1946 – The popular Christmas film It’s a Wonderful Life is first released in New York City.
1951 – The EBR-1 in Arco, Idaho becomes the first nuclear power plant to generate electricity. The electricity powered four light bulbs.
1968 – The Zodiac Killer kills Betty Lou Jenson and David Faraday in Vallejo, California.
1971 – The international aid organization Doctors Without Borders is founded by Bernard Kouchner and a group of journalists in Paris, France.
1985 – Pope John Paul II announces the institution of World Youth Day.
1995 – NATO begins peacekeeping in Bosnia.
1999 – Macau is handed over to China by Portugal.
2007 – Elizabeth II becomes the oldest monarch of the United Kingdom, surpassing Queen Victoria, who lived for 81 years, seven months and 29 days.
2007 – The Portrait of Suzanne Bloch (1904), by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, and O Lavrador de Café by Brazilian modernist painter Cândido Portinari, are stolen from the São Paulo Museum of Art.
2019 – The United States Space Force becomes the first new branch of the United States Armed Forces since 1947.
