Today in History: December 16, the Boston Tea Party

On Dec. 16, 1773, the Boston Tea Party took place as American colonists boarded British ships in Boston Harbor and dumped more than 300 chests of tea overboard to protest tea taxes.

Also on this date:

In 1907, 16 U.S. Navy battleships, which came to be known as the “Great White Fleet,” set sail from Hampton Roads, Virginia, on a 14-month, round-the-world voyage to demonstrate American sea power.

In 1944, the World War II Battle of the Bulge began as German forces launched a surprise attack against Allied forces through the Ardennes Forest in Belgium and Luxembourg.

In 1960, 134 people were killed when a United Air Lines DC-8 and a TWA Super Constellation collided over New York City.

In 2000, President-elect George W. Bush nominated Colin Powell to become secretary of state; Powell was confirmed by the Senate and became the first African-American to hold the position.

In 2020, a French court convicted 14 people accused of being accomplices in the 2015 Islamic State terror attacks in Paris against the satirical Charlie Hebdo newspaper and a kosher supermarket. The attacks, claimed jointly by the Islamic State group and al-Qaida, left 17 people dead along with three gunmen.

In 2024, a 15-year-old student opened fire at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin, killing a fellow student and a teacher. The shooter also died.

Today’s Birthdays: Artist Edward Ruscha is 88. Actor Liv Ullmann is 87. CBS news correspondent Lesley Stahl is 84. Pop singer Benny Andersson (ABBA) is 79. Rock singer-musician Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top) is 76. Actor Benjamin Bratt is 62. Filmmaker James Mangold is 62. Actor-comedian JB Smoove is 60. Actor Miranda Otto is 58. Astrophysicist Adam Reiss is 56. Actor Krysten Ritter is 44. Singer-songwriter Gaby Moreno is 44. Actor Theo James is 41. Actor Anna Popplewell is 37. Actor Stephan James is 32. Pop singer Zara Larsson is 28.