On This Day - 1st January

1735 - Paul Revere born
1752 - Maker of the first U.S. flag Betsy Ross born
1863 - President Abraham Lincoln signs the emancipation act, thus freeing all slaves in the US
1877 - Queen Victoria proclaimed Queen Empress of India
1892 - Ellis Island Immigration centre opens
1895 - J. Edgar Hoover born
1900 - Xavier Cugat born
1901 - The Commonwealth of Australia comes into being
1905 - The Trans-Siberian railways opens
1909 - The first old age pension was issued in Britain and failed republican U.S. Presidential ccandidate Barry Goldwater born
1919 - Catcher in the Rye author J.D. Salinger born
1924 - Robert N. Cronk born
1927 - The BBC comes into being
1943 - Don Novello born
1944 - DNA discovered by Oswald Avery
1959 - The President of Cuba, Fulgencio Batista, flees the country in the face of a relentless advance by the rebel army of Fidel Castro
1969 - Verne "Mini-Me" Troyer born
1973 - Great Britain joins the EEC
1978 - Newspaper editor Donald Woods arrives in London after fleeing South Africa's apartheid regime
1995 - Fred West, the Gloucestershire builder charged with 12 murders, is found dead in his prison cell.
2000 - The first baby born in the new millennium, Kala Sosefina Millennium Kauvaka is born in New Zealand
2002 - Twelve of the European Union's 15 countries wake up to life with a new currency as the euro reaches the streets.

So That Was 2010

The first winter solstice lunar eclipse for 400 years made the moon glow a vivid red on 21st December.

Events to look back on
Haiti was shattered by an earthquake on 12th January which killed at least 230,000 and left millions homeless.
America hand power back to the Iraqi government.
North Korea continue to provoke South Korea.
After a blast on a BP leased oil rig on 20th April, 11 workers were left dead and over 170,000,000 gallons of crude oil were pumped into the Gulf of Mexico.
Trapped nearly a half-mile underground after a mine collapsed on 5th August, 33 Chilean miners were eventually freed one-by-one after 69 days.
The general election in the UK leads to the first coalition government in post war Britain with David Cameron named as the new PM.
The previously unheard of Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland left a million holiday-makers stranded and thousands of flights grounded when it erupted in April.
The British government controversially announced in late November that it would pledge £7 billion to Ireland as part of a bailout deal for the debt-struck nation.
Pope Benedict XVI meets the Queen and Prime Minister David Cameron during the first papal visit to Britain in 28 years.
The royal weddings of Price William and Kate Middleton as well as that of Zara Philips and Mike Tindall are announced for 2011.

Sporting Highlights
Golf - Europe beat the USA in the Ryder Cup
Cricket - England retain the Ashes with a match to spare in Australia and win the Twenty20 World Cup
Tennis - Isner and Mahut’s epic Wimbledon match breaks all tennis records
F1 - Sebastian Vettel becomes youngest F1 champ
Skeleton Bob - Amy Williams takes skeleton gold to bring back Britain's first individual Winter Olympic gold medal for 30 years
Racing - A.P. McCoy rides into the history books by finally winning the Grand National and the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award.
Football - Spain beat the Netherlands in South Africa to win the World Cup.

Deaths
Alexander McQueen (CBE), Alex Higgins, Gary Coleman, Lynn Redgrave (OBE), Dennis Hopper, Tony Curtis, Claire Rayner (OBE), Norman Wisdom (OBE), Bernard Matthews (CVO, CBE), Leslie Nielsen

On This Day - 31st December

1869 - Henri Matisse born
1880 - George C. Marshall born
1908 - Simon Wiesenthal born
1930 - Odetta born
1937 - Anthony Hopkins born
1941 - Sarah Miles born
1943 - Ben Kingsley and John Denver born
1945 - Barbara Carrera born
1948 - Donna Summer born
1951 - The British Prime Minister sets off on his trip to America aboard the Queen Mary after more than 24 hours delay.
1959 - Val Kilmer born
1964 - Donald Campbell breaks the world water speed record, the only man to break both land and water speed records in the same year.
1972 - Joe McIntyre born
1987 - People who displayed heroism during the Zeebrugge ferry disaster are recognised in the New Year's Honours List.
1999 - Boris Yeltsin has resigned as Russian president and says Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will take over immediately. Also Britain gears up to join a global party with a spectacular array of revelries to welcome in the third millennium.

On This Day - 30th December

1865 - Rudyard Kipling born
1914 - Bert Parks born
1920 - Jack Lord born
1928 - Bo Diddley born
1934 - Russ Tamblyn born
1935 - Sandy Koufax born
1937 - Noel Paul Stookey born
1939 - Del Shannon born
1942 - Michael Nesmith born
1945 - Davy Jones born
1946 - Patti Smith born
1957 - Matt Lauer born
1958 - Thousands die in the bloodiest fighting in Cuba's history as rebels led by Fidel Castro threaten to overthrow the military regime of President Batista.
1959 - Tracey Ullman born
1971 - Some of the approximately 60,000 Iranian men, women and children expelled from Iraq in the past few days try to make their way home.
1975 - Tiger Woods born
1977 - Laila Ali born
1986 - More than 200 canary birds are to be phased out of Britain's mining pits and replaced by hand-held gas detectors.
1994 - Two women are shot dead and at least five others injured after a gunman opens fire at two neighbouring abortion clinics in Boston.
2002 - Singer Diana Ross is stopped by the police for drinking and driving after her car is seen swerving across a road.

On This Day - 29th December

1800 - Charles Goodyear born
1808 - Andrew Johnson born
1845 - Texas becomes the 28th state of the US
1936 - Mary Tyler Moore born
1938 - Jon Voight born
1946 - Marianne Faithfull born
1947 - Ted Danson born
1954 - Ed Autry born
1966 - Bryan "Dexter" Holland born
1972 - Jude Law born
1975 - Radical new legislation introducing a woman's right to equal pay and status comes into force in the UK.
1984 - Rajiv Gandhi claims a massive victory for his assassinated mother's Congress Party in the Indian general election.
1986 - Lord Stockton, the former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, dies aged 92.
1998 - Six people have died after mountainous seas smashed into yachts taking part in the prestigious Sydney to Hobart race.
2000 - A blanket of snow descends on the country as Arctic conditions disrupt travel.

On This Day - 28th December

1846 - Iowa becomes the 29th state of the US
1856 - Woodrow Wilson born
1905 - Earl "Fatha" Hines born
1905 - Cliff Arquette born
1908 - Lew Ayres born
1911 - Sam Levenson born
1918 - British Women vote for the first time in a General Election
1921 - Johnny Otis born
1933 - Nichelle Nichols born
1934 - Maggie Smith born
1940 - Don Francisco born
1946 - Edgar Winter born
1954 - Denzel Washington born
1957 - One of Britain's largest abattoirs closes down after foot-and-mouth disease is found in cattle waiting to be slaughtered.
1979 - Passengers retrace a fatal journey on the 100th anniversary of a train plunging from the Tay Bridge into icy waters.
1993 - British customs officials seize £70m of Colombian cocaine thought to be linked to the Mafia.
1980 - A shake-up of broadcasting franchises paves the way for breakfast television.
2003 - The British Government announces plans to tighten airline security by allowing armed guards on some British flights to the USA.

On This Day - 27th December

1822 - Louis Pasteur born
1879 - Sydney Greenstreet born
1901 - Marlene Dietrich born
1906 - Oscar Levant born
1939 - John Amos born
1943 - Cokie Roberts born
1948 - Gérard Depardieu born
1960 - The French move a step closer to developing a compact nuclear bomb after a third test in the Sahara desert.
1965 - Four men are dead and nine are still missing after Britain's first North Sea drilling rig 'Sea Gem' capsizes.
1975 - Heather O'Rourke born
1977 - Thousands of people flock to UK cinemas to watch the long-awaited blockbuster, Star Wars.
1985 - At least 16 people are killed and more than 100 injured during twin terrorist attacks in Rome and Vienna.
1997 - A leading protestant paramilitary, Billy Wright, is shot dead at the maximum security Maze prison in Northern Ireland.
2004 - Ukraine's "orange revolutionaries" celebrate as opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko is declared winner of the presidential election.

On This Day - 26th December

1791 - Charles Babbage born
1891 - Henry Miller born
1893 - Mao Tse-tung born
1914 - Richard Widmark born
1921 - Steve Allen born
1927 - Alan King born
1940 - Phil Spector born
1945 - John Walsh born
1947 - Carlton Fisk born
1954 - Ozzie Smith born
1963 - Lars Ulrich born
1970 - British Olympic medallist Lillian Board MBE has died after losing her battle against a virulent form of cancer.
1979 - A group of Patriotic Front guerrillas receive a joyous welcome as they arrive back in Rhodesia to help monitor the ceasefire.
1988 - Crash investigators uncover wreckage which may hold the key to the Lockerbie air disaster.
1990 - Iran's spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has said the death sentence on writer Salman Rushdie for alleged blasphemy will remain in force.
2004 - An 8.9 magnitude earthquake under the sea near Aceh, north Indonesia, at 0759 local time (0059 GMT) generated the biggest tsunami the world has seen for at least 40 years. The tsunami killed more than 200,000 people in 13 countries. At least 128,000 people died in Indonesia alone.