1252 Friar Giovanni da Pian del Carpini, who traveled to Mongolia for the pope in 1245, died (b. ca. 1180).

1546 Pierre Lefevre (Peter Faber) died (b. 13 April 1506). One of the original six Jesuits gathered by Loyola, he founded the Jesuit University at Cologne.

1560 Parliament adopted John Knox’s (1514?–1572) Confession of Faith.

1635 Georg Weissel, hymnist, died at Königsberg (b. 1590, Domnau, near Königsberg, Prussia).

1746 Evangelist Michael Schlatter (1716–1790), commissioned as a Dutch Reformed missionary, arrived in America.

1760 Frederick William Foster, hymn translator, was born at Bradford, England (d. 12 April 1835, Ockbrook, Derbyshire, England).

1779 Francis Scott Key, hymnist, author of “The Star-Spangled Banner” and a devout Episcopalian who helped establish the American Sunday School Union, was born in Frederick, Maryland (d. 11 January 1843).

1787 Saint Alphonsus Liguori died (b. 27 September 1696).

1801 Karl Johann Philipp Spitta, German pastor and hymn writer, was born in Hanover (d. 28 September 1859).

1812 Ambrose Serle, hymnist, died in England (b. 30 August 1742).

1815 The first Peace Society in the United States was formed in New York City.

1834 Robert Morrison, the first Protestant (English) missionary to China, died in Canton, China (b. 5 January 1782, Morpeth, Northumberland, England).

1842 Johann Leonhard Backhaus, professor at the Missouri Synod’s teacher seminary in Addison, Illinois, was born in Amsterdam, Netherlands (d. 11 March 1919).

1843 William Sanday, English New Testament scholar, was born (d. 16 September 1920).

1849 Missionary-explorer David Livingstone (1813–1873) first saw Lake Ngami, Africa.

1866 Alfred E. R. Brauer, hymn translator, was born near Adelaide, Australia. After beginning the study of law in his native country, he switched to theology and came to the U.S. He graduated from Concordia Theological Seminary (Springfield, Illinois) in 1890, then returned to Australia to serve as a pastor. He was editor of the  Australian Lutheran and contributed translations to the Australian Lutheran Hymn-Book (1925). (Source: The Handbook to the Lutheran Hymnal, pp. 486–87)

1890 Walther Eichrodt, Reformed Old Testament scholar, was born in Baden, Germany (d. 20 May 1978).

1894 Walter Herman Wente was born at Germanicus, Ontario, Canada (d. 9 September 1992, Fort Wayne, Indiana). He graduated from Concordia Seminary (Saint Louis) in 1914 and received an M.A. degree from the University of Chicago. He served as an assistant professor at Saint John’s College (Winfield, Kansas) from 1914 to 1917 and as a professor at Michigan Lutheran Seminary (Saginaw, Michigan), Saint John’s College (Winfield, Kansas) and Concordia Senior College (Fort Wayne, Indiana).

1897 Pope Leo XIII issued the encyclical Militantis Ecclesiae, which described Protestantism as the “Lutheran rebellion, whose evil virus goes wandering about in almost all nations.”

1898 The Fire Baptized Holiness Church of God of the Americas was organized at Anderson, South Carolina, as a result of a revival that swept over the western and southern states.

1914 Marcus Moziah Garvey Jr. organized the Universal Negro Improvement Association.

1914 The World Alliance for Promoting International Friendship through the Churches was organized at Constance, Germany.

1918 A planning committee met in Pittsburgh to form the National Lutheran Council.

1931 Hans G. Stub, first president of the National Lutheran Council, died (b. 23 February 1849).

1938 The first call for a native Lutheran African pastor was issued in Nigeria.

1949 The Far East Broadcasting Company began transmitting the gospel into Russia.

1953 Louis Balthasar Buchheimer, vice-president of the English District and professor at Immanuel Lutheran College (Greensboro, North Carolina), died in Saint Louis (b. 23 March 1872, Detroit).

1963 Jörgen Peter Nielsen, president of Trinity Seminary (Blair, Nebraska), died (b. 18 December 1877, Sludstrup, Parish Sjalland, Denmark).