(1265) Nobles and commoners hold England’s first parliamentBurgesses, or town representatives, sit for the first time among England’s barons and knights at the Palace of Westminster. The locale will later be known as the Houses of Parliament in London.The Palace of Westminster is the meeting place of the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Commonly known as the Houses of Parliament after its occupants, it is also known as the ‘heart of British politics’. The Palace lies on the north bank of the River Thames in the City of Westminster, in central London.
Address: Houses Of Parliament, London SW1A 0AA Phone: 020 7219 4114 Opened: 1016 Architects: Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin · Charles Barry · Henry Yevele · Hugh Herland
wiki/Palace_of_Westminster(1841) Hong Kong Island signed over to BritainA South China deep-water harbor, and island of about 3,000 residents, is ceded to the United Kingdom after its victory in the First Opium War. China will regain sovereignty in 1997.British Hong Kong was the period during which Hong Kong was under British Crown rule from 1841 to 1997. It was established as a Crown colony and later designated a British Dependent Territory in 1981. Hong Kong Island was ceded to Great Britain by the Qing dynasty of China after the First Anglo-Chinese War. The Kowloon Peninsula was added to the colony after the Second Anglo-Chinese War. Finally, in 1898, the New Territories were added under a 99-year lease. Although Hong Kong Island and Kowloon were ceded to Britain in perpetuity, the New Territories – which comprised over 90 per cent of Hong Kong’s land – had such a vital role in the economy that the British government agreed to transfer sovereignty of the entirety of Hong Kong to China upon the expiration of the lease in 1997.
Founded: 1841 Dissolved: 1997 Population: 6.30 million (1995)
wiki/British_Hong_Kong(1942) Wannsee Conference outlines extermination of JewsTop Nazi officials meet near Berlin and plan the implementation of their “final solution to the Jewish question,” which calls for concentration camp imprisonment, forced labor, and mass extermination.The Wannsee Conference was a meeting of senior government officials of Nazi Germany and SS leaders, held in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee on 20 January 1942. The purpose of the conference, called by director of the Reich Main Security Office SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, was to ensure the cooperation of administrative leaders of various government departments in the implementation of the final solution to the Jewish question, whereby most of the Jews of German-occupied Europe would be deported to Poland and murdered. Conference attendees included representatives from several government ministries, including state secretaries from the Foreign Office, the justice, interior, and state ministries, and representatives from the Schutzstaffel. In the course of the meeting, Heydrich outlined how European Jews would be rounded up from west to east and sent to extermination camps in the General Government, where they would be killed.
Date: Jan 20, 1942
wiki/Wannsee_Conference(1981) Iran releases 52 American hostages held for 444 daysTwenty minutes after Ronald Reagan is inaugurated president of the US, taking over the office from Jimmy Carter, Iran frees 52 Americans held hostage for more than 14 months at the US Embassy in Teheran.The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic standoff between Iran and the United States. Fifty-two American diplomats and citizens were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979, to January 20, 1981 after a group of Iranian students belonging to the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line, who supported the Iranian Revolution, took over the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. It stands as the longest hostage crisis in recorded history.