Also on this day
Lead Story
1897
On this day in 1897, a 25-year-old London taxi driver named George Smith becomes the first person ever arrested for drunk driving after slamming his cab into a building. Smith later pled guilty and was fined 25 shillings.
In the United States, the first laws against operating a motor vehicle while...
American Revolution
1776
On this day in 1776, General George Washington asks for a volunteer for an extremely dangerous mission: to gather intelligence behind enemy lines before the coming Battle of Harlem Heights. Captain Nathan Hale of the 19th Regiment of the Continental Army stepped forward and subsequently become one of the first...
Automotive
1897
On September 10, 1897, a London cabdriver named George Smith slams his taxi into a building and is the first person to be arrested for drunk driving. He pled guilty and was fined 25 shillings.
Police officers knew that Smith was drunk because he acted drunk (he had driven that cab...
Civil War
1861
Confederate forces withdraw from the Kanawha Valley in western Virginia after fighting an indecisive battle at Carnifex Ferry in the early months of the war.
During the summer of 1861, the two sides had struggled for control of western Virginia as the Union tried to secure the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad...
Cold War
1989
In a dramatic break with the eastern European communist bloc, Hungary gives permission for thousands of East German refugees to leave Hungary for West Germany. It was the first time one of the Warsaw Pact nations-who were joined in the defensive alliance between Russia and its eastern Europe satellites–broke from...
Crime
1931
Crime boss Salvatore Maranzano is shot and stabbed to death in New York City by four men working for Charles “Lucky” Luciano, one of the flashiest figures in organized crime. At one time, Luciano was living at the Waldorf Astoria and taking in over a million dollars a year, while...
1977
Charlene Williams meets Gerald Gallego at a poker club in Sacramento, California, resulting in one of the worst serial killing teams in American history. Before they were finally caught, the Gallegos killed and sexually assaulted at least 10 people over a two-year period.
Within a week of their first encounter, Charlene...
Disaster
1976
Two jets collide in mid-air over Zagreb, Yugoslavia, killing 176 people on this day in 1976. Errors by an air-traffic controller led to this deadly collision.
During the Cold War, flights between Europe and the Far East were routed around the nations of the Soviet bloc. This made the Zagreb air-traffic...
General Interest
1608
English adventurer John Smith is elected council president of Jamestown, Virginia–the first permanent English settlement in North America. Smith, a colorful figure, had won popularity in the colony because of his organizational abilities and effectiveness in dealing with local Native American groups.In May 1607, about 100 English colonists settled along...
1813
In the first unqualified defeat of a British naval squadron in history, U.S. Captain Oliver Hazard Perry leads a fleet of nine American ships to victory over a squadron of six British warships at the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812.The battle was closely contested for hours,...
1981
On September 10, 1981, Spanish artist Pablo Picasso’s monumental anti-war mural Guernica is received by Spain after four decades of refugee existence. One of Picasso’s most important works, the painting was inspired by the destruction of the Basque town of Guernica by the Nazi air force during the Spanish Civil...
Hollywood
2000
On this day in 2000, Halle Berry wins an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or Movie for her portrayal of the actress Dorothy Dandridge in Introducing Dorothy Dandridge. Dandridge, the star of 1954’s Carmen Jones, was the first African-American performer to be nominated for an Academy...
Literary
1941
Stephen Jay Gould, author of The Panda’s Thumb and other popular essay collections, is born on this day.
Gould grew up in Queens, New York, the son of a court stenographer without a college degree. Although Gould grew up to be a prominent paleontologist and biologist, he kept the common touch,...
Music
1991
You either had to be part of a fairly small subculture of music fans or a professional on the business side of the music industry to have heard of Nirvana before the autumn of 1991. To the few who followed their particular brand of alternative music before “alternative” went mainstream,...
Old West
1881
On this day in 1881, tensions near the breaking point between the Earp brothers and the Clanton-McLaury families, the two major power centers in Tombstone, Arizona.
Two days earlier, a stagecoach had been robbed and the Tombstone sheriff formed a posse that included Morgan and Wyatt Earp to find the culprits....
Presidential
1833
On this day in 1833, President Andrew Jackson announces that the government will no longer use the Second Bank of the United States, the country’s national bank. He then used his executive power to remove all federal funds from the bank, in the final salvo of what is referred to...
Sports
1962
On this day in 1962, Rod Laver defeats fellow Australian Roy Emerson in four sets to win the U.S. Open. With the victory, Laver became the first man to win the tennis “Grand Slam”–four major tournaments in the same year–since Don Budge in 1938.
Having already won the first three major...
Vietnam War
1963
Maj. Gen. Victor Krulak, USMC, Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency and Special Activities to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Joseph Mendenhall of the State Department report to President John F. Kennedy on their fact-finding mission to Vietnam.
The president had sent them to make a firsthand assessment of the situation in...
1964
Following the Tonkin Gulf incidents, in which North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked U.S. destroyers, and the subsequent passage of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution empowering him to react to armed attacks, President Lyndon B. Johnson authorizes a series of measures “to assist morale in South Vietnam and show the Communists [in...
World War I
1919
On this day in 1919, almost one year after an armistice officially ended the First World War, New York City holds a parade to welcome home General John J. Pershing, commander in chief of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF), and some 25,000 soldiers who had served in the AEF’s 1st...
World War II
1940
On this day in 1940, in light of the destruction and terror inflicted on Londoners by a succession of German bombing raids, called “the Blitz,” the British War Cabinet instructs British bombers over Germany to drop their bombs “anywhere” if unable to reach their targets.
The prior two nights of bombing...
