EVENTS:
- 1865 – The New York Stock Exchange opens its first permanent headquarters near Wall Street in New York City.
- 1896 – Utah is admitted as the 45th U.S. state.
- 1948 – Burma gains its independence from the United Kingdom.
- 1958 – Sputnik 1 falls to Earth from orbit.
- 1959 – Luna 1 becomes the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Moon.
- 1970 – The 7.1 Mw Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). Between 10,000–15,621 were killed and 26,783 were injured.
- 1987 – The Maryland train collision: An Amtrak train en route to Boston from Washington, D.C., collides with Conrail engines in Chase, Maryland, killing 16 people.
- 1990 – In Pakistan’s deadliest train accident an overloaded passenger train collides with an empty freight train, resulting in 307 deaths and 700 injuries.
- 1998 – A massive ice storm hits eastern Canada and the northeastern United States, continuing through January 10 and causing widespread destruction.
- 2004 – Spirit, a NASA Mars rover, lands successfully on Mars at 04:35 UTC.
- 2010 – Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building, is officially opened.
- 2013 – A gunman kills eight people in a house-to-house rampage in Kawit, the Philippines.
- 2018 – A passenger train operated by Shosholoza Meyl collided with a truck on a level crossing at Geneva Station between Hennenman and Kroonstad, Free State, South Africa. Twenty people were killed and 260 were injured.
BIRTHS:
- 1889 – M. Patanjali Sastri, Indian lawyer and jurist, 2nd Chief Justice of India (d. 1963)
- 1924 – Sebastian Kappen, Indian priest and theologian (d. 1993)
- 1930 – Don Shula, American football player and coach
- 1940 – Gao Xingjian, Chinese-French author, playwright, and critic, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1940 – Brian Josephson, Welsh physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1941 – Kalpnath Rai, Indian politician (d. 1999)
- 1945 – Richard R. Schrock, American chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1949 – Mick Mills, English footballer and manager
- 1956 – Sarojini Sahoo, Indian journalist, author, and poet
- 1957 – Gurdas Maan, Indian singer-songwriter
- 1978 – Paul Licuria, Australian footballer
- 1982 – Richard Logan, English footballer
- 1990 – Toni Kroos, German footballer
- 1999 – Jaeman Salmon, Australian rugby league player
HOLIDAYS and OBSERVANCES:
