January 31: What Happened on This Day in History (High_school Level)?

(Page last edited 10/12/2017)

1. 1801 - John Marshall is appointed the Chief Justice of the United States.
2. 1846 - After the Milwaukee Bridge War, Juneautown and Kilbourntown unify as the City of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
3. 1862 - Alvan Graham Clark discovers the white dwarf star Sirius B, a companion of Sirius, through an 18.5-inch (47 cm) telescope now located at Northwestern University.
4. 1865 - American Civil War: The United States Congress passes the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, abolishing slavery and submits it to the states for ratification.
5. 1944 - World War II: American forces land on Kwajalein Atoll and other islands in the Japanese-held Marshall Islands.
6. 1950 - President Harry S. Truman announces a program to develop the hydrogen bomb.
7. 1958 - Explorer program: Explorer 1 - The first successful launch of an American satellite into orbit.
8. 1958 - James Van Allen discovers the Van Allen radiation belt.
9. 1971 - Apollo program: Apollo 14 - Astronauts Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, and Edgar Mitchell, aboard a Saturn V, lift off for a mission to the Fra Mauro Highlands on the Moon.
10. 1996 - Comet Hyakutake is discovered by Japanese amateur astronomer Yuji Hyakutake.
11. Famous Birthdays: Franz Schubert (Austrian composer), Theodore William Richards (American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate), Irving Langmuir (American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate), Rudolf Mössbauer (German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate), Kenzaburō Ōe (Japanese author, Nobel Prize laureate)

For famous birthdays and other daily events in history, visit our Daily Dose Activities.

Click Here for Yesterday in History: January 30

Click Here for Tomorrow in History: February 1

For more history resources on Internet 4 Classrooms, visit our Social Studies and History index. For Pre K-8th Grade Level History and Social Studies Resources, visit our Grade Level Index.