Today is Wednesday, December 24, the 359th day of 2008. There are seven days left in the year.
1799 _ Jacobins plot against Napoleon uncovered
1818 _ ``Silent Night" composed by Franz Joseph Gruber; sung for first time the next day
1865 _ Several Confederate veterans form the Ku Klux Klan in Pulaski TN
1870 _ Giusseppe Verdi's ``Aida" premieres at Cairo Opera, one year after the opening of the Suez Canal, for which it was commissioned
1893 _ Henry Ford completes his first useful gas motor
1920 _ Enrico Caruso gives his last public performance (New York, N.Y.)
1936 _ First radioactive isotope medicine administered, Berkeley, Calif.
1948 _ First U.S. house completely sun-heated is occupied (Dover, Mass.)
1954 _ Laos gains its independence
1963 _ Greek and Turks riot in Cyprus