Websites… thisday.aspxhttp://encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/on thisday.aspx mhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/default.st m Date, description, image for each.

3 rd December 1818 Illinois became the 21 st state in the Untied States.

4 th December 1877 Thomas Edison invents the phonograph.

5 th December 1791 Composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart died in Vienna, Austria, at age 35.

6 th December 1992 The destruction of a mosque in India by Hindu extremists set off two months of Muslim-Hindu fighting that claimed at least 2,000 lives.

7 th December 1941 The Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor

8 th December 1980 John Lennon, former member of the Beatles, was shot and killed in New York City by a deranged fan.

9 th December 1965 "A Charlie Brown Christmas" premiered

10 th December 1964 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., received the first Noble Peace Prize.

11 th December 1941 Germany and Italy declared war on United States

12 th November 1913 The Mona Lisa was recovered in Florence after having been stolen two years earlier (August 1911) from the Lourve.

13 th December 2003 American forces captured Saddam Hussein who was hiding in a hole near his hometown of Tikrit.

14 th December 1967 DNA synthesized for the first time.

15 th December 1966 Animated- cartoon pioneer and movie producer Walt Disney died in Los Angeles.

16 th December 2000 Colin Powell was selected to become the first African-American secretary of state.

Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first flight in a heavier-than-air plane at Kitty Hawk, N.C. 17 th December 1903

18 th December 1958 Project Score, the world's first experimental communications satellite, is launched

19 th December 1843 Charles Dickens published “A Christmas Carol”.

20 th December 1803 The United States purchased the Louisiana Territory from France for $15 million.

21 st December 1913 The first crossword puzzle was printed in the New York World.

22 nd December 1894 The U.S. Golf Association is founded.

23 rd December 1823 The poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas" ("'Twas the night before Christmas"), written by either Clement C. Moore or Maj. Henry Livingston, Jr., was published in the Troy Sentinel of New York.

24 th December 1865 The Ku Klux Klan was formed in Pulaski, Tennessee.

25 th December 1977 British film actor, director, and producer Charlie Chaplin died in Switzerland at age 88.

26 th December 1966 The first Kwanzaa is celebrated.

27 th November 1932 Radio City Music Hall in New York City opened.

28 th December 1945 The U.S. Congress officially recognizes the pledge of allegiance and recommends its recitation in American classrooms.

29 th December 1891 Thomas Edison patents the wireless radio.

30 th December 1940 California'sCalifornia's first freeway opened.

31 st December 1938 The first breath test for drivers, "drunkometer,“ was introduced in Indianapolis.drunkometer