December 8

December 8 is the 342nd day (343rd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 23 days remaining.

Events

• 1854 – Pope Pius IX proclaims the dogma of Immaculate Conception, which holds that the Virgin Mary was born free of original sin.
• 1886 – American Federation of Labor founded.
• 1888 – Bulgaria's National Assembly adopts an Act on establishing a higher school in Sofia.
• 1907 – King Gustav V of Sweden accedes to the Swedish throne
• 1914 – Battle of the Falkland Islands fought.
• 1941 – World War II: After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor the previous day, the U.S. Congress passes a declaration of war against Japan, bringing the United States of America officially into World War II; Congresswoman Jeannette Rankin casts the only "no" vote. In response, Hitler's Germany declares war on the United States.
• 1941 – Holocaust: First Nazi use of gas vans on Jews, at the Chelmno camp near Lodz.
• 1949 – Chinese Civil War: The capital of the Republic of China is moved from Nanjing to Taipei, Taiwan
• 1961 – A fire at a hospital in Hartford, Connecticut kills 16 people.
• 1968 – NLS (a system for which hypertext and the computer mouse were developed) is publicly demonstrated for the first time in San Francisco
• 1969 – An Olympic Airways DC-6B crashes near Athens during a storm killing 93 people.
• 1976 – The Eagles release one of the biggest-selling albums of all time, Hotel California
• 1980 – Mark David Chapman murders former Beatle John Lennon.
• 1987 – The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed.
• 1991 – Leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine meet and sign an agreement ending the U.S.S.R. and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the Belovezhskaya Pushcha Nature Reserve in Belarus
• 1991 – First post-Communist Romanian Constitution is adopted in a referendum.
• 1993 – The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is signed into law by US President Bill Clinton.
• 1994 – US President Bill Clinton signs a bill enacting United States participation in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT was formally signed on April 15 1994, in Marrakesh, Morocco by 124 nations).
• 1998 – 81 people killed by armed groups in the Tadjena massacre in Algeria.
• 2003 – The Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada officially merge to create the new Conservative Party of Canada.
• 2004 – The Cuzco Declaration is signed in Cuzco, Peru, establishing the South American Community of Nations, a regional parliament, a common market and a common currency for South American nations.
• 2004 – Former Pantera guitarist Darrell Abbott is shot dead on stage with his new band Damageplan at a nightclub in Columbus, Ohio.

Births

• 65 BC – Horace, poet (d. 8 BC)
• 1542 – Mary Queen of Scots (d. 1587)
• 1626 – Queen Christina of Sweden (d. 1689)
• 1708 – Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1765)
• 1730 – Jan Ingenhousz, physiologist, botanist (d. 1799)
• 1765 – Eli Whitney, inventor (d. 1825)
• 1790 – Richard Carlille, reformer (d. 1843)
• 1813 – Adolf Kolping, theologian (d. 1865)
• 1815 – Adolph Menzel, painter and graphic artist (d. 1905)
• 1816 – August Belmont, Sr., Prussian-born financier (d. 1890)
• 1832 – Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Norwegian author (d. 1910)
• 1848 – Joel Chandler Harris, author and folklorist (d. 1908)
• 1861 – Aristide Maillol, sculptor (d. 1944)
• 1861  – William C. Durant, automobile pioneer (d. 1947)
• 1862 – Georges Feydeau, French playwright (d. 1921)
• 1864 – Camille Claudel, graphic artist (d. 1943)
• 1865 – Jean Sibelius, composer (d. 1957)
• 1886 – Diego Rivera, painter (d. 1957)
• 1890 – Bohuslav Martinu, composer (d. 1959)
• 1894 – James Thurber, writer (d. 1961)
• 1911 – Lee J. Cobb, actor (d. 1976)
• 1918 – Gérard Souzay, French baritone (d. 2004)
• 1919 – Peter Tali Coleman, American politician (d. 1997)
• 1923 – Rudolph Pariser, chemist
• 1925 – Sammy Davis Jr., actor, singer (d. 1990)
• 1927 – Vladimir Shatalov, cosmonaut
• 1930 – Maximilian Schell, actor, film director, author
• 1933 – Flip Wilson, comedian (d. 1998)
• 1936 – David Carradine, actor
• 1937 – James MacArthur, actor
• 1937  – Arne Næss Jr., Norwegian mountaineer, businessman (d. 2004)
• 1939 – James Galway, Irish flutist
• 1943 – Jim Morrison, singer (The Doors) (d. 1971)
• 1946 – John Rubinstein, actor, composer
• 1947 – Gregg Allman, musician
• 1950 – Rick Baker, film makeup artist
• 1953 – Kim Basinger, actress
• 1956 – Warren Cuccurullo, musician
• 1957 – Phil Collen, guitarist (Def Leppard)
• 1961 – Ann Coulter, author, political commentator, attorney
• 1964 – Teri Hatcher, actress
• 1966 – Sinéad O'Connor, musician
• 1968 – Mike Mussina, baseball player
• 1976 – Dominic Monaghan, actor
• 1976 – Corey Taylor, musician (Slipknot)
• 1978 – Vernon Wells, baseball player
• 1986 – Amir Khan, boxer

Deaths

• 899 – Arnulf of Carinthia (b. 850)
• 1638 – Ivan Gundulic, Croatian poet
• 1722 – Liselotte von der Pfalz, Duchess of Orléans and sister-in-law of Louis XIV
• 1830 – Benjamin Constant, Swiss writer (b. 1767)
• 1859 – Thomas de Quincey, English author (b. 1785)
• 1864 – George Boole, mathematician
• 1907 – King Oscar II of Sweden (b. 1829)
• 1917 – Mendele Moykher Sforim, writer (b. 1836)
• 1952 – Charles Lightoller, second officer on the Titanic (b. 1874)
• 1958 – Tris Speaker, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1888)
• 1978 – Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel
• 1980 – John Lennon, British musician, singer/songwriter, guitarist with The Beatles (b. October 9, 1940)
• 1982 – Marty Robbins, country music singer
• 1983 – Slim Pickens, actor
• 1984 – Luther Adler, American stage actor
• 1992 – William Shawn, American magazine editor (b. 1917)
• 1996 – Howard Rollins Jr., actor
• 1999 – Kuczka Péter, Hungarian writer, poet, and science fiction editor (b. 1923)
• 2001 – Kurt Ruh, German scholar
• 2001 – Don Tennant, American advertising executive (b. 1922)
• 2003 – Rubén González, Cuban pianist (Buena Vista Social Club)
• 2003 – Hans Hotter, German bass-baritone (b. 1909)
• 2004 – Darrell Abbott, guitarist (Damageplan and Pantera) (b. 1966)

Holidays and observances

• Afflux (50 Aftermath) (Discordianism)
• Buddhism – The Enlightenment of Sakyamuni Buddha
• Catholicism -Holy Day of Obligation The Feast of the Immaculate Conception
• Bulgaria – Day of the Student (studentski praznik)
• Romania – Constitution Day

External links

• BBC: On This Day

December 7 – December 9 – November 8 – January 8 — listing of all days