December 17th in History

Michael Dobson | December 17

The Wright Brothers make the first successful controlled, powered, heavier-than-air flight, Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, December 17, 1903

Today in History

  • The first Saturnalia is celebrated in ancient Rome (497 BCE)
  • Henry VIII is excommunicated by Pope Paul III (1538 CE)
  • Ulysses S. Grant issues General Order No. 11, expelling Jews from parts of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky (1862 CE)
  • The Wright brothers make the first controlled, powered, heavier-than-air flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina (1903 CE)
  • The Douglas DC-3 (1935 CE), the Boeing B-47 (1947 CE), and SpaceShipOne (2003 CE) make their first flights
  • The Malmedy Massacre takes place during the Battle of the Bulge (1944 CE)
  • The US Air Force closes Project Blue Book, its study of UFOs (1969 CE)
  • The video game Final Fantasy is released (1987 CE)
  • The first episode of The Simpsons airs (1989 CE)
  • Great Britain bans handguns (1997 CE)
  • Mohamed Bouazizi sets himself on fire, which becomes the catalyst for the Tunisian Revolution and the Arab Spring (2010 CE)

Birthdays

  • Humphrey Davy, chemist (1778)
  • John Greenleaf Whittier, poet (1807)
  • Ford Madox Ford, author (1873)
  • Arthur Fiedler, conductor (1894)
  • Erskine Caldwell, author (1903)
  • George Lindsey, actor (1928)
  • William Safire, journalist (1929)
  • Bob Guccione, publisher, founder of Penthouse (1930)
  • Cal Ripkin, Sr., baseball player and manager (1935)
  • Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio), pontiff (1936)
  • Bertha Harris, author (1937)*
  • Paul Butterfield, musician (1942)
  • Jack L. Chalker, science fiction writer (1944)
  • Ernie Hudson, actor (1945)
  • Eugene Levy, actor, director, and screenwriter (1946)
  • Bill Pullman, actor (1953)
  • Richard Jewell, police officer, falsely accused bomber (1962)
  • Milla Jovovich, actress (1975)
  • Chelsea Manning, soldier, convicted of espionage for releasing documents to WikiLeaks (1987)

*  Bertha Harris was my creative writing teacher, adviser, and friend at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where I went to school.

Deaths

  • Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī (جلال‌الدین محمد رومی), Sufi poet and mystic (1273)
  • Simón Bolívar, liberator (1930)
  • Kaspar Hauser, feral child (1833)
  • Dorothy L. Sayers, author (1957)
  • Grover Washington, Jr., singer-songwriter (1999)
  • Jack Anderson, journalist (2005)
  • Captain Beefheart, singer-songwriter (2010)
  • Kim Jong-il (김정일), North Korean “dear leader” (2011)
  • Daniel Inouye, politician (2012)

Holidays and Celebrations

  • Accession Day (Bahrain)
  • Feast of Lazarus of Bethany (Cuba)
  • International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers (US)
  • National Day (Bhutan)
  • Saturnalia (ancient Rome)
  • Urs of Rumi (Turkey)
  • Wright Brothers Day (US)
Informal and made-up holidays include National Maple Syrup Day and Pan American Aviation Day.
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December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years). There are 14 days remaining until the end of the year.