December 1 - Definition and Overview

December 1 is the 335th (in leap years the 336th) day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 30 days remaining.

Events

• 1640 - Portugal regains its independence from Spain and João IV of Portugal becomes king.
• 1822 - Peter I is crowned as Emperor of Brazil.
• 1824 - U.S. presidential election, 1824: Since no candidate received a majority of the total electoral college votes in the election, the United States House of Representatives is given the task to decide the winner (as stipulated by the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution).
• 1835 - Hans Christian Andersen publishes first book of fairy tales
• 1884 - American Old West - Near Frisco, New Mexico (now Reserve, New Mexico), deputy sheriff Elfego Baca holds off a gang of 80 Texan cowboys who want to kill him for arresting cowboy Charles McCarthy (the cowboys were terrorizing the area's Hispanos and Baca was working against them).
• 1885 - Although the exact date is unknown, the US Patent Office acknowledges December 1st, 1885 as the first day Dr Pepper was served.
• 1913 - Ford Motor Company introduces the first moving assembly line, reducing chassis assembly time from 12½ hours in October to 2 hours, 40 minutes (although Ford was not the first to use an assembly line, his successful adoption of one did spark an era of mass production).
• 1918 - Iceland becomes a self-governing kingdom, yet remains united with Denmark.
• 1918 - Transylvania unites with Romania, following the March 27 incorporation of Bessarabia and Bucovina.
• 1918 - The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later known as the Kingdom of Yugoslavia) is proclaimed.
• 1919 - Lady Astor becomes first female member of the British Parliament to take her seat (she had been elected to that position on November 28).
• 1925 - World War I aftermath: Locarno Treaties - The final Locarno Pact is signed in London, establshing post-war territorial settlements in return for normalizing relations with defeated Germany.
• 1934 - In the Soviet Union, Politburo member Sergei Kirov is shot dead at the Communist Party headquarters in Leningrad by Leonid Nikolayev (it is widely thought that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ordered this murder).
• 1941 - World War II: Former mayor of New York City, Fiorello LaGuardia, and the director of the Office of Civilian Defense, sign an order creating the Civil Air Patrol (CAP) as the civilian auxiliary of the United States Air Force (in April 1943 the CAP was placed under the jurisdiction of the Army Air Force).
• 1944 - Edward Stettinius Jr. becomes becomes the last United States Secretary of State of the Roosevelt administration, by filling the seat left by the Cordell Hull.
• 1952 - The New York Daily News carries a front page story announcing that Christine Jorgensen, a transsexual woman in Denmark became the recipient of the first successful sexual reassignment operation.
• 1955 - American Civil Rights Movement: In Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city's racial segregation laws (Baptist minister Martin Luther King, Jr. later led the successful Montgomery Bus Boycott as a result).
• 1958 - Central African Republic becomes independent from France.
• 1959 - Cold War: Antarctic Treaty signed - 12 countries, including the United States and the Soviet Union, sign a landmark treaty, which sets aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve and bans military activity on that continent (this was the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War).
• 1963 - Nagaland becomes the 16th state of India
• 1964 - Vietnam War: US President Lyndon B. Johnson and his top-ranking advisers meet to discuss plans to bomb North Vietnam (after some debate, they agreed to enact a two-phase bombing plan).
• 1965 - The Border Security Force is formed in India as a special force to guard the borders
• 1969 - Vietnam War: The first draft lottery in the United States is held since World War II (on January 4, 1970, the New York Times ran a long article, "Statisticians Charge Draft Lottery Was Not Random").
• 1971 - Cambodian Civil War: Khmer Rouge rebels intensify assaults on Cambodian government positions, forcing their retreat from Kompong Thmar and nearby Ba Ray, 10 kilometers northeast of Phnom Penh.
• 1973 - Papua New Guinea gains self government from Australia.
• 1974 - A Boeing 727 carrying TWA Flight 514 crashes 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Dulles International Airport during bad weather, killing all 92 people on-board.
• 1975 - The long-running soap opera The Edge of Night switches networks, and starts airing new installments on the American ABC network after 19 years on CBS.
• 1981 - A Yugoslavian DC-9 crashes into a mountain while approaching Ajaccio Airport in Corsica killing 178.
• 1987 - NASA announces the names of four companies who were awarded contracts to help build the International Space Station: Boeing Aerospace, General Electric's Astro-Space Division, McDonnell Douglas, and the Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell.
• 1989 - Cold War: East Germany's parliament abolishes the constitutional provision granting the communist party the leading role in the state (Egon Krenz, the Politburo and the Central Committee resigned two days later).
• 1990 - Channel Tunnel workers from the United Kingdom and France meet 40 meters beneath the English Channel seabed, establishing the first ground connection between the island of Great Britain and the mainland of Europe since the last ice age.
• 1990 - The Los Angeles, California radio station KROQ opens their live concert Acoustic Christmas for the first time as the first annual with Dramarama, The Havilinas, Chris Isaak, The Posies, Social Distortion, Soho and Trash Can Sinatras.
• 1991 - Cold War: Ukrainian voters overwhelmingly approve a referendum for independence from the Soviet Union.
• 1998 - Exxon announces a US$73.7 billion deal to buy Mobil, thus creating Exxon-Mobil, the largest company on the planet.
• 2001 - Trans World Airlines, also known as TWA, flies its last flight, after being bought by American Airlines

Births

• 1083 - Anna Comnena, Byzantine historian (d. 1153)
• 1709 - Franz Xaver Richter, German composer (d. 1789)
• 1716 - Etienne-Maurice Falconet, French sculptor (d. 1791)
• 1743 - Martin Heinrich Klaproth, German chemist (d. 1817)
• 1844 - Alexandra of Denmark, consort of King Edward VII of the United Kingdom (d. 1925)
• 1884 - Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, painter, graphic artist (d. 1976)
• 1886 - Rex Stout, American author (d. 1975)
• 1893 - Ernst Troller, dramatist (d. 1939)
• 1895 - Henry Williamson, English author (d. 1977)
• 1911 - Walter Alston, American baseball manager (d. 1984)
• 1911 - Calvin Griffith, baseball executive (d. 1999)
• 1912 - Minoru Yamasaki, American architect (d. 1986)
• 1913 - Mary Martin, American actor, singer (d. 1990)
• 1923 - Stansfield Turner, American admiral, director of the Central Intelligence Agency
• 1932 - Matt Monro, English singer
• 1935 - Woody Allen, American film director, actor, comedian
• 1935 - Lou Rawls, American singer
• 1939 - Lee Trevino, American golfer
• 1940 - Richard Pryor, American actor, comedian
• 1942 - John Crowley, American author
• 1945 - Bette Midler, American actress
• 1946 - Gilbert O'Sullivan, Irish singer
• 1948 - George Foster, American baseball star
• 1950 - Keith Thibodeaux, American child actor, drummer
• 1951 - Jaco Pastorius, American bassist (d. 1987)
• 1961 - Jeremy Northam, English actor
• 1974 - Costinha, Portuguese football player
• 1976 - Matthew Shepard, American murder victim (d. 1998)
• 1977 - Brad Delson, American lead guitarist of Linkin Park

Deaths

• 1135 - Henry I of England
• 1523 - Pope Leo X (b. 1475)
• 1602 - Kobayakawa Hideaki, Japanese samurai and warlord (b. 1582)
• 1755 - Maurice Greene, English composer (b. 1696)
• 1830 - Pope Pius VIII (b. 1761)
• 1928 - José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (b. 1888)
• 1934 - Sergei Kirov, Russian revolutionary (b. 1886)
• 1943 - Damrong Rajanubhab, Thai prince, administrator and historian (b. 1862)
• 1947 - Aleister Crowley, English occultist (b. 1875)
• 1950 - E. J. Moeran, English composer (b. 1894)
• 1964 - J. B. S. Haldane, Scottish geneticist (b. 1892)
• 1973 - David Ben-Gurion, first Prime Minister of Israel (b. 1886)
• 1975 - Nellie Fox, American Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1927)
• 1975 - Anna E. Roosevelt, American radio personality (b. 1906)
• 1985 - Alvin Ailey, American dancer, choreographer (b. 1931)
• 1987 - James Baldwin, American author (b. 1924)
• 2003 - Clark Kerr, first Chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, and President of the University of California (b. 1911)
• 2004 - Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands (b. 1911)

Holidays and observances

• Portugal - Restauration of Independence Day: on December 1, 1640, Portugal regains its independence from Spain and João IV of Portugal becomes king.
• Iceland
• Ancient Latvia - Barbes Diena observed
• Feast day of St Eligius
• Romania - Union Day (the national holiday)
• World AIDS Day

November 30 - December 2 - November 1 - January 1 -- listing of all days