0001 Christmas, according to calendar-maker Dionysus Exiguus

0336 The first1st recorded celebration of Christmas on 2005occurs in Rome

0597 England adopts Julian calendar

0795 Adrian I ends his reign as Catholic Pope

1066 Harold II is killed in the Battle of Hastings, and William is crowned December 25

1223 St Francis of Assisi assembles first Nativity scene (Greccio, Italy)

1535 French explorer Jacques Cartier and his crew celebrate Canada's first recorded Christmas at Stadacona.

1621 Gov William Bradford forbids game playing on this day

1635 Samuel de Champlain c1567-1635 dies at Quebec on Christmas Day, age 68, after stroke paralyzed him in October;

1745 Treaty of Dresden gives much of Silesia to the Prussians

1758 Halley's comet first sighted by Johann Georg Palitzsch during return

1760 Juptier Hammon, New York slave, publishes poetry in "An Evening Thought"

1775 Pope Pius VI encyclical on the problems of the pontificate

1776 Washington crosses Delaware and surprises and defeats 1,400 Hessians

1843 First theatre matinee (Olympic Theatre, NYC)

1848 New Haven Railroad opens

1854 Opening of the Bytown and Prescott Railway between Prescott and Bytown (now Ottawa), 54 miles. First rail service to what is now Canada's Capital. Bytown was renamed Ottawa in 1855 and the railway became the Ottawa and Prescott Railway Company, now part of Canadian Pacific.

1855 Soldiers of the Royal Canadian Rifles at the Tête du Pont barracks clear ice from Lake Ontario and use field hockey sticks and lacrosse balls to play what is reputed to be the first game of ice hockey

1862 40,000 watch the Union army men play baseball at Hilton Head, SC

1868 Despite bitter opposition, President A Johnson grants unconditional pardon to all persons involved in the Southern rebellion (the Civil War)

1881 The ship Lord Bute, left Newcastle on Tyne and was not heard of again. It is speculated that she was lost with all hands the following day.

1914 Just after midnight on Christmas morning, the German troops along the Eastern and Western fronts cease firing their guns and artillery, and start singing Christmas carols and playing brass musical instruments; at first light, many German soldiers emerge from their trenches and cross No Man's Land, calling out Merry Christmas in English and French; at first the Allied soldiers suspect a trick, but soon they are shaking hands with the Boche; swapping cigarettes and plum pudding, and even playing soccer; the Christmas Truce lasts a few days, then it is back to the bloody conflict of World War I; there are no more Christmas Truces.

1914 SS Therese Heymann. This Ropner ship left the Tyne and was posted missing thereafter. No information about her fate is known but she may have been mined off Filey, Yorkshire as was the fate of many other vessels.

1926 Hirohito became emperor of Japan (1926-1989)

1930 First US bobsled run open to the public (Lake Placid NY)

1931 New York's Metropolitan Opera broadcasts an entire opera over radio

1932 December 25 First Empire Christmas Broadcast, with address by King George V. included contributions from Canada, and was distributed to all Canadian stations

1939 Montgomery Ward introduces Rudolph the 9th reindeer

1941 Japan announces surrender of British-Canadian garrison at Hong Kong

1941 Japan announces the surrender of the British-Canadian garrison by radio broadcast; 290 members of the Royal Rifles of Canada (a Québec unit) and the Winnipeg Grenadiers are dead, 493 wounded; Canadian survivors spend rest of war in Japanese POW camps

1944 Canadian Army captures Adriatic coast city of Ravenna, Italy

1946 Constitution accepted in Taiwan

1953 Avalanche of lava kills 150 (Ruapehu volcano, New Zealand)

1959 A synagogue in Cologne Germany desecrated with swastikas

1963 Walt Disney's "The Sword In The Stone" is released

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