Today in History ^06/23/17

June 23, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ Leave a Comment

Illustration of King Robert the Bruce of Scotland killing Sir Henry de Bohun, an English knight, at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 (© The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)

(1314) Scotland fights England for independence at Bannockburn

Stirling Castle watches over the Highlands road, and Scots want it back from its English occupiers. The Scots lay siege, and when England’s King Edward II sends reinforcements they are shockingly defeated at the Battle of Bannockburn by a smaller Scottish force commanded by Robert the Bruce.

The Battle of Bannockburn was a significant Scottish victory in the First War of Scottish Independence, and a landmark in Scottish history.

Start date: Jun 23, 1314
End date: Jun 24, 1314

wiki/Battle_of_Bannockburn

Engraving of Lillian Sholes using an 1872 model of the machine invented by her father, Christopher Sholes (© AP)

(1868) Christopher Sholes receives a patent for his ‘Type-Writer’

Resembling a small piano set inside a wooden cabinet, a new writing machine invented by Christopher Sholes and his associates receives a US patent. Refinements, including the QWERTY keyboard, will be added in years to come as the typewriter taps into a vast business-world need.

Christopher Latham Sholes was an American inventor who invented the QWERTY keyboard, and along with Frank Haven Hall, Samuel W. Soule, Carlos Glidden and John Pratt, has been contended as one of the inventors of the first typewriter in the United States. He was also a newspaper publisher and Wisconsin politician.

Born: Feb 14, 1819 · Mooresburg, PA
Died: Feb 17, 1890 · Milwaukee, WI
Inventions: QWERTY · Sholes and Glidden typewriter
Siblings: Charles Sholes (Brother)
Parents: Catherine Sholes (Mother) · Orrin Sholes (Father)
Buried: Forest Home Cemetery
Highlights
1837: After completing his apprenticeship, Sholes moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1837, and later to Southport, Wisconsin (present-day Kenosha).

1845: In 1845, Sholes was working as editor of the Southport Telegraph, a small newspaper in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

1867: Further inspiration came in July 1867, when Sholes came across a short note in Scientific American describing the “Pterotype”, a prototype typewriter that had been invented by John Pratt.

1890: Sholes died on February 17, 1890 after battling tuberculosis for nine years, and is buried at Forest Home Cemetery in Milwaukee.

wiki/Christopher_Latham_Sholes

Aviator Wiley Post posing with his aircraft, the 'Winnie Mae,' that he flew around the world (© Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

(1931) Aviator Wiley Post takes off to break world record

Once a flying circus performer, aviator Wiley Post has bigger plans as he and his navigator take off from New York in their single-engine plane hoping to beat a 21-day circumnavigation flight record. Post will break that record, and by a lot, when he flies around the world in just eight days.

Wiley Hardeman Post was a famed American aviator during the interwar period, the first pilot to fly solo around the world. Also known for his work in high-altitude flying, Post helped develop one of the first pressure suits and discovered the jet stream. On August 15, 1935, Post and American humorist Will Rogers were killed when Post’s aircraft crashed on takeoff from a lagoon near Point Barrow in the Territory of Alaska.

Born: Nov 22, 1898 · Grand Saline, TX
Died: Aug 15, 1935 · Barrow, AK
Spouse: Mae Laine (m. 1927)
Movies: Air Hawks
Parents: William Francis Post · Mae Quinlan Post
Highlights
1921: He was arrested in 1921 and sent to the Oklahoma State Reformatory.

1927: Wiley Post married Mae Laine on June 27, 1927.

1930: Post was the personal pilot of wealthy Oklahoma oilmen Powell Briscoe and F.C. Hall in 1930 when Hall bought a high-wing, single-engine Lockheed Vega, one of the most famous record-breaking aircraft of the early 1930s.

1933: In 1933, he repeated his flight around the world, this time using the auto-pilot and compass in place of his navigator and becoming the first to accomplish the feat alone.

1935: In 1935 Post became interested in surveying a mail-and-passenger air route from the West Coast of the United States to Russia.

1935: On August 15, 1935, Post and American humorist Will Rogers were killed when Post’s aircraft crashed on takeoff from a lagoon near Point Barrow in the Territory of Alaska.

wiki/Wiley_Post

Emperor penguin on Riiser-larsen Ice Shelf, Antarctica (© Wolfgang Kaehler/LightRocket via Getty Images))

(1961) Antarctic arms control treaty avoids ‘Cold War’

Aimed at preserving a pristine part of the globe, the Antarctic Treaty System goes into effect, stipulating the continent can only be used for peaceful and scientific endeavors – military uses, such as weapons testing, are banned. With 12 signatories, it’s the first arms-control treaty of the Cold War.

The Antarctic Treaty and related agreements, collectively known as the Antarctic Treaty System, regulate international relations with respect to Antarctica, Earth’s only continent without a native human population. For the purposes of the treaty system, Antarctica is defined as all of the land and ice shelves south of 60°S latitude. The treaty, entering into force in 1961 and having 53 parties as of 2016, sets aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve, establishes freedom of scientific investigation and bans military activity on that continent. The treaty was the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War. The Antarctic Treaty Secretariat headquarters have been located in Buenos Aires, Argentina, since September 2004.

wiki/Antarctic_Treaty_System

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Today in History ^06/01/17

June 1, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ Leave a Comment

Whisky sample inside the Diageo Claive Vidiz Collection, the world's largest collection of Scottish Whisky on display at The Scotch Whisky Experience in Edinburgh, Scotland (© Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

(1495) A batch of whisky is made for Scotland’s King James IV

In the earliest known written mention of the spirit, Brother John Cor, a monk at a Scottish abbey, notes in his exchequer rolls that ‘aqua vitae VIII bolls of malt’ are to be made by order of the King. Lindores Abbey will later be considered the birthplace of Scotch whisky.

Lindores Abbey was a Tironensian abbey on the outskirts of Newburgh in Fife, Scotland. Now a much reduced and overgrown ruin, it lies on the southern banks of the River Tay, about 1-mile north of the village of Lindores.

Address: Abbey Road, Newburgh KY14 6HH
Burials: James Douglas, 9th Earl of Douglas

wiki/Lindores_Abbey

A photograph of Navajo Native Americans at Fort Defiance, Arizona, circa 1873 (© Fotosearch/Getty Images)

(1868) Treaty of Bosque Redondo
repatriates Navajos with homelands

The Long Walk of the Navajo, a two-year US government relocation of the Navajo people from Arizona to New Mexico in 53 different forced 300-mile marches, ends with a treaty allowing Navajos to return to their original homelands after the catastrophic failure of the New Mexico reservation.

The Long Walk of the Navajo, also called the Long Walk to Bosque Redondo, refers to the 1864 deportation of the Navajo people by the government of the United States of America. Navajos were forced to walk from their land in what is now Arizona to eastern New Mexico. Some 53 different forced marches occurred between August 1864 and the end of 1866. Some anthropologists claim that the “collective trauma of the Long Walk…is critical to contemporary Navajos’ sense of identity as a people”.
wiki/Long_Walk_of_the_Navajo

Martial law in Tulsa, Oklahoma after the race riots (© Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

(1921) Tulsa’s prosperous African-American
community destroyed

Known as the ‘Black Wall Street,’ and the nation’s wealthiest African-American neighborhood, the Greenwood district of Tulsa, OK, is attacked by gangs of marauding whites. When the Tulsa race riot ends, 35 city blocks have been burned, 800 are injured, upwards of 300 are dead, and 10,000 left homeless.

The Tulsa race riot, or Tulsa race riot of 1921, occurred between May 31–June 1, 1921, when a white mob started attacking residents and businesses of the African-American community of Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in what is considered one of the worst incidents of racial violence in the history of the United States. The attack, carried out on the ground and by air, destroyed more than 35 blocks of the district, at the time the wealthiest black community in the nation. More than 800 people were admitted to hospitals and more than 6,000 black residents were arrested and detained, many for several days. The Oklahoma Bureau of Vital Statistics officially recorded 39 dead, but the American Red Cross estimated 300, a number supported by historians since then.

Start date: May 31, 1921
End date: Jun 01, 1921

wiki/Tulsa_race_riot

The Beatles album 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' (© SSPL/Getty Images)

(1967) The Beatles usher in the era of the rock album

The Beatles’ eighth studio LP sees the band reinvent itself, and in the process, the entire landscape of modern popular music. ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band will be a smash hit and a revelation for critics, and decades later, many will still call it a work of art that qualifies as the best rock album in history.

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by English rock band the Beatles. Released on 26 May 1967 in the United Kingdom and 2 June 1967 in the United States, it was an immediate commercial and critical success, spending 27 weeks at the top of the UK albums chart and 15 weeks at number one in the US. On release, the album was lauded by the vast majority of critics for its innovations in music production, songwriting and graphic design, for bridging a cultural divide between popular music and legitimate art, and for providing a musical representation of its generation and the contemporary counterculture. It won four Grammy Awards in 1968, including Album of the Year, the first rock LP to receive this honour.

Release year: 1967
Genre: Rock music
Label: Capitol Records
Artist: The Beatles
Awards: Grammy Award for Album of the Year · Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album · Grammy Award for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical · Grammy Hall of Fame · Grammy Award for Best Contemporary (R&R) Performance · Grammy Award for Best Album Cover, Graphic Arts · Brit Award for MasterCard British Album of the Year

wiki/Sgt._Pepper’s_Lonely_Hearts_Club_Band

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Today in History ^05/16/17

May 16, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ Leave a Comment

President Andrew Johnson (© Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty images))

(1868) US President Andrew Johnson escapes conviction by one vote

Having impeached Andrew Johnson three months earlier, the US Congress fails to convict the president of ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ stemming from his refusal to go along with Civil War Reconstruction. A Senate trial acquits the first US president ever impeached of all charges.

Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. Johnson became president as he was vice president at the time of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. A Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union ticket, Johnson came to office as the Civil War concluded. The new president favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union. His plans did not give protection to the former slaves, and he came into conflict with the Republican-dominated Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives. The first American president to be impeached, he was acquitted in the Senate by one vote.

Lived: Dec 29, 1808 – Jul 31, 1875 (age 66)
Height: 5′ 10″ (1.78 m)
Spouse: Eliza McCardle Johnson (m. 1827 – 1875)
Successor: David M. Key (Senator)
Parties: National Union Party · Republican Party · Democratic Party
Children: Martha Patterson (Daughter) · Mary Stover (Daughter) · Brig. Gen. Robert Johnson (USA) (Son) · Andrew “Frank” Johnson, Jr. (Son) · Charles Johnson, MD, USA (Son)
Highlights
1827: In 1827, at the age of 18, he married 16-year-old Eliza McCardle, the daughter of a local shoemaker.

1829: Johnson helped organize a mechanics’ (working men’s) ticket in the 1829 Greeneville municipal election.

1865: Johnson traveled to Washington to be sworn in, although according to Gordon-Reed, “in light of what happened on March 4, 1865, it might have been better if Johnson had stayed in Nashville.”

1868: In January 1868, the Senate disapproved of his action, and reinstated Stanton, contending the President had violated the Tenure of Office Act.

1868: Stanton refused to leave his office, and on February 24, 1868, the House impeached the President for intentionally violating the Tenure of Office Act, by a vote of 128 to 47.

1875: Returning to Tennessee after his presidency, Johnson sought political vindication, and gained it in his eyes when he was elected to the Senate again in 1875 (the only former president to serve there), just months before his death.

wiki/Andrew_Johnson

Mao Zedong, chairman of the communist party of China, 1966 (© Probst/ullstein bild via Getty Images)

(1966) Cultural Revolution begins in China

Mao Zedong, China’s Communist Party chairman, issues his ‘May 16 Notice’ condemning the growing influence of capitalist elements in the government, and he calls for a purge. The resulting ‘Cultural Revolution’ will lead to the destruction of important landmarks, torture, and murder.

The Cultural Revolution, formally the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement that took place in China from 1966 until 1976. Set into motion by Mao Zedong, then Chairman of the Communist Party of China, its stated goal was to preserve ‘true’ Communist ideology in the country by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society, and to re-impose Maoist thought as the dominant ideology within the Party. The Revolution marked the return of Mao Zedong to a position of power after the Great Leap Forward. The movement paralyzed China politically and negatively affected the country’s economy and society to a significant degree.

Start date: 1966
End date: 1976

wiki/Cultural_Revolution

The Beach Boys pose in July 1967 in Los Angeles © Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

(1966) Beach Boys release landmark album

The Beach Boys release ‘Pet Sounds,’ which showcases Brian Wilson’s elaborate production and personal approach to songwriting. The album is not an instant smash in the U.S., but will go on to influence the experimental sounds of the psychedelic-rock era and generations of musicians to come.

Pet Sounds is the eleventh studio album by American rock band the Beach Boys, released on May 16, 1966. It initially met with a lukewarm critical and commercial response in the United States, peaking at number 10 in the Billboard 200, a significantly lower placement than the band’s preceding albums. In the United Kingdom, the album was hailed by its music press and was an immediate commercial success, peaking at number 2 in the UK Top 40 Albums Chart and remaining among the top ten positions for six months. Pet Sounds has subsequently gathered worldwide acclaim from critics and musicians alike, and is widely considered to be one of the most influential albums in music history.

Release year: 1966
Genre: Pop music, Contemporary Pop
Label: Capitol Records
Artist: The Beach Boys

wiki/Pet_Sounds

Surgeon General C. Everett Koop fields questions during his news conference, Monday, May 16, 1988, in Washington, where he released a report on smoking (AP Photo/Barry Thumma) (© Barry Thumma/AP)

(1988) C. Everett Koop warns of nicotine’s addictive power

US Surgeon General C. Everett Koop reports on the addictive properties of nicotine, described as on par with cocaine and heroin. A dedicated campaigner against smoking, his public advocacy will be credited with helping spur declines in cigarette use during his tenure and beyond.

Charles Everett Koop, MD (October 14, 1916 – February 25, 2013) was an American pediatric surgeon and public health administrator. He was a vice admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, and served as the 13th Surgeon General of the United States under President Ronald Reagan from 1982 to 1989. According to the Associated Press, “Koop was the only surgeon general to become a household name.”

Koop was known for his work to prevent tobacco use, AIDS, and abortion, and for his support of the rights of disabled children.

wiki/C._Everett_Koop

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Today in History ^03/13/17

March 13, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ

Depiction of the Senate as a court of impeachment for the trial of Andrew Johnson (© Theodore R. Davis/Harper's Weekly/Library of Congress )

(1868) First US presidential impeachment trial opens

President Andrew Johnson’s lax attitude towards Reconstruction has raised the ire of Republicans who feel he should be tougher on the South. The trial in the Senate considers whether Johnson has violated the Tenure of Office Act. Johnson will avoid being thrown out of office by a single vote.

The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson occurred in 1868, when the United States House of Representatives resolved to impeach President Andrew Johnson, adopting eleven articles of impeachment detailing his “high crimes and misdemeanors”, in accordance with Article Two of the United States Constitution. The House’s primary charge against Johnson was with violation of the Tenure of Office Act, passed by Congress the previous year. Specifically, he had removed Edwin McMasters Stanton, the Secretary of War (whom the Tenure of Office Act was largely designed to protect), from office and attempted to replace him with Brevet Major General Lorenzo Thomas. Contrary to popular belief, Johnson was not impeached for temporarily replacing Stanton with General Ulysses Grant earlier while Congress was not in session.

The House formally agreed to the articles of impeachment on March 2, 1868, and forwarded them to the Senate. The trial in the Senate began three days later, with Chief Justice of the United States Salmon P. Chase presiding. The first vote on one of the eleven impeachment articles concluded on May 16 with a failure to convict Johnson. A ten-day recess was called before attempting to convict him on additional articles, but that effort failed on May 26. The 35-to-19 votes on the three articles actually voted on were all one short of the required two-thirds needed for conviction.

This was the first impeachment of an incumbent President since creation of the office in 1789. The culmination of a lengthy political battle between Johnson and the Republican majority in Congress over how best to deal with the defeated Southern states following the conclusion of the American Civil War, the impeachment and the subsequent trial were among the most dramatic events in the political life of the nation during the Reconstruction Era. Together, they have gained a historical reputation as an act of political expedience, rather than necessity, based on Johnson’s defiance of an unconstitutional piece of legislation, and with little regard for the will of a general public which, despite the unpopularity of Johnson, opposed the impeachment. There would not be another serious attempt to impeach a President for 106 years when, during the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon resigned from office, rather than face impeachment and trial. The only other impeachment trial of a President would occur 131 years later with the impeachment of Bill Clinton.

wiki/Impeachment_of_Andrew_Johnson

Marines in a bougainville jungle clearing pose with their dog partners during WWII, March 24, 1944 (© AP)

(1942) US Army K-9 Corps let slip the dogs of war

German shepherds, doberman pinschers, and Siberian huskies are three of the many breeds that begin training with the Quartermaster Corps. These courageous canines will serve with distinction in World War II.

Dogs in warfare have a long history starting in ancient times. From war dogs trained in combat to their use as scouts, sentries and trackers, their uses have been varied and some continue to exist in modern military usage.
wiki/Dogs_in_warfare

Catherine ‘Kitty’ Genovese in an undated photo (© NY Daily News Archive/Getty Images)

(1964) Kitty Genovese is murdered in New York City

Bar manager Kitty Genovese is stabbed to death outside her apartment in Queens, and later reports will question whether neighbors heard and did nothing to help. The controversy will spur research into the ‘bystander effect.’

Catherine Susan “Kitty” Genovese was an American woman who was stabbed to death outside her apartment building in Kew Gardens, a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens, on March 13, 1964.
wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese

Unidentified parents embrace their daughter outside the elementary school in Dunblane, Scotland, where a gunman opened fire, killing 16 children, one teacher, and wounding at least 12 others, March 13, 1996 (© Glasgow Evening Times/AP)

(1996) Dunblane Primary School shooting

Tragedy strikes the small village of Dunblane, Scotland, when a lone gunman enters the primary school’s gym and begins shooting. Sixteen young students are killed along with their teacher and 13 are injured.

The Dunblane school massacre was the deadliest mass shooting in the UK’s history, when gunman Thomas Hamilton killed 16 children and one teacher at Dunblane Primary School near Stirling, Scotland, on 13 March 1996, before killing himself.

Date: Mar 13, 1996

wiki/Dunblane_school_massacre

3.3.f17

A Historical Day

June 23, 2016 by GµårÐïåñ

(1314) Scotland fights England for independence at Bannockburn
	Stirling Castle watches over the Highlands road, and Scots want it back from its English occupiers. The Scots lay siege, and when England’s King Edward II sends reinforcements they are shockingly defeated at the Battle of Bannockburn by a smaller Scottish force commanded by Robert the Bruce..
(1868) Christopher Sholes receives a patent for his ‘Type-Writer’
Resembling a small piano set inside a wooden cabinet, a new writing machine invented by Christopher Sholes and his associates receives a US patent. Refinements, including the QWERTY keyboard, will be added in years to come as the typewriter taps into a vast business-world need..
(1931) Aviator Wiley Post takes off to break world record
	Once a flying circus performer, aviator Wiley Post has bigger plans as he and his navigator take off from New York in their single-engine plane hoping to beat a 21-day circumnavigation flight record. Post will break that record, and by a lot, when he flies around the world in just eight days. .
(1961) Antarctic arms control treaty avoids ‘Cold War’
Aimed at preserving a pristine part of the globe, the Antarctic Treaty System goes into effect, stipulating the continent can only be used for peaceful and scientific endeavors – military uses, such as weapons testing, are banned. With 12 signatories, it’s the first arms-control treaty of the Cold War..