Template:On this day - December 16

Catherine of Aragon

• 1485 – Birth of Catherine of Aragon (Catalina de Trastámara y Trastámara), Spanish aristocrat and Queen consort of England from 1509 to 1533 (d. 1536).
• 1602 – In New Spain, Sebastián Vizcaíno is the first European to reach Monterey Bay, which he names.
• 1702 – In Spain, Philip V returns to Madrid in view of the growing allied threat and the internal problems of the Crown.
• 1837 – In Spain, Narciso Heredia y Begines de los Ríos is appointed President of the Government.
• 1877 – In Barcelona (Spain), the country's first telephone communication takes place.
• 1900 – In Málaga (Spain), the German training ship Gneisenau is wrecked; the commander and several officers perish, as do some thirty Málaga fishermen who went out to rescue the castaways.
• 1902 – Birth of Rafael Alberti, Spanish poet (d. 1999).
• 1935 – In Spain, the Popular Front is formed, led by Manuel Azaña and made up of republicans, socialists, communists and Basque nationalists.
• 1936 – In Mexico, President Lázaro Cárdenas del Río (1895-1970) orders the creation of a national park of Citlaltépetl of 19 750 ha, covering the volcanic cone and its surrounding area, including the municipalities of Tlachichuca, Ciudad Serdán, La Perla, Mariano Escobedo (Veracruz) and Calcahualco, among others, in the states of Puebla and Veracruz.
• 1971 – Death of Santiago Salvat Espasa, Spanish publisher (b. 1891).
• 1981 – Death of Manuel Sanchís Guarner, Spanish philologist, historian and writer (b. 1911).
• 1965 – At the United Nations (New York), Resolution 2017 is voted, urging the Government of Spain to decolonize the territories of Ifni and Western Sahara.
• 2004 – In Paris (France), the BIE (Bureau International des Expositions) proclaims Zaragoza (Spain) host of the International Exposition of 2008, after prevailing over Thessaloniki (Greece) and Trieste (Italy) in a second vote.