- 1760 – Deborah Sampson was born. During the Revolutionary War, Sampson disguised herself as a man using the name Robert Shurtliff and enlisted in the Continental Army. She is one of a handful of women who also received a military pension at that time.
- 1777 – France formally recognizes the United States
- 1892 – Arthur Baldwin Turnure published the first edition of Vogue.
- 1903 – Orville and Wilbur Wright successfully complete the first powered and controlled flight.
- 1917 – Burt Baskin is born. One half of the Baskin-Robbins Ice Cream business duo, Burt Baskin joined his brother-in-law Irv Robbins in 1948.
- 1933 – The NFL hosts their first Championship Game.
- 1944 – U.S. approves end to internment of Japanese Americans
- 1963 – Clean Air Act becomes law
- 1991 – Boris Yeltsin announces the Soviet Union will cease to exist by New Year’s Eve
- 1993 – Judith Rodin is named president of Univ. of Pennsylvania, the first woman to head an Ivy League institution
- 2011 – Kim Jong Il, leader of North Korea, dies
- 2014 – The United States and Cuba re-establish diplomatic relations that had been severed since 1961
