It’s Sunday, Jan. 6, the sixth day of 2013. There are 359 days left in the year.

Happenings

Syria — President Bashar Assad, his capital under seige, is set to deliver a speech to the nation — his first since June.

Nixon — The Richard Nixon Presidential Library in Yorba Linda, Calif., marks what would have been the president’s 100th birthday today (three days before the actual date).

Birthdays

Retired MLB All-Star Ralph Branca is 87. Author E.L. Doctorow is 82. Actress Bonnie Franklin is 69. Former FBI director Louis Freeh is 63. Singer Jett Williams is 60. Rock musician Malcolm Young (AC/DC) is 60. Actor-comedian Rowan Atkinson is 58. World Golf Hall of Famer Nancy Lopez is 56. Rhythm-and-blues singer Kathy Sledge is 54. TV chef Nigella Lawson is 53. Movie director John Singleton is 45. TV personality Julie Chen is 43. Actor Danny Pintauro (“Who’s the Boss?”) is 37. NBA player Gilbert Arenas is 31.

History

Highlight: In 1963, “Oliver!,” Lionel Bart’s musical adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel “Oliver Twist,” opened on Broadway.

In 1540, England’s King Henry VIII married his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves. (The marriage lasted about six months.)

In 1759, George Washington and Martha Dandridge Custis were married in New Kent County, Va.

In 1838, Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail gave the first successful public demonstration of their telegraph, in Morristown, N.J.

In 1912, New Mexico became the 47th state.

In 1919, the 26th president of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, died in Oyster Bay, N.Y., at age 60.

In 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union address, outlined a goal of “Four Freedoms”: Freedom of speech and expression; the freedom of people to worship God in their own way; freedom from want; freedom from fear.

In 1942, the Pan American Airways Pacific Clipper, a flying boat built by Boeing, arrived in New York more than a month after leaving California and following a westward route.

In 1945, George H.W. Bush married Barbara Pierce.

In 1950, Britain recognized the Communist government of China.

In 1963, “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom” premiered on NBC-TV.

In 1982, truck driver William Bonin was convicted in Los Angeles of 10 of the “Freeway Killer” slayings of young men and boys. (Bonin was later convicted of four other killings; he was executed in 1996.)

In 1993, authorities rescued Jennifer Stolpa and her infant son, Clayton, after Jennifer’s husband, James, succeeded in reaching help, ending the family’s eight-day ordeal in the snow-covered Nevada desert. Jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, 75, died in Englewood, N.J.; ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev died in suburban Paris at 54.

Ten years ago: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein accused U.N. inspectors of engaging in “intelligence work” instead of searching for suspected nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in his country.

Five years ago: In a video posted on the Internet, al-Qaida’s American-born spokesman, Adam Gadahn, urged fighters to meet President George W. Bush with bombs during his upcoming Mideast visit.

One year ago: The Obama administration expanded the FBI’s more than eight-decades-old definition of rape to count men as victims for the first time and to drop the requirement that victims physically resisted their attackers.

— From wire reports