This Day, That Year – December 13

Francis Drake set sail from England on a circumnavigation of the world on this day in 1577.

Did you know that:

• Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted the South Island of present-day New Zealand on this day in 1642
• A patent for a dry dock was issued to John Adamson on this day in 1816
• Ernst Werner von Siemens, a German artillery officer and the inventor of the electric elevator, was born on this day in 1816