Today in History...

[El Diablo 4232]

Yeah, I didn't know that when I was there in '81 but have read a little bit about the region/city and its history since. They know how to have a good time, I'll give 'em that.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

June 29, 1613, London's Globe Theatre went up in flames. The Globe is often thought of as "Shakespeare's theater" but this is only partially accurate -- Shakespeare owned a minority share (12.5%), making him a co-owner alongside five other prominent members of London's burgeoning dramatic community.

While the fire was a raging conflagration, eye-witnesses stated that no one was seriously injured, though one spectator's pants caught fire, and had to be doused with a flagon of beer.

Built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company (the "Lord Chamberlain's Men"), the Globe served as the preeminent stage in English theater for several decades; after the 1613 fire, it was completely rebuilt and continued its run until the conservative fundamentalist Puritans took power and shut down all theaters in 1642; it was torn down two years later.

In 1997, a reconstruction named "Shakespeare's Globe" was built approximately 750 feet from the original site, using drawings of the 1599 and 1614 buildings as a guide for the modern blueprints.

[Armybrat 40725]

The Globe you say?

Got a glimpse of it from a tourist barge whilst putt-putting up the Thames last summer...

[RPM 26215]

(CNN)It was 40 years ago today that Sony, not Apple, revolutionized the way we listen to music.

The Walkman, a portable cassette player that, for the first time, let us take our music with us without bothering our neighbors, hit the market on July 1, 1979.
The portable cassette player revolutionized how people listen to music.

In its heyday, the Walkman was as synonymous with portable music players as Kleenex became to tissue and Xerox was to copy machines.
The Walkman continued to sell well even through the CD era. Innovations like the 1981 Walkman II -- barely bigger than a cassette tape -- and the 1984 Discman helped Sony stay on top of the portable music world.

But sales began to plummet soon after Apple unveiled the iPod in 2001 and digital downloads began to dominate.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 2, 1822 thirty-five slaves were hanged in South Carolina, including Denmark Vesey, who had been one of the founding members in 1818 of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, later renamed Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, the oldest predominantly African-American church south of Baltimore, Maryland.

Emanuel AME, of course, is the church where in June of 2015, white supremacist terrorist Dylann Storm Roof opened fire, murdering nine people because of their ethnicity.

The 1822 slave rebellion was referred to everafter in Charleston as "the rising" -- some personal diaries of slaveholders at the time estimated that there were several thousand slaves and free blacks who took part. Vesey, in particular, was noteworthy as he had been free since 1799, when he won a lottery allowing him to purchase himself.

A skilled carpenter, by the 1820s, he had built a good independent business for himself, but was unable to purchase his wife and children out of slavery -- the refusal of their owner to sell was undoubtedly the final impetus for his decision to take up arms.

The plotters (including Vesey) had planned to kill slaveowners in Charleston, liberate thousands of slaves, and sail to Haiti, where a successful slave revolt had earned freedom for the oppressed. Word leaked, however, and the freedom movement was dealt with in brutal fashion.

Not one single white person was injured, let alone killed.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 4, 1054 C.E., the royal astronomers of the Song dynasty in China, along with several observers in modern Saudi Arabia, and possibly by Pueblo observers in modern New Mexico, observed a bright light, bright enough to be seen during the day, near the star now known as Zeta Tauri.

This was the supernova scientists have dubbed "SN 1054" and the remnants of which form the Crab Nebula. The core of the exploding star has been dubbed the "Crab Pulsar" because the type of star associated with this kind of explosion is a white dwarf which emits "pulses" of electromagnetic radiation in highly predictable patterns as the star rotates, making them some of the most avidly studied features in the astronomical lexicon.

Because the explosion was so bright that it remained visible for up to two years, it was one of the earliest catalogued extraterrestrial extreme events, and has been easily the most thoroughly documented example of a supernova.

[Bull Horn 118]

On July 4, 1776, two days after after voting for independence, the Continental Congress formally approved the Declaration of Independence after debating and revising the wording.

TLDR: Suck it, King George.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 5, 1687, Isaac Newton published Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, usually referred to simply as Principia, which set forth Newton's laws of motion, which form the foundation of classical mechanics.

Comprising three separate volumes, the Principia was remarkable at the time for a wide variety of reasons, not least of which was, of course, the new ideas expressed therein. Almost as impressive, however, were the kinds of proofs Newton presented -- the language of Calculus as a mathematical field of study did not, strictly speaking, exist at the time, so Newton's presentation made use of a geometric form of infinitesimal calculus, based on limits of ratios of vanishing small geometric quantities.

Scientists are more likely to be familiar with the most quoted saying from the revised conclusion to the Principia, though it is smart-alecky enough to justify wider distribution:  "Hypotheses non fingo" ("I feign no hypotheses.")

[El Diablo 4232]

July 6, 1988 - Piper Alpha, an oil and gas rig in the North Sea, suffered a catastrophic explosion and fire that killed 167. The total insured loss amounted to approximately $3.4 billion dollars. The rig continued to burn for 3 weeks after the initial explosions until finally extinguished by a team led by Red Adair, working in reported conditions of 80mph winds and waves to 70 feet.

[HouTex 1850]

1815 1st natural gas well in US is discovered

1872 Doughnut cutter patents granted to John Blondel, Thomaston, Maine

1877 First ever Wimbledon tennis championship begins - first official lawn tennis tournament - men's singles only

1918 101 killed and 171 injured in worst US train wreck, Nashville, Tennessee

1947 Engagement of Britain's Princess Elizabeth and Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten

1955 Bill Haley & Comets' "Rock Around the Clock" tops the billboards chart, one of the best-selling singles ever

1956 Dick Clark's 1st appearance as host of American Bandstand

1958 Giant splash caused by fall of 90 million tons of rock & ice into Lituya Bay, Alaska washes 1,800 feet up the mountain

1971 Henry Kissinger visits the People's Republic of China to negotiate a detente between the US and China

 

[RomaVicta 29775]

6 minutes ago, HouTex said:

Bill Haley & Comets' "Rock Around the Clock"

That's one of those songs you can love, get tired of, and hate during the course of a single hearing. I guess you tuned out the words at the sock hop and just leapt about.

[Armybrat 40725]

6 hours ago, RomaVicta said:

That's one of those songs you can love, get tired of, and hate during the course of a single hearing. I guess you tuned out the words at the sock hop and just leapt about.

Correct.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 10, 1921, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the second of three "Bloody Sunday" incidents marked the beginning of four days of violence in which 22 people were killed and at least 70 more were badly wounded. The conflict began just 24 hours before a scheduled truce between Sinn Fein and the British administration.

Now referred to as "Belfast's Bloody Sunday" this incident set an all-too common pattern for mob behavior in Northern Ireland in the 20th century -- a three way battle raged between Protestant "Unionists" and Catholic youth sometimes under the auspices of the Irish Republican Army, but more often simply acting on their own, and, of course, British paramilitary police who did not have a clear mission, and were not well regulated even if they were to have had proper chain-of-command.

The incident most Irish refer to when speaking of "Bloody Sunday" is more commonly the events in Dublin in November 1920 or Derry in January 1972. Though there is no explicit mention in Rock Band U2's popular song by that name, the odds are pretty good they were referring to the Derry violence when British soldiers shot 26 unarmed civilians during a protest march against internment, killing 14. 

If you're looking for a "good guy" in the sad history of Northern Ireland, good luck. There's plenty of bad guys, though, particularly in the ranks of English politicians and absentee landlords.

[HouTex 1850]

1040 Lady Godiva rides naked on horseback through Coventry, according to legend, to force her husband, the Earl of Mercia, to lower taxes

1212 The most severe of several early fires of London burns most of the city to the ground

1553 Lady Jane Grey, daughter of the Duke of Suffolk, proclaimed Queen of England, succeeds Edward VI, who proclaimed his half-sisters illegitimate. Reigns for nine days.

1778 American Revolution: Louis XVI of France declares war on the Kingdom of Great Britain

1914 Boston Red Sox purchase Babe Ruth from Baltimore Orioles

1940 Battle of Britain begins as Nazi forces attack shipping convoys in the English Channel

1943 US, British and Canadian forces invade Sicily in WW II (Operation Husky)

1953 British Open Golf, Carnoustie: In his only Open Championship appearance, Ben Hogan prevails by 4 strokes over Dai Rees, Antonio Cerdá, Peter Thomson, Frank Stranahan

1965 Rolling Stones score their 1st US #1 single "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"

1973 John Paul Getty III, grandson of oil tycoon J. Paul Getty, is kidnapped in Rome by Italian gangsters wanting a ransom

1985 Coca-Cola Co announces it will resume selling old formula Coke

1991 Boris Yeltsin sworn in as 1st elected President of the Russian Federation

[HouTex 1850]

1533 Pope Clement VII excommunicates England's King Henry VIII

1804 Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr mortally wounds former Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton in a pistol duel

1981 Neva Rockefeller is 1st woman ordered to pay her husband alimony

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 11th marks the beginning of Naadam (Mongolian "Наадам", literally "Games") the "eriin gurvan naadam" (эрийн гурван наадам) "the three games of men". Mongolian wrestling, horse racing and archery are the most important sports in Mongolian culture and on July 11th, a festival featuring these three sports is held throughout the country, with the largest event obviously being in Ulaanbaatar, the capital and largest city.

These games have existed for several centuries at least, and probably much longer, but now they formally commemorate the 1921 revolution when Mongolia achieved independence.

The sports themselves are uniquely Mongolian -- their rendition of wrestling is an untimed event in which the winner is the one who does not touch the ground with any part of their body other than their feet or hand. Mongolian horse races are cross-country events, completely unlike the much shorter track races with which Westerners are familiar. And archery, of course, is the skill which allowed the Khans to be the terror of the known world in their day, and is still a source of national pride in Mongolia.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

On 7/10/2019 at 8:05 AM, Walden Ponderer said:

July 10, 1921, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the second of three "Bloody Sunday" incidents marked the beginning of four days of violence in which 22 people were killed and at least 70 more were badly wounded. The conflict began just 24 hours before a scheduled truce between Sinn Fein and the British administration.

Now referred to as "Belfast's Bloody Sunday" this incident set an all-too common pattern for mob behavior in Northern Ireland in the 20th century -- a three way battle raged between Protestant "Unionists" and Catholic youth sometimes under the auspices of the Irish Republican Army, but more often simply acting on their own, and, of course, British paramilitary police who did not have a clear mission, and were not well regulated even if they were to have had proper chain-of-command.

The incident most Irish refer to when speaking of "Bloody Sunday" is more commonly the events in Dublin in November 1920 or Derry in January 1972. Though there is no explicit mention in Rock Band U2's popular song by that name, the odds are pretty good they were referring to the Derry violence when British soldiers shot 26 unarmed civilians during a protest march against internment, killing 14. 

If you're looking for a "good guy" in the sad history of Northern Ireland, good luck. There's plenty of bad guys, though, particularly in the ranks of English politicians and absentee landlords.

The British were absolute bastards, and some of the most pompous, self righteous people on the planet. They make Americans seem humble, and yet I still love the bastards.

[HouTex 1850]

1191 English King Richard I the Lionheart and Crusaders defeat Saracens in Palestine

1804 Former United States Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton dies after being shot in a pistol duel by Vice President Aaron Burr

1843 Mormon leader Joseph Smith says God allows polygamy

1861 Wild Bill Hickok reputed to have shot and killed David McCanles, possibly his first kill. Hickok later acquitted after found he acted in self defense.

1900 114°F (46°C), Basin, Wyoming (state record)

1916 3rd and 4th of 4 fatal Jersey Shore shark attacks occurs at Matawan Creek when epileptic Lester Stilwell (11) is dragged into a creek and Watson Fisher (24), believing Silwell had a seizure, is bitten while retreiving the body and subsequently bleeds to death

1954 President Eisenhower put forward a plan for an interstate highway system

1957 US Surgeon General Leroy Burney connects smoking with lung cancer

1979 "Disco Demolition Night" at Comiskey Park: fans go wild destroying disco records and cause the White Sox to forfeit second game of a doubleheader to the Detroit Tigers

[El Diablo 4232]

July 13, 1985, "Live Aid," an international rock concert in London, Philadelphia, Moscow and Sydney, took place to raise money for Africa's starving people.

I remember this well. I was 7 months out of the Navy, living in Galveston and working on offshore supply boats on a week on/week off rotation. Was chilling out at and getting shitfaced the whole time. 'Twas one helluva concert. It came on MTV from London starting at like 8:00 am Texas time and then transitioned to Philly later in the day. Just one great band after another.

 

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 14, 1881, Henry McCarty (September 17, 1859 – July 14, 1881), better known as Billy the Kid, and also as William H. Bonney, was shot and killed by Pat Garrett near Fort Sumner in New Mexico.

While he was still alive, Billy the Kid was relatively unknown, but in 1881, Governor Lew Wallace placed a price on his head, which drew the attention of bounty hunters and paparazzi alike. The Las Vegas Gazette (that'd be Las Vegas, New Mexico) and the New York Sun carried stories about his exploits. These amounted to little more than precursors to the pulp fiction of the 20th century, bearing very little resemblance to legitimate news stories.

While much of what has appeared in print or on the silver screen has been apocryphal, one bit of his history has taken hold as essential William Bonney lore -- the Lincoln County War. 

Whether with John Wayne's pathetic "Chisum" (one of the worst movies ever made, IMHO), or Emilio Esteves' campy "Young Guns", this event has been one of the least accurately portrayed conflicts ever. 

For one thing, nobody ever points out that young Billy had come to New Mexico to work in, of all things, a cheese factory. They got the state right, though, so I suppose that's something.

In any event, there were no good guys in this fight, just bad guys. Billy the Kid eventually lost his life (if one version of the story is to be believed) because he happened to have joined the losing side -- old story, but more romantically told in this instance.

The idea that he lived into the 20th century appeals to many, but the fact that there are multiple versions of that story, coupled with Occam's Razor, lead me to doubt it greatly.

[Armybrat 40725]

On ‎7‎/‎13‎/‎2019 at 10:31 AM, El Diablo said:

July 13, 1985, "Live Aid," an international rock concert in London, Philadelphia, Moscow and Sydney, took place to raise money for Africa's starving people.

I remember this well. I was 7 months out of the Navy, living in Galveston and working on offshore supply boats on a week on/week off rotation. Was chilling out at and getting shitfaced the whole time. 'Twas one helluva concert. It came on MTV from London starting at like 8:00 am Texas time and then transitioned to Philly later in the day. Just one great band after another.

 

Lest you forget, the best part of that concert....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbvyNnw8Qjg

[El Diablo 4232]

2 hours ago, Armybrat said:

Lest you forget, the best part of that concert....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbvyNnw8Qjg

I had just seen Queen at Reunion Arena in Dallas 5 years earlier so for me the highlight of the concert was The Who. Kick ass. 

[El Diablo 4232]

July 15, 1976, a 36-hour kidnap ordeal began for 26 schoolchildren and their bus driver as they were abducted near Chowchilla, California, by three gunmen and imprisoned in an underground cell.

[HouTex 1850]

1099 City of Jerusalem is captured and plundered by Christian forces during the First Crusade

1799 The Rosetta Stone is found in the Egyptian village of Rosetta by French Captain Pierre-François Bouchard during Napoleon's Egyptian Campaign

1941 Howard Florey and Norman Heatley present freeze dried mold cultures (Penicillin)

1954 1st commercial jet transport plane built in US tested (Boeing 707)

1974 Television new reporter Christine Chubbuck shoots herself live on TV WXLT-TV, Florida, first person to commit suicide in a live broadcast

1987 Boy George barred from British TV show, he may be a bad influence

1988 "Die Hard" directed by John McTiernan and starring Bruce Willis and Alan Rickman is released in the US

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 16, 1935, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, the world's first public parking meter was installed.  Dubbed "The Black Maria" by its designers (professors Holger George Thuesen and Gerald A. Hale of Oklahoma State University), this first coin-operated parking-ticket-magnet was an improvement over the originally patented model designed by Roger W. Babson in August of 1928 -- the first meter was intended to operate on power from the battery of the parking vehicle and required a connection from the vehicle to the meter.

Since 1935, of course, the devices have come to be recognized as a necessary evil in most major metropolitan areas.  Several court challenges to their legality have limited the scope of use to the sole purpose of regulating traffic flow -- if a plaintiff can prove that the device has been installed for the purpose of revenue generation, they can get out of paying... but good luck with that, as it's a fairly difficult thing to prove.

Since the days of the clunky analog meters, we now have digital parking vending which accepts credit cards and, in some places, PayPal.  Ain't progress a pain.

[El Diablo 4232]

July 16, 1945—74 years ago today--the United States exploded its first experimental atomic bomb in the desert of Alamogordo, N.M. Scientists detonated the plutonium device, which was secured atop a steel tower, at 5:30 a.m. at the Trinity test site, producing an intense burst of light and a sudden wave of heat followed by the sound of the explosion, which echoed in the valley as a ball of fire shot skyward surrounded by a massive mushroom cloud. The steel tower was obliterated. J. Robert Oppenheimer, director of the Los Alamos project, recalled a line from Hindu scripture as he watched; “Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds.” The same day, the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis left Mare Island Naval Shipyard in California on a secret mission to deliver atomic bomb components to Tinian Island in the Marianas. The U.S. dropped a uranium gun-type bomb nicknamed “Little Boy” on Aug. 6, 1945 on Hiroshima, and a plutonium implosion-type bomb (of the same design as the one tested just weeks earlier) dubbed “Fat Man” on Aug. 9, 1945 on Nagasaki, forcing Japan to accept the terms of an unconditional surrender.

[PatrickMcHorn 376]

My fiance is from los alamos, and they've got a pretty solid little museum on the Manhattan project if you're ever in the area. It's a really interesting town with the national lab being there. Generally, you either have three masters degrees or else work at three different convenience stores.

[HouTex 1850]

622 Muslim Era begins - Muhammad begins flight from Mecca to Medina (Hijra)

1054 Three Roman legates fracture relations between Western and Eastern Christian churches by placing invalid Papal Bull of Excommunication on altar of Hagia Sophia during liturgy. Often dated start of the East-West Schism.

1940 Adolf Hitler orders preparations for the invasion of Britain (Operation Sealion)

1946 US court martial sentences 46 members of the SS to death (Battle of Bulge crimes) in Dachau

1951 Novel "Catcher in Rye" by J. D. Salinger published by Little Brown and Company

1969 Apollo 11 launched, carrying 1st men to land on Moon

1999 John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, and sister-in-law Lauren Bessette are killed in a plane crash off the coast of Martha's Vineyard. The Piper Saratoga aircraft was piloted by Kennedy.

[phdhorn 6224]

Did not know that JFK Jr. bought it the same day (anniversary) that Apollo 11 was launched.
Daddy might have found that ironicicical.

[El Diablo 4232]

Wonder what might have become of John John if he had not sucked at piloting.

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 17, 1955, Walt Disney dedicated and opened Disneyland in Anaheim, California. Disney conceived the idea of a tourist attraction near his movie studios in Burbank to entertain fans of his animated features who might wish to visit -- he had wanted to build a theme part ever since visiting amusement parks with his daughters in the 1930s and 1940s, and finding them all lacking an essential spark of inspiration.

He quickly realized after doing a survey of the available properties near his studios, though, that there simply wasn't enough room to house the kinds of attractions he envisioned building. In fact, Disneyland (as magnificent as it was for its time) quickly outgrew his expectations, leading him to look for a much larger space, which he eventually found in Orlando, Florida, where he bought somewhere on the order of 10 times as much property as his "Imagineers" estimated would be necessary -- and a good thing, too, as Disneyworld has grown as exponentially as Disneyland did
.
In the history of the park, 650 million guests have visited Disneyland, more people than any other park in the world. According to a March 2005 Disney Company report 65,700 jobs are supported by the Disneyland Resort.

[HouTex 1850]

1918 The Romanov royal family and several of their retainers are executed by a Bolshevik firing squad in the basement of Ipatiev House, in Yekaterinburg, Siberia

1936 Spanish generals Francisco Franco and Emilio Mola lead a right-wing uprising, starting the Spanish Civil War

1938 Douglas "Wrong Way" Corrigan leaves NY flying for LA, winds up in Ireland supposedly by mistake

1941 NY Yankee Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak ends in Cleveland

1945 Potsdam Conference: Harry Truman, Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill hold 1st meeting

1959 Paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey discovers partial skull of a new species of early human ancestor, Zinjanthropus boisei or 'Zinj' (now called Paranthropus boisei) lived in Africa almost 2 million years ago

1959 "North by Northwest" directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint premieres in Los Angeles

1984 US passes National Minimum Drinking Age Act, prohibiting under 21's from buying or possessing alcohol as a condition of receiving State highway funds

1987 Dow Jones closes above 2,500 (2,510.04) for 1st time

[Buffsoldier 1895]

4 hours ago, HouTex said:

1936 Spanish generals Francisco Franco and Emilio Mola lead a right-wing uprising, starting the Spanish Civil War

And now....he's still dead.

[NeverMarryAStripper 21781]

1918 The Romanov royal family and several of their retainers are executed by a Bolshevik firing squad in the basement of Ipatiev House, in Yekaterinburg, Siberia

All except Anastasia of course

[HouTex 1850]

64 Great Fire of Rome begins under the Emperor Nero (he blames the Christians)

1536 Pope's authority declared void in England

1925 Adolf Hitler publishes Mein Kampf (original title was the catchy "Four and a Half Years (of Struggle) Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice")

1942 Test flight of German Messerschmitt Me-262 using only its jet engines for the first time

1947 King George VI signs Indian Independence Act

1966 Carl Sagan turns 1 billion seconds old

1976 Nadia Comăneci becomes the first gymnast in Olympic Games history to score a perfect 10 score (total 7) at Montreal Games

1994 Houston Astros tie NL comeback record, trailing 10-0, beat Cards 15-12

2013 Detroit, Michigan, files for bankruptcy, becoming the largest US municipal bankruptcy ever at $18.5 billion

[Trey3216 15325]

Pretty cool presentation today at the WH of the American Flag that was flown on the first landing craft to hit the beach at Normandy.  It presented by the PM of the Netherlands and a private collector, who had bought it at auction some years ago for $500k.  The flag was brought all over Europe by one of the gents on board the craft, including during the operations to free the Netherlands from Nazi rule.   Pretty cool ceremony.  

 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

July 19, 1878—141 years ago today—Texas Ranger Dick Ware ended the career of notorious train robber Sam Bass. Ware shot and fatally wounded Bass after intercepting the outlaw as he checked out a bank he planned to rob in Round Rock. Bass turned to crime after failing at a series of legitimate endeavors, formed a gang and robbed a Union Pacific Gold train in September 1877. A year later, after the gang robbed two stagecoaches and four trains in North Texas, Bass became the focus of a manhunt by a special company of Texas Rangers, which he managed to elude until a member of the gang turned informant. An ambush was set up in Round Rock, where Bass planned to rob a bank and he and his gang were scouting the bank when a deputy sheriff spotted them. The deputy was shot to death, but then Ware and Ranger George Herold shot Bass as he and the other would-be robbers tried to escape. (Ware is generally considered to have fired the fatal shot). Railroad workers later found Bass lying near death in a pasture. He died the next day, which was his 27th birthday, and was buried in Round Rock

[Message Board User 12389]

 

[HouTex 1850]

1553 15-year-old Lady Jane Grey deposed as England's Queen after 9 days

1692 5 more people are hanged for witchcraft (20 in all) in Salem, Massachusetts

1860 1st railroad reaches Kansas

1918 World War I: German armies retreat across Marne River in France

1940 Adolf Hitler orders Great Britain to surrender (my avatar said in not as few words "fuck you")

1941 Churchill launches his "V for Victory" campaign

1965 Shooting begins on Star Trek 2nd pilot "Where No Man Has Gone Before"

1969 Apollo 11 goes into lunar orbit

1985 Christa McAuliffe chosen as 1st school teacher to fly aboard the space shuttle

2001 Michael Brunet discovers the skull of Sahelanthropus tchadensis in the Djurab Desert, Chad. One of the oldest known species in the human family tree, 6-7 million years ago years old

2007 TV drama "Mad Men" debuts starring Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss and Vincent Kartheiser on cable network AMC

2018 Largest intact sarcophagus of its kind ever found (2000 years old) opened in Alexandria, contains 3 skeletons, not a curse as feared

[HouTex 1850]

1969   "Houston, Tranquility Base here.  The Eagle has landed." 

"Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind"

[Armybrat 40725]

On 7/19/2019 at 7:28 AM, El Diablo said:

July 19, 1878—141 years ago today—Texas Ranger Dick Ware ended the career of notorious train robber Sam Bass. Ware shot and fatally wounded Bass after intercepting the outlaw as he checked out a bank he planned to rob in Round Rock. Bass turned to crime after failing at a series of legitimate endeavors, formed a gang and robbed a Union Pacific Gold train in September 1877. A year later, after the gang robbed two stagecoaches and four trains in North Texas, Bass became the focus of a manhunt by a special company of Texas Rangers, which he managed to elude until a member of the gang turned informant. An ambush was set up in Round Rock, where Bass planned to rob a bank and he and his gang were scouting the bank when a deputy sheriff spotted them. The deputy was shot to death, but then Ware and Ranger George Herold shot Bass as he and the other would-be robbers tried to escape. (Ware is generally considered to have fired the fatal shot). Railroad workers later found Bass lying near death in a pasture. He died the next day, which was his 27th birthday, and was buried in Round Rock

Piss on that asshole.

[Armybrat 40725]

13 minutes ago, HouTex said:

1969   "Houston, Tranquility Base here.  The Eagle has landed." 

"Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind"

We watched it live from a friend’s house in Columbia, Missouri. Awesome doesn’t begin to describe it.

[HouTex 1850]

We watched it live from a friend’s house in Columbia, Missouri. Awesome doesn’t begin to describe it.

We were in a motel room on vacation. I was almost 7 years old and we were glued to the TV watching every second of it.

[El Diablo 4232]

3 hours ago, HouTex said:

We were in a motel room on vacation. I was almost 7 years old and we were glued to the TV watching every second of it.

I was 8, almost 9. The rest of the family were gathered around the TV and I was in the bathroom with the Sears spring/summer catalog. 

[HouTex 1850]

1861 First Battle of Bull Run [Battle of First Manassas], 1st major battle of the US Civil War is fought near Manassas, Virginia, Confederate victory

1865 In market square of Springfield, Missouri, Wild Bill Hickok shoots and kills Davis Tutt in what is regarded as the first true western showdown

1873 Jesse James and James Younger gang's 1st train robbery (Adair Iowa)

1921 To prove his contention that air power is superior to sea power, US Colonel William Mitchell demonstrates how bombs from planes can sink a captured German battleship

1944 Field Marshal Günther von Kluge warns Hitler of impending collapse of front in Normandy

1972 In New York 57 murders occur in 24 hours
 

[Walden Ponderer 12639]

July 21, 1902, Willis Haviland Carrier (November 26, 1876 – October 7, 1950) set himself apart from the rest of humanity as a genius beyond comparison, and easily the most important person ever born in the continental United States.

His feat of this date 117 years ago was, of course, the invention of the air conditioner.

The original installation in Buffalo, New York, was in response to a quality control problem experienced by the Sackett-Wilhelms Lithographing & Publishing Company, where humidity was wreaking havoc with their printing processes.

The byproducts of controlling temperature, improving air flow, and cleansing air of impurities have over the last century been tremendous pluses, of course -- we have often marveled that places like the Gulf Coast could have been populated prior to this invention, but I suppose some people are just masochists.

Anyway, happy birthday to the air conditioner, that most blessed of all mechanical devices.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

On 7/20/2019 at 10:20 AM, Armybrat said:

We watched it live from a friend’s house in Columbia, Missouri. Awesome doesn’t begin to describe it.

7 years old, and watching it with my older cousins who were huge space geeks.  One of my earliest memories of big TV events besides Captn Kangaroo and the Flintstones.

[HouTex 1850]

1934 Outside Chicago's Biograph Theatre, "Public Enemy No. 1" John Dillinger is mortally wounded by FBI agents

1937 US Senate rejects FDR's proposal to enlarge Supreme Court

1942 Warsaw Ghetto Jews (300,000) are sent to Treblinka Extermination Camp

1943 US forces led by General George Patton liberate Palermo, Sicily

1991 Jeffrey Dahmer confesses to killing 17 men in 1978

1994 O.J. Simpson pleads "Absolutely 100% Not Guilty" of murder

1997 Greg Maddux throws a complete game with just 76 pitches

[El Diablo 4232]

July 23rd 1962, the first public TV transmissions over Telstar 1 took place during a special program featuring live shots beamed from the United States to Europe, and vice versa.

Space! The final frontier!

[abuelo gringo 319]

3 hours ago, El Diablo said:

July 23rd 1962, the first public TV transmissions over Telstar 1 took place during a special program featuring live shots beamed from the United States to Europe, and vice versa.

Space! The final frontier!