On This Day March 3

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1820 – Congress passes the Missouri Compromise, temporarily resolving the first serious political clash between slavery and antislavery interests by admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state.

1887 – Anne Mansfield Sullivan begins teaching six-year-old Helen Keller, who lost her sight and hearing at 19 months of age. Under Sullivan’s tutelage, including her pioneering “touch teaching” techniques, the previously uncontrollable Keller thrived, eventually graduating from college and becoming an international lecturer and activist. 

1923 – The first edition of Time magazine is published. The 32-page issue features former U.S. House Speaker Joseph G. Cannon on the cover. 

1931 – With the stroke of President Herbert Hoover’s pen, the United States officially adopts the “Star-Spangled Banner” as its national anthem.

1950 – Marilyn Monroe makes her first screen appearance when the musical comedy “Love Happy,” starring the Marx Brothers, opens in movie theaters.

1952 – The U.S. Supreme Court upholds a New York state law (Feinberg Law) that prohibits communists from teaching in public schools. Coming at the height of the Red Scare in the U.S., the high court’s decision was further proof that many Americans feared possible subversive communist activity within their borders.

1991 – In what’s believed to be the first viral video, amateur video footage captures the beating of African American motorist Rodney King by four Los Angeles police officers, igniting outrage over alleged police brutality and social inequalities in LA’s black community. The cops are later tried and acquitted, which triggers riots.

On This Day January 14

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History Highlights
History Highlights

On This Day December 1

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On This Day September 15

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1916 – The tank makes its debut as a battlefield weapon, attacking German troops as part of a British assault near Bois d’Elville, or Delville Wood, on the Western Front, during the Battle of the Somme in World War I.

1942 – Three Japanese torpedoes slam into the American aircraft carrier USS Wasp off Guadalcanal in the South Pacific during World War II. The attack claims the lives of nearly 200 of the ship’s 2,000 crewmen. The wreckage of the Wasp was discovered at the bottom of the Coral Sea in January 2019.

1954 – The iconic scene of Marilyn Monroe laughing as her skirt is blown up by the blast of air from a Manhattan subway vent is shot during the filming of “The Seven Year Itch,” directed by Billy Wilder.

1959 – Nikita Khrushchev becomes the first Soviet leader to visit the United States. During the next two weeks, Khrushchev’s visit dominates the headlines and provides some dramatic and humorous moments in the history of the Cold War.

1963 – Four young black girls are killed in a bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, that investigators determine to be a racially motivated terrorist attack. The bombing, which shocks the nation, is Birmingham’s third in 11 days following a federal order to integrate the Alabama schools.

1978 – Muhammad Ali defeats Leon Spinks to win the world heavyweight boxing title for the third time in his career, becoming the first fighter ever to do so. 

1981 – The Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approves Sandra Day O’Connor as the first female Supreme Court justice. 

1982 – Gannett publishes the first edition of a new national daily newspaper called USA Today.

2008 – The venerable Wall Street brokerage firm Lehman Brothers seeks Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, becoming the largest victim of the subprime mortgage crisis that would devastate financial markets and contribute to the biggest economic downturn since the Great Depression.

On this Day August 5

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1858 – The first telegraph line across the Atlantic Ocean is completed, stretching nearly 2,000 miles at depths of up to two miles. It is put to use on August 16, as U.S. President James Buchanan and Queen Victoria exchange formal introductory and complimentary messages.

1914 – The world’s first electric traffic signal is installed at the corner of Euclid Avenue and East 105th Street in Cleveland, Ohio.

1962 – Hollywood icon Marilyn Monroe is found dead in her Los Angeles home at the age of 36. An investigation determines that her death was “caused by a self-administered overdose of sedative drugs and that the mode of death is probable suicide.”

1963 – Representatives of the U.S., Soviet Union and Great Britain sign the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits the testing of nuclear weapons in outer space, underwater or in the atmosphere. The treaty is hailed as an important first step toward the control of nuclear weapons.

1981 – President Ronald Reagan begins firing more than 11,000 striking air traffic controllers for defying his order to return to work. The move slowed commercial air travel for months.

1983 – “Risky Business” opens in theaters, propelling actor Tom Cruise to stardom. The movie’s most iconic scene features Cruise dancing at home in his underpants to Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll.”

1998 – Seventy-year-old Marie Noe is arrested and charged with the suffocation murders of eight of her 10 children over a 50-year period.

2002 – Divers recover the rusty turret of the ironclad Civil War-era warship U.S.S. Monitor, which sank 140 years earlier in a storm off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. 

On this Day June 1

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1938 – Publication of “Action Comics No. 1” introduces the world to Superman and is considered the first true superhero comic. It not only marks the first appearance of the Man of Steel, Clark Kent and Lois Lane, but launches the entire superhero genre. A pristine copy sells on eBay for $3.2 million in 2014 — the highest price ever paid for a single comic book.

1942 – News of Holocaust death camp killings becomes public for the first time. Liberty Brigade, a Warsaw underground newspaper, reports on the gassing of tens of thousands of Jews at Chelmno, a Nazi-operated death camp in Poland— nearly seven months after extermination of prisoners began. 

1968 – Helen Keller, who overcame blindness and deafness to become a world-renowned writer, lecturer, humanitarian and co-founder of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), dies at the age of 87.

1974 – The Heimlich maneuver for rescuing choking victims is published in the journal Emergency Medicine.

1980 – Cable News Network (CNN) debuts as TV’s first all-news service. The first broadcast is co-anchored by David Walker and Lois Hart.

1990 – President George H. W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agree to halt their production of chemical weapons and commit to the eventual destruction of 80 percent of their chemical weapons stockpiles.

2004 – Opening statements begin in the trial of Scott Peterson, who was accused of murdering his wife Laci and the couple’s unborn son in a case that dominated the headlines for nearly two years.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1963 – “It’s My Party,” by Lesley Gore, kicks off two weeks as a No. 1 single.

1964 – The Rolling Stones step onto American soil for the first time when they arrive at New York’s Kennedy Airport to kick off their debut U.S. tour. At the time, they were not as well known in the U.S. as The Beatles were when they arrived four months earlier.

1967 – The Beatles release the groundbreaking album “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” The album took four months and cost $75,000 to complete. It goes on to sell more than 8 million copies and spends 15 weeks at No. 1.

1968 – Simon & Garfunkel grab the top spot on the singles chart with “Mrs. Robinson.” The song, from the duo’s “Bookends” album, is also in the soundtrack to the movie “The Graduate,” starring Anne Bancroft and Dustin Hoffman. It goes on to capture a Record of the Year Grammy.

1974 – Ray Stevens’ novelty song, “The Streak,” begins its third and final week on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

1985 – Prince and The Revolution launch a three-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart with “Around The World In A Day,” which contains Top 10 hits “Raspberry Beret” and “Pop Life.”

1991 – “I Don’t Wanna Cry,” by Mariah Carey, begins its second and final week as a No. 1 hit.

1996 – “Tha Crossroads,” by Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, is in the middle of an eight-week domination of the singles chart.

2002 – Ashanti maintains her hold on the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 with “Foolish.”

2013 – “Modern Vampires of the City,” by Vampire Weekend, debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart.

On this Day May 19

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1749 – England’s King George II grants the Ohio Company of Virginia a charter of 200,000 acres stretching out from the forks of the Ohio River on the present site of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

1921 – Congress passes the Emergency Quota Act (also known as the Immigration Act of 1921), establishing national quotas on the immigration of foreigners into the U.S.

1935 – T.E. Lawrence, known to the world as Lawrence of Arabia, dies as a retired Royal Air Force mechanic living under an assumed name. He is just 46. The legendary war hero, author, and archaeological scholar succumbed to to severe brain injuries sustained in a motorcycle accident six days earlier. His death eventually led to development of the crash helmet. Lawrence was famously portrayed in the Oscar-winning 1962 movie, “Lawrence of Arabia,” by actor Peter O’Toole.

1962 – Marilyn Monroe takes center stage at New York’s Madison Square Garden as she sings “Happy Birthday” to President John F. Kennedy. About 15,000 people are on hand for the star-studded gala that takes place 10 days before JFK’s actual birthday.

2006 – Amid a firestorm of publicity and controversy, director Ron Howard’s adaptation of Dan Brown’s mega-bestselling thriller, “The Da Vinci Code,” debuts in theaters, starring Tom Hanks.

2016 – EgyptAir Flight 804, an Airbus A320 on a routine flight from Paris to Cairo, disappears over the Mediterranean Sea with 66 passengers and crew. It takes weeks to find signs of the wreckage, and while terrorism is suspected initially, investigators conclude that the aircraft broke up in midair after a fire broke out in the cockpit and quickly spread.