THIS DAY IN HISTORY ― DECEMBER 8

December 8 is the 342nd day of the year (343rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 23 days remaining until the end of the year. This date is slightly more likely to fall on a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday (58 in 400 years each) than on Sunday or Monday (57), and slightly less likely to occur on a Wednesday or Friday (56).

PRETEND TO BE A TIME TRAVELER DAY 

1854 – In his Apostolic constitution Ineffabilis Deus, Pope Pius IX proclaims the dogmatic definition of Immaculate Conception, which holds that the Blessed Virgin Mary was conceived free of Original Sin.

1914 – World War I: A squadron of Britain's Royal Navy defeats the Imperial German East Asia Squadron in the Battle of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.

1927 – The Brookings Institution, one of the United States' oldest think tanks, is founded through the merger of three organizations that had been created by philanthropist Robert S. Brookings.

1941 – World War II: Japanese forces simultaneously invade Shanghai International Settlement, Malaya, Thailand, Hong Kong, the Philippines, and the Dutch East Indies. (See December 7 for the concurrent attack on Pearl Harbor in the Western Hemisphere.)

1953 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers his "Atoms for Peace" speech, which leads to an American program to supply equipment and information on nuclear power to schools, hospitals, and research institutions around the world.

1962 – Workers at four New York City newspapers (this later increases to nine) go on strike for 114 days.

1971 – Indo-Pakistani War: The Indian Navy launches an attack on West Pakistan's port city of Karachi.

1980 – John Lennon is murdered by Mark David Chapman in front of The Dakota in New York City. Lennon disengaged himself from the music business in 1975 to raise his infant son Sean, but re-emerged with Yoko Ono in 1980 with the new album Double Fantasy. He was murdered three weeks after its release.

By 2012, Lennon's solo album sales in the United States exceeded 14 million and, as writer, co-writer, or performer, he is responsible for 25 number-one singles on the US Hot 100 chart. In 2002, a BBC poll on the 100 Greatest Britons voted him eighth and, in 2008, Rolling Stone ranked him the fifth-greatest singer of all time. He was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987, and into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, as a member of the Beatles in 1988 and as a solo artist in 1994.

1988 – A United States Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II crashes into an apartment complex in Remscheid, Germany, killing 5 people and injuring 50 others.

1991 – The leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine sign an agreement dissolving the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States.

2004 – The Cusco Declaration is signed in Cusco, Peru, establishing the South American Community of Nations.

2009 – Bombings in Baghdad, Iraq, kill 127 people and injure 448 others.

2010 – With the second launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 and the first launch of the SpaceX Dragon, SpaceX becomes the first private company to successfully launch, orbit and recover a spacecraft.

2010 – The Japanese solar-sail spacecraft IKAROS passes the planet Venus at a distance of about 80,800 km.

2013 – Riots break out in Singapore after a fatal accident in Little India. About 300 migrant labourers from India were involved in the riot which lasted for around two hours. This was the second riot in post-independence Singapore, and the first in over 40 years since the 1969 race riots.

TODAY'S BIRTHS

65 BC – Horace, Roman soldier and poet (d. 8 BC)

1542 – Mary, Queen of Scots (d. 1587)

1765 – Eli Whitney, American engineer, invented the cotton gin (d. 1825)

1861 – William C. Durant, American businessman, founded General Motors and Chevrolet (d. 1947)

1864 – Camille Claudel, French illustrator and sculptor (d. 1943)

1865 – Jean Sibelius, Finnish violinist and composer (d. 1957)

From Wikipedia and Google, ex as noted.