This is a list of selected December 26 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 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.
Staging area
Images
Use only ONE image at a time
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William Shakespeare -
A tsunami generated by the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake in Ao Nang, Thailand -
Babe Ruth -
Jack Johnson -
Pierre and Marie Curie -
Flannan Isles Lighthouse -
Flamingo Las Vegas -
Ineligible
| Blurb | Reason |
|---|---|
| Saint Stephen's Day (Western Christianity); | refimprove |
| 1790 – French Revolution: Louis XVI of France gave his royal assent to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, subordinating the Roman Catholic Church in France to the French government. | needs more footnotes |
| 1806 – War of the Fourth Coalition: French troops under Napoleon engaged Russian forces in both the Battles of Pułtusk and Golymin. | both: refimprove section |
| 1908 – Boxer Jack Johnson became the first African American Heavyweight Champion of the World after defeating Canadian Tommy Burns in Sydney. | refimprove, unreferenced section, too many examples |
| 1968 – The Communist Party of the Philippines, which is fighting an ongoing insurgency, was established by Jose Maria Sison. | Communist Party: unreferenced section; Sison: refimprove section |
| 1975 – The Tupolev Tu-144, the first commercial aircraft to surpass Mach 2, went into service. | unreferenced section |
| 1980 – Witnesses reported the first of several sightings of unexplained lights in the sky near RAF Woodbridge in Rendlesham Forest, England, in an incident later called "Britain's Roswell". | Refimprove |
| 1991 – The Supreme Soviet officially dissolved itself, completing the dissolution of the Soviet Union. | multiple issues |
| 2006 – The Hengchun earthquake struck off the coast of Taiwan, on the anniversaries of the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake that devastated Southeast and South Asia, and of the 2003 Bam earthquake that killed more than 26,000 people. | 2004: lots of {{cn}} tags (13) |
| John Page |baptised|1628| | lots uncited |
| Jean François de Saint-Lambert |b|1716 | lots of {{cn}} tags (5) |
| Ram Swarup |d|1998 | Deathdate not cited |
Eligible
- 1606 – The first known performance of King Lear, a tragedy written by William Shakespeare (pictured) and based on the legend of Leir of Britain, took place before King James I.
- 1709 – The opera Agrippina by George Frideric Handel premiered in Venice.
- 1776 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington led a Continental Army column across the Delaware River to launch a surprise attack against Hessian forces at the Battle of Trenton (painting shown).
- 1811 – Seventy-two people died when a theater in Richmond, Virginia, was destroyed by fire, becoming the worst urban disaster in American history at the time.
- 1825 – Imperial Russian Army officers led about 3,000 soldiers in protest against Nicholas I's assumption of the throne after his elder brother Konstantin removed himself from the line of succession.
- 1862 – American Civil War: The Battle of Chickasaw Bayou began with Confederate defenders engaging Union forces attempting to capture the city of Vicksburg, Mississippi.
- 1871 – Thespis, the first comic opera by Gilbert and Sullivan, premiered at the Gaiety Theatre in London.
- 1898 – At the French Academy of Sciences, physicists Pierre and Marie Curie announced the discovery of a new element, naming it radium.
- 1900 – A relief crew arrived at the Flannan Isles Lighthouse in Scotland and discovered that the previous crew had disappeared.
- 1919 – American baseball player Babe Ruth was sold by the Boston Red Sox to their rivals, the New York Yankees, beginning the 84-year-long "Curse of the Bambino".
- 1943 – Second World War: The German battleship Scharnhorst was sunk at the Battle of the North Cape during an attempt to attack Arctic convoys.
- 1946 – American gangster Bugsy Siegel opened The Flamingo Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, the oldest casino still in operation on the Las Vegas Strip.
- 1996 – Six-year-old American beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, Colorado.
- Born/died this day: | Masrur al-Balkhi |d|893| Reginald Fitz Jocelin |d|1191| Rose Lok |b|1526| John Fothergill |d|1780| Seth Warner |d|1784| Bazoline Estelle Usher |b|1885 Mary Jane Richardson Jones |d|1909| Raja Pervaiz Ashraf |b|1950|
Notes
- Battle of the Assunpink Creek appears on January 2 and Battle of Princeton appears on January 3, so Washington's crossing of the Delaware/Battle of Trenton should not appear if either of the two are going to
December 26: Boxing Day in the Commonwealth; Wren Day in Ireland and the Isle of Man; Kwanzaa begins (African diaspora in the Americas)
Johann Sebastian Bach
- 1723 – Johann Sebastian Bach (pictured) directed the premiere of Darzu ist erschienen der Sohn Gottes, his first Christmas cantata composed in Leipzig.
- 1943 – World War II: In the Battle of Cape Gloucester, American and Australian forces bombarded Japanese positions on New Britain in the Territory of New Guinea while U.S. Marines invaded from two sides of the island.
- 1996 – The Federation of Korean Trade Unions called on its 1.2 million members to refuse to work, beginning the largest organized strike in South Korean history.
- 2006 – Two earthquakes off the southwest coast of Taiwan damaged submarine communications cables, disrupting Internet services in Asia and affecting financial transactions.
- 2015 – A violent tornado moves through several suburbs of Dallas, killing nine and injuring almost 500 others. It was the deadliest tornado to ever hit Texas during the month of December.
- Willy Corsari (b. 1897)
- Elizabeth David (b. 1913)
- Milagros Benet de Mewton (d. 1948)
- Stanisław Kot (d. 1975)
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