What Happened Today in History on January 17

Emperor Theodosius I dies and the Roman Empire is permanently divided into Eastern and Western halves. He bequeathed the Eastern half to his son Arcadius and the Western half to his son Honorius. This event is considered the permanent split of the Roman Empire. The East eventually became the Byzantine Empire and the West collapse within a century.

King John of England appoints Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury.

Pope Gregory XI moves the Papal See back to Rome from Avignon, ending the Avignon Papacy.

The city of Prague surrenders to the Prussian army during the War of the Austrian Succession.

Bonnie Prince Charlie's Jacobite forces defeat government troops at the Battle of Falkirk Muir in Scotland.

The first hospital in the United States, the Pennsylvania Hospital, is founded in Philadelphia.

The Leiden University Library, one of the oldest in the Netherlands, burns down with over 100,000 books lost.

English explorer Captain James Cook anchors at Botany Bay in Australia during his first voyage.

American forces win the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina during the American Revolutionary War.

American forces under Daniel Morgan defeat the British at the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina during the American Revolutionary War.

General William T. Sherman begins his march through the Carolinas during the American Civil War.

The Kingdom of Hawaii is overthrown by a group which called themselves the Committee of Safety, staged a coup d'état against Queen Liliuokalani and her government. The group composed of 13 Caucasian businessmen and lawyers, six citizens of the Kingdom and seven foreign residents of Hawaii (five Americans, one Scotsman, and one German). Their ultimate goal was annexation to the United States. However it took five years until that goal was achieved. More

The United States formally devalues the dollar against gold for the first time in history.

Soviet forces capture Warsaw during World War II.

The trial of 11 U.S. Communist Party leaders begins in New York City.

The security firm Brinks, in Boston, Massachusetts, is surprised by five heavily disguised men as they were closing for the day. The men quickly bound the employees and within minutes, they’d stolen more than $1.2 million in cash and another $1.5 million in checks and other securities, making it the largest robbery in the U.S. at the time. More

A US B-52 bomber loaded with nuclear weapons collides with a tanker plane during a midair refueling operation off the coast of Almeria, Spain. Seven of the total 11 crew members were killed. The crash caused four hydrogen bombs to tumble from the B-52; one was later recovered intact in the Mediterranean while the other three crashed on land near the coastal village of Palomares. The bombs did not explode but two cracked open and dispersed 7 pounds of radioactive plutonium with the wind. More

The International Olympic Committee restores Jim Thorpe's Olympic medals 70 years after they were taken away due to his playing semi-professional baseball.

Operation Desert Storm begins as coalition forces led by the United States launch air raids against Iraq, five months after Iraqi forces invaded and annexed Kuwait. More

At 4:30 am, on January 17, 1994, Residents of the greater Los Angeles area were awakened by the strong shaking of the magnitude 6.7 Northridge earthquake. This was the first earthquake to strike directly under an urban area of the United States since the 1933 Long Beach earthquake. More