The final signal was detected from the NASA space probe Pioneer 10, then about 12 billion kilometres (7.5 billion miles) from Earth.
Source23 January 1749
A Thursday in history
Weekday
Thursday
Season
Winter (N. Hemisphere)
Century
18th century
Records
356
2003
2002American journalist Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and later murdered by al-Qaeda agents in Karachi, Pakistan.
Source- 2001
Five people attempted to set themselves on fire in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, an act that many later claimed to have been staged by the Chinese Communist Party to frame Falun Gong and thus escalate their persecution.
Source
1997Madeleine Albright was sworn in as the first female United States Secretary of State, becoming the highest-ranking woman in the history of the U.S. government at that time.
Source
1993The first version of Mosaic, created by Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina, was released, becoming the first popular web browser.
Source
1968USS Pueblo was seized by North Korean forces, who claimed that it had violated their territorial waters while spying.
Source
1957American inventor Fred Morrison sold the rights to his "flying disc" to the Wham-O toy company, who later renamed it the "Frisbee"
Source
1942World War II: Japan began an invasion of the island of New Britain in the Australian Territory of New Guinea.
Source
1915Rebels led by John Chilembwe attacked local plantation owners, beginning an uprising regarded as a key moment in the history of Malawi.
Source
1909Two men committed an armed robbery in Tottenham, London, and led police on a two-hour chase, partially by tram, that ended in the perpetrators' suicides.
Source
1902In the most fatal recorded mountaineering accident, 199 of the 210 members of an Imperial Japanese Army unit perished in a blizzard on the Hakkōda Mountains.
Source
1870American Indian Wars: In the Marias Massacre, the United States Army killed about 200 Piegan Blackfeet, mostly women, children, and the elderly.
Source
1849Elizabeth Blackwell (pictured) graduated from Geneva Medical College in New York, making her the first woman to receive a medical degree in the United States.
Source
1793The Russian Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia partitioned the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth for the second time.
Source
1789Bishop John Carroll purchased a plot of land that would become the home of the future Georgetown University, the oldest Catholic university in the United States.
Source
1570James Hamilton killed James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, in the first recorded assassination of a head of government using a firearm.
Source
1556One of the deadliest earthquakes in history struck Shaanxi, China, resulting in at least 100,000 direct deaths.
Source
1368The Hongwu Emperor (pictured) ascended the throne, initiating the Ming dynasty, which would rule China for three centuries.
Source
1264King Louis IX of France issued the Mise of Amiens, a settlement between King Henry III of England and barons led by Simon de Montfort heavily favouring the former, which later led to the Second Barons' War.
Source
Photo archive
24 historic images from this day — tap to open the gallery.
What was life like?
Prices, jobs, food, music and everyday routine — the world as it felt to live in.
Sources & fact check
Every claim is traced to primary sources, archives, universities and the press — with an explicit confidence rating. Dossiers are generated once and cached permanently.