This Week in History: Dec. 24-30, 2018

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This Week in History
by Dianne Hermann

“The most effective way to destroy people is to
deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”
George Orwell

Week of Dec. 24-30, 2018

 

December 24

1814 – The Treaty of Ghent is signed, ending the War of 1812. The British stalled negotiations awaiting the British capture of New Orleans and the valuable port at the mouth of the Mississippi River. Future president Andrew Jackson, who was very ill at the time, successfully defended New Orleans with a much smaller military force and inferior weapons in January of 1815.

1851 – Fire devastates the U.S. Library of Congress in Washington, DC, destroying 35,000 volumes and documents, about two-thirds of its book collection.

1948 – The first house in the U.S. completely sun-heated is occupied in Dover, Massachusetts. It cost about $20,000 to build it. Eleanor Raymond designed the structure, Maria Telkes designed the heating system, and Boston heiress and sculptress Amelia Peabody financed it.

1968 – Apollo 8 astronauts give a Christmas Eve reading from the Bible book of Genesis while orbiting the Moon. Watch images from Apollo 8 as the astronauts read from Genesis:

2000 – Thirty-six minutes after the end of the football game, the New England Patriots and Miami Dolphins are called back to the field to play the final 3 seconds of the game, which the Dolphins had won 27-24. The final score did not change.

December 25 – Merry Christmas!

1651 – A Massachusetts General Court orders a fine of five shillings for “observing any such day as Christmas.” The law banning Christmas celebrations was passed in 1659 and lasted 22 years.

1776 – General George Washington and his troops cross the Delaware River, surprising and defeating 1,400 Hessians soldiers during the Revolutionary War.

1868 – Despite bitter opposition, President Andrew Johnson grants an unconditional pardon to most persons involved in the Southern Rebellion (aka The Civil War), except former Confederate officers like Jefferson Davis. In 1872 and 1876, Davis was again excluded from citizenship rights granted to the remaining Confederate officers. It wasn’t until 1978 that President Jimmy Carter restored full citizenship rights to Davis. Davis died in 1889 at age 81.

1896 – John Philip Sousa writes “Stars & Stripes Forever.” In 1987, Congress made the song the official national march of the U.S. Sousa served in the Marine Corps as a musician and band leader from 1872 to 1792. He also served as a band leader in the Naval Reserve during WWI. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1990. Sousa, known as the “March King,” died in 1932 at age 77. Watch “The President’s Own” U.S. Marine Band perform Sousa’s most famous march:

1939 – Montgomery Ward introduces Rudolph as the 9th reindeer in the story “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer.” The story was written by marketing employee Robert May. May considered naming the reindeer “Rollo” or “Reginald.” May’s brother-in-law adapted the poem into a song, which was recorded by Gene Autry in 1949. The recording sold 2.5 million copies the first year and hit #1 on the Billboard chart during the week of Christmas that year.

1974 – Marshall Fields drives his vehicle through the gates of the White House, resulting in a four-hour standoff. He surrendered and the bombs he said were strapped to his body turned out to be flares. Fields was sentenced to 18 months in jail.

1990 – The first successful trial test is run on the system that would become the World Wide Web (www). On August 6, 1991, web server creator Tim Berners-Lee posted a short summary of the project, although public availability of the first web servers occurred earlier that year. The original web page was thought to be lost, but Paul Jones of UNC-Chapel Hill saved a copy of the page on a floppy disk.

2018 – Have yourself a merry little Christmas.

December 26

1799 – George Washington is eulogized by Col. Henry Lee as, “First in war, first in peace, and first in hearts of his countrymen.” Henry Lee was the grandfather of Civil War general Robert E. Lee.

1877 – The Socialist Labor Party of North America holds its first national convention. It is the second oldest socialist party in the world still in existence.

1924 – Judy Garland, age 2½, makes her show business debut (as Baby Frances) with her two sisters. Her real name was Frances Gumm. Her most famous role was as Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz.” Garland died in 1969 at age 47. Her older sister, Dorothy Virginia, died in 1977 at age 59. Her oldest sister, Mary Jane, committed suicide in 1964 at age 48. Watch the Gumm Sisters perform (Baby Frances is on the left):

1928 – Johnny Weissmuller announces his retirement from amateur swimming after winning six Olympic medals. He went on to star as Tarzan in 12 movies. Romanian-born Weissmuller died in 1984 at age 79.

1941 – Winston Churchill becomes the first British Prime Minister to address a joint meeting of Congress, warning that the Axis would “stop at nothing.”

1954 – “The Shadow” airs for last time on radio. It premiered in 1930 with the burning question, ”Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?” (Answer: The Shadow knows!)

1982 – Time Magazine’s “Man” of the Year is a computer.

1991 – Jack Ruby’s gun, used to kill Lee Harvey Oswald, sells for $220,000 at auction. In 2008, the gun was sold at a Las Vegas auction for the same price.

1996 – Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey is found beaten and strangled to death in the basement of her family’s home in Boulder, Colorado. Her murder remains unsolved.

December 27

1900 – Temperance leader Carrie Nation leads her first public smashing of a bar at the Carey Hotel in Wichita, Kansas. Watch a slide show about her life:

1937 – Mae West performs an Adam and Eve skit that is so suggestive it gets her banned from NBC radio. Mae West died in 1980 at age 87.

1947 – The first “Howdy Doody Show” (Puppet Playhouse) is telecast on TV. It aired until 1960. Watch the 1947 intro:

1985 – Dian Fossey, an American naturalist, is found murdered at a research station in Rawanda. She was 53 years old. No one ever served prison time for her murder.

2012 – NASA unveils its plan to capture a 500 ton asteroid in 2025. It is called the Asteroid Redirect Mission.

December 28

1832 – John C. Calhoun becomes the first Vice President to resign from office. He cited political differences with President Andrew Jackson. Calhoun then sought to fill the vacant Senate seat in South Carolina, which he did.

1869 – William Finley Semple of Mount Vernon, Ohio, patents chewing gum. Semple was a dentist who intended for the gum to clean teeth and strengthen the jaw.

1905 – The Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the U.S. is founded and becomes the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in 1910.

1945 – Congress officially recognizes the “Pledge of Allegiance.” The phrase “Under God” is added in 1954.

1948 – A DC-3 airliner disappears 50 miles south of Miami, Florida, in the Bermuda Triangle. The airplane, including 32 passengers and crew, were never found.

1967 – Muriel Siebert is the first woman to be a member of the New York Stock Exchange. She died in August 2013 at age 80.

1981 – Elizabeth Jordan Carr, the first American “test-tube baby,” is born in Norfolk, Virginia. Carr was the 15th baby born in the world from the in-vitro fertilization procedure. Watch an interview with Carr:

2000 – Retail giant Montgomery Ward announces it was going out of business after 128 years. The last stores closed the following year. Aaron Montgomery Ward started the company in 1872. Montgomery Ward launched as an online retailer in 2004. Ward died in 1913 at age 69.

2005 – A U.S. immigration judge orders John Demjanjuk deported to Ukraine for crimes against humanity committed during World War II. After years of delays and court proceedings, Demjanjuk was finally deported to Germany in 2009. He was arrested in there, tried, and convicted as an accessory to the murder of 27,900 Jews. Demjanjuk died in 2012 at age 91.

2008 – The Detroit Lions finish the season 0-16 after a 31-21 lost to the Green Bay Packers. It was the first time in National Football League history that a team went winless in a 16-game season.

2012 – Vladimir Putin signs into law a ban on the U.S. adoption of Russian children after a child who was adopted died three months after his arrival in the U.S. The boy died after being accidentally left in a car in July for nine hours.

December 29

1848 – Gas lights are first installed at the White House during the Polk administration.

1851 – The first chapter of America’s Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) opens in Boston, Massachusetts. There are about 2,700 YMCAs in the U.S.

1930 – Fred P. Newton completes the longest swim ever (1,826 miles) when he swims the Mississippi River from Ford Dam, Minnesota, to New Orleans, Louisiana. He was in the water for 742 hours over a five-month period. The feat still stands in the Guinness Book of Records.

1957 – Singers Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme get married in Las Vegas, Nevada. Eydie died in 2013 at age 84. Steve is now 83 years old. Watch the power couple of the day in a medley on the Ed Sullivan Show, What’s My Line, with Sammy Davis, Jr., and on The Johnny Carson Show:

1970 – The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) is signed into law by President Richard M. Nixon.

1972 – Life magazine ceases weekly publication. It originally started in 1883 and went through several owners and eras. Watch a slide show of the 40 best Life covers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TtFzeEAB8k

1992 – Governor Mario Cuomo grants clemency to Jean Harris, who killed Scarsdale Diet Doctor Dr. Herman Tarnower in 1980. Harris, who suffered several heart attacks, had previously been denied clemency several times. Harris died in 2012 at age 89.

2007 – New England Patriot quarterback Tom Brady sets a (then) NFL record by throwing his 50th touchdown pass for the season. The Patriots became the first team in NFL history to finish the longer regular season at 16-0. They lost the Super Bowl to the New York Giants. The season high touchdown record now belongs to Peyton Manning, with 55 touchdown passes in 2013.

December 30

1903 – An electric arc lamp sets fire to the Iroquois Theater in Chicago, leaving 602 people dead in the deadliest single-building blaze in American history.

1907 – Abraham Mills, head of the Mills commission, declares that Abner Doubleday invented baseball. The Commission was charged with settling a dispute over whether baseball evolved from the British game of Rounders or, as Albert Spalding contended, was invented in America.

1924 – Edwin Hubble announces the existence of other galactic systems after he views the spiral nebula Andromeda through a telescope. The space telescope, named for Hubble, was launched in April 1990. Hubble died in 1953 at age 63.

1953 – The first color television sets, by RCA, go on sale for about $1,175 each.

1968 – Frank Sinatra first records the song “My Way.” The lyrics were written by Paul Anka. Watch Sinatra sing his signature song live:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AVOpNR2PIs

1988 – Oliver North subpoenas Ronald Reagan and George Bush as defense witnesses for his upcoming Iran-Contra trial.

2003 – Attorney General John Ashcroft recuses himself and his office from the Valerie Plame affair. Plame was a CIA employee and wife of the former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson. Robert Novak wrote a newspaper column about whether false information provided by Plame was used to justify the Iraq war during the Bush administration.

 

Image from en.wikipedia.org


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