Also on this day
Lead Story
1911
Norwegian Roald Amundsen becomes the first explorer to reach the South Pole, beating his British rival, Robert Falcon Scott.
Amundsen, born in Borge, near Oslo, in 1872, was one of the great figures in polar exploration. In 1897, he was first mate on a Belgian expedition that was the first ever...
American Revolution
1777
On this day in 1777, the Continental Congress names Irish-born Thomas Conway to the post of inspector general of the United States. Conway, who was born in Ireland but raised in France, entered the French army in 1749. He was recruited to the Patriot cause by Silas Deane,...
Automotive
1909
On this day in 1909, workers place the last of the 3.2 million 10-pound bricks that pave the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana (a town surrounded by the city of Indianapolis). Since then, most of that brick has been buried under asphalt, but one yard remains exposed at the...
Civil War
1863
On this day in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln announces a grant of amnesty forEmilie Todd Helm, his wife Mary Lincoln’s half sister and the widow of a Confederate general. The pardon was one of the first under Lincoln’s Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, which he had announced less than a...
Cold War
1980
On this day, a CIA report claims that the Soviet Union delivered nearly $7 billion worth of military assistance to Third World nations in 1979, and made over $8 billion in arms sales during that same year. The study also noted that there were nearly 51,000 communist military advisors...
Crime
2012
On this day in 2012, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, Adam Lanza killed 20 first graders and six school employees before turning a gun on himself. Earlier that day, he killed his mother at the home they shared.
The Sandy Hook shooting was, at the time, the second-deadliest...
Disaster
1967
On this day in 1967, record snow continues to fall in New Mexico in a blizzard that eventually kills 51 people. In December of that year, snow fell almost constantly in the northern part of the state for two weeks, piling up to five feet in some areas.
Particularly hard hit...
General Interest
1799
George Washington, the American revolutionary leader and first president of the United States, dies of acute laryngitis at his estate in Mount Vernon, Virginia. He was 67 years old.George Washington was born in 1732 to a farm family in Westmoreland County, Virginia. His first direct military experience came as a...
1900
German physicist Max Planck publishes his groundbreaking study of the effect of radiation on a “blackbody” substance, and the quantum theory of modern physics is born.Through physical experiments, Planck demonstrated that energy, in certain situations, can exhibit characteristics of physical matter. According to theories of classical physics, energy is solely...
Hollywood
2005
On this day in 2005, King Kong, a remake of the classic 1933 film of the same name about a fictional giant ape who climbs New York City’s Empire State Building, opens in theaters.
The original King Kong, starring Fay Wray as the great ape’s love interest, as well as Robert...
Literary
1640
On this day in 1640, Aphra Behn is baptized at Harbledown, near Canterbury, England. A successful playwright and novelist, Behn has been called the first Englishwoman to make her living as a writer.
Behn’s origins are unclear, but historians believe she was probably the daughter of Bartholomew Johnson and Elizabeth Denham...
Music
1977
In a 2008 interview on BBC Radio 4, Robin Gibb confessed to making it through only the first 30 minutes of the world premiere, and to never having seen the rest of the picture in the decades that followed. Millions of Americans did, however, make it through the film that...
Old West
1799
A major landholder and promoter of western settlement, George Washington dies on this day in 1799 at his Mount Vernon home along the banks of the Potomac.
From an early age, the future first president of the United States had a passionate interest in the vast unsettled territories of the West....
Presidential
1799
On this day in 1799, George Washington, the man described by fellow soldier and Virginian Henry Lee as “first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen” dies at his Mount Vernon estate in Virginia.
Born in Westmoreland County, Virginia, the second son from the second...
Sports
1946
On this day in 1946, the American tennis champion Stan Smith is born in Pasadena, California. A three-time All-American at the University of Southern California (USC), Smith captured the NCAA singles title in 1968 and the doubles title in 1967 and 1968. With his USC doubles partner, Bob Lutz, Smith...
Vietnam War
1961
In a public exchange of letters with South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem, President John F. Kennedy formally announces that the United States will increase aid to South Vietnam, which would include the expansion of the U.S. troop commitment. Kennedy, concerned with the recent advances made by the communist...
1964
In Laos, Operation Barrel Roll, the name given to the first phase of the bombing plan approved by President Lyndon B. Johnson on December 1, begins with U.S. planes attacking “targets of opportunity” in northern Laos.
This operation was initiated in response to a Pathet Lao offensive in the Plaine des...
World War I
1918
In the latest bump on Finland’s rocky road from Swedish and Russian duchy to independent nation, the newly-crowned Frederick, German-born and the brother-in-law of Kaiser Wilhelm II, renounces the Finnish throne after barely two months. After Finland declared its independence from Russia in December 1917, a struggle...
World War II
1939
On this day, the League of Nations, the international peacekeeping organization formed at the end of World War I, expels the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in response to the Soviets’ invasion of Finland on October 30.
Although the League of Nations was more or less the brainchild of President Woodrow...
