January 26, 1788
The first 736 convicts banished from England to Australia landed in Botany Bay. Over the next 60 years, approximately 50,000 criminals were transported from Great Britain. The accepted wisdom of the ruling classes in 18th century England was that criminals were inherently defective, could not be rehabilitated and required separation from the “genetically pure” and law-abiding citizens. Accordingly, lawbreakers had to be either killed or exiled, since prisons were too expensive.
January 26, 1980
At the request of President Jimmy Carter, the U.S. Olympic Committee voted to ask the International Olympic Committee to cancel or move the upcoming Moscow Olympics in response to the Soviet military invasion of Afghanistan the previous month. The US ended up boycotting the games; almost a decade passed before the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan.
