Embargo Act, designed to force peace between Britain and France as well as keep the US out of their war, is passed.
22	1941	72nd	British Prime Minister Churchill arrives in Washington to confer with Pres. Franklin Roosevelt at the Arcadia Conference.
23	1921	92nd	Pres. Warren Harding frees socialist Eugene Debs and other political prisoners.
23	1862	151st	Confederate president Jefferson Davis declares Union Gen. Butler a felon for harassing the women of New Orleans.
24	1972	41st	Comedian Bob Hope gives his last show to entertain U.S. troops in Vietnam.
24	1822	191st	Matthew Arnold, British poet and essayist, born.
24	1871	142nd	Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Aida" premieres in Cairo, Egypt, for the opening of the Suez Canal.
24	1851	162nd	The Library of Congress is ravaged by fire, two thirds of its collection destroyed.
25	1821	192nd	Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, is born in Oxford, Massachusetts.
25	1991	22nd	Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev announces his resignation.
25	1926	87th	Hirohito becomes emperor of Japan.
25	1776	237th	General Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware River to surprise the Hessian forces in New Jersey.
25	336	1677th	The first known Christmas celebrated on Dec. 25, in Rome, is set on the birthday of the sun god, Mithras.
25	1862	151st	Lt. Elisha Rhodes, one of the most famous Civil War diarists, writes in his journal, "I should like to be home this Christmas night."
25	1977	36th	Charlie Chaplin, English-born comedian, actor, director and producer, dies at age 88.
26	1791	222nd	Charles Babbage, British mathematician and inventor, born.
26	1941	72nd	Winston Churchill is the first British prime minister to address the U.S. Congress.
26	1972	41st	Harry S. Truman, 33rd U.S. president, dies.
26	1837	176th	Admiral George Dewey, U.S. naval commander, is born.
26	1776	237th	The British suffer a major defeat at the Battle of Trenton during the Revolutionary War.
26	1492	521st	Columbus establishes the first Spanish settlement in the Americas, on the island of Haiti.
26	1861	152nd	Mason and Slidell are freed from their Boston jail, in exchange for Union prisoners of war, in the Trent Affair
27	1822	191st	Louis Pasteur, French scientist who developed pasteurization as well as a rabies vaccination, is born.
27	1831	182nd	Naturalist Charles Darwin sets out from England for a 5-year survey of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans aboard the HMS Beagle.
28	1856	157th	Woodrow Wilson, 28th president of the U.S., is born in Staunton, VA.
28	1832	181st	John Calhoun becomes the first US vice president to resign, due to differences with Pres. Andrew Jackson.
29	1837	176th	Canadian militiamen destroy the Caroline, a US steamboat docked at Buffalo, NY.
29	1986	27th	Former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan dies at age 92.
29	1851	162nd	The first U.S. branch of the YMCA (Young Men's Christian Association) is established in Boston.
29	1607	406th	Chief Powhatan spares John Smith's life because of the pleas of his daughter, Pocahontas.
29	1862	151st	At Chickasaw Bluffs, 6,000 Confederates defeat 37,000 Union troops, thwarting Union Gen. Sherman's attempt to take Vicksburg.
30	1922	91st	Lenin proclaims the establishment of the USSR.
30	1862	151st	The Union ironclad USS Monitor sinks off Cape Hatteras.
30	1916	97th	Grigory Rasputin, Russian mystic and favorite of Czar Nicholas II, is murdered by a group of Russian nobles.
30	1816	197th	Poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and novelist Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin marry
31	1897	116th	Brooklyn's last day as a separate entity from New York City, before becoming a borough.
31	1946	67th	President Harry S. Truman declares World War II officially over.
31	1961	52nd	America's Marshall Plan ends, after distributing more than $12 billion in foreign aid since 1948.
31	1781	232nd	America's first modern bank, the Bank of North America, opens in Philadelphia, as conceptualized by Robert Morris
31	1862	151st	At the Battle of Stones River, Rosecrans and Bragg begin a fight in the bitter cold that will last 3 days before a Union victory.
31	1862	151st	At Parker's Crossroads, Nathan Forrest barely escapes capture but his raid forces Grant to give up on capturing Vicksburg.