Today in History for Jan. 16:
In 1543, the British Parliament prohibited any ``women or artificer's prentices, journeymen, servingmen of the degree of yeoman, or under, husbandmen or labourers to read the New Testament in English.''
In 1545, Georg Spalatin, German reformer and friend of Martin Luther, died. Spalatin's court life allowed him to give secular government a better understanding of Luther's ideas.
In 1547, Ivan the Terrible was crowned the first czar of Russia.
In 1637, the Company of New France was given a grant for the establishment of a nunnery at Quebec.
In 1642, French settlers were given land in Acadia.
In 1866, clamp-on roller skates were patented.
In 1874, Robert Service, known as the ``Poet of the Yukon,'' was born in Preston, England. The author of such works as ``The Cremation of Sam McGee'' died in 1958.
In 1905, the Ottawa Silver Seven routed the visiting team from Dawson City, Yukon, 23-2 to win the Stanley Cup. Ottawa's Frank McGee scored 14 goals in the most lopsided game in Stanley Cup history.
In 1906, Britain relinquished control of the naval bases at Halifax and Esquimault, B.C., turning them over to Canada.
In 1908, the Manitoba government took over the province's telephone system.
In 1919, pianist and statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski became the first premier of the newly created republic of Poland.
In 1920, the first meeting of the League of Nations (the forerunner of the United Nations) began in Paris.
In 1920, prohibition began in the United States. It ended in 1933.
In 1927, 17-year-old Toronto swimmer George Young became the first person to cross the 35 kilometres from Santa Catalina Island to Los Angeles. He needed 15 hours and 45 minutes to complete the swim, which earned him $25,000.
In 1939, the first ``Superman'' comic strip by Toronto-born Joe Shuster appeared.
In 1944, General Dwight D. Eisenhower took command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in London.
In 1956, the first jet flight was made across Canada from Vancouver to Dartmouth, N.S.
In 1958, Lester Pearson became leader of the federal Liberal party, succeeding Louis St. Laurent.
In 1965, Prime Minister Lester Pearson and U.S. President Lyndon Johnson signed the Canada-U.S. Automotive Agreement. The Auto Pact, as it became known, provided a large measure of free trade in motor vehicles and parts between the two countries. It also produced a major boost for the Canadian auto industry over the next 35 years. The Auto Pact died Feb. 19, 2001, after the World Trade Organization ruled it violated international trade laws.
In 1969, the Soviet spaceships ``Soyuz 4'' and ``Soyuz 5'' became the first vehicles to dock in space and transfer personnel.
In 1970, Ottawa announced plans to convert the country from the Imperial to the Metric system of measurement. A special commission was appointed to oversee the introduction of metric, or the International System of Units.
In 1970, Moammar Gadhafi became ruler of Libya following a military coup.
In 1972, Justin Pierre James Trudeau, the first prime ministerial baby born in more than 100 years, was baptized at Notre-Dame Basilica in Ottawa.
In 1979, the Shah of Iran left his country for what became a permanent self-imposed exile.
In 1981, the entire staff of El Salvador's embassy in Nicaragua, including the ambassador, resigned to join anti-government forces.
In 1984, Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang arrived in Ottawa for a week-long visit and was greeted with full military honours.
In 1991, the Persian Gulf War began when jet fighters from the U.S.-led coalition bombed Baghdad. Because of the time difference, it was the early morning of Jan. 17 in the Persian Gulf when the attack began. A defiant Iraqi president Saddam Hussein promised to wage ``the mother of all battles.''
In 1992, the Salvadorean government and FMLN rebel leaders signed an agreement in Mexico City, putting a formal end to 12 years of civil war that left at least 75,000 people dead.
In 1998, 21 sailors drowned and four were rescued from a Cypriot-registered ship, ``Flare,'' that broke in half and sank in the stormy North Atlantic, southwest of St. Pierre and Miquelon.
In 2003, the space shuttle ``Columbia'' blasted off. On board was Israel's first astronaut, Ilan Ramon. The mission ended in tragedy on Feb. 1, when the shuttle broke up during its return descent, killing all seven crew members.
In 2005, a 66-year-old Romanian woman gave birth to a baby girl, becoming the oldest mother ever.
In 2010, Sgt. John Faught, 44, of the 1st Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry based in Edmonton, was killed in the Panjwaii district of Afghanistan after stepping on an IED.
In 2012, Canadian naval intelligence officer Sub.-Lt. Jeffrey Paul Delisle was charged with two counts of breaching the Security of Information Act by allegedly passing secrets to a foreign entity. It was the first charge under that section of the act since it was passed after the 9-11 attacks in the U.S. (In October, Delisle pleaded guilty to all the espionage charges he was facing and was later sentenced to 20 years in prison.)
In 2013, Mali-based al-Qaida-linked militants raided a remote Algerian natural gas plant beginning a four-day hostage standoff. Algerian specials forces stormed the plant, killing 32 militants, including two Canadians; at least 40 hostages of various nationalities died in the standoff.
In 2013, Pauline Friedman Phillips, who as Dear Abby dispensed snappy, sometimes saucy advice on love, marriage and meddling mothers-in-law to millions of newspaper readers around the world, died after a long battle with Alzheimer's disease. She was 94.
In 2013, regulators in the U.S., Japan, India and Europe temporarily grounded and ordered a safety review of all 787 Dreamliners, Boeing's newest and most technologically advanced plane, after a series of problems with the lithium-ion batteries. Flights resumed in late April after the FAA approved Boeing's redesigned battery system.
In 2016, the UN nuclear agency certified that Iran had met all of its commitments under a landmark deal, prompting the West to lift economic sanctions that had been in place for years.
In 2016, Taiwan elected Tsai Ing-wen as its first female president, handing her pro-independence party its first majority in the national legislature.
In 2019, British Prime Minister Theresa May survived a no-confidence vote in Parliament _ but saw more of her power ebb away as she battled to keep Brexit on track after lawmakers demolished her European Union divorce deal. May won a narrow victory on an opposition motion seeking to topple her government and trigger a general election.
In 2019, Foreign Ministry officials in Burkina Faso confirmed Canadian mining company executive Kirk Woodman was found dead after being kidnapped in the west African country's northern Sahel region. Woodman, who was from Halifax, worked for the Vancouver-based Progress Mineral Mining Company. West Africa's Sahel region had seen a number of abductions of foreigners in recent years by extremists linked to al-Qaida or the Islamic State organization.
In 2020, the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly approved the long-awaited U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement by a vote of 89-10.
In 2020, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled unanimously against British Columbia's attempt to block the flow of heavy oil through an expanded Trans Mountain pipeline from Alberta. The ruling gave the project the green light to proceed.
In 2020, former prime minister Stephen Harper resigned as a director of the fundraising arm of the federal Conservative party, a post that would have required him to remain neutral in the party's leadership race. Sources said the decision to step aside from the Conservative Fund dated back months and was linked to Harper's concerns he occupies too large a role in the party's operations.
In 2021, Canada surpassed 700-thousand cases of COVID-19.
In 2022, Ottawa told Canadians not to take any non-essential trips to Ukraine. The change in risk level was due to the buildup of Russian troops near the country's border. Canadians who were in Ukraine for non-essential purposes were being told to consider leaving.
In 2022, one of the last surviving Tuskegee Airmen died. Charles McGee, who flew fighter combat missions over three wars, was 102. A family member said McGee died at his home in Bethesda, Md. The Tuskegee Airmen was the nickname of the first African American unit to fly combat airplanes. They flew in the Second World War, Korea and Vietnam.
In 2024, New York architect Rex Heuermann, accused in the Gilgo Beach killings, was formally charged in the death of Maureen Brainard-Barnes, a Connecticut woman who vanished in 2007. Her remains were found more than three years later along a coastal highway in New York. Heuermann, arrested in July in the deaths of three other women, insisted he is innocent of all charges.
In 2024, Alberta NDP Leader Rachel Notley announced she is stepping down after almost a decade in the role, but planned to stay on as leader until her replacement is chosen.
In 2024, thousands of teachers in Saskatchewan were striking across the province to push the government to bargain on key demands. Saskatchewan Teachers' Federation president Samantha Becotte said teachers want the province to address critical issues, such as classroom sizes and support for students with higher needs.
In 2024, a Jean Chrétien-era effort to soften the United Nations Indigenous language was casting a pall on the current Liberal government. Newly released Australian cabinet documents from 2003 showed the two countries worked together on putting forward a softer version of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which was amended before it was adopted by the UN in 2007-- with Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States the only countries to vote against it.
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The Canadian Press