A Brief History
This article presents a chronological list of notable events that happened on December 12th. For each date below, please click on the date to be taken to an article covering that date’s event.
Digging Deeper
On December 12, 884, the King of West Francia, Carloman II, son of Louis the Stammerer (Louis II), died in a hunting accident.
On December 12, 1098, in what is now Syria, Crusaders massacred 20,000 Muslims and ate some of them!
On December 12, 1862, the United States ship, USS Cairo, an iron-clad gunboat of the City-class, was sunk in the Yazoo River by a remotely detonated Confederate “torpedo,” what naval mines were called back then.
On December 12, 1937, the USS Panay, a gunboat afloat on the Yangtze River near the city of Nanking (now called Nanjing) was attacked by Japanese military aircraft and sunk, with the loss of three American lives.
On December 12, 1939, an all too familiar scenario developed when two British warships collided, resulting in the sinking of the smaller vessel including considerable loss of life.
On December 12, 1941, American forces were still reeling from the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor when Philippine-American pilot Jesus Villamor led a flight of Boeing P-26 “Peashooter” fighter planes against superior Japanese aircraft that were raiding Batanga Airfield.
On December 12, 1967, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, an American comedy-drama film produced and directed by Stanley Kramer, and written by William Rose, was released in the United States of America.
On December 12, 1985, the US Army experienced one of its worst non-combat tragedies in its history when 236 soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division were killed in the crash of Arrow Flight 1285.
On December 12, 2019, as Christmas (December 25, 2019) approached, we asked, “Who doesn’t like the holidays?”
On December 12, 2021, the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix was won by Max Verstappen, beating Lewis Hamilton because of a mistaken conduct of a “safety car” restart at the end of the race.
Question for students (and subscribers) to ponder: Which event that occurred on today’s date would you like to learn more about?
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Andrews, John and Matt Baker. Timeline of World History. Thunder Bay Press, 2020.
You can also watch video versions of this article on YouTube.