Today in history, Dec 10th!

Some of the great historical events that happened today in history, on December 10th!

Today in history facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, HistoryOrb.com, and On This Day blogs from my blogroll.

http://hankeringforhistory.com/2012/12/10/today-in-history-dec-10th/

1817	Mississippi was admitted to the union as the 20th state.
1861	Kentucky is admitted to the Confederate States of America.
1862	The U.S. House of Representatives passes a bill creating the state of West Virginia.
1869	Governor John Campbell signs the bill that grants women in Wyoming Territory the right to vote as well as hold public office.
1898	The United States and Spain sign the Treaty of Paris, ceding Spanish possessions, including the Philippines, to the United States.
1917	The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to the International Red Cross.
1918	U.S. troops are called to guard Berlin as a coup is feared.
1919	Captain Ross Smith becomes the first person to fly 11,500 miles from England to Australia.
1936	Edward VIII abdicates to marry Wallis Warfield Simpson, an American-born divorcee.
1941	Japanese troops invade the Philippine island of Luzon.
1941	The siege of Tobruk in North Africa is raised.
1943	Franklin D. Roosevelt signs a bill that postpones a draft of pre-Pearl Harbor fathers.
1943	Allied forces bomb Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria.
1948	The U.N. General Assembly adopted its Universal Declaration on Human Rights.
1949	150,000 French troops mass at the border in Vietnam to prevent a Chinese invasion.
1950	Dr. Ralph J. Bunche becomes the first African-American to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1965	The Grateful Dead played their first concert, at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco.
1967	Singer Otis Redding died at age 26 in the crash of his private plane in Wisconsin.
1977	On UN Human Rights Day, the Soviet Union places 20 prominent dissidents under house arrest, cutting off telephones and threatening to break up a planned silent demonstration in Moscow’s Pushkin Square. Soviet newspapers decry human rights violations elsewhere in the world.
1980	Rep. John W. Jenrette, D-S.C., resigned to avoid being expelled from the House following his conviction on charges related to the FBI’s Abscam investigation.
1984	South African Bishop Desmond Tutu received the Nobel Peace Prize.
1994	Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin received the Nobel Peace Prize.
1998	Six astronauts opened the doors to the new international space station.
1998	The Palestinian leadership scrapped constitutional clauses rejecting Israel’s right to exist.
2001	“The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring,” the first in a three-film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic fantasy trilogy, premiered in London.
2002	Former President Jimmy Carter accepted the Nobel Peace Prize for his diplomacy in the Middle East in the 1970s.
2007	Former Vice President Al Gore accepted the Nobel Peace Prize with a call for humanity to rise up against a looming climate crisis.
2007	NFL star Michael Vick was sentenced to 23 months in prison for bankrolling a dogfighting operation and killing dogs that underperformed.
2007	Cristina Fernandez was sworn in as Argentina’s first elected female president.
2009	President Barack Obama accepted the Nobel Peace Prize with a humble acknowledgment of his scant accomplishments and a robust defense of the U.S. at war.
2009	James Cameron’s 3-D film epic “Avatar” had its world premiere in London.