December 17 in History

• 1807

  December 17, 1807:

  Napoleon issues his decree of Milan, forbidding France’s allies and all neutral countries from engaging in trade with Great Britain.

• 1865

  December 17, 1865:

  Franz Schubert’s “Unfinished Symphony” is premiered in Vienna, Austria.

• 1892

  December 17, 1892:

  Vogue magazine is published for the first time as a weekly newspaper.

• 1903

  December 17, 1903:

  The Wright Brothers (Orville and Wilbur) make the first successful sustained flights in an airplane.

• 1961

  December 17, 1961:

  A circus tent in Niterói, Brazil catches fire, eventually killing an estimated 500 people.

• 1986

  December 17, 1986:

  Davina Thompson, a British woman, becomes the first patient to successfully undergo surgery to receive heart, lung and liver transplants simultaneously.

• 1989

  December 17, 1989:

  The animated television sitcom, “The Simpsons” debuts on Fox.

• 2010

  December 17, 2010:

  Mohamed Bouazizi, a Tunisian street vendor, sets himself on fire due to his frustrations with harassment from municipal officials and the country’s harsh economic conditions, leading to the Jasmine Revolution.

• 2011

  December 17, 2011:

  The President of North Korea, Kim Jong Il dies and is succeeded by his son, Kim Jong-Un.

• 2014

  December 17, 2014:

  Diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States, which had been severed for over 50 years, are reestablished.