On January 7

After 253 days without an operational government, a second round of investiture votes produced Spain's first coalition government since the Second Republic.

A hot air balloon flight from Carterton, New Zealand, collided with a power line while landing, causing it to crash and killing all eleven people on board.

In Nag Hammadi, Egypt, Muslim gunmen opened fire on a crowd of Coptic Christians leaving church after attending Christmas Liturgy, killing eight of them, as well as one Muslim bystander.

The Fourth Republic of Ghana was inaugurated with Jerry Rawlings, the country's former military ruler, as president.

In one of the most famous upsets in FA Cup history, Sutton United, a team in the fifth tier of English league football, defeated top-tier Coventry City.

Representatives of Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini delivered a letter to Mikhail Gorbachev, inviting him to consider Islam as an alternative to communism, and predicting the dissolution of the Soviet Bloc.

The People's Army of Vietnam captured Phnom Penh, marking the end of large-scale fighting in the Cambodian–Vietnamese War.

An article entitled "Iran and Red and Black Colonization" was published in the newspaper Ettela'at attacking Ruhollah Khomeini, then in exile in Iraq.

Marian Anderson became the first African-American to perform with the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell, flying in pursuit of an alleged UFO, was killed when his P-51 Mustang crashed near Fort Knox, Kentucky.

French physicist Marguerite Perey identified francium, the last element to be discovered in nature rather than by synthesis.

Australian aviator Guy Menzies (pictured) flew from Sydney to New Zealand's West Coast, making the first solo trans-Tasman flight.

The Marconi International Marine Communication Company specified CQD (audio featured) as the distress signal to be used by its operators.

The Italian tricolour was first adopted as an official flag by the government of the Cispadane Republic.

The Bank of North America (pictured) opened in Philadelphia as the de facto first central bank of the United States.

Through his telescope, Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei made the first observation of Jupiter's Galilean moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, although he was not able to distinguish the first two until the following night.

The Parliament of 1327, which was instrumental in the transfer of the English Crown from King Edward II to his son, Edward III, began at the Palace of Westminster.