January 28 in History

Charlemagne ( SHAR-lə-mayn; 2 April 748 – 28 January 814) was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire from 800. He united most of Western and Central Europe and was the first recognised emperor to rule from the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Charlemagne's reign was marked by political and social changes that had lasting influence on Europe throughout the Middle Ages. A member of the Frankish Carolingian dynasty, Charlemagne was the eldest son of Pepin the Short and Bertrada of Laon. With his brother Carloman I, he became king of the Franks in 768 following Pepin's death and became the sole ruler three years later. Charlemagne continued his father's policy of protecting the papacy and became its chief defender, removing the Lombards from power in northern Italy in 774. His reign saw a period of expansion that led to the conquests of Bavaria, Saxony, and northern Spain, as well as other campaigns that led Charlemagne to extend his rule over a large part of Europe. Charlemagne spread Christianity to his new conquests, as seen at the Massacre of Verden against the Saxons. He also sent envoys and initiated diplomatic contact with Harun al-Rashid, the Abbasid caliph in the 790s, due to their mutual interest in Iberian affairs. In 800, Charlemagne was crowned emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III. Although historians debate the coronation's significance, the title represented the height of his prestige and authority. Charlemagne's position as the first emperor in the West in over 300 years brought him into conflict with the Eastern Roman Empire in Constantinople. Through his assumption of the imperial title, he is considered the forerunner to the line of Holy Roman Emperors, which persisted into the 19th century. As king and emperor, Charlemagne engaged in numerous reforms in administration, law, education, military organisation, and religion, which shaped Europe for centuries. The stability of his reign began a period of cultural activity known as the Carolingian Renaissance. Charlemagne died in 814 and was buried at the Palatine Chapel (now part of Aachen Cathedral) in Aachen, his imperial capital city. Charlemagne's influence on the Middle Ages and on the territory he ruled has led him to be called the "Father of Europe" by many historians. He is seen as a founding figure by multiple European states, and several historical royal houses of Europe trace their lineage back to him. Charlemagne has been the subject of artworks, monuments and literature during and after the medieval period.

The Road to Canossa or Humiliation of Canossa (Italian: L'umiliazione di Canossa), or, sometimes, the Walk to Canossa (German: Gang nach Canossa/Kanossa) was the journey of the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV to Canossa Castle in 1077, and his subsequent ritual submission there to Pope Gregory VII. It took place during the Investiture controversy and involved the Emperor seeking absolution and the revocation of his excommunication by the Pope who had been staying at the castle as the guest of Margravine Matilda of Tuscany. According to contemporary sources, he was forced to supplicate on his knees, waiting for three days and nights before the castle gate while a blizzard raged, "one of the most dramatic moments of the Middle Ages". The episode has spurred much debate among medieval chroniclers as well as modern historians, who dispute whether the walk was a humiliating defeat for the emperor or a "brilliant masterstroke".

Charles VI (3 December 1368 – 21 October 1422), nicknamed the Beloved (French: le Bien-Aimé) and in the 19th century, the Mad (French: le Fol or le Fou), was King of France from 1380 until his death in 1422. He is known for his mental illness and psychotic episodes that plagued him throughout his life, including glass delusion. Charles ascended the throne at age 11, his father Charles V leaving behind a favorable military situation, marked by the reconquest of most of the English possessions in France. Charles VI was placed under the regency of his uncles: Philip II, Duke of Burgundy; Louis I, Duke of Anjou; John, Duke of Berry; and Louis II, Duke of Bourbon. He decided in 1388, aged 20, to emancipate himself. In 1392, while leading a military expedition against the Duchy of Brittany, the king had his first attack of delirium, during which he attacked his own men in the forest of Le Mans. A few months later, following the Bal des Ardents (January 1393) where he narrowly escaped death from burning, Charles was again placed under the regency of his uncles, the Dukes of Berry and Burgundy. From then on, and until his death, Charles alternated between periods of mental instability and lucidity. Power was held by his influential uncles and by his wife, Queen Isabeau. His younger brother, Louis I, Duke of Orléans, also aspired to the regency and saw his influence grow. The enmity between the Duke of Orléans and his cousin John the Fearless, successor of Philip the Bold as Duke of Burgundy, plunged France into the Armagnac–Burgundian Civil War of 1407–1435, during which the king found himself successively controlled by one or the other of the two parties. In 1415, Charles's army was crushed by the English at the Battle of Agincourt. The king subsequently signed the Treaty of Troyes, which entirely disinherited his son, the Dauphin and future King Charles VII, in favour of Henry V of England. Henry was thus made regent and heir to the throne of France, and Charles' daughter Catherine married to Henry. However, Henry died shortly before Charles, which gave the House of Valois the chance to continue the fight against the House of Lancaster, leading to eventual Valois victory and the end of the Hundred Years' War in 1453. Charles was succeeded in law by his grandson (Henry V's son), the infant Henry VI of England, but Charles's own son was crowned first in Reims Cathedral in 1429 and was widely regarded even before his coronation as the true heir by the French people.

The Diet of Worms of 1521 (German: Reichstag zu Worms [ˈʁaɪçstaːk tsuː ˈvɔʁms]) was an imperial diet (a formal deliberative assembly) of the Holy Roman Empire called by Emperor Charles V and conducted in the Imperial Free City of Worms. Martin Luther was summoned to the diet in order to renounce or reaffirm his views in response to a Papal bull of Pope Leo X. In answer to questioning, he defended the views that had been criticized and refused to recant them. At the end of the diet, the Emperor issued the Edict of Worms (Wormser Edikt), a decree which condemned Luther as "a notorious heretic" and banned citizens of the Empire from propagating his ideas. Although the Reformation is usually considered to have begun in 1517, this edict is the first overt schism associated with it. The diet was conducted from 28 January to 25 May 1521 at the Bischofshof palace in Worms, with the Emperor presiding. Other imperial diets took place at Worms in the years 829, 926, 1076, 1122, 1495, and 1545, but unless plainly qualified, the term "Diet of Worms" usually refers to the assembly of 1521.

Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. The only surviving son of Henry VIII by his third wife, Jane Seymour, Edward was the first English monarch to be raised as a Protestant. During his reign, the realm was governed by a regency council because Edward never reached maturity. The council was first led by his uncle Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset (1547–1549), and then by John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland (1550–1553). Edward's reign was marked by many economic problems and social unrest that in 1549 erupted into riot and rebellion. An expensive war with Scotland, at first successful, ended with military withdrawal from Scotland and Boulogne-sur-Mer in exchange for peace. The transformation of the Church of England into a recognisably Protestant body also occurred under Edward, who took great interest in religious matters. His father, Henry VIII, had severed the link between the English Church and Rome but continued to uphold most Catholic doctrine and ceremony. During Edward's reign, Protestantism was established for the first time in England, with reforms that included the abolition of clerical celibacy and the Latin Mass and the imposition of compulsory English in church services, including a communion service with a Protestant emphasis. In 1553, at age 15, Edward fell ill. When his sickness was discovered to be terminal, he and his council drew up a "Devise for the Succession" to prevent the country's return to Catholicism. Edward named his Protestant first cousin once removed, Lady Jane Grey, as his heir, excluding his half-sisters, Mary and Elizabeth. This decision was disputed following Edward's death, and Jane was deposed by Mary nine days after becoming queen. Mary, a Catholic, reversed Edward's Protestant reforms during her reign, but after her, Elizabeth restored them in 1559.

The Warsaw Confederation, also called the Compact of Warsaw, was a political-legal act concluded in Warsaw by the first Convocation Sejm (Sejm konwokacyjny) of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and formally promulgated in Kraków on 28 January 1573. Convened and deliberating as a confederation between 6 and 29 January 1573, during the Commonwealth's first interregnum (1572–1574), the Sejm sought to establish a general confederation to secure continuity of governance and prepare for the election of a new king. The confederation also aimed to enact a guarantee of religious tolerance, ensuring the political equality of dissenters with Catholics. It is regarded as one of the first European acts to grant freedom of religion. It was an important development in the history of Poland and Lithuania, extending religious tolerance to the nobility and free persons (burghers, the townspeople of royal cities) within the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. This event is considered the formal beginning of religious freedom in the Commonwealth. Although the confederation initially granted religious freedom primarily to the nobility, it was also embraced in practice by the townspeople of royal cities. This groundbreaking act marked a significant milestone not just for the Commonwealth but for the entire continent, as it was one of the first European acts granting broad religious freedoms. The text of the Warsaw Confederation was originally written in multiple languages: the original in Classical Latin and Old Polish (mixed-language manuscript), with translations in Ruthenian, Early New High German, and Middle French (intended for Prince Henry of Valois who would be crowned King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania). This multilingual approach ensured that the document could be understood by a diverse audience within the Commonwealth and beyond. While the confederation could not prevent all religious conflicts and tensions within the state, it guaranteed religious tolerance, civil rights, and political equality to religious minorities, the so-called dissenters (dissidentes de religione), who did not follow the dominant Roman Catholic state religion. At the same time, it ensured internal peace and stability in the Commonwealth, especially during a time of great religious upheavals in 16th and 17th century Europe, which culminated in events such as the bloody Huguenot Wars and the devastating Thirty Years' War.

Agnes Sampson (died 28 January 1591) was a Scottish healer and purported witch. Also known as the "Wise Wife of Keith", Sampson was executed during the North Berwick witch trials in the last decade of the 16th century.

Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country located at the southern end of Central America in North America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the south. Its capital and largest city is Panama City, whose metropolitan area is home to nearly half of the country's over 4 million inhabitants.

The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; Russian: Росси́йская акаде́мия нау́к, РАН, romanized: Rossiyskaya akademiya nauk, RAN) consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation; and additional scientific and social units such as libraries, publishing units, and hospitals. Peter the Great established the academy (then the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences) in 1724 with guidance from Gottfried Leibniz. From its establishment, the academy benefited from a slate of foreign scholars as professors; the academy then gained its first clear set of goals from the 1747 Charter. The academy functioned as a university and research center throughout the mid-18th century until the university was dissolved, leaving research as the main pillar of the institution. The rest of the 18th century continuing on through the 19th century consisted of many published academic works from Academy scholars and a few Academy name changes, ending as The Imperial Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences right before the Soviet period. Now headquartered in Moscow, the academy (RAS) is a non-profit organization established in the form of a federal state budgetary institution chartered by the Government of Russia. In 2013, the Russian government restructured RAS, assigning control of its property and research institutes to a new government agency headed by Mikhail Kotyukov. As of November 2017, the academy included 1,008 institutions and other units; in total, about 125,000 people were employed of whom 47,000 were scientific researchers.

Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford, better known as Horace Walpole, was a British Whig politician, writer, historian and antiquarian.

Jane Austen was an English writer known primarily for her six novels, which implicitly interpret, critique, and comment on the English landed gentry at the end of the 18th century.

The Battle of Aliwal was fought on 28 January 1846 between the British and Sikh forces in northern India (now Punjab, India). The British were led by Sir Harry Smith, while the Sikhs were led by Ranjodh Singh Majithia. Britain's victory in the battle is sometimes regarded as the turning point in the First Anglo-Sikh War.

Northwestern University (NU) is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851, it is the oldest chartered university in Illinois. Northwestern was initially affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal Church but later became non-sectarian. Northwestern became a founding member of the Big Ten Conference in 1896 and joined the Association of American Universities in 1917. Northwestern is composed of eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools in the fields of management, law, journalism, engineering, medicine, and others. As of 2024, the university had an endowment of $15.6 billion, an annual budget of around $3.3 billion, and research funding of over $1 billion. The university fields 19 intercollegiate athletic teams, the Northwestern Wildcats, which compete in the NCAA Division I in the Big Ten Conference. As of September 2026, 39 Nobel Prize laureates and 2 Fields Medalists were affiliated with Northwestern as alumni or faculty. In addition, Northwestern has been associated with 53 Pulitzer Prize winners, 23 National Medal of Science winners, 11 National Humanities Medal recipients, 23 MacArthur Fellows, 20 Rhodes Scholars, and 28 Marshall Scholars. Northwestern alumni also include 10 living billionaires, 2 U.S. Supreme Court justices, and 25 Olympic medalists.

The Panama Canal Railway (PCR, Spanish: Ferrocarril de Panamá) is a railway line linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean in Central America. Opened in 1855, the route today stretches 47.6 miles (76.6 km) across the Isthmus of Panama from Colón (Atlantic) to Balboa (Pacific, near Panama City). The construction of the railroad, under difficult physical conditions and with the day's limited technology, was hailed as an international engineering achievement—one that cost US$8 million and the lives of an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 workers. The railway was vital to the early 1900s construction of the Panama Canal, and its route was altered to accommodate the creation of the canal's Gatun Lake. After World War II, the railroad's importance declined and much of it fell into a state of neglect. It was reopened in 2001 after a three-year effort to rebuild it to haul intermodal traffic. The original line was built by the United States and the principal incentive was the vast increase in passenger and freight traffic from the Eastern United States to California following the 1849 California Gold Rush. The United States Congress had provided subsidies to companies to operate mail and passenger steamships on the coasts, and supported some funds for construction of the railroad, which began in 1850; the first revenue train ran over the full length on January 28, 1855. Referred to as an inter-oceanic railroad when it opened, it was later also described by some as representing a "transcontinental" railroad, despite traversing only the narrow isthmus connecting the North and South American continents. For a time the Panama Railroad also owned and operated ocean-going ships that provided mail and passenger service to a few major US East Coast and West Coast cities, respectively. Known as the Panama Railroad Company when founded in the 19th century, today it is operated as Panama Canal Railway Company (reporting mark: PCRC). From 1998 to 2025, it was jointly owned by then Kansas City Southern, now Canadian Pacific Kansas City, and Mi-Jack Products and leased to the government of Panama. On April 2, 2025, Canadian Pacific Kansas City and Mi-Jack Products sold the railway to APM Terminals, which is owned by Maersk. Limited passenger service is offered mainly for tourists and cruise ship passengers, operating as an approximately three-hour round trip between Panama City and Colón.

The Franco-Prussian War, occasionally known as the Franco-German War, and sometimes referred to in France as the War of 1870, was a conflict between France and the North German Confederation led by Prussia. Lasting from 19 July 1870 to 28 January 1871, the conflict was caused primarily by France's determination to reassert its dominant position in continental Europe, which appeared in question following the decisive Prussian victory over Austria in 1866. After Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern of the Roman Catholic branch Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen had been offered the vacant Spanish throne in 1870 and had withdrawn his acceptance, the French ambassador approached Prussian King Wilhelm I at his vacationing site in Ems demanding Prussia renounce any future claims, which Wilhelm rejected. The internal Ems dispatch reported this to Berlin on July 13; Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck quickly then made it public with altered wording. Thus the French newspapers for July 14, the French national holiday contained translations of Bismarck's press release, but not a report from their own ambassador. A crowd in the streets of Paris demanded war, and soon French mobilization was ordered. According to some historians, Bismarck deliberately provoked the French into declaring war on Prussia in order to induce four independent southern German states—Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt—to join the North German Confederation. Other historians contend that Bismarck exploited the circumstances as they unfolded. All agree that Bismarck recognized the potential for new German alliances, given the situation as a whole. France mobilised its army on 15 July 1870, leading the North German Confederation to respond with its own mobilisation later that day. On 16 July 1870, the French parliament voted to declare war on Prussia; France invaded German territory on 2 August. The German coalition mobilised its troops much more effectively than the French and invaded northeastern France on 4 August. German forces were superior in numbers, training, and leadership and made more effective use of modern technology, particularly railways and artillery. A series of hard-fought Prussian and German victories in eastern France, culminating in the Siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, resulted in the capture of the French Emperor Napoleon III and the decisive defeat of the army of the Second Empire; a Government of National Defense was formed in Paris on 4 September and continued the war for another five months. German forces fought and defeated new French armies in northern France, then besieged Paris for over four months before it fell on 28 January 1871, effectively ending the war. In the final days of the war, with German victory all but assured, the German states proclaimed their union as the German Empire under the Prussian king Wilhelm I. With the notable exceptions of Austria and German Switzerland, the vast majority of German-speakers were united under a nation-state for the first time. Following an armistice with France, the Treaty of Frankfurt was signed on 10 May 1871, giving Germany billions of francs in war indemnity, as well as most of Alsace and parts of Lorraine, which became the Imperial Territory of Alsace-Lorraine (Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen). The war had a lasting impact on Europe. By hastening German unification, the war significantly altered the balance of power on the continent, with the new German state supplanting France as the dominant European land power. Bismarck maintained great authority in international affairs for two decades, developing a reputation for Realpolitik that raised Germany's global stature and influence. In France, it brought a final end to imperial rule and began the first lasting republican government. Resentment over the French government's handling of the war and its aftermath triggered the Paris Commune, a revolutionary uprising which seized and held power for two months before its suppression; the event would influence the politics and policies of the Third Republic.

The Yale Daily News is a student newspaper published by students at Yale University, an Ivy League university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States since 1878. It is the oldest independent college daily newspaper in the United States.

East Peckham is a village and civil parish in Kent, England on the River Medway. The parish covers the main village as well as Hale Street and Beltring.

Carnegie Science, also known as Carnegie Institution for Science and formerly the Carnegie Institution of Washington, is an independent, nonprofit organization established in 1902 to fund and perform scientific research. The institution is headquartered in Washington, D.C. Its three interdisciplinary scientific divisions focus on life and environmental science, Earth and planetary science, and astronomy and astrophysics. In 2024, expenses for scientific programs and administration totaled approximately $110 million. As of June 30, 2025, the institution's investment portfolio was valued at approximately $986 million. The current president is American astronomer and astrophysicist John Mulchaey, whose official term began in November 2024.

The Portuguese Republican Party was a Portuguese political party formed during the late years of the constitutional monarchy that proposed and later brought about the replacement of the monarchy with the Portuguese First Republic.

Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country in the Caribbean. It comprises the eponymous main island as well as 4,195 islands, islets, and cays. Situated at the convergence of the Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and Atlantic Ocean, Cuba is located east of the Yucatán Peninsula, south of both Florida and the Bahamas, west of Hispaniola, and north of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. Cuba is the largest country in the Caribbean by area and the third-largest by population, after Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Culturally, Cuba is considered to be part of Latin America. Its capital and largest city is Havana.

The United States Congress is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a bicameral legislature, including a lower body, the U.S. House of Representatives, and an upper body, the U.S. Senate. They both meet in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.

Manitoba is a province of Canada at the longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's fifth-most populous province, with an estimated population of 1,517,379 as of 2026. Manitoba is bordered by Nunavut and the Northwest Territories to the north, Hudson Bay to the northeast, Ontario to the east, the US states of North Dakota and Minnesota to the south, and Saskatchewan to the west. The province has a widely varied landscape, from arctic tundra and the Hudson Bay coastline in the north to dense boreal forest, large freshwater lakes, and prairie grassland in the central and southern regions. Its capital and largest city is Winnipeg.

The Finnish Civil War was fought in 1918 for the leadership and control of recently independent Finland (formerly part of Russia) between White Finland and the Finnish Socialist Workers' Republic (Red Finland). The clashes took place in the context of the national, political, and social turmoil caused by World War I (Eastern Front) in Europe. The belligerents were the paramilitary Red Guards, led by a section of the Social Democratic Party with backup of the Russian bolsheviks, and the paramilitary White Guards of the senate. General C. G. E. Mannerheim led the White Guards with major assistance by both the Finnish Jäger Battalion trained in Germany and from March-April 1918 by the German Imperial Army, along the German goal to control Fennoscandia and Petrograd of Russia. The Reds, composed of industrial and agrarian working class people, controlled the cities and industrial centres of southern Finland. The Whites, composed of land owners and the middle and upper class, controlled the rural central and northern Finland. In the years before the civil war, Finland had experienced rapid population growth, industrialisation, gradually increasing urbanisation and the rise of a comprehensive labour movement. The country's political and governmental systems were in an unstable phase of democratisation and modernisation. The socio-economic condition and education of the population had gradually improved, and national awareness and culture had progressed. World War I led to the collapse of the Russian Empire, causing a power vacuum in Finland, and the subsequent struggle for dominance led to militarisation and an escalating crisis between the left-leaning labour movement and the conservatives. The Reds carried out an unsuccessful general offensive in February 1918, supplied with weapons by Soviet Russia. A counteroffensive by the Whites began in March, reinforced by the German Empire's military detachments in April. The decisive engagements were the Battles of Tampere and Viipuri, won by the Whites, and the Battles of Helsinki and Lahti, won by German troops, leading to overall victory for the Whites and the German forces. Political violence became a part of this warfare with around 12,000 casualties - most of them were Reds. Moreover, about 12,500 Red prisoners died of malnutrition and disease in camps. In total around 38,000 people died in the conflict, where around one million Finns of the total population of three million had been more or less involved with. In the immediate aftermath, Finland passed from the sphere of influence of Soviet Russia to the German power sphere with a plan to establish a German-led Finnish monarchy. The scheme ended with Germany's defeat in World War I, and Finland instead emerged as a sovereign, democratic, constitutional state with proper civil society. The civil war divided the nation for decades. The Finnish society was gradually reunited through social compromises based on a long-term culture of moderate politics, religion and a post-war economic recovery.

The Order of the White Rose of Finland (Finnish: Suomen Valkoisen Ruusun ritarikunta; Swedish: Finlands Vita Ros’ orden) is one of three official orders in Finland, along with the Order of the Cross of Liberty, and the Order of the Lion of Finland. The President of Finland is the Grand Master of all three orders. The orders are administered by boards consisting of a chancellor, a vice-chancellor and at least four members. The orders of the White Rose of Finland and the Lion of Finland have a joint board.

For centuries, Spain recruited foreign soldiers to its armies, forming the foreign regiments such as the Regiment of Hibernia. However, the specific unit of the Spanish Army and Spain's Rapid Reaction Force, now known as the Spanish Legion, and informally known as the Tercio, is a 20th-century creation. It was raised in the 1920s to serve as part of Spain's Army of Africa. The unit, which was established in January 1920 as the Spanish equivalent of the French Foreign Legion, was initially known as the Tercio de Extranjeros, the name under which it began fighting in the Rif War of 1921–1926.

The Knickerbocker storm was a blizzard on January 27–28, 1922 in the upper South and the middle Atlantic United States. The storm took its name from the resulting collapse of the Knickerbocker Theatre in Washington, D.C., shortly after 9 p.m. on January 28, which killed 98 people and injured 133.

The January 28 incident or Shanghai incident was a conflict between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. In apparent response to a mob attack on Japanese Buddhist monks, the Japanese in Shanghai rioted and burned down a factory, killing two Chinese. Heavy fighting broke out, and China appealed to the League of Nations. A truce was finally reached on May 5, calling for Chinese military withdrawal, and an end to Chinese boycotts of Japanese products. It is seen as the first example of a modern war waged in a large city between two heavily equipped armies and as a preview of what was to come during the Second World War.

Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the second-largest Muslim population in the world as of 2023. Islamabad is the nation's capital, while Karachi is its largest city and financial centre. Pakistan is the 33rd-largest country by area. Bounded by the Arabian Sea on the south, the Gulf of Oman on the southwest, and the Sir Creek on the southeast, it shares land borders with India to the east; Afghanistan to the west; Iran to the southwest; and China to the northeast. It shares a maritime border with Oman in the Gulf of Oman, and is separated from Tajikistan in the northwest by Afghanistan's narrow Wakhan Corridor.

Iceland is a Nordic island country between the Arctic Ocean and the North Atlantic Ocean, located on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between Europe and North America. It is Europe's westernmost and most sparsely populated country. Its capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which is home to about 35% of the country's roughly 395,000 residents. The official language of the country is Icelandic. Iceland is on a rift between tectonic plates, and its geologic activity includes geysers and frequent volcanic eruptions. The interior consists of a volcanic plateau with sand and lava fields, mountains and glaciers, and many glacial rivers flow to the sea through the lowlands. Iceland is warmed by the Gulf Stream and has a temperate climate, despite being at a latitude just south of the Arctic Circle. Its latitude and marine influence keep summers chilly, and most of its islands have a polar climate.

The land speed record (LSR) or absolute land speed record is the highest speed achieved by a person using a vehicle on land. By a 1964 agreement between the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) and Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM), respective governing bodies for racing in automobiles and motorcycles, both bodies recognise as the absolute LSR whatever is the highest speed record achieved across any of their various categories. While the three-wheeled Spirit of America set an FIM-validated LSR in 1963, all subsequent LSRs are by vehicles in FIA Category C in either class JE or class RT.

The Franco-Thai War was fought between Thailand and Vichy France over certain areas of French Indochina.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many engaging in total war on an unprecedented scale. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the deaths of 60 to 75 million people, a majority of whom were civilians. Millions died as a result of massacres, starvation, disease, and genocides including the Holocaust. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

Elvis Aaron Presley was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is widely regarded as one of the most culturally significant figures of the 20th century. Presley's energetic and sexually provocative performance style, combined with a mixture of influences across color lines during a transformative era in race relations, brought both great success and initial controversy.

Lego is a brand of plastic construction toys manufactured by the Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. Lego consists of variously coloured interlocking plastic bricks made of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) that accompany an array of gears, figurines called minifigures, and various other parts. Its pieces can be assembled and connected in many ways to construct objects, including vehicles, buildings, and working robots. Assembled Lego models can be taken apart, and their pieces can be reused to create new constructions.

The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada and the highest professional level of American football in the world. Each NFL season begins annually with a three-week preseason in August, followed by an 18-week regular season, which runs from early September to early January, with each team playing 17 games and having one bye week. Seven teams from each conference, including the four division winners and three wild card teams, then advance to the playoffs, a single-elimination tournament, which culminates in the Super Bowl, played in early February between the winners of the AFC and NFC championship games. The NFL is headquartered in New York City.

The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is a part of the United States Department of Defense (DoD) and is one of the six armed forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal Corps, the Air Force was established by transfer of personnel from the Army Air Forces with the enactment of the National Security Act of 1947. It is the second youngest branch of the United States Armed Forces and the fourth in order of precedence. The United States Air Force articulates its core missions as air supremacy, global integrated intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, rapid global mobility, global strike, and command and control.

The national flag of Canada, popularly referred to as the Maple Leaf, consists of a red field with a white square at its centre in the horizontal ratio of 1∶2∶1, in which is featured one stylized, red, 11-pointed maple leaf charged in the centre. It is the first flag to have been adopted by both houses of Parliament and officially proclaimed by the Canadian monarch as the country's official national flag. The flag has become the predominant and most recognizable national symbol of Canada.

The blizzard of 1977 hit Western New York, Central New York, Northern New York, and Southern Ontario from January 28 to February 1 of that year. Daily peak wind gusts ranging from 46 to 69 mph were recorded by the National Weather Service in Buffalo, with snowfall as high as 100 in (254 cm) recorded in areas, and the high winds blew this into drifts of 30 to 40 ft. There were 23 total storm-related deaths in Western New York, with five more in northern New York.

USCGC Blackthorn (WLB-391) was a 180-foot (55 m) seagoing buoy tender (WLB) of the United States Coast Guard that sank following a collision in Tampa Bay, resulting in 23 fatalities.

Ronald Wilson Reagan was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. A member of the Republican Party, he became an important figure in the American conservative movement. The period encompassing his presidency is known as the Reagan era.

The United States Army is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is designated as the army of the United States in the United States Constitution. As a part of the United States Department of Defense, it is one of the six armed forces of the United States and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Founded in 1784, it succeeded the Continental Army, formed in 1775 during the American Revolutionary War.

Severe Tropical Storm Domoina in 1984 caused 100-year floods in South Africa and record rainfall in Swaziland. The fourth named storm of the season, Domoina developed on January 16 off the northeast coast of Madagascar. With a ridge to the north, the storm tracked generally westward and later southwestward. On January 21, Domoina struck eastern Madagascar, the third storm in six weeks to affect the nation; collectively, the storms caused 242 deaths and $25 million in damage (1984 USD). After crossing the country, Domoina strengthened in the Mozambique Channel to peak 10-minute sustained winds of 95 km/h (60 mph). On January 28, the storm made landfall in southern Mozambique, and slowly weakened over land. Domoina crossed into Swaziland and later eastern South Africa before dissipating on February 2.

"We Are the World" is a charity single recorded by the supergroup USA for Africa in 1985. It was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie and produced by Quincy Jones for the album We Are the World to raise money for the 1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia. With sales in excess of 20 million physical copies, it is the eighth-best-selling single of all time.

The Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. Its official program name was carried over from the 1969 plan for the Space Transportation System (STS) of reusable spacecraft. Only the shuttle and supporting rockets were funded for development; a proposed nuclear lunar shuttle in the plan was canceled in 1972. It flew 135 missions and carried 355 astronauts from 16 countries, many on multiple trips.

R v Morgentaler, [1988] 1 SCR 30 is a decision of the Supreme Court of Canada which held that the abortion provision in the Criminal Code was unconstitutional because it violated women's rights to security of the person under section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Since this ruling, there have been no criminal laws regulating abortion in Canada.

TAME Flight 120 was a Boeing 727-134 airliner, registration HC-BLF, named El Oro, operating as a scheduled international passenger flight between Quito, Ecuador and Cali, Colombia, with a scheduled stopover at the Ecuadorian border town of Tulcán. The aircraft crashed while on approach to Tulcán's Teniente Coronel Luis A. Mantilla International Airport on January 28, 2002. The pilot flew the approach incorrectly in reportedly foggy conditions, and the aircraft crashed into the side of the Cumbal Volcano, located near Ipiales, Colombia, at 10:23 in the morning. All 94 passengers and crew were killed in the crash.

Katowice International Fair was an international trade fair in Katowice and one of the largest in Poland. A few dozen events were organized there each year, with the participation of some 4,500 companies.

Protests over the killing of Tyre Nichols began on January 27, 2023, following the release of police body camera and surveillance footage showing five Black officers from the Memphis Police Department beating Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man. The police assault on Nichols occurred on January 7, 2023, and he died three days later in a hospital. The five officers were subsequently fired and charged with second-degree murder. Protests first emerged in Memphis, Tennessee, and spread to several cities in the United States. Protesters demanded legal accountability for the officers responsible for Nichols death and for the enactment of police-reform measures.

The Learjet 45 (LJ45) is a mid-size business jet aircraft produced by the Learjet Division of Bombardier Aerospace.

On 28 January 2026, a severe collapse occurred at the Rubaya mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Initially, 200 people were estimated to have been killed in the collapse, but by 2 February, more than 400 deaths were confirmed in the incident. The mine collapse was caused by a landslide that was the result of years of poor mining practices and a lack of maintenance. Several individual mines collapsed in the landslide.

Storm Kristin was a compact, catastrophic and record-breaking extratropical cyclone that severely impacted Portugal, as well as parts of the Mediterranean and Southeastern Europe in late January 2026. Storm Kristin was the twenty-sixth storm of the 2025–26 European windstorm season, and the eleventh to be named by the south-western naming group, which consists of France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and Luxembourg. Kristin was named by the IPMA on 27 January, as a significant impact was forecast. The impact of Kristin and its successors was described as a humanitarian crisis by a researcher in extreme weather and climate change.