On This Day
What Happened on December 3 in History
9 events that happened on December 3, oldest first. Every entry is written in our own words and links to its source.
The Young Republic and the Civil War Era
1818
Illinois is admitted to the Union as the 21st state.
The prairie lands between the Mississippi River and Lake Michigan had long been home to the Illinois, a confederation of Algonquian-speaking nations. After statehood Illinois grew into a busy and densely populated state.
Source: history.com
The Early 1900s and the World Wars
1901
Theodore Roosevelt sends Congress his first annual message after the assassination of William McKinley.
Roosevelt opened by mourning McKinley, who had been shot by an anarchist in September, and called for action against anarchism. The long message also took up the great industrial combinations known as trusts.
Source: millercenter.org
The Cold War
1947
Tennessee Williams's play A Streetcar Named Desire opens on Broadway.
Marlon Brando starred as Stanley Kowalski and Jessica Tandy as Blanche DuBois at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre in New York. The drama became one of the landmarks of American theater.
Source: history.com
1967
Surgeon Christiaan Barnard performs the first human heart transplant in Cape Town, South Africa.
Louis Washkansky, a 53-year-old grocer with chronic heart disease, received the heart of a young woman fatally injured in a car accident. He died of pneumonia 18 days later, but the operation opened the era of heart transplants.
Source: history.com; cuimc.columbia.edu
1979
Eleven people die in a crowd crush outside a Who concert in Cincinnati.
Fans holding general admission tickets surged toward the doors of Riverfront Coliseum to claim the best unreserved seats. The tragedy made the practice known as festival seating infamous.
Source: history.com
1984
A toxic gas leak at a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, kills thousands.
Poisonous gas spread over the city, and hundreds of thousands of people were injured. It is considered the worst industrial accident in history, and the final death toll is still disputed.
Source: history.com
1989
George H.W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev signal that the Cold War is ending at the Malta Summit.
At their first summit, held off the coast of Malta, the two leaders issued statements suggesting the long rivalry was winding down. Commentators in both countries went further and declared the Cold War over.
Source: history.com
The Modern Era
1997
Representatives of more than 120 countries begin signing the treaty banning antipersonnel land mines.
The Mine Ban Convention opened for signature at a ceremony in Ottawa, Canada. It entered into force in 1999.
Source: legal.un.org
1999
NASA loses contact with the Mars Polar Lander as it arrives at Mars.
The spacecraft went silent as it turned to prepare for entry into the Martian atmosphere and was never heard from again. Two small probes riding along with it were lost as well.
Source: science.nasa.gov