World/nation trivia: The week of Dec. 22-28

Dec. 22:

1944, during the World War II Battle of the Bulge, U.S. Brig. Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe rejected a German demand for surrender, writing “Nuts!” in his official reply.

1984, New York City resident Bernhard Goetz shot and wounded four young Black men on a Manhattan subway, alleging they were about to rob him. (Goetz was acquitted of attempted murder and assault charges but convicted on a weapons possession charge, ultimately serving eight months of a one-year sentence.)

2001, Richard C. Reid, a passenger on an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami, tried to ignite explosives in his shoes, but was subdued by flight attendants and fellow passengers. (Reid is serving a life sentence in federal prison.)

Dec. 23:

1823, the poem “Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas” was published anonymously in the Troy Sentinel of New York; the verse, more popularly known as “The Night Before Christmas,” was later attributed to Clement C. Moore.

1948, former Japanese Premier Hideki Tojo and six other Japanese war leaders were executed in Tokyo.

1972, in an NFL playoff game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Oakland Raiders, Steelers running back Franco Harris scored a game-winning touchdown on a deflected pass with less than 10 seconds left in the game. The “Immaculate Reception,” as the catch came to be known, is often cited as the greatest NFL play of all time.

2003, a jury in Chesapeake, Virginia, sentenced teen sniper Lee Boyd Malvo to life in prison, sparing him the death penalty.

Dec. 24:

1814, the United States and Britain signed the Treaty of Ghent, which ended the War of 1812 following ratification by both the British Parliament and the U.S. Senate.

1865, several veterans of the Confederate Army formed a private social club in Pulaski, Tennessee, that was the original version of the Ku Klux Klan.

1914, during World War I, impromptu Christmas truces began to take hold along parts of the Western Front between British and German soldiers.

1992, President George H.W. Bush pardoned former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and five others in the Iran-Contra scandal.

Dec. 25:

1776, Gen. George Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware River for a surprise attack against Hessian forces in Trenton, New Jersey, during the American Revolutionary War.

1868, President Andrew Johnson granted unconditional pardons to “every person who directly or indirectly” supported the Confederacy in the Civil War.

1926, Hirohito became emperor of Japan, succeeding his father, Emperor Yoshihito.

2021, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, the world’s largest and most powerful space telescope, rocketed away from French Guiana in South America on a quest to see light from the first stars and galaxies and search the universe for signs of life.

Dec. 26:

1908, Jack Johnson became the first Black boxer to win the world heavyweight championship as he defeated Canadian Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia.

1990, Nancy Cruzan, a young woman in an irreversible vegetative state whose case led to a U.S. Supreme Court decision on the right to die, died at a Missouri hospital.

1991, the USSR was formally dissolved through a declaration by the Supreme Soviet.

2004, a 9.1-magnitude earthquake beneath the Indian Ocean triggered a tsunami with waves up to 100 feet high, killing an estimated 230,000 people.

Dec. 27:

1831, naturalist Charles Darwin set out on a round-the-world voyage aboard the HMS Beagle.

1968, the Apollo 8 capsule splashed down safely in the Pacific, completing the first crewed mission to orbit the moon.

1979, Soviet forces seized control of Afghanistan. President Hafizullah Amin, who was overthrown and executed, was replaced by Babrak Karmal.

2007, former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in a shooting and bomb attack that killed at least 20 people in the city of Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

Dec. 28:

1908, a major earthquake followed by a tsunami devastated the Italian cities of Messina and Reggio Calabria, killing at least 70,000 people.

1945, Congress officially recognized the Pledge of Allegiance.

1981, Elizabeth Jordan Carr, the first American “test-tube” baby, was born in Norfolk, Virginia.

2014, the U.S. war in Afghanistan came to a formal end after 13 years with a quiet flag-lowering ceremony in Kabul that marked the transition of the fighting from U.S.-led combat troops to the country’s own security forces.

– Associated Press