IOTD

Calendar day; January 27, 2016

Wednesday, the 27th of January, 2016 is the 27th day in 2016 and in the 4th calendar week.

General Events:

International Holocaust Remembrance Day
January 27, 2016 in the World

International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is observed on January 27, 2016, is an international memorial day for the victims of the Holocaust. Holocaust is the genocide that resulted in the annihilation of six million European Jews as well as millions of others by the Nazi regime. The day was designated by the United Nations General Assembly Resolution on November 1, 2005.

The Resolution establishing January 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day urges every member nation of the U.N. to honor the memory of Holocaust victims, and encourages the development of educational programs about Holocaust history to help prevent future acts of genocide. It rejects any denial of the Holocaust as an event and condemns all manifestations of religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against persons or communities based on ethnic origin or religious belief.

January 27 is the date, in 1945, when the largest Nazi death camp (Auschwitz-Birkenau), was liberated by Soviet troops. This camp was a network of Nazi concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II. It was the largest of the German concentration camps.

The gas chambers of Birkenau were blown up by the SS in an attempt to hide the German crimes from the advancing Soviet troops. The SS command sent orders on January 17, 1945 calling for the execution of all prisoners remaining in the camp, but in the chaos of the Nazi retreat the order was never carried out. On January 17, 1945, Nazi personnel started to evacuate the facility.

http://www.un.org/en/holocaustremembrance/

https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/media-room/stories/international-holocaust-remembrance-day-2016

Where is International Holocaust Remembrance Day?
Worldwide

Auschwitz Liberation Day
January 27, 2016 in the World

The Auschwitz main camp, the Birkenau death camp, and the Monowitz labor camp were liberated by soldiers of the Soviet Union in the First Army of the Ukrainian Front, under the command of Marshal Koniev, on January 27, 1945.

Auschwitz was a network of concentration camps built and operated in occupied Poland by Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Auschwitz I and nearby Auschwitz II-Birkenau were the extermination camps where an estimated 1.1 million people—mostly Jews from across Europe, but also political opponents, prisoners of war, homosexuals, and Roma—were killed in gas chambers or by systematic starvation, forced labor, disease, or medical experiments. About 200,000 camp inmates survived the ordeal.

After the three Auschwitz camps were liberated, the survivors were on their own. Unlike the concentration camps in Germany, where the liberated prisoners remained in the camps as Displaced Persons and were cared for by the Americans or the British, the Auschwitz-Birkenau prisoners from 29 countries were released to find their own way home.

Where is Auschwitz Liberation Day?
Worldwide

Holocaust Memorial Day
January 27, 2016 in United Kingdom

Holocaust Memorial Day takes place on January 27, 2016. Holocaust Memorial Day is a national event in the United Kingdom dedicated to the remembrance of the victims of The Holocaust. It was first held in January 2001 and has been on the same date every year since. The chosen date is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz concentration camp by the Soviet Union in 1945, the date also chosen for the International Holocaust Remembrance Day and some other national Holocaust Memorial Days. In addition to the national event, there are numerous smaller memorial events around the country organised by many different organisations, groups and individuals.

Where is the event?
Nationwide United Kingdom

Thomas Crapper Day
January 27, 2016 in the World

Thomas Crapper was a plumber in the late 19th century who founded Thomas Crapper & Co. Ltd. in London. Contrary to widespread misconceptions, Crapper did not invent the flush toilet. He did, however, do much to increase the popularity of the toilet, and developed some important related inventions, such as the ballcock. He was noted for the quality of his products and received several royal warrants.

The flush toilet was invented in 1596 by John Harrington. From the time of its invention up until the start up of Crapper’s company, bathroom fixtures were not part of the everyday household. Crapper heavily promoted sanitary plumbing and pioneered the concept of the bathroom fittings showroom, which made toilets and bathroom fixtures a global success.

Manhole covers with Crapper’s company’s name on them in Westminster Abbey are now one of London’s minor tourist attractions. Thomas Crapper & Co owned the world’s first bath, toilet and sink showroom, in King’s Road until 1966.

Where is the event?
Worldwide

National Chocolate Cake Day
January 27, 2016 in the USA

Cakes have a rich culinary history. In Greece, cakes (or “plakous”) were heavy and flat, and people served them with nuts and honey. The Romans made cakes that were more like cheesecake or pastry, and presented them as offerings to the gods. In Medieval England, people used the words “bread” and cake” interchangeably to refer to anything made with flour dough.

A company called O. Duff and Sons created the first boxed cake mix in the late 1920s. In 1947, after years of research and development, General Mills released the first “just add water” Betty Crocker cake mixes. The available flavors were Ginger, Spice, Yellow, and White. In 1948, Pillsbury introduced the first chocolate cake mix.

In the U.S., “chocolate decadence” cakes were popular in the 1980s; in the 1990s, single-serving molten chocolate cakes with liquid chocolate centers and infused chocolates with exotic flavors such as tea, curry, red pepper, passion fruit, and champagne were popular. Chocolate lounges and artisinal chocolate makers were popular in the 2000s. Rich, flourless, all-but-flourless chocolate cakes are “now standard in the modern pâtisserie,” according to “The New Taste of Chocolate”.

Where is the event?
Nationwide USA

Historical Events on 27th January:

661 – Rashidun Caliphate, then the largest empire in history, ends with death of Ali. Succeeded by the Umayyad Caliphate

1142 – Wrongful execution of noted Song Dynasty General Yue Fei

1593 – Vatican opens 7 year trial against scholar Giordano Bruno

1695 – Mustafa II becomes the Ottoman sultan in Istanbul on the death of Ahmed II. Mustafa rules until his death in 1703

1825 – U.S. Congress approves Indian Territory (in what is present-day Oklahoma), clearing the way for forced relocation of the Eastern Indians on the “Trail of Tears.”

1888 – National Geographic Society organizes (Wash DC)

1900 – Foreign diplomats in Peking, China, write formal notes of protest demanding that the Chinese Government stop the Boxes and other groups leading attacks on Westerners and Christians

1908 – Pasiphaë, a satellite of Jupiter, discovered by Melotte

1915 – US Marines occupy Haiti

1918 – “Tarzan of the Apes”, 1st Tarzan film, premieres at Broadway Theater

1926 – Physicist Erwin Schrödinger publishes his theory of wave mechanics and presents what becomes known as the Schrödinger equation in quantum mechanics

1941 – Peruvian agent Rivera-Schreiber warns of Japanese assault on Pearl Harbor

1945 – Russia liberates Auschwitz & Birkenau Concentration Camp (Poland)

1948 – 1st tape recorder sold

1951 – US begins 126 nuclear tests at Nevada Test Site

1967 – A fire in the Apollo I Command Module kills astronauts Grissom, White & Chaffee during a launch rehearsal

1967 – Treaty signed banning military use of nuclear weapons in space

1973 – US & North Vietnam’s William Rogers & Nguyen Duy Trinh sign cease-fire, ending longest US war and miltary draft

1983 – World’s longest underwater tunnel (53.90 km) opens, Honshu-Hokkaid

1996 – Germany celebrates its 1st Holocaust Remembrance Day