1666 Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Sikh guru, was born on December 22, 1666. He was formally installed as the leader of the Sikhs at age nine, Sikhism took on a distinct identity in 1699, when Guru Gobind Singh founded the Sikh warrior community called Khalsa. Guru Gobind Singh's other notable contributions to Sikhism also include introducing the Five Ks, the five articles of faith that Khalsa Sikhs wear at all times.
1808 Beethoven conducted and performed in concert at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna on December 22, 1808, during which he premiered his Fifth Symphony, Sixth Symphony, Fourth Piano Concerto (performed by Beethoven himself) and Choral Fantasy (with Beethoven at the piano).
1828 President Andrew Jackson's wife Rachel died on December 22, 1828, two weeks after her husband's victory in the election and two months before Jackson took office as President. A distraught Jackson had to be pulled from her so the undertaker could prepare the body. Rachel had been under extreme stress during the election, and she had never done well when Jackson was away at war or work.
1849 Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky was arrested with 33 others on April 1, 1849 as a Social Revolutionary, after a police informer had slipped into his socialist discussion groups. Originally he was sentenced to be executed on December 22, 1849. At the stake in front of the squad he was told his sentence was a joke and he was to be sent to Siberia for four years instead. Dostoyevsky was incarcerated at a penal settlement where they were packed in "like herrings in a barrel."
1858 Italian composer Giacomo Puccini was born on December 22, 1858, in Lucca, Tuscany, one of nine children. The heads of his family for four generations had been professional musicians and Giacomo was chosen to carry on the Puccini musical tradition. Young Puccini studied at the Pacini Institute of Music in Lucca, where encouraged by a sympathetic teacher, he began to blossom as a church organist. He was considered second only to Giuseppe Verdi as an Italian opera composer in his day.
1880 Seven months after marrying John Cross, English author George Eliot fell ill with a throat infection. This, coupled with the kidney disease she had been afflicted with for the previous few years, led to her death on December 22, 1880. Eliot was interred in Highgate Cemetery, London in the area reserved for religious dissenters or agnostics. A hundred years later in 1980 a place was found for Eliot in Westminster Abbey when a memorial tablet was placed in Poets Corner.
1882 The first Christmas tree decorated with electrical lights on it was put up by Edward Johnson, President of the Edison Electric Company on December 22, 1882. At the time, many people mistrusted electricity and thought that dangerous vapors would seep into their homes through the lights and wires.
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| Guru Nanak with Bhai Bala, Bhai Mardana and Sikh Gurus |
1808 Beethoven conducted and performed in concert at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna on December 22, 1808, during which he premiered his Fifth Symphony, Sixth Symphony, Fourth Piano Concerto (performed by Beethoven himself) and Choral Fantasy (with Beethoven at the piano).
1828 President Andrew Jackson's wife Rachel died on December 22, 1828, two weeks after her husband's victory in the election and two months before Jackson took office as President. A distraught Jackson had to be pulled from her so the undertaker could prepare the body. Rachel had been under extreme stress during the election, and she had never done well when Jackson was away at war or work.
1849 Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky was arrested with 33 others on April 1, 1849 as a Social Revolutionary, after a police informer had slipped into his socialist discussion groups. Originally he was sentenced to be executed on December 22, 1849. At the stake in front of the squad he was told his sentence was a joke and he was to be sent to Siberia for four years instead. Dostoyevsky was incarcerated at a penal settlement where they were packed in "like herrings in a barrel."
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| A sketch of the Petrashevsky Circle mock execution |
1858 Italian composer Giacomo Puccini was born on December 22, 1858, in Lucca, Tuscany, one of nine children. The heads of his family for four generations had been professional musicians and Giacomo was chosen to carry on the Puccini musical tradition. Young Puccini studied at the Pacini Institute of Music in Lucca, where encouraged by a sympathetic teacher, he began to blossom as a church organist. He was considered second only to Giuseppe Verdi as an Italian opera composer in his day.
1880 Seven months after marrying John Cross, English author George Eliot fell ill with a throat infection. This, coupled with the kidney disease she had been afflicted with for the previous few years, led to her death on December 22, 1880. Eliot was interred in Highgate Cemetery, London in the area reserved for religious dissenters or agnostics. A hundred years later in 1980 a place was found for Eliot in Westminster Abbey when a memorial tablet was placed in Poets Corner.
1882 The first Christmas tree decorated with electrical lights on it was put up by Edward Johnson, President of the Edison Electric Company on December 22, 1882. At the time, many people mistrusted electricity and thought that dangerous vapors would seep into their homes through the lights and wires.
1885 On December 22, 1885, Itō Hirobumi, a former samurai of the Chōshū Domain, became the first Prime Minister of Japan under the modern cabinet system, which was established as part of Japan's Meiji-era reforms. This marked a significant moment in Japan's transition from a feudal society to a modern state modeled after Western political systems.
1891 Discovered on December 22, 1891, 323 Brucia was the first asteroid to be found by the use of astrophotography. It was also the first of over 200 asteroids discovered by Max Wolf, a pioneer in that method of finding astronomical objects.
1894 Claude Debussy's symphonic poem Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (English Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun) was first performed in Paris on December 22, 1894, conducted by Gustave Doret. The work was based on a poem about a faun playing panpipes and falling into a languorous sleep after an exhausting session chasing nymphs around the woods.
1933 Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers first danced together on the big screen in the 1933 film Flying Down to Rio. Their partnership continued in nine films at RKO Pictures, including Roberta (1935), where Astaire showcased his musical talents with a solo piano performance of "I Won't Dance."
1937 The Lincoln Tunnel, an approximately 1.5-mile-long (2.4 km) tunnel under the Hudson River, connecting Weehawken, New Jersey on the west bank with Midtown Manhattan on the east bank opened on December 22, 1937. It charged $0.50 per car. A second tube opened in 1945 and a third in 1957.
1943 English children's book writer and illustrator Beatrix Potter died of complications from pneumonia and heart disease on December 22, 1943 at Castle Cottage, and her remains were cremated at Carleton Crematorium. Beatrix Potter is best known for her charming and timeless tales, such as The Tale of Peter Rabbit and The Tale of Benjamin Bunny, which have become classics in children's literature.
1956 A baby gorilla named Colo entered the world at the Columbus Zoo in Ohio on December 22, 1956 becoming the first-ever gorilla born in captivity. Her name is a combination of Columbus and Ohio. Weighing in at approximately 4 pounds, Colo, a western lowland gorilla, was the daughter of Millie and Mac, two gorillas captured in French Cameroon, who were brought to the Columbus Zoo in 1951.
1961 25-year-old James Davis of Livingston, Tennessee, was killed by the Viet Cong, on a road near the old French Garrison of Cau Xang on December 22, 1961, becoming the first of some 55,000 U.S. soldiers killed during the Vietnam War.
1965 Barbara Castle's first act on becoming UK Transport Minister in 1965 was to introduce on December 22, 1965 a 70 mph speed limit to all rural roads including motorways. Previously, there had been no speed limit. The 70 mph speed limit on UK motorways was a supposedly temporary measure, but has remained to this day.
1968 The People's Daily published a piece by China's leader Mao Zedong on December 22, 1968 directing that "the intellectual youth must go to the country, and will be educated from living in rural poverty." The following year many youth were rusticated and high school students were organized and assigned to the countryside on a national level.
1987 Irish airline Aer Lingus flew an exhausted bald eagle back to the US on December 22, 1987 after storms blew it across the Atlantic Ocean. The bird received an official send-off from Irish Prime Minister Charles Haughey at the airport in Shannon, Ireland. “I wish Godspeed to our feathered friend. May he live long and happily in the wild, back in his natural habitat,” Haughey said,
1989 On December 22, 1989, Communist President of Romania, Nicolae Ceaușescu, was overthrown by Ion Iliescu after days of bloody confrontations. The deposed dictator and his wife fled Bucharest with a helicopter as protesters erupted in cheers. He was condemned to death and executed three days later after a summary trial.
1989 The only remaining town gate of Berlin, the Brandenburg Gate was located a few meters from the Berlin Wall, which for 28 years cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany. The Brandenburg Gate reopened on December 22, 1989 after engineers worked through the night to create two crossing points in the gate.
1989 Confined to a nursing home and suffering from emphysema and possibly Parkinson's disease, Irish author, poet, and playwright Samuel Beckett died on December 22, 1989. He was interred together with his wife Suzanne Déchevaux-Dumesnil in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris. They share a simple granite gravestone that follows Beckett's directive that it should be "any color, so long as it's grey."
2000 Madonna married film director Guy Ritchie on December 22, 2000 in a Scottish castle, with Gwyneth Paltrow as maid of honor — before enjoying smoked salmon and haggis at a champagne reception. They divorced eight years later.
2001 On December 22, 2001, terrorist Richard Reid, a British passenger on an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami, tried to blow up the plane with a bomb in his shoes. Fortunately the fuse, disguised as a lace, was too wet to light.
2007 When "Our Song" reached #1 on the country chart week ending December 22, 2007, Taylor Swift who had just turned 18, became the youngest performer ever to write and sing a chart-topping country single.
2010 The repeal of the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, the policy banning homosexuals serving openly in the United States military, was signed into law by President Barack Obama on December 22, 2010. However, the actual repeal took effect on September 20, 2011.
2014 The current official world record for fastest five metres on front paws by a dog belongs to Konjo, a mixed-breed dog, with a time of 2.39 seconds. She achieved this amazing feat on December 22, 2014, at Tustin Sports Park in Tustin, California, USA. This record dethroned the previous titleholder, Jiff the Pomeranian, whose record from 2014 stood at 7.76 seconds.
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