9th of January

It is the 9th day of the year, with only 356 days remaining until the end of the year.

1349 - The Jewish population of Basel, Switzerland believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing Black Death, is rounded up and incinerated.

1768 - In London, Philip Astley stages the first modern circus.

1788 - Connecticut becomes the 5th state admitted to the United States.

1793 - Jean-Pierre Blanchard becomes the first person to fly in a balloon in the United States.

1806 - Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson, receives a state funeral and is interred in St. Paul's Cathedral.

1861 - The "Star of the West," incident occurs near Charleston, South Carolina.  It is considered by some historians to be the "First Shots of the American Civil War."

1861 - Mississippi becomes the second state to secede from the Union before the outbreak of the War of Secession.

1894 - New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard in Lexington, Massachusetts.

1909 - Ernest Shackleton, leading the Nimrod Expedition, plants the British flag, 97 nautical miles from the South Pole.

1918 - The Battle of Bear Valley, marks the last battle of the American Indian Wars.

1941 - The first flight of the Avro Lancaster during World War II.

1937 - Elizabeth "Betty" Short, the Black Dahlia, is last seen alive.