| On this date in: |
| 1653 |
Oliver Cromwell became lord protector of England, Scotland and Ireland. |
| 1773 |
The Boston Tea Party took place as American colonists boarded a British ship and dumped more than 300 chests of tea overboard to protest tea taxes. |
| 1809 |
Napoleon Bonaparte was divorced from the Empress Josephine by an act of the French Senate. |
| 1811 |
The first of the powerful New Madrid earthquakes, with an estimated magnitude of 7.7, struck the central Mississippi Valley. |
| 1916 |
Gregory Rasputin, the monk who had wielded powerful influence over the Russian court, was murdered by a group of noblemen. |
| 1917 |
Science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke was born in Minehead, England. |
| 1944 |
The Battle of the Bulge during World War II began as German forces launched a surprise counterattack against Allied forces in Belgium. |
| 1985 |
Reputed organized-crime chief Paul Castellano was shot to death outside a New York City restaurant. |
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| AP Photo/Mario Suriani |
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| 1990 |
Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected president of Haiti in the country’s first democratic elections. |
| 1991 |
The U.N. General Assembly rescinded its 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism. |
| 1998 |
President Bill Clinton ordered a sustained series of airstrikes against Iraq by American and British forces in response to Saddam Hussein’s continued defiance of U.N. weapons inspectors. |
| 2000 |
President-elect George W. Bush selected Colin Powell to become the first African-American secretary of state. |
| 2007 |
British forces formally handed over to Iraq responsibility for Basra, the last Iraqi region under their control. |
| 2009 |
Iran test-fired a missile capable of hitting Israel and parts of Europe. |
| 2010 |
Larry King concluded his CNN talk show after 25 years. |
