Today is Wednesday, Dec. 25, the 360th day of 2024. There are six days left in the year. This is Christmas Day.
►Birthdays: Football Hall of Famer Larry Csonka is 78. Country singer Barbara Mandrell is 76. Actor Sissy Spacek is 75. Former White House adviser Karl Rove is 74. Singer Annie Lennox is 70. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is 53. Actor Jeremy Strong is 46.
In 1066, William the Conqueror was crowned King of England.
►In 1651, the Massachusetts General Court, reflecting Puritan attitudes, ordered a five shilling fine for “observing any such day as Christmas.’’
In 1776, General George Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware River for a surprise attack against Hessian forces at Trenton, New Jersey, during the American Revolutionary War.
In 1818, “Silent Night (Stille Nacht)’’ was publicly performed for the first time during the Christmas Midnight Mass at the Church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorf, Austria.
►In 1821, Clara Barton, founder of the Red Cross, was born in North Oxford, Mass.
►In 1868, President Andrew Johnson granted unconditional pardons to “every person who directly or indirectly’’ supported the Confederacy in the Civil War.
In 1926, Hirohito became emperor of Japan, succeeding his father, Emperor Yoshihito.
In 1989, ousted Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, were executed following a populist uprising.
In 2009, passengers aboard Northwest Airlines Flight 253 foiled an attempt to blow up the plane as it was landing in Detroit by seizing Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to set off explosives in his underwear. (Abdulmutallab later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.)
In 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.
