Jan. 16 history: Desert Storm

In 27 B.C., Caesar Augustus was declared the first Emperor of the Roman Empire by the Senate. 

In 1861, The Crittenden Compromise, the last chance to keep North and South united, dies in the U.S. Senate. 

In 1865, Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman decreed that 400,000 acres of land in the South would be divided into 40-acre lots and given to former slaves. (The order, later revoked by President Andrew Johnson, is believed to have inspired the expression, “Forty acres and a mule.”.)

In 1920, Prohibition began in the United States as the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution took effect, one year to the day after its ratification. (It was later repealed by the 21st Amendment.) 

In 1942, actor Carole Lombard, 33, her mother, Elizabeth, and 20 other people were killed when their plane crashed near Las Vegas, Nevada, while enroute to California from a war-bond promotion tour.

In 1945, Hitler descends into his bunker

In 1991, the White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait. (Allied forces prevailed on Feb. 28, 1991.)

In 2002, Richard Reid was indicted in Boston on federal charges alleging he’d tried to blow up a U.S.-bound jetliner with explosives hidden in his shoes. (Reid later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.)

In 2003, the space shuttle Columbia blasted off for what turned out to be its last flight; on board was Israel’s first astronaut, Ilan Ramon. (The mission ended in tragedy on Feb. 1, when the shuttle broke up during its return descent, killing all seven crew members.)

In 2017, former NASA astronaut Eugene Cernan, to date the last man to walk on the moon, died in Houston at age 82.

In 2020, the first impeachment trial of President Donald Trump opened in the Senate, with senators standing and swearing an oath of “impartial justice.” Trump, who denounced the proceedings as a “hoax,” would later be acquitted on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

In 2013, Pauline Friedman Phillips, better known as advice columnist Dear Abby, died in Minneapolis at age 94. (History.com 01/16/24)