69 Vitellius, Emperor of Rome for a short time in  “the year of the Four Emperors,” died (b. 24 September 15). Vitellius ruled only from April to December and was executed by Vespasian.

1216 Pope Honorius III officially approved the Ordo Praedicatorum or Order of Preachers (the Dominicans).

1316 Aegidius Romanus, Augustinian theologian, died (b. ca. 1243).

1548 The Leipzig Interim was adopted at the Diet of Leipzig. The interim, written by Maurice of Saxony, compromised several of the Lutheran beliefs and positions, including those dealing with the doctrine of justification.

1757 Olaf Parlin, Swedish American Lutheran pastor, died (b. 1716).

1770 Father Demetrius Augustine Gallitzin (d. 6 May 1840), “Apostle to the Alleghenies,” was born in the Hague, Netherlands.

1789 Ann Hasseltine Judson, missionary, was born in Bradford, Massachusetts (d. 24 October 1826).

1803 Deodatus Dutton, religious composer, was born at Monson, Massachusetts (d. 16 December 1832, New York, New York).

1826 Ulrik Vilhelm Koren was born in Bergen, Norway (d. 19 December 1910).

1837 Mercer University was chartered in Penfield, Georgia, under Baptist support.

1839 Hezekiah Butterworth, hymnist, was born in Warren, Rhode Island (d. 1905).

1862 William Dallmann, president of the English Synod of Missouri, vice-president of the Missouri Synod and editor of  The Lutheran Witness, was born at Neu Damerow, Pomerania (d. 2 February 1952).

1899 Dwight L. Moody (b. 5 February 1837), American evangelist, died.

1906 Robert Rainy (b. 1 January 1826), clergyman and leader in the Free Church of Scotland, died.

1908 Philip Andreas von Rohr, president of Wisconsin Synod, died (b. 13 February 1843, Buffalo, New York).

1913 Heinrich Wunder, pastor of Saint Paul Lutheran Church (Chicago, Illinois) for sixty years and the first president of the Illinois District, died (b. 12 March 1830).

1913 John T. McFarland, hymnist, died (b. 2 January 1851).

1917 Francesca Xavier Cabrini, founder of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart, died in Chicago (b. 15 May 1850).

1919 E. Theodore Delaney was born in Santa Maria, California (d. 20 January 1987). He served as a missionary at large in Barstow, California, and as a missionary with the deaf in Austin, Texas, and San Francisco, California. In 1967 he became the executive secretary for the LCMS Commission on Worship and was a representative to the Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship that developed the  Lutheran Book of Worship. He later was pastor in Red Bluff and Corning, California. Delaney also compiled Sing Unto the Lord: A Hymnal for the Deaf.

1921 The first radio station license for a religious broadcaster in the U.S. was granted to the National Presbyterian Church of Washington, D.C. Within the next five years there were more than sixty licensed religious stations, including KJS-Biola/Los Angeles in 1922, KFUO-Concordia/Saint Louis in 1924 and WMBI-Moody Bible Institute/Chicago in 1926.

1999 Lewis W. Spitz Jr., a world-renowned expert on Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation, died (b. 1922, Bertrand,
Nebraska).