On This Day - 11th December

1816 - Indiana becomes the 19th State of the US
1882 - Fiorello La Guardia born
1901 - Marconi transmits the first transatlantic wireless message
1913 - Carlo Ponti born
1931 - Rit Moreno born
1936 - Edward VIII abdictates
1941 - Germany and Italy announce they are at war with the United States. America immediately responds by declaring war on the two Axis powers.
1942 - Donna Mills born
1943 - John Kerry born
1944 - Brenda Lee born
1949 - Teri Garr born
1954 - Jermaine Jackson born
1975 - An Icelandic gunboat opens fire on unarmed British fishery support vessels in the North Atlantic Sea.
1979 - The Zimbabwe-Rhodesian Parliament votes itself out of office and hands power back to the British until democratic elections can take place.Also Rider Strong born
1986 - A Church of England Bishop joins Roman Catholic authorities in criticising the "Play Safe" slogan on sexual relationships as showing a disregard for morals.
1994 - Russian President Boris Yeltsin orders tanks and troops into the rebel region of Chechnya.
2001 - Up to 30,000 Post Office workers are told they could lose their jobs over the next 18 months.
2005 - A series of massive explosions lead to an enormous fire at Buncefield, one of Britain's largest oil depots sending thick black smoke drifting up to 40 miles away.

On This Day - 10th December

1817 - Mississippi becomes the 20th State of the US
1830 - South American revolutionary hero Simon Bolivar dies.
1830 - Emily Dickinson born
1901 - The first Nobel prizes were awarded
1902 - The Sawan Dam is completed
1911 - Chet Huntley born
1914 - Dorothy Lamour born
1952 - Susan Dey born
1960 - Kenneth Branagh born
1961 - Albert Luthuli, leader of the banned African National Congress, appeals for racial equality in South Africa after accepting the Nobel peace prize for 1960 in Oslo, Norway.
1979 - Stuntman Eddie Kidd accomplishes a "death-defying" motorcycle leap, crossing an 80ft gap over a 50ft sheer drop above a viaduct, on a 400cc motorcycle.
1981 - It is announced that a mysterious epidemic, discovered in homosexual men, is causing increasing concern in the United States.
1988 - 25,000 people die and a further 500,000 are left homeless after the devastating earthquake ripped through Armenia.
1990 - The first of the hostages held in the Gulf for four-and-a-half months arrive in Britain after their release by Saddam Hussein.
2003 - The Court of Appeal overturns the conviction of Angela Cannings, jailed for life for the murder of her two baby sons.

On This Day - 9th December

1608 - 17th century english poet John Milton born
1868 - William Gladstone becomes British Prime Minister
1898 - Emmett Kelly born
1902 - Margaret Hamilton born
1909 - Douglas Fairbanks born
1916 - Kirk Douglas born
1922 - Redd Foxx born
1925 - Dina Merrill born
1928 - Dick Van Patten born
1930 - Buck Henry born
1934 - Judy Dench born
1941 - Beau Bridges born
1942 - Dick Butkus born
1952 - Sunshine returns to London following four days of dense fog in which transport was brought to a standstill.
1953 - John Malkovich born
1957 - Donny Osmond born
1968 - Kurt Angle born
1969 - Jakob Dylan born
1970 - David Kersh born
1972 - Tre Cool born
1973 - Tripartite talks on Northern Ireland end in the signing of the 'Sunnigdale Agreement' to set up a Council of Ireland.
1974 - Emjay born
1987 - The England cricket tour to Pakistan is under threat of being called off following a row between Mike Gatting and the umpire Shakoor Rana.
1992 - US troops arrive in Somalia in a bid to aid thousands of starving locals.
1993 - Astronauts put Hubble back in action
1996 - Horrett Campbell, 33, who attacked three children and four women with a machete at an infant school teddy bears' picnic is found guilty of seven counts of attempted murder.

On This Day - 8th December

1542 - Mary Queen of Scots born
1865 - Jean Sibelius born
1886 - Diego Rivera born
1894 - James Thurber born
1911 - Lee J. Cobb born
1916 - Richard Fleischer born
1925 - Sammy Davis born
1930 - Maximilian Schell born
1933 - Flip Wilson born
1936 - David Carradine born
1939 - James Galway born
1943 - Jim Morrison born
1947 - Gregg Allman born
1953 - Kim Basinger born
1964 - Teri Hatcher born
1965 - The Race Relations Act comes into force in the UK, making racial discrimination unlawful in public places.
1966 - Sinead O'Connor born
1980 - John Lennon is shot dead by Mark Chapman outside the musician's apartment in the Dakota Building, on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
1983 - The House of Lords votes in favour of allowing cameras to broadcast live discussions from its chamber.
1987 - Leaders of the world's two superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States of America sign the first ever treaty to reduce the size of their ground-based nuclear arsenals.
1995 - Head teacher Philip Lawrence is stabbed to death outside his west London school whilst protecting a pupil who was being assaulted.
2003 - A court in Athens convicts 15 key members of Greece's most infamous left-wing terrorist group known as November 17.

On This Day - 7th December

1910 - Louis Prima born
1915 - Eli Wallach born
1916 - Lloyd George becomes British Prime Minister
1923 - Ted Knight born
1932 - Ellen Burstyn born
1941 - Japan has launches a surprise attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, declaring war on Britain and the United States. Within two hours, six battleships had been sunk, another 112 vessels sunk or damaged, and 164 aircraft destroyed.
1942 - Harry Chapin born
1947 - Johnny Bench born
1949 - Tom Waits born
1955 - Clement Attlee resigns as leader of the opposition Labour Party, following months of speculation.
1956 - Larry Bird born
1958 - Edd Hall born
1966 - C. Thomas Howell born
1967 - Tino Martinez born
1979 - Cabinet minister Lord Soames is named transitional governor of Rhodesia to oversee its progress into legal independence.
1983 - Chief chimney-toppler Fred Dibnah is halted in his work after a ginger tomcat got to his latest assignment first.
1993 - Dozens of people are injured at the end of a 20-year battle to save a 250-year-old chestnut tree in east London.
2001 - Taleban surrender Kandahar

On This Day - 6th December

1833 - John Singleton Mosby born
1870 - William S. Hart born
1886 - Joyce Kilmer born
1887 - Lynn Fontanne born
1896 - Ira Gershwin born
1906 - Agnes Moorehead born
1920 - Dave Brubeck born
1924 - Wally Cox born
1926 - Artist Claude Monet dies
1936 - David Ossman born
1953 - Tom Hulce born
1955 - Steven Wright born
1956 - Peter Buck born
1957 - Andrew Cuomo born
1962 - Choking fog spreads across Britain
1969 - Andrew J. Howard born
1975 - Three armed IRA men on the run from police burst into a flat in central London and take two people hostage.
1978 - Spaniards turn out in force to cast a vote for democracy and end almost 40 years of dictatorial rule.
1983 - Swedish journalist, Lars Ljungberg, underwent the first heart and lung transplant operation to be performed in Britain.
1992 - A mob of Hindu militants tear down a mosque and attack other Muslim targets in the north Indian town of Ayodhya, in one of India's worst outbreaks of inter-communal violence.
1994 - The Queen gives the go ahead for oil drilling to take place in the grounds of Windsor Castle.
2005 - David Cameron is elected the new Conservative leader by a margin of more than two to one over David Davis.

On This Day - 5th December

1782 - 8th President of the USA and one time American Ambassidor to the UK, Martin Van Buren born
1839 - George Armstrong Custer born
1901 - Walt Disney born
1902 - Strom Thurmond born
1905 - Sir Henry Campbell-Banner becomes the British Prime Minister
1906 - Otto Preminger born
1922 - The Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) is proclaimed
1932 - Little Richard born
1933 - Prohibition in the US ends
1947 - Jim Messina born
1950 - Chinese troops have enter the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, as United Nations forces are pushed steadily back towards South Korea.
1951 - Morgan Brittany born
1965 - John Rzeznik born
1967 - Gary Allan born
1977 - President Anwar al-Sadat of Egypt breaks all relations with Syria, Libya, Algeria and South Yemen.
1989 - Margaret Thatcher survives the first challenge to the leadership of the Conservative Party by beating backbencher Sir Anthony Meyer in a ballot at Westminster.
1991 - Administrators are called in to try and salvage the Maxwell business empire, which is at least £1bn in debt.
1995 - Sri Lankan troops drive the Tamil Tiger guerrillas out of their heartland capital of Jaffna after a 49-day operation.