December 21 – Some important events on this day
1163 👉🏼 Hurricane hits villages in Holland/Friesland, causing floods
1582 👉🏼 Flanders adopts Gregorian calendar, tomorrow is Jan 1 1583
1620 👉🏼 Mayflower Pilgrims come ashore at in Plymouth Bay, traditionally thought to be at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts
1891 👉🏼 1st game of basketball, based on rules created by James Naismith, played by 18 students in Springfield, Massachusetts
1894 👉🏼 Mackenzie Bowell becomes the 5th Prime Minister of Canada
1898 👉🏼 French Scientists Pierre and Marie Curie discover radium
1913 👉🏼 1st crossword puzzle (with 32 clues) printed in NY World
1937 👉🏼 The first full-length animated feature film and the earliest in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, premieres at the Carthay Circle Theatre
1970 👉🏼 Elvis Presley meets US President Richard Nixon in the White House – the image of this meeting is the most requested photo from the entire National Archives.
Elvis Presley’s famous meeting with US President Richard Nixon came out of bizarre desire on Presley’s behalf to get a badge from the US Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. His wife Priscilla later wrote that with a badge Presley thought he could “legally enter any country both wearing guns and carrying any drugs he wished.”
So it was that Presley wrote to Nixon “I can and will do more good if I were made a Federal Agent at Large and I will help out by doing it my way through my communications with people of all ages. First and foremost, I am an entertainer, but all I need is the Federal credentials.” He concluded by saying he would love to meet the President.
The letter made its way to Nixon’s aides and the meeting went ahead. Despite the obvious differences between the two, or because of them, the men got along well during their meeting – though Nixon apparently found it slightly awkward – and Presley’s request for a badge was granted.
During the meeting Presley said he felt The Beatles exemplified an anti-American nature (though this didn’t stop him performing Beatles songs in concert, nor from meeting them years earlier) – Paul McCartney later said he felt “betrayed” by Presley’s comment.
1971 👉🏼 The United Arab Emirates is formed
1988 👉🏼 Lockerbie disaster: Pan Am Flight 103 destroyed mid air by a terrorist bomb killing all 258 on board over Scotland
1991 👉🏼 Soviet Union formally dissolves as 11 of 12 republics sign treaty forming Commonwealth of Independent States
2012 👉🏼 “Gangnam Style” by Psy becomes the first video to reach one billion views on YouTube