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1969
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1935
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more events on January 4
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2010
Burj Khalifa (Khalifa tower) officially opens in Dubai, UAE. At 2,722 ft (829.8 m) it is the world’s tallest man-made structure.
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2007
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-California) becomes the first female speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.
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2004
Mikheil Saakashvili is elected President of Georgia following the Rose Revolution of November 2003.
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NASA Mars rover Spirit successfully lands on Mars.
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1999
Jesse “The Body” Ventura, a former professional wrestler, is sworn in as populist governor of Minnesota.
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1990
Over 300 people die and more than 700 are injured in Pakistan’s deadliest train accident, when an overloaded passenger train collides with an empty freight train.
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1976
The Ulster Volunteer Force kills six Irish Catholic civilians in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The next day 10 Protestant civilians are murdered in retaliation.
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1974
President Richard Nixon refuses to hand over tape recordings and documents that had been subpoenaed by the Senate Watergate Committee.
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1972
Rose Heilbron becomes the first female judge to sit at the Old Bailey (The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales) in London, England.
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1970
A 7.7 earthquake kills 15,000+ people in Tonghai County, China.
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1969
Spain signs a treaty to return Ifni province to Morocco.
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1957
Patty Loveless, country singer; her multiple awards include Academy of Country Music Top Female Vocalist 1996, 1997.
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1952
The French Army in Indochina launches Operation Nenuphar in hopes of ejecting a Viet Minh division from the Ba Tai forest.
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1951
UN forces abandon Seoul, Korea, to the Chinese Communist Army.
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1943
Doris Kearns Goodwin, biographer, historian, political commentator; won Pulitzer Prize in 1995 (No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The American Homefront During WWII) and the Lincoln Prize in 2005 (Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln).