On This Day December 24

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On This Day December 17

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On This Day November 10

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1775 – The U.S. Marine Corps is founded with a mission to defend the U.S. Constitution, protect American citizens and stabilize the world in times of crisis.

1903 – The U.S. Patent Office awards Patent No. 743,801 to Mary Anderson for her “window cleaning device” for cars and other vehicles to remove snow, ice or sleet from the window. Known today as the windshield wiper, Anderson never made a penny on her invention because the patent expired before it was put into widespread use.

1951 – The introduction of area codes means callers no longer require an operator to place domestic long-distance phone calls for them. Rather, they can direct-dial anywhere across the country.

1969 – “Sesame Street” premieres on public television (PBS), introducing a generation of kids to Big Bird, Oscar the Grouch, Kermit the Frog, Ernie and Bert, Cookie Monster and many other beloved characters — some puppets, some animated as well as live actors — breaking new ground by combining fun with education on TV.

1970 – The Great Wall of China opens to world tourism.

1975 – The SS Edmund Fitzgerald, a workhorse freighter that carried massive loads of iron ore from mines in Minnesota to various Great Lakes ports, sinks in Lake Superior after getting caught in a powerful storm. All 29 crewmembers are killed. The tragedy is immortalized in musician Gordon Lightfoot’s 1976 hit, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

1989 – Germans continue to tear down whole sections of the Berlin Wall, and souvenir hunters quickly snatch up stone and concrete chunks from the crumbling Cold War icon.

On this Day May 5

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1862 – During the Battle of Puebla, Mexican troops under General Ignacio Zaragoza — outnumbered three to one — defeat invading French forces. The historic event is marked each year with Cinco de Mayo celebrations.

1925 – Teacher John Scopes is arrested for violating the Butler Act, which prevents the teaching of evolution in Tennessee schools. He is later tried in the famous Scopes Monkey Trial.

1945 – One woman and five children are killed in rural Oregon while attempting to drag a Japanese balloon out the woods. The balloon was armed and exploded after the group began tampering with it. They were the first and only known American civilians killed in the continental U.S. during World War II.

1955 – The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) becomes a sovereign state when the U.S., France and Great Britain end their 10-year military occupation. The move clears the way for West Germany to rearm and become a full-fledged member of the western alliance against the Soviet Union.

1961 – Astronaut Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel into outer space during a suborbital flight of 15 minutes aboard the Mercury capsule named Freedom 7.

1985 – President Ronald Reagan angers Jewish leaders and Holocaust survivors by visiting the Bitburg war cemetery in Germany, unaware that the cemetery houses the graves of 49 Nazi officers.

2002 – “Spider-Man” becomes first movie to top $100 million in an opening weekend. Directed by Sam Raimi and starring Tobey Maguire in the title role, the eagerly awaited comic book adaptation rakes in a staggering $114.8 million.