Template:On this day - January 15

Mario Vargas Llosa

• 1519 – Death of Vasco Núñez de Balboa, Spanish adelantado, explorer, ruler and conquistador (b. 1475).
• 1526 – A maritime expedition led by Diego García de Moguer, to whom the discovery of the Río de la Plata is attributed, sails from La Coruña.
• 1543 – In El Salvador (Captaincy General of Guatemala), the village of Apopa is founded.
• 1724 – In Spain, Louis I is proclaimed King.
• 1777 – The Quechua cacique Tomás Katari dies after being thrown off a cliff at the Cuesta de Chataquilla (Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, present-day Bolivia) (b. 1740).
• 1798 – In Madrid (Spain), Francisco de Goya begins painting the frescoes of the church of San Antonio de la Florida.
• 1810 – In Andalusia, Joseph Bonaparte, at the head of an army of 80,000 men, reaches Sierra Morena to begin the occupation of the region.
• 1811 – In the New Kingdom of Granada (present-day Colombia), the municipality of Abejorral is founded by the schoolmaster José Antonio Villegas.
• 1831 – In Mexico, President Vicente Guerrero and his associates are taken by surprise and seized at Tlacopanocha Beach in Acapulco, aboard the brigantine Colombo of the Genoese mercenary Francisco Picaluga, on the instructions of Vice President Anastasio Bustamante.
• 1847 – In Mexico, Benito Juárez is initiated as an apprentice in the lodge "Independencia No. 2" of the Mexican National Rite, in a hall of the Senate of the Republic fitted out as a Masonic temple.
• 1881 – During the War of the Pacific, the Battle of Miraflores takes place between the forces of the Chilean Army and the Peruvian Army, won by the Chilean troops.
• 1932 – In Madrid, Niceto Alcalá-Zamora, President of the Republic, inaugurates the first building of the University City, the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters.
• 1944 – The city of San Juan (Argentina) is destroyed by an earthquake.
• 1983 – The Non-Aligned Countries unanimously call on the United States to hold talks with Nicaragua and help seek peace in El Salvador.
• 1996 – Mario Vargas Llosa takes his seat "L" at the Royal Spanish Academy.
• 2001 – The Wikipedia project officially begins.
• 2006 – Michelle Bachelet is elected President of Chile, the first woman to hold this office in the country's history.
• 2007 – Rafael Correa takes office as president of Ecuador and the so-called Citizens' Revolution begins.
• 2012 – Death of Manuel Fraga, Spanish politician, diplomat and university professor, one of the most prominent figures of late Francoism and of the Transition (b. 1922).
• 2022 – Death of Aurora del Mar, Argentine radio actress and theater, film and television actress (b. 1934).