On January 6, 1912, the German Meteorologist Alfred Wegener presented to the public, in a lecture entitled, "Die Heraushebung der Großformen der Erdrinde (Kontinente und Ozeane) auf geophysikalischer Grundlage", his hypothesis on continental drift in relation to the former super continent Pangaea. Wegener didn't propose something completely new; as he based his idea on earlier… Continue reading January 6th, 1912
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October 1st, 1976
The CN Tower (French: Tour CN) is a 553.3 m-high (1,815.3 ft) concrete communications and observation tower located in Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Built on the former Railway Lands, it was completed in 1976. Its name "CN" originally referred to Canadian National, the railway company that built the tower. The construction of the tower had… Continue reading October 1st, 1976
January 5th, 1933
On January 5, 1933, construction begins on the Golden Gate Bridge, as workers began excavating 3.25 million cubic feet of dirt for the structure’s huge anchorages. Following the Gold Rush boom that began in 1849, speculators realized the land north of San Francisco Bay would increase in value in direct proportion to its accessibility to… Continue reading January 5th, 1933
January 4th, 1965
On January 4, 1965, in his State of the Union address, President Lyndon Baines Johnson lays out for Congress a laundry list of legislation needed to achieve his plan for a Great Society. On the heels of John F. Kennedy’s tragic death, Americans had elected Johnson, his vice president, to the presidency by the largest… Continue reading January 4th, 1965
January 3rd, 1521
On January 3, 1521, Pope Leo X issues the papal bull Decet Romanum Pontificem, which excommunicates Martin Luther from the Catholic Church. Martin Luther, the chief catalyst of Protestantism, was a professor of biblical interpretation at the University of Wittenberg in Germany when he drew up his 95 theses condemning the Catholic Church for its corrupt practice… Continue reading January 3rd, 1521
January 2nd, 1492
The Muslim forces of the Umayyad dynasty invaded and conquered much of the Iberian peninsula in the 8th century, beginning a 780-year process by Christian forces of recapturing the territory. This period of Spanish history is known as the Reconquista. By the early 1490s, the tributary state of Granada on the southern Spanish coast was… Continue reading January 2nd, 1492
January 1st, 45 BC
In 45 B.C., New Year’s Day is celebrated on January 1 for the first time in history as the Julian calendar takes effect. Soon after becoming Roman dictator, Julius Caesar decided that the traditional Roman calendar was in dire need In designing his new calendar, Caesar enlisted the aid of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, who… Continue reading January 1st, 45 BC
On This Day: Trapped in History 