January 1

January 1 is the first day of the calendar year in the Julian calendar and the Gregorian calendar. A calendar year means the order in which we list the months, January to December. Starting in the 1200s, January 1 was called New Year's Day. It was a holiday.

There are 364.25 days in the year after January 1 (365 in leap years).

Births

• 1895 - J. Edgar Hoover, American, founding director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations
• 1900 - Xavier Cugat, Catalan-born musician, bandleader (died 1990)
• 1909- Barry Goldwater

Deaths

• 1894 - Heinrich Rudolf Hertz, German physicist
• 1953 - Hank Williams, country star

Events

Before 1900

• 1502 - The place where Rio de Janeiro is now was explored.
• 1651 - Charles II becomes King of Scotland.
• 1700 - Russia first starts using Western numbers for its calendar.
• 1705 - Sandra Giuseppina Isabella Elisabetha Iaconosemos countess of Aragon stops the Protestant Reformation in Spain by burning leader Miguel Sciarra.
• 1707 - John V becomes King of Portugal.
• 1801 - The Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland join to make the United Kingdom
• 1804 - France stops ruling Haiti.
• 1808 - The United States makes a law to stop people bringing slaves from other countries.
• 1863 - Abraham Lincoln signs the Emancipation Proclamation during the second year of the American Civil War.
• 1874 - The Bronx becomes part of New York City.
• 1880 - Workers start to make the Panama Canal.
• 1887 - People at the first Imperial Assemblage (Durbar) (a meeting in Delhi) give Queen Victoria the title of Empress of India.
• 1892 - Ellis Island starts to take people moving to live in the United States.
• 1893 - Japan starts to use the Gregorian calendar.
• 1897 - Brooklyn, New York joins with New York City.
• 1898 - New York City and places around it join to make the City of Greater New York.
• 1899 - Spanish rule in Cuba ends.
• 1899 - Queens and Staten Island join with New York City.

After 1900

• 1934- Alcatraz becomes a federal prison.
• 2001- A big black rock that was nine feet tall was found in Seattle's Magnuson Park, by an artist because this happened in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.