Updated December 18, 2011, 1:28 pm
On Dec. 19, 1984, Britain and China signed an accord returning Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997.
On Dec. 19, 1906, Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet statesman who was the leader of the Soviet Union for 18 years, was born. Following his death on Nov. 10, 1982, his obituary appeared in The Times.
Go to obituary » | Other birthdays »
On This Date
By The Associated Press
1732 Benjamin Franklin began publishing “Poor Richard’s Almanac.” 1776 Thomas Paine published his first “American Crisis” essay, writing: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” 1777 Gen. George Washington led his army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, Pa., to camp for the winter. 1843 Charles Dickens’ Yuletide tale, “A Christmas Carol,” was first published in Britain. 1907 A coal mine explosion in Jacobs Creek, Pa., killed 239 workers. 1946 War broke out in Indochina as troops under Ho Chi Minh launched widespread attacks against the French. 1972 Apollo 17 splashed down in the Pacific, ending the Apollo program of manned lunar landings. 1974 Nelson A. Rockefeller was sworn in as vice president, replacing Gerald R. Ford, who became president when Richard M. Nixon resigned. 1984 Britain and China signed an accord returning Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. 1986 The Soviet Union announced it had freed dissident Andrei Sakharov from internal exile and pardoned his wife, Yelena Bonner. 1997 “Titanic,” the second highest-grossing movie of all-time, opened in American theaters. 2000 The U.N. Security Council voted to impose broad sanctions on Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers unless they closed terrorist training camps and surrendered U.S. embassy bombing suspect Osama bin Laden. 2003 Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi agreed to halt his nation’s drive to develop nuclear and chemical weapons. 2005 Afghanistan’s first democratically elected parliament in more than three decades convened. Current Birthdays
By The Associated Press
Actor Jake Gyllenhaal turns 31 years old today.
AP Photo/Evan Agostini
Actress Jennifer Beals turns 48 years old today.
AP Photo/Peter Kramer
1933 Cicely Tyson, Actress, turns 78 1934 Al Kaline, Baseball Hall of Famer, turns 77 1941 Maurice White, R&B musician (Earth, Wind and Fire), turns 70 1943 James Jones, Former national security adviser, turns 68 1943 Elaine Joyce, Actress, turns 68 1944 Richard E. Leakey, Palaeontologist, turns 67 1944 Alvin Lee, Rock singer (Ten Years After), turns 67 1944 Tim Reid, Actor (“WKRP in Cincinnati”), turns 67 1955 Rob Portman, U.S. senator, R-Ohio, turns 56 1957 Kevin McHale, Basketball Hall of Famer, turns 54 1960 Mike Lookinland, Actor (“The Brady Bunch”), turns 51 1964 Randall McDaniel, Football Hall of Famer, turns 47 1967 Criss Angel, Magician, turns 44 1969 Kristy Swanson, Actress, turns 42 1971 Amy Locane, Actress, turns 40 1972 Alyssa Milano, Actress (“Charmed,” “Who’s the Boss?”), turns 39 1972 Warren Sapp, Football player, turns 39 1985 Lady Sovereign, Rapper, turns 26 Historic Birthdays
Leonid Brezhnev 12/19/1906 – 11/10/1982 Russian statesman. Go to obituary »
80 Charles-Julien Brianchon 12/19/1783 – 4/29/1864
French mathematician55 Edwin Stanton 12/19/1814 – 12/24/1869
American Secretary of War under President Lincoln78 A.A. Michelson 12/19/1852 – 5/9/1931
German-born American physicist83 Barry Byrne 12/19/1883 – 12/17/1967
American architect74 Fritz Reiner 12/19/1888 – 11/15/1963
Hungarian-born American conductor80 Sir Ralph Richardson 12/19/1902 – 10/10/1983
English actor92 George Davis Snell 12/19/1903 – 6/6/1996
American geneticist and Nobel Prize winner75 Jean Genet 12/19/1910 – 4/15/1986
French novelist47 Edith Piaf 12/19/1915 – 10/11/1963
French singer and actress
