12 History Lessons + 7 Births & 7 Deaths for December 20, 2025
Today’s History:
- 1803 – Formal transfer of the Louisiana Purchase takes place in New Orleans, doubling the size of the United States.
- 1860 – South Carolina becomes the first state to secede from the Union.
- 1917 – The Cheka, Bolshevik Russia’s secret police, is established under Felix Dzerzhinsky.
- 1946 – “It’s a Wonderful Life,” directed by Frank Capra, premieres in New York.
- 1951 – Experimental Breeder Reactor-I (EBR-I) in Idaho produces the first usable electricity from nuclear power.
- 1955 – Cardiff is declared the capital of Wales.
- 1968 – The Zodiac Killer sends his first known communication to authorities in California.
- 1987 – Philippine ferry MV Doña Paz collides with an oil tanker, causing the deadliest peacetime maritime disaster.
- 1989 – United States invades Panama in Operation Just Cause to depose Manuel Noriega.
- 1995 – NATO’s IFOR assumes peacekeeping duties in Bosnia and Herzegovina under the Dayton Accords.
- 1996 – Apple announces it will acquire NeXT, paving the way for Steve Jobs’s return and macOS’s future.
- 1999 – Macau is handed over from Portugal to China, becoming a Special Administrative Region.
- 2019 – The United States Space Force is officially established as a separate branch of the U.S. armed forces.
Today’s Birthdays:
- 1945 – Peter Criss, drummer and founding member of KISS (80)
- 1946 – Uri Geller, illusionist and television personality (79)
- 1948 – Alan Parsons, producer/engineer (Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side of the Moon”), musician (77)
- 1952 – Jenny Agutter, actor (“Walkabout,” “Call the Midwife”) (73)
- 1970 – Todd Phillips, filmmaker (“The Hangover,” “Joker”) (55)
- 1983 – Jonah Hill, actor/filmmaker (“Moneyball,” “Superbad”) (42)
- 1998 – Kylian Mbappé, French football (soccer) superstar (27)
Today’s Deaths:
- 1968 – John Steinbeck, Nobel Prize–winning novelist (“The Grapes of Wrath”) (66)
- 1982 – Arthur Rubinstein, acclaimed classical pianist (95)
- 1984 – Stanley Milgram, social psychologist known for obedience experiments (51)
- 1996 – Carl Sagan, astronomer, science educator, and author (“Cosmos”) (62)
- 2001 – Léopold Sédar Senghor, poet and first President of Senegal (95)
- 2017 – Bernard Law, former Archbishop of Boston (86)
- 2022 – Franco Harris, Pro Football Hall of Famer (Pittsburgh Steelers) (72)
Our revenue comes from a combination of direct subscriptions from users and commissions earned by affiliate commissions from sponsors’ links and banners. Some of the links you click may be affiliate links that generate that revenue.