Captured by Burgundian forces and sold to the English, Joan of Arc faced a tribunal engineered to discredit the French monarchy she had helped crown. Presided over by Bishop Pierre Cauchon, the proceedings combined religious inquisition with political vendetta, ultimately condemning her to death by burning that May — a verdict later annulled by the Catholic Church.

Alaska's territorial legislature approved women's suffrage, making it one of the earliest American territories to grant women full voting rights, well before the 19th Amendment took effect nationally in 1920. The move reflected a broader wave of suffrage victories across western U.S. states and territories, which generally extended voting rights to women faster than the more conservative eastern states.

At a war council in Pless Castle, German military leaders convinced the Kaiser that unrestricted U-boat attacks could starve Britain into surrender within months, before American intervention could matter. The decision, taking effect February 1, sank Allied and neutral shipping indiscriminately and became the single most direct provocation drawing the United States into declaring war that April.

Tensions over sovereignty in the U.S.-controlled Canal Zone exploded into four days of violent clashes after Panamanian students attempting to raise their national flag beside the American one at Balboa High School were rebuffed, sparking riots that killed roughly 21 Panamanians and 4 American soldiers. The crisis, later commemorated as Martyrs' Day, permanently soured U.S.-Panama relations and fed the eventual push to transfer canal control.

Steve Jobs held up a black slab with no keyboard and declared Apple was reinventing the phone. The device fused a widescreen iPod, a mobile phone, and an internet browser with a multi-touch screen. Skeptics doubted a touchscreen without a stylus, but the iPhone, released six months later, would upend the mobile industry and reshape how billions interact with computers.

A Long March 4C rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center carrying three Chinese satellites for scientific experimentation and technology testing. The mission was part of Beijing's steadily accelerating space program during a decade that saw China rapidly close the gap with the United States and Russia in orbital launch capacity.

Two days after the massacre at Charlie Hebdo's offices, brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi were cornered in a printing plant in Dammartin-en-Goële; police stormed the building as they emerged firing. Almost simultaneously, Amedy Coulibaly, who had claimed allegiance to Islamic State, was killed after taking hostages at a Hyper Cacher supermarket in Porte de Vincennes, having already murdered four Jewish shoppers.