On This Day: January 26

On This Date

1788 – The first European settlers in Australia landed in present-day Sydney.
1802 – Congress passed an act calling for a library to be established within the U.S. Capitol.
1837 – Michigan became the 26th state.
1861 – Louisiana seceded from the Union.
1870 – Virginia rejoined the Union.
1925 – Actor Paul Newman was born in Cleveland, Ohio.
1950 – India proclaimed itself a republic.
1979 – Former Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller died at age 70.
1988 – The Andrew Lloyd Webber musical “Phantom of the Opera,” the longest-running show in Broadway history, opened at the Majestic Theater in New York.
1993 – Former Czechoslovak President Vaclav Havel was elected president of the new Czech Republic
1996 – First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton testified before a grand jury connected to the Whitewater probe.
2001 – An earthquake hit the Indian subcontinent, killing more than 13,000 people.
2005 – Condoleezza Rice was sworn in as secretary of state.
2006 – Confronted by Oprah Winfrey on her syndicated talk show, author James Frey acknowledged lies in his addiction memoir “A Million Little Pieces.”
2009 – “Octomom” Nadya Suleman of Whittier, Calif., gave birth to octuplets conceived by in vitro fertilization. Suleman was already a mother of six.