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Jan. 6 (UPI) — On this date in history:
In 1759, George Washington married widow Martha Dandridge Custis.
In 1838, in Morristown, N.J., Samuel F.B. Morse and his partner, Alfred Vail, publicly demonstrated their new invention, the telegraph, for the first time.
In 1912, New Mexico joined the United States as the 47th state.
In 1914, the day after the Ford Motor Co. announced the “$5 Day,” more than 10,000 men jockeyed for places as each sought to become one of the army of 22,000 workers who would benefit under the $10,000,000 profit-sharing plan.
In 1919, Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president of the United States, died at the age of 60.
In 1925, Paavo Nurmi, known as the “Flying Finn” and regarded as the greatest runner of his day, set world records in the mile run and 5,000-meter run within the space of 1 hour in his first U.S. appearance, an indoor meet at New York City’s new Madison Square Garden.
In 1942, a Pan American Airways plane arrived in New York, completing the first around-the-world flight by a commercial airliner.
In 1950, Britain formally recognized the communist government of China.
In 1961, Vice President Richard Nixon made official that he had been defeated by Sen. John F. Kennedy in one of the closest presidential elections in history.
UPI File Photo
In 1984, the first test-tube quadruplets, all boys, were born in Melbourne, Australia.
In 1994, American skater Nancy Kerrigan was clubbed on the right knee in an attack that forced her out of the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. The assault was traced to four men with links to her leading rival, Tonya Harding.
In 1996, the Blizzard of 1996 began, dropping up to 4 feet of snow and paralyzing Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia and other major cities in the Northeast. The winter weather was blamed for dozens of deaths.
File Photo by Ken Cedeno/UPI
In 1999, an agreement ended a six-month player lockout by owners of National Basketball Association teams.
In 2010, Tsutomu Yamaguchi, the only officially recognized survivor of both the 1945 U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that led to the Japanese surrender in World War II, died of stomach cancer at age 93.
In 2014, Martin Walsh was sworn in as Boston’s first new mayor in more than two decades, succeeding Thomas Menino.
In 2021, thousands of supporters of President Donald Trump attacked the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to disrupt Congress’ certification of the 2020 presidential election in Joe Biden’s favor. The riots resulted in five civilian deaths and hundreds of criminal cases.
