1931

Today in History 10/17 (Loma Prieta Earthquake)

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Workers check the damage to Interstate 880 in Oakland, California on October 19, 1989, after it collapsed during the Loma Prieta earthquake two days earlier (© Paul Sakuma/AP)(1989) San Francisco Bay Area rocked by major quake
Just minutes before Game 3 of the World Series is scheduled to start in San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, a violent earthquake hits Northern California, severely pounding the San Francisco Bay Area. The quake collapses bridges and freeways, causes $7 billion in damage, nearly 4,000 injuries, and 67 deaths.
The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake occurred in Northern California on October 17 at 5:04 p.m. local time. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park approximately 10 mi northeast of Santa Cruz on a section of the San Andreas Fault System and was named for the nearby Loma Prieta Peak in the Santa Cruz Mountains. With a moment magnitude of 6.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX, the shock was responsible for 63 deaths and 3,757 injuries. The Loma Prieta segment of the San Andreas Fault System had been relatively inactive since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake until two moderate foreshocks occurred in June 1988 and again in August 1989.
Date: Oct 17, 1989
Areas affected: Central Coast (California), San Francisco Bay Area, United States
Depth: 12 mi (19 km)
Max. intensity: IX (Violent)
Total damage: $5.6–6 billion

1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. Photograph of a collapsed five-story tower, St. Joseph's Seminary, Los Altos, California. One person, Curtis Lee Currin, working in the tower was killed
One person died when a five-story tower collapsed at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Santa Clara County.
wiki/1989_Loma_Prieta_earthquake
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(1989) San Francisco Bay Area rocked by major quake.
Also on this day,

1860 | 1st Open Championship as golfers play a new tournament near Glasgow
A single-day championship is held near Glasgow, Scotland at Prestwick Golf Club, a 12-hole course hosting eight professional golfers for a three-round game to determine the winner of The Open. The tournament will become the oldest in golfing and be known in the US as the British Open.
1931 | A Chicago mobster’s criminal career ends with taxes due as Al Capone convicted
Brooklyn native Al Capone is brought to justice after a violent criminal career, but it’s not a rival’s bullets or a murder conviction that finally does him in. The 32-year-old known as ‘Scarface’ is convicted on tax evasion charges and sentenced to a prison term of 11 years.
1979 | Spreadsheets come to personal computers as VisiCalc released
Personal computers get down to business as VisiCalc is released for the Apple II. It will go on to sell about a million copies, with versions for the IBM PC and other platforms added in the coming years. The day will later be known as National Spreadsheet Day.

Today in History 10/17/17

Chicago crime boss Al Capone, left, wearing white hat, as he leaves the courtroom in Chicago on October 12, 1931 (© AP)(1931) A Chicago mobster's criminal career ends with taxes due
Brooklyn native Al Capone is brought to justice after a violent criminal career, but it's not a rival's bullets or a murder conviction that finally does him in. The 32-year-old known as 'Scarface' is convicted on tax evasion charges and sentenced to a prison term of 11 years.
Alphonse Gabriel Capone, sometimes known by the nickname Scarface, was an American mobster, crime boss, and businessman who attained fame during the Prohibition era as the co-founder and boss of the Chicago Outfit. His seven-year reign as crime boss ended when he was 33 years old.
Lived: Jan 17, 1899 - Jan 25, 1947 (age 48)
Height: 5' 10" (1.79 m)
Spouse: Mae Capone (m. 1918 - 1947)
TV shows: The Mystery of Al Capone's Vaults
Children: Albert Francis Capone (Son)
Buried: Mount Carmel Cemetery
Capone’s criminal record in 1932
Capone's FBI criminal record in 1932, showing most of his criminal charges were discharged/dismissed
Highlights
  • 1918: Capone married Mae Josephine Coughlin at age 19 on December 30, 1918.

  • 1920: Torrio took over Colosimo's crime empire after Colosimo's murder on May 11, 1920, in which Capone was suspected of being involved.

  • 1926: On September 20, 1926, the North Side Gang used a ploy outside the Capone headquarters at the Hawthorne Inn, aimed at drawing him to the windows.

  • 1927: In January 1927, the Hawthorne's restaurant owner, a friend of Capone's, was kidnapped and killed by Moran and Drucci.

  • 1931: An indication of the attitude of local law enforcement to Capone's organization came in 1931 when Belcastro was wounded in a shooting; police suggested to skeptical journalists that Belcastro was an independent operator.

  • 1947: On January 25, 1947, Capone died of cardiac arrest after suffering a stroke.

wiki/Al_Capone
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Today in History 10/17/17

Chicago crime boss Al Capone, left, wearing white hat, as he leaves the courtroom in Chicago on October 12, 1931 (© AP)(1931) A Chicago mobster’s criminal career ends with taxes due
Brooklyn native Al Capone is brought to justice after a violent criminal career, but it’s not a rival’s bullets or a murder conviction that finally does him in. The 32-year-old known as ‘Scarface’ is convicted on tax evasion charges and sentenced to a prison term of 11 years.
Alphonse Gabriel Capone, sometimes known by the nickname Scarface, was an American mobster, crime boss, and businessman who attained fame during the Prohibition era as the co-founder and boss of the Chicago Outfit. His seven-year reign as crime boss ended when he was 33 years old.
Lived: Jan 17, 1899 – Jan 25, 1947 (age 48)
Height: 5′ 10″ (1.79 m)
Spouse: Mae Capone (m. 1918 – 1947)
TV shows: The Mystery of Al Capone’s Vaults
Children: Albert Francis Capone (Son)
Buried: Mount Carmel Cemetery
Capone’s criminal record in 1932
Capone’s FBI criminal record in 1932, showing most of his criminal charges were discharged/dismissed
Highlights
  • 1918: Capone married Mae Josephine Coughlin at age 19 on December 30, 1918.

  • 1920: Torrio took over Colosimo’s crime empire after Colosimo’s murder on May 11, 1920, in which Capone was suspected of being involved.

  • 1926: On September 20, 1926, the North Side Gang used a ploy outside the Capone headquarters at the Hawthorne Inn, aimed at drawing him to the windows.

  • 1927: In January 1927, the Hawthorne’s restaurant owner, a friend of Capone’s, was kidnapped and killed by Moran and Drucci.

  • 1931: An indication of the attitude of local law enforcement to Capone’s organization came in 1931 when Belcastro was wounded in a shooting; police suggested to skeptical journalists that Belcastro was an independent operator.

  • 1947: On January 25, 1947, Capone died of cardiac arrest after suffering a stroke.

wiki/Al_Capone
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Today in History 06/23/17

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
First Day
Second Day

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.
Flag of Antarctic Treaty

wiki/Antarctic_Treaty_System
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Today in History 05/01/17

Initiation of an Illuminatus, published circa 1867 (© Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)(1776) Bavarian Illuminati society is founded
With Freemason membership beyond his means, Adam Weishaupt founds his own secret society to promote anti-clerical and pro-Enlightenment ideas, the Order of Illuminati. The society will inspire both deep thought and wild conspiracy theories.
The Illuminati is a name given to several groups, both real and fictitious. Historically, the name usually refers to the Bavarian Illuminati, an Enlightenment-era secret society founded on 1 May 1776. The society’s goals were to oppose superstition, obscurantism, religious influence over public life and abuses of state power. “The order of the day,” they wrote in their general statutes, “is to put an end to the machinations of the purveyors of injustice, to control them without dominating them”. The Illuminati—along with Freemasonry and other secret societies—were outlawed through edict, by the Bavarian ruler, Charles Theodore, with the encouragement of the Roman Catholic Church, in 1784, 1785, 1787 and 1790. In the several years following, the group was vilified by conservative and religious critics who claimed that they continued underground and were responsible for the French Revolution.
Founded: 1776
Ceased operation: 1785
Headquarters: Ingolstadt, Germany
Founder: Adam Weishaupt
Minerval Insignia

wiki/Illuminati
Coloured lithograph showing the Crystal Palace of The Great Exhibition in London in 1851 (© SSPL/Getty Images)(1851) The Great Exhibition displays 19th-century might and majesty
The Great Exhibition in London’s Hyde Park opens with 13,000 exhibitors of the finest achievements in industry, science, and the arts. The displays stretch over 8 miles of tables inside a massive glass and iron structure dubbed ‘The Crystal Palace.’ The show will attract 6 million visitors.
The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations or The Great Exhibition, sometimes referred to as the Crystal Palace Exhibition in reference to the temporary structure in which it was held, was an international exhibition that took place in Hyde Park, London, from 1 May to 15 October 1851. It was the first in a series of World’s Fairs, exhibitions of culture and industry that became popular in the 19th century, and it was a much anticipated event. The Great Exhibition was organized by Henry Cole and Prince Albert, husband of the reigning monarch, Queen Victoria. It was attended by famous people of the time, including Charles Darwin, Samuel Colt, members of the Orléanist Royal Family and the writers Charlotte Brontë, Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll, George Eliot and Alfred Tennyson. Music for the opening was under the direction of Sir George Thomas Smart and the continuous music from the exhibited organs for the Queen’s procession was “under the superintendence of William Sterndale Bennett”.
Start date: May 01, 1851
End date: Oct 15, 1851

wiki/The_Great_Exhibition
Engraving of police officers dispersing the strike of streetcar employees in New York in 1886 (© Prisma/UIG/Getty Images)(1886) Workers strike and rally for rights in major US cities
Sixty-hour workweeks at poverty wages inspire marchers to mass in Chicago, New York, Milwaukee, and other American cities. Among their demands are an 8-hour workday and better labor conditions. The strikes and rallies will inspire International Worker’s Day.

On May 1, 1886, 350,000 workers staged a nationwide work stoppage to demand the adoption of a standard eight-hour workday. Forty thousand workers struck in Chicago, Illinois; ten thousand struck in New York; eleven thousand struck in Detroit, Michigan. As many as thirty-two thousand workers struck in Cincinnati, Ohio, although some of these workers had been out on strike for several months before May 1.

The purpose of the May Day Strike was to bring pressure on employers and state governments to create an eight-hour workday. During this period, workers commonly spent twelve or more hours of each day at work. Unions, especially the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the United States and Canada — the predecessor of the American Federation of Labor, encouraged workers to strike on May 1, 1886, to demonstrate the need for an eight-hour day. The strike was to last a single day, although numerous workers remained away from their jobs for several weeks.

Not all unions condoned the May Day Strike. The Knights of Labor preferred peaceful negotiations and boycotts to secure better working conditions for employees. Terence Powderly, the leader of the Knights of Labor at this time, prohibited Knights of Labor members from participating. Despite Powderly’s proclamation, thousands of his union’s members struck on May 1. Numerous members of the Knights of Labor opposed the more peaceful tactics of Powderly.

The May Day Strike had some success. In Cincinnati, some employers, hoping to avoid the strike, granted their workers an eight-hour day. Other employers increased workers’ pay. Throughout the late 1800s, May Day Strikes became commonplace. Very quickly similar strikes occurred around the world. The May Day Strikes helped convince United States President Grover Cleveland to implement Labor Day, a holiday that celebrates the American worker. Numerous countries still celebrate May Day today.


/w/May_Day_Strike_of_1886
The Empire State Building and the Manhattan skyline viewed from the Metropolitan Life Insurance tower. (© NY Daily News Archive/Getty Images)(1931) World’s tallest building is dedicated in New York City
At 102 stories high, the towering Art Deco-inspired Empire State Building is now the tallest manmade structure on the planet, and dominates midtown Manhattan’s skyline. It will reign as the world’s tallest building for nearly four decades, until the original World Trade Center overtakes it in 1970.
The Empire State Building is a 102-story skyscraper located on Fifth Avenue between West 33rd and 34th Streets in Midtown, Manhattan, New York City. It has a roof height of 1,250 feet, and with its antenna included, it stands a total of 1,454 feet tall. Its name is derived from the nickname for New York, the Empire State. It stood as the world’s tallest building for nearly 40 years, from its completion in early 1931 until the topping out of the original World Trade Center’s North Tower in late 1970. Following the September 11 attacks in 2001, the Empire State Building was again the tallest building in New York, until One World Trade Center reached a greater height in April 2012. The Empire State Building is currently the fifth-tallest completed skyscraper in the United States and the 34th-tallest in the world. It is also the fifth-tallest freestanding structure in the Americas. When measured by pinnacle height, it is the fourth-tallest building in the United States.
Website: www.esbnyc.com
Address: 350 5th Ave, New York, NY 10118
Phone: (212) 736-3100
Opened: May 01, 1931
Floors: 102
Height: 1,250 feet (381 m) (Architectural) · 1,454 feet (443.20 m) (Tip)

wiki/Empire_State_Building
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Today in History

Today in History
(1860) Golfers play a new tournament near Glasgow
1860 A single-day championship is held near Glasgow, Scotland at Prestwick Golf Club, a 12-hole course hosting eight professional golfers for a three-round game to determine the winner of The Open. The tournament will become the oldest in golfing and be known in the US as the British Open..

The Open Championship, often referred to as The Open or the British Open, is the oldest of the four major championships in professional golf. Held in the United Kingdom, it is administered by The R&A and is the only major outside the United States. The Open is currently the third major of the year, between the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship, and is played in mid-July.

First occurred: Oct 17, 1860

— Source: wiki/The_Open_Championship
(1931) A Chicago mobster’s criminal career ends with taxes due
Brooklyn native Al Capone is brought to justice after a violent criminal career, but it’s not a rival’s bullets or a murder conviction that finally does him in. The 32-year-old known as ‘Scarface’ is convicted on tax evasion charges and sentenced to a prison term of 11 years.. 1931

I got nothing against the honest cop on the beat, the kind you can’t buy. You just have to have them transferred someplace where they can’t do you any harm.

Lived: Jan 17, 1899 – Jan 25, 1947 (age 48)
Height: 5′ 10″ (1.79 m)
Spouse: Mae Capone (m. 1918 – 1947)
Children: Albert Francis Capone (Son)
Buried: Mount Carmel Cemetery

— Source: wiki/Al_Capone
(1943) Uprising shutters a Nazi death camp in Poland
1943 After 600 prisoners attempt a daring escape from the Nazi extermination camp Sobibór, it’s ordered shut down by Holocaust architect Heinrich Himmler. Efforts will be taken to hide the site, but later excavation will uncover the machinery of death that killed upwards of 250,000 Jews. .

Sobibór was a Nazi German extermination camp located on the outskirts of the village of Sobibór, in occupied Poland, within the semi-colonial territory of General Government, during World War II. The camp was part of the secretive Operation Reinhard, which marked the deadliest phase of the Holocaust in German-occupied Poland. The camp was situated near the rural county’s major town of Włodawa, 85 km south of the provincial capital, Brest-on-the-Bug. Its official German name was SS-Sonderkommando Sobibór. Jews from Poland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, were transported to Sobibór by rail. Most were suffocated in gas chambers fed by the exhaust of a large petrol engine. Up to 200,000 people were murdered at Sobibór and possibly more. At the postwar trial against the former SS personnel of Sobibór, held in Hagen two decades into the Cold War, Professor Wolfgang Scheffler estimated the number of murdered Jews totalled a minimum of 250,000.

— Source: wiki/Sobib%C3%B3r_extermination_camp
(1989) San Francisco Bay Area rocked by major quake
Just minutes before Game 3 of the World Series is scheduled to start in San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, a violent earthquake hits Northern California, severely pounding the San Francisco Bay Area. The quake collapses bridges and freeways, causes $7 billion in damage, nearly 4,000 injuries, and 67 deaths.. 1989

The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake occurred in Northern California on October 17 at 5:04 p.m. local time. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park approximately 10 mi northeast of Santa Cruz on a section of the San Andreas Fault System and was named for the nearby Loma Prieta Peak in the Santa Cruz Mountains. With a moment magnitude of 6.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX, the shock was responsible for 63 deaths and 3,757 injuries. The Loma Prieta segment of the San Andreas Fault System had been relatively inactive since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake until two moderate foreshocks occurred in June 1988 and again in August 1989.

Date: Oct 17, 1989

— Source: wiki/1989_Loma_Prieta_earthquake
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