Jan. 10, 1905: The Cedar Falls hydroelectric plant begins lighting Seattle street lamps for the first time. The City of Seattle owns the power plant, the first municipally owned plant in the United States.

Jan. 11, 1922: First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient. 1964: US Surgeon General Dr. Luther Leonidas Terry, publishes a report stating smoking may be hazardous to health, the first such statement ever made by the US government.

Jan. 12, 1915: The US House of Representatives rejects a proposal to give women the right to vote.

Jan. 13, 1938: The Church of England accepts the theory of evolution. 1992: Japan apologizes for forcing Korean women into sexual slavery during World War II.

Jan. 14, 1639: The "Fundamental Orders", the first written constitution creating a government, is adopted in Connecticut.

Jan. 15, 1975: The Boston Molasses Disaster kills 21 people and injures 121 more, when a large tank bursts and a wave of molasses rushed through the streets at an estimated 35 mph. It requires over 87,000 hours of labor to remove the syrup from the area's cobblestone streets, theaters, businesses, automobiles, and homes.

Jan. 16, 2006: Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf is sworn in as Liberia's new president, becoming Africa's first female elected head of state.

Jan. 17, 1961: US President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers his televised farewell address to the nation three days before leaving office, warning against the accumulation of power by the "military-industrial complex."

Jan. 18, 1943: The first uprising of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto. 1993: For the first time, the holiday honoring Martin Luther King, Jr. is officially observed in all 50 US states.

Jan. 19, 1969: Student Jan Palach dies after setting himself on fire three days earlier in Prague's Wenceslas Square to protest the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union in 1968. His funeral turned into another major protest.

Jan. 20, 1841: Hong Kong Island becomes occupied by the British. 1920: The American Civil Liberties Union is founded.

Jan. 21, 1789: The first American novel, The Power of Sympathy or the Triumph of Nature Founded in Truth, is printed in Boston, Mass.

Jan. 22, 1973: The US Supreme Court delivers its decision in Roe v. Wade, striking down state laws restricting abortion during the first six months of pregnancy. 2006: Evo Morales is inaugurated as President of Bolivia to become the country's first indigenous president.

Jan. 23, 1978: Sweden becomes the first nation to ban aerosol sprays believed to damage earth's protective ozone layer.

Jan. 24, 1935: The first cans of beer are sold in the US (Krueger's Finest Beer and Krueger's Cream Ale). 1986: Newspaper workers in London launch an ultimately unsuccessful strike against Rupert Murdoch's News International.