December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 14 days remaining.

Events

• 283 - St Gaius becomes Pope.
• 384 - St Siricius becomes Pope.
• 1586 - The reign of Emperor Go-Yozei, the 107th imperial ruler of Japan, began.
• 1637 - The Shimabara Rebellion broke out in Japan.
• 1777 - France became the first nation to recognize the United States of America
• 1830 - Santa Marta, Colombia Simon Bolivar dies.
• 1843 - A Christmas Carol, a fictional short story by Charles Dickens, was first published.
• 1862 - General Ulysses S. Grant issued General Order No. 11, expelling Jews from Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky.
• 1903 - First powered flight, by the Wright Brothers.
• 1935 - First flight of the Douglas DC-3.
• 1939 - German battleship Admiral Graf Spee was scuttled by Captain Hans Langsdorff at the Battle of the River Plate.
• 1941 - German siege of Sevastopol begins
• 1944 - Western Defense Command issues proclamation ending requirement of Japanese internment.
• 1944 - In the Malmédy massacre around 80 American POW are executed by Waffen-SS troops of Jochen Peiper’s Kampfgruppe.
• 1961 - India seizes Goa from Portugal
• 1967 - Harold Holt, Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1908) disappeared swimming near Portsea, Victoria
• 1969 - U.S. Air Force announces that its UFO investigations have found no evidence of extraterrestrial spacecraft.
• 1969 - SALT I talks begin
• 1970 - My Lai trial begins
• 1970 - Coastal cities events Mass riots in the coastal cities of Poland ended in massacre of shipyard workers in Gdynia
• 1973 - The American Psychiatric Association removes homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses.
• 1982 - Tootsie opens in theaters, starring Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Teri Garr, Dabney Coleman, Charles Durning, Bill Murray, Sydney Pollack, George Gaynes, and Geena Davis.
• 1987 - The first game in the Mega Man series of video games is released.
• 1989 - The first half-hour length episode of The Simpsons debuts with their Christmas special, "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire".
• 1989 - Brazil holds its first free election in 25 years.
• 1989 - Full scale street manifestations and riots in Timisoara ignite the Romanian Revolution
• 1997 - A chartered Ukraine crashes into the mountains near Katerini, Greece killing 70
• 1998 - Claudia Benton is murdered in her West University, Texas home by Angel Maturino Resendiz. She is his fifth murder victim in his fourth incident.
• 2002 - Peace accord signed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
• 2003 - First supersonic flight by Scaled Composites SpaceShipOne
• 2003 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King is the third and final Lord of the Rings movie to open in theaters.

Births

• 1619 - Prince Rupert, Royalist commander in the English Civil War born in Prague
• 1770 - Ludwig van Beethoven, composer (d. 1827)
• 1778 - Humphry Davy, chemist (d. 1829)
• 1796 - Thomas Chandler Haliburton, novelist (d. 1865)
• 1799 - Titian Peale, artist (d. 1885)
• 1807 - John Greenleaf Whittier, poet, abolitionist (d. 1892)
• 1830 - Jules Alfred Huot de Goncourt, Prix Goncourt (d. 1870)
• 1853 - Herbert Beerbohm Tree, actor (d. 1917)
• 1872 - Mistinguett, actress, singer (d. 1956)
• 1873 - Ford Madox Ford, writer (d. 1939)
• 1874 - William Lyon Mackenzie King, tenth Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1950)
• 1892 - Sam Barry, Hall of Fame basketball coach (d. 1950)
• 1893 - Erwin Piscator, film director (d. 1966)
• 1894 - Arthur Fiedler, American conductor (d. 1979)
• 1894 - Hans Henny Jahnn, dramatist, narrator and essayist (d. 1959)
• 1901 - Lee Strasberg, actor, director, acting teacher (d. 1982)
• 1903 - Erskine Caldwell, author (d. 1987)
• 1906 - Simo Häyhä, most successful sniper in history (d. 2002)
• 1908 - Willard Frank Libby, physicist and chemist, inventor of radiocarbon dating (d. 1980)
• 1911 - André Claveau, French singer, Eurovision Song Contest winner (d. 2003)
• 1916 - Penelope Fitzgerald, poet, author, biographer (d. 2000)
• 1925 - Rock Hudson, actor (d. 1985)
• 1929 - William Safire, columnist
• 1930 - Bob Guccione, publisher of Penthouse magazine
• 1930 - Bob Mathias, athlete
• 1930 - Armin Mueller-Stahl, actor
• 1931 - Constantin Freiheer von Heeremann, president of Germany's National Farmers Union
• 1938 - Gordon Lightfoot, musician
• 1938 - Peter Snell, New Zealand athlete
• 1939 - Eddie Kendricks, musician
• 1941 - Gene Clark, musician
• 1942 - Paul Butterfield, musician (d. 1987)
• 1943 - Ron Geesin, musician.
• 1943 - Lauren Hutton, model, actress
• 1944 - Jack L. Chalker, novelist
• 1944 - Lorne Michaels, producer
• 1945 - Elvin Hayes, basketball star
• 1947 - Wes Studi, actor
• 1951 - Ken Hitchcock, NHL coach
• 1955 - Brad Davis, basketball player
• 1968 - Paul Tracy, Canadian Champ Car driver
• 1973 - Paula Radcliffe, distance runner in athletics
• 1975 - Nick Dinsmore, professional wrestler
• 1975 - Milla Jovovich, actress, model
• 1976 - Takeo Spikes, American football player
• 1979 - William Green, American football player

Deaths

• 1187 - Pope Gregory VIII (b. c. 1100)
• 1273 - Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi, Persian poet and sufi mystic (b. 1207)
• 1663 - Nzinga, queen of Ndongo and Matamba (b. 1583)
• 1812 - Kaspar Hauser, German foundling
• 1830 - Simón Bolívar, Latin American politician and activist (b. 1783)
• 1907 - William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, physicist (b. 1824)
• 1909 - King Leopold II of Belgium (b. 1835)
• 1917 - Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, physician died in Aldeburgh Suffolk
• 1957 - Dorothy L. Sayers, writer (b. 1893)
• 1964 - Victor Franz Hess, American physicist (b. 1883)
• 1987 - Irving Allen, producer
• 1987 - Marguerite Yourcenar, novelist (b. 1903)
• 1992 - Dana Andrews, actor (b. 1909)
• 1996 - Sun Yaoting, China's last imperial eunuch died in Beijing
• 1998 - Claudia Benton, child psychologist
• 1999 - Grover Washington Jr., musician (b. 1943)
• 2003 - Ed Devereaux, Australian actor (b. 1925)
• 2003 - Otto Graham, NFL quarterback (b. 1921)

Holidays and observances

• National Day in Bhutan (1907)
• Roman Empire - Saturnalia, in honor of Saturn, began.

December 16 - December 18 - November 17 - January 17 -- listing of all days