Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/January 17
This is a list of selected January 17 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.
Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article, featured list or picture of the day.
To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
| ← January 16 | January 18 → |
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Images
Use only ONE image at a time
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Queen Liliʻuokalani of the Kingdom of Hawaii -
Lorrin A. Thurston -
E. C. Segar -
Popeye and Olive Oyl
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One of the hydrogen bombs recovered from the 1966 Palomares B-52 crash -
Raoul Wallenberg
Ineligible
| Blurb | Reason |
|---|---|
| 1377 – Pope Gregory XI moved the Papacy back to Rome from Avignon, effectively becoming the last Avignon Pope. | {{no footnotes}}, short |
| 1885 – Mahdist War: British troops defeated Mahdist Sudanese forces at the Battle of Abu Klea in Khartoum, Sudan. | needs more footnotes |
| 1899 – The United States took possession of Wake Island in the Pacific Ocean. | {{refimprove-section}} |
| 1904 – Russian playwright Anton Chekhov's last play, The Cherry Orchard, premiered at the Moscow Art Theatre in Moscow. | {{more footnotes}} |
| 1917 – Denmark sold their portion of the Virgin Islands archipelago to the United States for US$25 million. | {{refimprove}}, and History of the United States Virgin Islands has no footnotes |
| 1929 – American cartoonist E. C. Segar's character Popeye first appeared in his newspaper comic strip Thimble Theater. | {{refimprove}} |
| 1945 – Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who had saved thousands of Jews from the Holocaust, was taken into Soviet custody while in Hungary, and was never publicly seen again. | undue weight |
| 1961 – Three days before leaving office, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered a farewell speech to the nation, in which he warned about the dangers of the military–industrial complex. | MIC has refimprove section, Eisenhower's farewell address is short |
| 1977 – Convicted murderer Gary Gilmore was executed by firing squad in Utah, ending a four-year moratorium on the death penalty in the United States. | {{refimprove}} |
| 1981 – President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos lifted martial law, eight years and five months after declaring it. | refimprove, Marcos already featured on December 30 |
| 1994 – A 6.7 Mw earthquake killed 72 people, injured more than 9,000 others, and caused an estimated US$20 billion in damage in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles. | unreferenced section |
| 1995 – The Great Hanshin Earthquake struck near Kobe, Japan, killing over 6,000 people and causing over ¥10 trillion (US$200 billion) worth of damage. | Tagged with {{refimprove}} |
| 2002 – Mount Nyiragongo erupted in the Democratic Republic of the Congo 20 kilometres (12 mi) north of the town of Goma, destroying 4,500 buildings and leaving about 120,000 people homeless. | refimprove |
Eligible
- 1524 – Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano set sail westward from Madeira to find a sea route to the Pacific Ocean.
- 1893 – The Citizens' Committee of Public Safety led by Lorrin A. Thurston (pictured) overthrew the government of Queen Liliʻuokalani of the Kingdom of Hawaii.
- 1966 – A U.S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortress collided with a KC-135 Stratotanker during aerial refueling over the Mediterranean Sea, dropping three hydrogen bombs on land near Palomares, Spain, and a fourth one into the sea.
- 1989 – Patrick Purdy opened fire in an elementary school in Stockton, California, killing five and wounding 30 others.
- 2010 – The first spate of violence between Muslims and Christians began in Jos, Nigeria, and would end in more than 200 deaths.
January 17: National Day in Minorca (1287)
- 1781 – American Revolutionary War: American forces won a surprising victory over the British at the Battle of Cowpens, one of the most pivotal battles of the war.
- 1912 – Robert Falcon Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition reached the South Pole, only to find that Roald Amundsen's team had beaten them by 33 days.
- 1946 – The United Nations Security Council (chamber pictured), the organ of the United Nations charged with the maintenance of international peace and security, held its first meeting at Church House in London.
- 1955 – USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine, put to sea for the first time from Groton, Connecticut, with the message, "Underway on nuclear power."
- 1961 – Former Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba was murdered in circumstances suggesting the support and complicity of the governments of Belgium and the United States.