TODAY IN HISTORY: He saved thousands of lives, then vanished forever

Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg saved the lives of thousands of Jews in German-occupied Hungary during World War II. He disappeared after being arrested by Soviet forces on January 17, 1945. Wallenberg's actions are admirable, and his disappearance remains a historical mystery.

In Budapest, Wallenberg rented 32 buildings and declared them extraterritorial, enjoying diplomatic immunity. These buildings, flying large Swedish flags, housed nearly 10,000 Jews, providing them with shelter and preventing their deportation to death camps. He even climbed onto the roof of a train heading to Auschwitz, distributing dozens of Swedish passports, demonstrating his courageous actions to save lives.

Wallenberg's heroic actions were inspired by the 1941 British film "The Scarlet Pimpernel," in which the protagonist rescues 28 Jews from the Nazis. Wallenberg had told his wife, "That's exactly what I want to do." However, Wallenberg was arrested by Soviet occupation forces just days after the Red Army occupied Budapest. The last time he was seen was on March 1, 1945, when he was still a prisoner.

In 1957, the Soviet government announced that Wallenberg had died of a heart attack or heart failure in 1947, but he was cremated without an autopsy. A 1991 investigation concluded that Wallenberg was executed while imprisoned, possibly by poisoning. His fate and cause of death remain controversial to this day.

On January 17, 1998, the "Drudge Report" website broke the story that U.S. President Bill Clinton had a sexual relationship with a 23-year-old intern. The report also claimed that Newsweek had suppressed a story about Clinton and the intern. This article marked the first time a major news event was reported first on the internet. The next day, the "Drudge Report" released the intern Monica Lewinsky's name and published her resume. The website reported that Lewinsky was "proficient in Macintosh Microsoft Word 6.0, Windows WordPerfect, and Infosys."

The first prisoner to be executed after the United States reinstated the death penalty was shot by a firing squad on January 17, 1977. Murderer Gary Gilmore was unusual in that he actively opposed any efforts to spare his life. Gilmore said he wanted anti-death penalty activists to "butt out." "This is my life, this is my death. The court has approved my death, I accept it," he said. His last words were: "Let's do it."

Under Utah law, one member of the five-man firing squad unknowingly fires a blank. This way, no one can be sure if they killed the prisoner. But when his brother viewed his body, he found five bullet holes in his shirt. In a particularly macabre irony, the comedy show "Saturday Night Live" had performed a song called "Let's Kill Gary Gilmore for Christmas" just days before his death.

Hawaii's last queen, Liliuokalani, was overthrown on January 17, 1893, by a Committee of Public Safety made up of American businessmen residing in the country. The United States deployed Marines to Hawaii to protect American interests, but did not annex it until 1898. Liliuokalani died in Honolulu in 1917 at the age of 79, then a private citizen.