Nelson Mandela laid to rest in a state funeral – Chicago Tribune
Today is Monday, December 15, the 349th day of the year 2025. There are 16 days left in the year.
Today in history:
On December 15, 2013, Nelson Mandela was buried in a state funeral, ending a 10-day mourning period for South Africa’s first black president. Mandela died on December 5 of the same year at the age of 95.
Also on this date:
In 1791, the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, took effect after its ratification by Virginia.
In 1890, Hunkpapa Lakota Chief Sitting Bull and 11 other members of the tribe were killed in Grand River, South Dakota, during a confrontation with Indian Agency police.
In 1939, the epic Civil War film “Gone With the Wind,” starring Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable, had its world premiere in Atlanta.
In 1944, a single-engine plane carrying conductor Glenn Miller, a major in the United States Air Force, disappeared over the English Channel while en route to Paris.
In 1967, the Silver Bridge between Gallipolis, Ohio, and Point Pleasant, West Virginia, collapsed into the Ohio River, killing 46 people.
In 2011, the flag used by U.S. forces in Iraq was lowered in a ceremony at Baghdad airport, marking the official end of the U.S. military mission there. The war left 110,000 Iraqis and 4,500 Americans dead.
In 2016, a federal jury in Charleston, South Carolina, found Dylann Roof guilty of the racist murders of nine black church members who hosted him at their Bible study meeting. The following year, he would become the first person sentenced to death in the United States for a federal hate crime, a sentence confirmed in 2021.
Today’s birthdays: singer Cindy Birdsong (The Supremes) is 86 years old. Rock musician Dave Clark (The Dave Clark Five) is 86 years old. Baseball Hall of Fame manager Jim Leyland is 81 years old. Actor Don Johnson is 76 years old. Film and theater director Julie Taymor is 73 years old. Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia is 71 years old. Rock musician Paul Simonon (The Clash) is 70 years old. Actor and filmmaker Lee Jung-jae is 53 years old. Actor Adam Brody is 46 years old. Actress Michelle Dockery is 44 years old. Actor Charlie Cox is 43 years old. Actress Camilla Luddington is 42 years old. Rock musician and actress Alana Haim is 34 years old. Actress Maude Apatow is 28 years old.
