840 Agobard of Lyons is commemorated (b. ca. 779).

1523 Gustav Vasa (1496-1560) became King of Sweden, marking the end of the Kalmar Union with Denmark. During his reign Lutheranism was introduced into the country.

1542 Francis Xavier (1506–1552) arrived in India, the first step of his whirlwind evangelization of the Orient.

1641 New Netherland (now New York) granted the Church of England the right to worship, an unusual act of toleration for the times.

1647 Johann F. Hertzog, hymnist, was born in Dresden (d. 21 March 1699).

1654 Christina, Queen of Sweden (1626–1689), abdicated her throne, joined the Roman Catholic church and spent the rest of her life engaged in religious thought (though she twice attempted to resume her crown).

1657 Johann Ernst Goetwater (Gutwasser) arrived in New Amsterdam (New York) as the first Lutheran pastor.

1820 Henry Lascelles Jenner, hymn translator, was born (d. 18 September 1898).

1835 Titus Coan (1801–1872), missionary, arrived in Honolulu.

1840 Sir John Stainer, composer of sacred music, organist and hymnist, was born in London (d. 31 March 1901).

1843 J. I. Wilhelm Thomas, New Guinea missionary, was born in Eilbach, Germany (d. 30 December 1900).

1844 The YMCA organized in London under the leadership of English merchant George Williams.

1852 Conrad Emil Lindberg, professor and dean at Augustana Seminary (Rock Island, Illinois), was born in Joenkoeping, Sweden (d. 2 August 1930).

1860 Franz Adolph Marbach, lay leader of the Saxon immigration to Missouri, died (b. ca. 1798).

1871 Henry J. Buckoll (b. 9 September 1803), the translator of the English version of the hymn “Come, My Soul, Thou Must Be Waking,” died.

1882 The Augustana Lutheran Church Women voted to organize in Lindsborg, Kansas.

1882 George Matheson (1842–1906), a blind Scottish clergyman, penned the words to the haunting hymn “O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go.”

1905Harold J. Ockenga, American evangelical leader, was born. Ockenga is credited with having helped shape the intellectual credibility of modern evangelicalism in America. In addition to serving at Boston’s Park Street Church for thirty-three years, he was the first president of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) and co-founder and first president of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California (d. 8 February 1985).

1907 Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, a graduate college for biblical and rabbinical studies, was chartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1929 Concordia Press, Vaniyambadi, India, opened.

1932 German Christians who refused to accept Nazi theories published their “Guiding Principles.”

1942 Knut Olafson Lundeberg, president of the Church of Lutheran Brethren in America, died (b. 23 January 1859).

1968 Franklin Clark Fry, Lutheran Church in America president, died (b. 30 August 1900).

1992 The Fantoft stave church near Bergen, Norway, dating from the 12th century, was destroyed by arson. A reconstruction of the church was completed in 1997.

2001 Arthur H. Ziegler, president of the LCMS Ohio District from 1972 to 1985, died in Cleveland, Ohio. Ziegler graduated from Concordia College (Fort Wayne, Indiana) in 1931 and from Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis) four years later. He served pastorates at Kent, Ohio; Huntington, Indiana; and Cleveland, Ohio. Ziegler also was a member of the LCMS Board of Parish Education (1959–1969) and was on the board of directors of the Lutheran Deaconess Association from 1964 to 1970, part of that time as its chairman.