History of the Day for:
January 18
- 1535: Francisco Pizarro founds Lima, Peru.
- 1778: English navigator Captain James Cook discovered the Hawaiian Islands, which he dubbed the Sandwich Islands.
- 1779: Peter Mark Roget, the creator of the thesaurus of English words and phrases that bears his name, was born.
- 1788: The first English settlers arrived in Australia's Botany Bay to establish a penal colony.
- 1882: Alan Alexander (A.A.) Milne, English writer and creator of "Winnie the Pooh," was born.
- 1904: Actor Cary Grant was born in England as Archibald Alexander Leach.
- 1912: English explorer Robert F. Scott and his expedition reached the South Pole, only to discover that Roald Amundsen had gotten there first.
- 1929: "New York Daily Mirror" columnist Walter Winchell made his debut on radio.
- 1943: A wartime ban on the sale of pre-sliced bread in the United States - aimed at reducing bakeries' demand for metal replacement parts - went into effect.
- 1958: William O'Ree, the first black person played in the NHL with the Boston Bruins.
- 1962: The U.S. began spraying the foliage in Vietnam with pesticide to reveal Viet Cong guerrillas.
- 1964: Plans for the World Trade Center in New York City were announced in New York; The Beatles entered the Billboard U.S. singles chart for the first time with "I Want To Hold Your Hand" at No. 35, just ten days after its release, making it the fastest-breaking and the fastest-selling single in Capitol Records history.
- 1966: Robert Clifton Weaver, the Secretary of Housing & Urban Development, became the first black cabinet member.
- 1967: Albert DeSalvo, who claimed to be the "Boston Strangler," was convicted in Cambridge, Mass., of armed robbery, assault and sex offenses.
- 1973: John Cleese filmed his final episode of "Monty Python's Flying Circus."
- 1980: Studio 54 owners Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager were sentenced to 3-1/2 years in prison for tax evasion and fined $20,000.
- 1990: Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry was arrested in a drug enforcement sting operation after he was videotaped smoking crack.
- 1993: The Martin Luther King Jr. holiday was observed in all 50 states for the first time.
- 1996: Baseball owners broke with more than a century of tradition, unanimously approving interleague play in 1997.
- 1997: In north west Rwanda, Hutu militia members kill 3 Spanish aid workers, 3 soldiers and seriously wound one other.
- 1997: Boerge Ousland of Norway becomes the first person to cross Antarctica alone and unaided.
- 1998: Lewinsky scandal: Matt Drudge breaks the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky affair story on his website The Drudge Report.
- 2000: The Tagish Lake meteorite impacts the Earth.
- 2002: Sierra Leone Civil War is finally declared over.
- 2003: A bushfire kills 4 people and destroys more than 500 homes in Canberra, Australia.
- 2003: The Airbus A380, the world's largest commercial jet, is unveiled at a ceremony in Toulouse, France
- 2007: The strongest storm in the United Kingdom in 17 years kills 14 people, Germany sees the worst storm since 1999 with 13 deaths. Hurricane Kyrill, causes at least 44 deaths across 20 countries in Western Europe. Other losses include the Container Ship MSC Napoli destroyed by the storm off the coast of Devon, England.