This Week in History
by Dianne Hermann
“In the summer of 1776 our Founding Fathers sought to secure our independence and our liberties
that remain the foundation of our nation today.” Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA)
August 3-9, 2026
August 3
1882 – Congress passed the first law restricting immigration. It imposed a 50 cents head tax on non-citizens and restricted “criminals, the insane, or any person unable to take care of him or herself.”
1952 – Francis the Talking Mule (with Chill T. Wills providing the voice) was the mystery guest on the TV show “What’s My Line?” Francis (in reality a female mule named Molly) was the first recipient of the American Humane Association Annual Patsy Award in 1950. The award is given for an outstanding performance by an animal appearing in motion pictures. Watch the blindfolded “What’s My Line?” judges try to guess the mystery guest (starts at 15:08 of clip).
1968 – More than a year before Woodstock, the Newport Pop Festival was held in Costa Mesa, California. More than 100,000 people attend the two-day festival featuring Alice Cooper, The Animals, Sonny & Cher, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and many others. The first Monterey Pop Festival was held in June 1967, starting the “Summer of Love.” Some bands performed at all three events.
2004 – NASA launched the spacecraft Messenger. The 6 1/2-year journey was scheduled to arrive at the planet Mercury in March 2011. On April 30, 2015, Messenger crashed into the surface of Mercury after sending back more than 270,000 pictures.
August 4
1892 – The bodies of Andrew and Abby Borden were found in their house in Fall River, Massachusetts. Their daughter (Abby’s step-daughter), Sunday school teacher Lizzie Borden, was arrested for their murders a week later but was subsequently acquitted. No one else was ever charged with the murders. Lizzie died in 1927 at age 66.
1922 – AT&T and Bell Systems recognized the death of Alexander Graham Bell two days earlier by shutting down all of its switchboards and switching stations. The shutdown affected 13 million phones.
1964 – The bodies of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James E. Chaney awe discovered in an earthen Mississippi dam. In November the FBI accused 21 Mississippi men, including a county sheriff, of engineering a conspiracy to injure, oppress, threaten, and intimidate Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney. When Mississippi officials refused to try any of the men for murder the men were charged and convicted of civil rights violations. Seven were convicted, but none served more than six years. In 2005, 80-year-old Edgar Ray Killen was tried and convicted of three counts of manslaughter and sentenced to three consecutive terms of 20 years in prison. Killen died in 2018 in prison at age 92.
1987 – The Federal Communications Commission rescinded the 1949 Fairness Doctrine. The doctrine required that radio and TV stations present controversial issues in an “honest, equitable, and balanced” manner.
1988 – Congress voted to award $20,000 to each Japanese-American interned during WW II. President Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act (H.R. 442) on August 10th. Rev. Mamoru Eto of Los Angeles, age 107, was the first to receive a check on October 9, 1990.
2015 – Muppets Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog announced on Twitter the end of their relationship. Watch a post-break up interview with the famous Muppets.
August 5
1861 – The U.S. levied its first Income Tax (3% of incomes over $800).
1884 – The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty was laid on Bedloe’s Island in New York City. The Statue of Liberty, a gift from France, was dedicated in 1886.
1914 – The first traffic light in the U.S. was installed on Euclid Ave and East 105th Street in Cleveland, Ohio. The traffic signal had only a red and green light and a buzzer that was operated by a traffic officer on the corner. Black American inventor Garrett Morgan is credited with adding the yellow warning light in 1923.
1985 – The establishment of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was announced. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Museum opened in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1995. The first inductees included Chuck Berry, Ray Charles, The Everly Brothers, Alan Freed, Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, and 10 others. Watch a video montage of artists and the museum.
1997 – Ramzi Yousef, mastermind of world trade center bombing, went on trial. He was convicted in 1998 and sentenced to two life terms plus 240 years in prison without parole. He is now 58 years old.
2012 – General Motors (Chevrolet) signed a record breaking seven-year $559 million marketing deal with Manchester (England) United soccer team. In 2008, the Bush administration authorized $13 billion in loans to GM through the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). In April and May 2009, the Obama administration provided another $6 billion. GM filed for Chapter 11 reorganization in June. The Obama administration provided a $30 billion debtor-in-possession loan. In July 2009, GM exited bankruptcy and in 2010 GM made its final repayment, with the government still holding 61 percent in GM stocks. In December 2013, the last stocks were sold and the U.S. government no longer owns stock in GM. The government recovered only $70 billion of the $80 billion it lent to the GM and Chrysler in the TARP bailout.
August 6
1890 – The electric chair was first used in U.S. for execution on William Kemmler (aka John Hart) in New York, who was convicted of murder.
1890 – Cy Young pitches and won his first game. He went on to play baseball for 22 seasons, setting the still unbroken records of most career wins and most complete games. Young died in 1955 at age 88. In 1956, baseball commissioner Ford Frick introduced the Cy Young Award, given every year to the best pitcher in each league.
1930 – Supreme Court Justice Joseph Force Crater disappeared in New York City. He was declared legally dead in 1939. The case was officially closed in 1979 and remains unsolved. A letter found among the effects of a woman who died 2005 claimed her late police officer husband and cab driver brother-in-law murdered Crater and buried him under the Coney Island Boardwalk.
1945 – The U.S. dropped the world’s first atom bomb (Little Boy) on Hiroshima, Japan. Watch a BBC documentary of the bombing and aftermath.
1996 – NASA announces the discovery of evidence of primitive life on Mars based on a meteorite found in Antarctica. The meteorite is believed to have come from Mars and contained a fossil.
2011 – A helicopter carrying 20 members of Navy SEAL Team 6 was shot down in Afghanistan, killing all 31 U.S. specials ops troops and 7 Afghan commandos. The death toll surpassed the worst single day loss of life for the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan since the war began in 2001. Members of SEAL Team 6 killed Osama bin Laden three months earlier.
2012 – The Mars rover Curiosity landed on the floor of Gale Crater. The Mars Science Laboratory/Curiosity spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, in November 2011. The most recent mission to Mars is the InSight. It launched in May 2018 and landed on Mars in November 2018.
August 7
1782 – George Washington created the Order of the Purple Heart after the Continental Congress forbids Washington from granting soldiers commissions and promotions based on merit.
1882 – The Hatfields of West Virginia and the McCoys of Kentucky began their infamous feud with the mortal wounding of Elliston Hatfield by three McCoy brothers in a dispute over a stolen pig. The families agreed to stop fighting in 1891 after 15 people were killed and many more were wounded, but bad feelings continued throughout the 20th Century. The ongoing grudge inspired the TV show “The Family Feud.” Descendants of both families appeared on the show in 1979 where the show’s producers paid each family the winner’s share to avoid renewing hostilities. Watch the fifth and final Hatfield and McCoy Family Feud game.
1912 – The Progressive (Bull Moose) Party nominated Theodore Roosevelt for president, who already served as president 1901-1909. Woodrow Wilson won the 1912 election.
1964 – Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, which gave President Johnson broad powers in dealing with North Vietnamese attacks on American ships, without having to declare war. The resolution was repealed by President Nixon in January 1971.
2007 – Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants broke baseball great Hank Aaron’s record by hitting his 756th home run. Watch the homer.
August 8
1894 – Will Kellogg accidentally invented the cereal Corn Flakes when he let cooked wheat set out at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan. When the wheat was processed through the rollers it came out in flakes, and was then served to patients.
1918 – Alvin York was given command of troops when six U.S. soldiers are surrounded by Germans in France during World War I. York shot 20 Germans and captured 132 more. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor and eight other American and European awards. Sergeant York was the most highly decorated soldier of WWI. York died in 1964 at age 76.
1945 – President Harry S. Truman signed the United Nations Charter. The U.N. came into existence on October 24, 1945, after it was ratified by a majority of member nations. The U.N. headquarters building in New York City was completed in 1952.
1973 – Vice President Spiro T. Agnew said the reports that he took kickbacks from government contracts in Maryland are “damned lies” and he vows not to resign. Agnew resigned on October 10, 1973.
1992 – The “Dream Team” clinched the gold medal in basketball at the Barcelona Summer Olympics when the U.S. team beats Croatia 117-85. It was the first U.S men’s Olympic basketball team to feature active professional players. The Dream Team was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010. Watch a video of the best U.S. shots at the Olympics.
2000 – The Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley was raised to the surface after 136 years on the ocean floor off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina. It was the first submarine to sink a ship during wartime. The sinking of the Federal warship USS Housatonic also resulted in the sinking of the Hunley due to its close proximity to the explosion. The Housatonic remains on the ocean floor.
August 9
1936 – Jesse Owens won his 4th and final gold medal at the Berlin Summer Olympics. President Roosevelt never invited Owens to the White House because he was running for re-election.
1944 – The Forest Service and Wartime Advertising Council created “Smokey the Bear” to curb forest fires and conserve resources. A bear cub was rescued during a 1950 New Mexico fire, sent to the National Zoo in Washington, and became the living symbol of Smokey the Bear. Smokey died in 1976 and is buried in New Mexico. Watch an early public service ad.
1945 – The U.S. dropped its second atomic bomb (Fat Man) on Nagasaki, Japan. The following day the Japanese government announced Japan would surrender. The only condition was that the status of Emperor Hirohito remain unchanged. Japan signed the surrender on board the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay on September 2nd.
1969 – The Manson family committed the Tate-LaBianca murders. Charles Manson’s followers murdered pregnant actress Sharon Tate and four others in her home, and then murdered Leno and Rosemary LaBianca the next day. Manson and four of his followers were convicted of murder and sentenced to death. The sentences were commuted to life in prison by the California Supreme Court’s 1972 ruling in People vs. Anderson. Manson died in prison in 2018 at the age of 83.
1974 – Richard Nixon resigned the presidency. Vice President Gerald Ford became president. Nixon selected Senator Gerald Ford as Vice President in 1973 after Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned. Ford is the only person to serve as both President and Vice President without having been elected to either office. Watch Nixon’s announcement from the White House.
2014 – Michael Brown, age 18, was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, after robbing a store and assaulting the clerk. The St. Louis County prosecutor announced that charges would not be brought against the police officer in Brown’s death.
Image from: www.usatoday.com
