05 January History
- 1477 - Swiss troops defeat the forces under Charles the Bold of Burgundy at the Battle of Nancy.
- 1815 - Federalists from all over New England, angered over the War of 1812, draw up the Hartford Convention, demanding several important changes in the U.S. Constitution.
- 1861 - The merchant vessel Star of the West sets sail from New York to Fort Sumter, in response to rebel attack, carrying supplies and 250 troops.
- 1904 - American Marines arrive in Seoul, Korea, to guard the U.S. legation there.
- 1914 - Henry Ford astounds the world as he announces that he will pay a minimum wage of $5 a day and will share with employees $10 million in the previous year's profits.
- 1917 - Bulgarian and German troops occupy the Port of Braila.
- 1919 - British ships shell the Bolshevik headquarters in Riga.
- 1920 - GOP women demand equal representation at the Republican National Convention in June.
- 1921 - Wagner's "Die Walkyrie" opens in Paris. This is the first German opera performed in Paris since the beginning of World War I.
- 1923 - The U.S. Senate debates the benefits of Peyote for the American Indian.
- 1925 - Nellie Tayloe Ross of Wyoming is sworn in as the first woman governor in the United States.
- 1936 - Daggha Bur, Ethiopia, is bombed by the Italians.
- 1942 - U.S. and Filipino troops complete their withdrawal to a new defensive line along the base of the Bataan peninsula.
- 1947 - Great Britain nationalizes its coal mines.
- 1951 - Inchon, South Korea, the sight of General Douglas MacArthur's amphibious flanking maneuver, is abandoned by United Nations force to the advancing Chinese Army.
- 1952 - Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrives in Washington to confer with President Harry S. Truman.
- 1968 - U.S. forces in Vietnam launch Operation Niagara I to locate enemy units around the Marine base at Khe Sanh.
- 1969 - President Richard M. Nixon appoints Henry Cabot Lodge as negotiator at the Paris Peace Talks.
- 1971 - President Richard M. Nixon names Robert Dole as chairman of the Republican National Party.
- 1982 - A Federal judge voids a state law requiring balanced classroom treatment of evolution and creationism.
05 January Birthdays
- 1779 - Stephen Decatur, American naval hero during actions against the Barbay pirates and the War of 1812.
- 1876 - Conrad Adenauer, first chancellor of post-World War II West Germany.
- 1928 - Walter Mondale, 42nd Vice President of the United States, Democratic presidential nominee who lost to Ronald Reagan in 1984, and Ambassador to Japan.
- 1932 - Umberto Eco, Italian novelist (The Name of the Rose).
- 1938 - Juan Carlos I, King of Spain.