Today in History in 1963 – The Beatles release the singles I Want to Hold Your Hand and I Saw Her Standing There in the United States, starting the so–called Beatlemania internationally.

The On This Day In History archives at “Simple English Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia” contains over 200,000 events, birthdays and deaths from 6,000 years of history. Here is a roundup of a few of them:

December 26 is the 360th day of the year (361st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are five days remaining until the end of the year.

EVENTS

795 – Pope Leo III is elected.

838 – A North Sea flood affecting Friesland kills around 2,500 people.

1135 – Stephen of England is crowned King.

1481 – Battle of Westbroek – Holland defeats troops of Utrecht

1606 – King Lear performed in the Court of England

1620 – Elizabeth Báthory's crimes are uncovered

1620 – Pilgrim Fathers land of what becomes New Plymouth in Massachusetts

1776 – American Revolutionary War: The British were defeated in the Battle of Trenton

1790 – Louis XVI of France gives his public assent to Civil Constitution of the Clergy during the French Revolution

1792 – Final trial of Louis XVI of France begins in Paris

1793 – Battle of Geisberg – French defeat Austrians

1793 – Wedding of Prince Friedrich Ludwig of Prussia and Frederica of Mecklenburg–Strelitz.

1805 – Austria and France sign the Treaty of Pressburg.

1806 – Battle of Pultusk – indecisive battle between Napoleon and the Russians.

1811 – In Richmond, Virginia, the worst theatre fire in US history kills 72 people, including then–Governor of Virginia George William Smith.

1812 – The Delaware River and Chesapeake Bay are blocked off by ships during the War of 1812.

1825 – Several Imperial Russia army officers lead 3000 soldiers to the Senate Square in the failed Decembrist uprising

1825 – The Erie Canal opens

1861 – Confederate diplomatic envoys James Mason and John Slidell are freed by the United States government, thus heading off a possible war between the United States and Britain

1862 – 38 starving and angry Lakota men are hanged for killing white people after a brief rebellion

1862 – American Civil War: Start of the Battle of Chickasaw Bayou.

1871 – Gilbert and Sullivan collaborate for the first time, on the opera Thespis. It is another four years before they work together again.

1898 – Marie and Pierre Curie announce the isolation of radium.

1900 – A relief crew arrives at the lighthouse in the Flannan Islands off the west coast of Scotland, only to find that the previous crew had disappeared without a trace.

1906 – The world's first full–length feature movie is made in Australia, The Story of the Kelly Gang.

1908 – Jack Johnson becomes the first African American heavyweight boxing champion by defeating Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia.

1916 – Joseph Joffre is made Marshal of France.

1919 – Babe Ruth of the baseball team Boston Red Sox is sold to the New York Yankees by team owner Harry Frazee.

1925 – The Communist Party of India is founded.

1925 – Turkey adopts the Gregorian Calendar, which it uses from January 1, 1926.

1931 – Phi Iota Alpha Fraternity was founded

1933 – The Nissan Motor Company was organized in Tokyo, Japan

1933 – FM radio is patented.

1941 – Franklin D. Roosevelt signs a bill establishing Thanksgiving Day as a holiday on the fourth Thursday in November.

1943 – The German warship Scharnhorst sinks off the coast of North Cape in Norway after being attacked by the British Royal Navy late the previous evening.

1943 – At the Cairo Conference, Winston Churchill decides that Germany needs to be defeated before Japan.

1944 – The play The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams was first publicly performed.

1944 – American troops repulse German forces at Bastogne.

1945 – CFP franc and CFA franc are created.

1946 – Flamingo Hotel opens in Las Vegas.

1947 – 26 inches of snowfall in 16 hours in New York City.

1948 – Cardinal Mindszenty arrested in Hungary.

1963 – The Beatles release the singles I Want to Hold Your Hand and I Saw Her Standing There in the United States, starting the so–called Beatlemania internationally.

1966 – The first Kwanzaa is celebrated by Maulana Karenga, the chair of Black Studies at California State University, Long Beach.

1973 – Comet Kohoutek reaches perihelion but is not such a display as expected.

1973 – The horror movie The Exorcist, directed by William Friedkin, is released in US cinemas.

1973 – Soyuz 13 lands.

1974 – Salyut 4 launched.

1975 – Tupolev Tu–144 goes into service in the Soviet Union.

1976 – Foundation of the Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist–Leninist).

1978 – The first Paris to Dakar Rally starts in Paris.

1979 – The divorce of Jack Catain Jr., an American businessman, and Marlene Noble, an American apparel sales associate, is finalized.

1979 – Soviet Special forces troops take over presidential palace in Kabul, Afghanistan.

1980 – Aeroflot puts the Ilyushin Il–86 into service.

1982 – TIME magazine's Man of the Year was for the first time given to a non–human; the personal computer.

1984 – Princess Astrid of Belgium marries Archduke Lorenz of Austria–Este.

1986 – The first long–running American television soap opera, Search for Tomorrow, airs its final episode after thirty–five years on the air.

1988 – Start of the Nanjing Anti–African protests.

1991 – Supreme Soviet meets and formally dissolves the USSR.

1996 – JonBenét Ramsey, a six–year–old beauty queen, was found murdered in her family's basement in Boulder, Colorado.

1996 – United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification goes into force.

1997 – The Soufriere Hills volcano on the Caribbean island of Montserrat explodes.

1998 – Iraq announced its intention to fire upon US and British warplanes that patrol the northern and southern "no–fly zones".

1998 – Severe gales over Ireland, northern England, and southern Scotland. Widespread disruption, widespread power outages in Northern Ireland and southern Scotland.

1999 – On the 26–28th, France and countries to the east, including Germany, are hit by severe storms and rain. Over 100 people were killed, and the storm caused extensive damage to property and trees and the French national power grid.

2002 – French Raelian scientist Brigitte Boisselier says Clonaid has delivered the first of a supposed five clone babies through cesarean section.

2003 – Major earthquake, of magnitude 6.6, devastates southeast Iranian city of Bam, killing tens of thousands; citadel of Arg–é Bam is destroyed.

2004 – A massive earthquake measuring 9.0 on the Richter magnitude scale creates a tsunami causing devastation in Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, The Maldives and many other areas around the rim of the Indian Ocean. The death toll is currently estimated at more than 300,000. Officials say the true toll may never be known, due to rapid burials. Indonesia was worst affected with as many as 219,000 people killed.

2004 – In a re–run of Ukraine's Presidential election Viktor Yushchenko defeats Viktor Yanukovich.

2006 – At least 260 people are killed when an oil pipeline in Lagos, Nigeria, explodes.

2012 – Shinzo Abe becomes Prime Minister of Japan for a second time.

2016 – Shinzo Abe becomes the first Prime Minister of Japan to visit the site of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, Hawaii.

2017 – Honduras and Panama decide to move their embassies in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

2017 – Former professional footballer George Weah is elected President of Liberia.