December 31 in History

The Huguenots are a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed (Calvinist) tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of burgomaster Besançon Hugues, who ironically defended Geneva from Catholic Savoy but then let it fall to Protestantism, was in common use by around 1550. Huguenot was frequently used in reference to those of the Reformed Church of France from the time of the Protestant Reformation. By contrast, the Protestant populations of eastern France, in Alsace, Moselle, and Montbéliard, were mainly Lutherans.

Arthur Guinness was an Irish brewer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. The inventor of Guinness stout, he founded the Guinness Brewery at St. James's Gate in 1759.

Efimeris was a Greek-language newspaper published in Vienna from 1790 to 1797. It is the oldest Greek newspaper of which issues have survived till today.

Gramercy Park is the name of both a small, fenced-in private park, and the surrounding neighborhood, in Manhattan in New York City.

Iguanodon, named in 1825, is a genus of iguanodontian dinosaur. While many species found worldwide have been classified in the genus Iguanodon, dating from the Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous, taxonomic revision in the early 21st century has defined Iguanodon to be based on at least one well-substantiated species: Iguanodon bernissartensis, which lived during the Barremian to early Aptian ages of the Early Cretaceous in Belgium, Germany, England, and Spain, between about 126 and 122 million years ago. Iguanodon was a large, bulky herbivore, measuring up to 9–11 metres (30–36 ft) in length and 4.5 metric tons in body mass. Distinctive features include large thumb spikes, which were possibly used for defense against predators, combined with long prehensile fifth fingers able to forage for food.

The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States between the Union and the Confederacy, which was formed in 1861 by states that had seceded from the Union to preserve slavery in the United States, which they saw as threatened because of the election of Abraham Lincoln and the growing abolitionist movement in the North. The war ended with Union victory, the dissolution of the Confederacy and the abolition of slavery, freeing four million African Americans.

Carl Friedrich Benz was a German engine designer and automotive engineer. His Benz Patent-Motorwagen from 1885 is considered the first practical, modern automobile and the first car to be put into series production. He received a patent for the motorcar in 1886, the same year he first publicly drove the Benz Patent-Motorwagen.

Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar was the fifth Qajar shah of Iran, reigning from 1896 until his death in 1907. He is often credited with the creation of the Persian Constitution of 1906, which he approved of in one of his final acts as shah.

USS Essex (CV/CVA/CVS-9) was an aircraft carrier and the lead ship of the 24-ship Essex class built for the United States Navy during World War II. She was the fourth US Navy ship to bear the name. Commissioned in December 1942, Essex participated in several campaigns in the Pacific Theater of Operations, earning the Presidential Unit Citation and 13 battle stars. Decommissioned shortly after the war, she was modernized and recommissioned in the early 1950s as an attack carrier (CVA), eventually becoming an antisubmarine aircraft carrier (CVS). In her second career, she served mainly in the Atlantic, playing a role in the Cuban Missile Crisis. She also participated in the Korean War, earning four battle stars and the Navy Unit Commendation. She was the primary recovery carrier for the Apollo 7 space mission.

Operation Northwind was the last major German offensive of World War II on the Western Front. Northwind was launched to support the German Ardennes offensive campaign in the Battle of the Bulge, which by late December 1944 had decisively turned against the German forces. It began on 31 December 1944 in Rhineland-Palatinate, Alsace and Lorraine in southwestern Germany and northeastern France, and ended on 25 January 1945. The German offensive was an operational failure, with its main objectives not achieved.

The Cold War was a period of international geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc. It began in the aftermath of the Second World War and ended with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The term cold war is used because there was no direct fighting between the two superpowers, though each supported opposing sides in regional conflicts known as proxy wars. In addition to the struggle for ideological and economic influence and an arms race in both conventional and nuclear weapons, the Cold War was expressed through technological rivalries such as the Space Race, espionage, propaganda campaigns, embargoes, and sports diplomacy.

Televiziunea Română, more commonly referred to as TVR, is the short name for Societatea Română de Televiziune, the Romanian public television. It operates nine channels: TVR 1, TVR 2, TVR 3, TVR Cultural, TVR Folclor, TVR Info, TVRi, TVR Moldova and TVR Sport along with six regional studios in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Iași, Timișoara, Craiova, and Târgu Mureș.

The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, also known as the Central African Federation (CAF), was a colonial federation that consisted of three southern African territories: the self-governing British colony of Southern Rhodesia and the British protectorates of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland. It existed between 1953 and 1963. Rhodesia and Nyasaland bordered Angola, Bechuanaland, Congo-Léopoldville, Mozambique, South Africa, South West Africa and Tanganyika.

The Tupolev Tu-144 is a Soviet supersonic passenger airliner designed by Tupolev that operated commercially from 1975 to 1983, including 1977–1978 passenger service.

The 1981 Ghanaian coup d'état was a successful government takeover in Ghana led by Air Force Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings, overthrowing the administration of President Hilla Limann and establishing the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC), with Jerry Rawlings assuming leadership of the country. The second of two coups to be orchestrated by Jerry Rawlings, the 1981 coup d'état was motivated by Rawling's dissatisfaction with the management of the country under the Limann administration, as Ghana's economic situation, plagued by spiraling foreign debt and hyperinflation, continued to deteriorate without any real promised political change. Thus, on December 31, 1981, Jerry Rawlings intervened once again in a leftist-backed coup, replacing the government with the PNDC and seeking to transform the country into a Marxist state.

Benjamin Ward was the first African American New York City Police Commissioner.

On New Year's Eve, December 31, 1986, three disgruntled employees of the Dupont Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, intentionally set a fire. The employees were involved in a labor dispute with the owners. The fire killed between 96 and 98 people and injured 140 others. It is the most catastrophic hotel fire in Puerto Rican history and the second deadliest hotel fire in U.S. territory in history, after the Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta in 1946. This fire and other incidents of its kind gave rise to amendments to security policies to be implemented at hotels around the world.

Czechoslovakia was a country in Central Europe. The country was bordered by Austria and Hungary to the south, Germany to the west and northwest, Poland to the northeast, and Ukraine to the southeast. Czechoslovakia had a hilly and mostly mountainous landscape that covered an area of 127,906 square kilometers (49,385 sq mi) with a mostly temperate continental and oceanic climate. The capital and largest city was Prague; other major cities and urban areas include Brno, Ostrava, Plzeň, Liberec, Bratislava and Košice.

The First Chechen War, also referred to as the First Russo-Chechen War, was a conflict between the separatist Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and the Russian Federation from 1994 to 1996. The conflict ended in a peace treaty that saw Russian forces withdraw from the territory only for them to invade again three years later sparking the Second Chechen War of 1999–2009.

The European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM II) is a system introduced by the European Economic Community on 1 January 1999 alongside the introduction of a single currency, the euro as part of the European Monetary System (EMS), to reduce exchange rate variability and achieve monetary stability in Europe.

The Panama Canal is an artificial 82-kilometer (51-mile) waterway in Panama that connects the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean. It cuts across the narrowest point of the Isthmus of Panama, and is a conduit for maritime trade between the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. Locks at each end lift ships up to Gatun Lake, an artificial fresh water lake 26 meters (85 ft) above sea level, created by damming the Chagres River and Lake Alajuela to reduce the amount of excavation work required for the canal. Locks then lower the ships at the other end. The original locks are 33.5 meters (110 ft) wide and allow the passage of Panamax ships. A third, wider lane of locks was constructed between September 2007 and May 2016. The expanded waterway began commercial operation on 26 June 2016. The new locks allow for the transit of larger, Neopanamax ships. An average of 200,000,000 litres of fresh water is used in a single passing of a ship. The canal is threatened by low water levels during droughts.

The national flag of Rwanda is a horizontal tricolour of light blue, yellow, and green, in a 2:1:1 ratio, charged with a golden sun in the upper fly-side corner. It was adopted on 31 December 2001 and replaced the flag adopted shortly before independence. The design of the flag is defined in the Rwandan constitution and regulations regarding the use and manufacture of the flag are outlined in the country's national flag law.

A blue moon refers to the presence of a second full moon in a calendar month, the third full moon in a season containing four, or a moon that appears blue due to atmospheric effects.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government responsible for the United States' civil space program and for research in aeronautics and space. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., NASA operates ten field centers across the U.S. and is organized into three mission directorates: Human Spaceflight, Research and Technology, and Science. Established in 1958 amid the Space Race, NASA succeeded the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) to give the U.S. space program a distinct civilian orientation focused on peaceful applications. Since then, it has led most American spaceflight programs, including Project Mercury, Project Gemini, the Apollo program, Skylab, the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station (ISS) and the ongoing multi-national Artemis program.

On 31 December 2018, at approximately 6:02 a.m. local time, an apartment block in Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, partially collapsed. The collapse killed 39 people and injured 17 more. The cause of the collapse is believed to have been a gas explosion.

A COVID‑19 vaccine is designed to induce immunity against SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). COVID-19 vaccines help reduce the risk of severe illness, hospitalisation and death from the virus.