January is the first month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars and one of seven months with the length of 31 days. The first day of the month is known as the day of New Year. It is, on average, the coldest month of the year within most of the Northern Hemisphere (where it is the second month of winter) and the warmest month of the year within most of the Southern Hemisphere (where it is the second month of summer).
January symbols: The birthstone of January is the garnet which represents constancy. Its birth flower is the cottage pink Dianthus caryophyllus or galanthus. In Finnish, the month of tammikuu means the heart of the winter and because the name literally means Oak moon. The zodiac signs for the month of January are Capricorn (until January 19) and Aquarius (January 20 onwards). The traditional English birth month flower is the Carnation.
Historical Events for January, 2002
Day of Week 1st » Taiwan officially joins the World Trade Organization, as Chinese Taipei.
1st » The Treaty on Open Skies named Open Skies mutual surveillance treaty, initially signed in 1992, officially comes into force.
Day of Week 3rd » Israeli forces seize the Palestinian freighter 'Karine A Affair or Karine A' in the Red Sea, finding 50 tons of weapons.
Day of Week 8th » President George W. Bush signs into law the No Child Left Behind Act.
Day of Week 16th » The United Nations Security Council named UN Security Council unanimously establishes an arms embargo and the freezing of assets of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the remaining members of the Taliban.
Day of Week 17th » Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, displacing an estimated 400,000 people.
Day of Week 22nd » Kmart becomes the largest retailer in United States history to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Day of Week 23rd » "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh returns to the United States in Federal Bureau of Investigation e.g FBI custody.
23rd » Reporter Daniel Pearl is kidnapping known as kidnapped in Karachi, Pakistan and subsequently murdered .
Day of Week 27th » Lagos armoury explosion e.g An explosion at a military storage facility in Lagos, Nigeria, kills at least 1,100 people and displaces over 20,000 others.
Day of Week 28th » TAME Flight 120, a Boeing 727-100 crashes in the Andes mountains in southern Colombia killing 92.
Day of Week 29th » In his State of the Union address, President George W. Bush describes "regimes that sponsor terrorism named terror" as an 'Axis of evil', in which he includes Iraq, Iran and North Korea.
Famous Deaths for January 2002
1st » Julia Phillips, American film producer and author (b. 1944)
2nd » Armi Aavikko, Finnish model and singer, Miss Finland named Miss Finland 1977 (b. 1958)
3rd » Juan García Esquivel, Mexican pianist and composer (b. 1918)