January 18 is:
Thesaurus Day (Birthday of Peter Roget)
National Gourmet Coffee Day
Peking Duck Day
Winnie the Pooh Day -The Birthday of Winnie’s creator, A.A. Milne
Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro founded Lima, the capital of Peru in 1535. Pizarro is famed for the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire.
James Cook is the first known European to discover the Hawaiian Islands, which he named the “Sandwich Islands” in 1778.
Publication of Federalist Paper #40: The Powers of the Convention to Form a Mixed Government Examined and Sustained written by James Madison in 1788. This paper addresses one question “whether the Convention were authorized to frame and propose this mixed Constitution” or was the authorization merely to amend the Articles. Madison argues that to fix the Articles, it was necessary to scrap them and start over. The Convention was given the task of “revising the Articles which shall render them adequate to the exigencies of government and the preservation of the union.” The changes were to be submitted to Congress and presented to the states for ratification.
Birthday of Peter Mark Roget (January 18, 1779), English physician, and author, famous for the Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases
Birthday of Daniel Webster (January 18, 1782), American statesman, lawyer, and orator, senator from Massachusetts. As Secretary of State for John Tyler, he negotiated the Webster-Ashbuton Treaty which resolved several border issues between the U. S. and Canada. He and Henry Clay from Kentucky and John C. Calhoun from South Carolina were known as the “Great Triumvirate”, three statesmen who dominated the U.S. Senate in the 1830’s and 1840’s.
The first elements of the First Fleet carrying 736 convicts from England to Australia arrived at Botany Bay. Admiral Arthur Phillip sailed the armed tender HMS Supply into the bay on 18 January, 1788. Two days later the remaining ships of the First Fleet arrived to found the planned penal colony. However, the land was quickly ruled unsuitable for settlement as there was insufficient fresh water.
On January 18, 1861 Georgia joined South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama in seceding from the United States.
1862 John Tyler, the tenth president of the United States, died in Richmond, Va., at age 71. Tyler was the first Vice-President to ascend to the Presidency upon the death of the President, William Henry Harrison. He fathered more children than any other president – eight with his first wife and seven with his second wife. When Civil War broke out, Tyler sided with the Confederacy and his death was not officially recognized in Washington, D.C. His coffin was draped with the Confederate Flag.
1871 – Wilhelm I of Germany was proclaimed the first German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles (France) towards the end of the Franco-Prussian War. The empire is known as the Second Reich to Germans. The Second Reich ended in 1919 with formation of the Weimar Republic (1919-1933).
(The First Reich, was also known as The Holy Roman Empire (a continuation of the Roman Empire in Europe), that started in the lands ruled by Charlemagne (Germany, Austria, Eslovenia, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Belgium, Czech Republic, eastern France, Northern Italy and western Poland), with a period beginning on the 9th century and finishing in the 19th century.)
Winnie the Pooh Day -The Birthday of Winnie’s author A.A. Milne (1882)
Birthday of Oliver Hardy (January 18, 1892), American comic movie actor, one-half of the famed Laurel & Hardy team. He was born Norvell Hardy and added his father’s name “Oliver” to his own prior to 1910.
Birthday of Cary Grant, (January 18, 1904), actor, born Archibald Leach in Bristol, England.
1911 – Eugene B. Ely landed on the deck of the USS Pennsylvania stationed in San Francisco Bay, the first time an aircraft landed on a ship.
Birthday of Danny Kaye (born David Daniel Kaminsky) (January 18, 1913), American actor/comedian/dancer whose performances featured physical comedy, idiosyncratic pantomimes and rapid-fire nonsense songs. See BenneynLinda.com/showtunes for my tribute to Danny Kaye.
1919 – Bentley Motors Limited was founded by W. O. Bentley. It was purchased by Rolls-Royce in 1931.
1944 – The Metropolitan Opera House in New York City hosted a jazz concert for the first time. The performers were Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton, Artie Shaw, Roy Eldridge and Jack Teagarden.