This Week in History: May 14-20, 2018

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 May 14-20, 2018

May 14

1804 – Lewis and Clark set out from St. Louis for the Pacific Coast.

1897 – “The Stars and Stripes Forever” by John Philip Sousa is performed for the first time at a ceremony when a statue of George Washington is unveiled.

1904 – The Olympic Games are held in St. Louis, Missouri. It was the first time the Olympic Games are played in the U.S.

1942 – The U.S. Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAACs) forms after Congresswoman Edith Nourse Rogers of Massachusetts introduces a bill in Congress. The Corps became a permanent part of the Army from 1948 until 1978, when women were assimilated into all but the combat branches of the Army.

1945 – Dr. Joseph G. Hamilton injects misdiagnosed cancer patient Albert Stevens with 131 kBq of plutonium without his knowledge. Stevens lived for another 20 years until his death at age 79, surviving the highest known accumulated radiation dose in any human. Dr. Hamilton died in 1957 at age 49.

1948 – The U.S. grants Israel de facto recognition by President Harry Truman after Israel’s proclamation of independence.

1949 – Harry Truman signs a bill establishing a rocket test range at Cape Canaveral, Florida. The space center was renamed Cape Kennedy, following the assassination of President Kennedy, from 1963 to 1973.

1973 – The U.S. Supreme Court approves equal rights to females in the military.

1999 – North Korea returns the remains of six U.S. soldiers who were killed during the Korean War. The Department of Defense estimated there are still over 7,000 U.S. personnel unaccounted for (missing in action) in Korea.

2005 – The USS America, a decommissioned Navy supercarrier, is deliberately sunk in the Atlantic Ocean after four weeks of live-fire exercises. It was the largest ship ever to be disposed of as a target in a military exercise. Watch the sinking:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR-yd3sTsaY

2012 – Stanford University scientists develop a prototype bionic eye.

May 15

1817 – The Asylum for the Relief of Persons Deprived of the Use of Their Reason (now Friends Hospital) opens in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as the first private mental health hospital in the U.S.

1869 – The National Woman Suffrage Association forms. Elizabeth Cady Stanton served as its first president.

1911 – The Supreme Court dissolves Standard Oil Company using the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, which is passed by Congress to combat monopolies.

1928 – Mickey Mouse makes his first appearance in the cartoon short “Plane Crazy.” Watch the primitive animation classic:

1934 – The Department of Justice offers a $25,000 reward for John Dillinger, dead or alive. Dillinger was shot and killed by FBI agents on July 22nd in Chicago.

1944 – President Eisenhower, General Montgomery, Winston Churchill, and King George VI meet to discuss D-Day, which was planned for June 6th.

1963 – Weight Watchers is founded by New York homemaker Jean Nidetch. She died in 2015 at age 91.

1972 – Presidential candidate and former Governor George Wallace is shot and left paralyzed by Arthur Bremer in Laurel, Maryland. Bremer was convicted and sentenced to 63 years in prison. He was paroled in 2007 at age 57 after serving 35 years. Gov. Wallace died in 1998 at age 79.

1991 – President Bush takes Queen Elizabeth to an Oakland A’s / Baltimore Orioles baseball game. Watch some of the pomp and circumstance:

2014 – The National September 11 Memorial Museum is dedicated in New York City.

May 16

1866 – Congress authorizes the nickel 5¢ piece to replace the silver half-dime.

1868 – President Andrew Johnson is acquitted of “high crimes and misdemeanors” during a Senate impeachment by 1 vote. The impeachment stemmed from Johnson’s attempt to replace Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton. This was the first impeachment trial of a president. President Nixon resigned during Watergate impeachment proceedings in 1974. President Clinton was impeached by the House in 1999 for perjury and obstruction of justice, but acquitted by the Senate.

1918 – The Sedition Act of 1918 (during WWI) is passed by Congress, making “disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive” language about the government, flag, or armed forces an offense punishable by imprisonment. Since the act was passed near the end of WWI, only a handful of people were ever charged with sedition. Congress repealed the Sedition Act in 1920.

1929 – The first Academy Awards is held in the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. “Wings” wins for Best Picture, Emil Jennings wins for Best Actor (“The Way of All Flesh”), and Janet Gaynor wins for Best Actress (“7th Heaven,” “Street Angel,” and “Tempest”). In 1934, Gossip columnist Sidney Skolsky is the first to call the Academy Award the “Oscar” in print.

1948 – CBS news correspondent George Polk’s body is found in Greece while he is covering the Greek civil war. Gregoris Staktopoulos, a Greek journalist, was jailed for 10 years for Polk’s murder.

1988 – Surgeon General C. Everett Koop reports that nicotine is as addictive as heroin.

1991 – Queen Elizabeth becomes the first British monarch to address the U.S. Congress. Watch a behind-the-scenes British report on the Queen’s visit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0-J59LjVWk

2000 – First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton is nominated to run for Senator in New York. She was the first former first lady to run for public office and later the first woman of a major party to run for president.

2015 – Victor Espinoza riding American Pharoah wins the 140th Preakness in 1:58.46 on his way to the Triple Crown. (See May 17, 2014 and May 18, 2002)

May 17

1733 – England passes the Molasses Act, putting high tariffs on rum and molasses imported to the colonies from a country other than British possessions.

1792 – The New York Stock Exchange is formed when 24 merchants sign the Buttonwood Agreement at 68 Wall Street.

1875 – In the first Kentucky Derby horse race, Oliver Lewis wins aboard Aristides in 2:37.75.

1883 – Buffalo Bill Cody’s first wild-west show premieres in Omaha, Nebraska.

1884 – Alaska becomes a U.S. territory following its purchase from Russia. It is known as Seward’s Folly.

1954 – The Supreme Court unanimously rules (9-0) in Brown v Topeka Board of Education that racial segregation of children in public schools violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, reversing the 1896 “separate but equal” Plessy v Ferguson decision.

1973 – The Senate Watergate Committee began its hearings. Watch a news report and the opening remarks of the committee:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSpFIRrm0Bw

1996 – President Clinton signs a measure requiring neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in. Megan’s Law was named for 7-year-old Megan Kanka, who was raped and killed in 1994 by a repeat sex offender.

2000 – Thomas E. Blanton Jr. and David Luker surrender to police in Birmingham, Alabama. The two former Ku Klux Klan members were arrested on charges from the bombing of a church in 1963 that killed four young black girls.

2014 – Victor Espinoza riding California Chrome wins the 139th Preakness in 1:54.84. Watch Espinoza ride California Chrome to a win the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness:

May 18

1652 – Rhode Island enacts the first law declaring slavery illegal.

1896 – The Supreme Court affirms race separation in Plessy v Ferguson. Homer Plessy was arrested in New Orleans for sitting in a “whites only” railroad car. The Supreme Court ruled that separate facilities were constitutional as long as they are equal. Justice John Harlan was the lone dissenter on the Court.

1926 – Evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson vanishes while swimming near Venice, California. She showed up a month later in Senora, Mexico, saying she had been kidnapped. Watch a video of McPherson’s speech on prohibition:

1927 – Andrew Kehoe blows up Bath Consolidated School in Michigan, killing 38 children and 2 teachers after killing his wife and setting their home on fire. Kehoe died in a second bombing later that day aimed at the school’s superintendent.

1933 – The first major league baseball All-Star Game is announced for July 6 at Comiskey Park. The game was played as part of the Chicago World’s Fair.

1953 – Jacqueline Cochran is the first woman to break the sound barrier, flying an F-86 Sabre fighter plane. She set more than 200 aviation records. Cochran died in 1980 at age 74.

1967 – Tennessee Gov. Ellington repeals the “Monkey Law,” upheld in the 1925 Scopes Trial.

1972 – John Sebastian of Maine East High School makes a record 63 consecutive free throws while blindfolded. In 1978, Fred Newman broke the record with 88 consecutive free throws while blindfolded at the Central YMCA in San Jose, California.

1980 – Mt. Saint Helens erupts in the state of Washington. The eruption caused the deaths of 57 people and $3 billion in damage. Watch a USGS video of the eruption:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP2dreOI8gI

1983 – The Senate revises U.S immigration laws, gives millions of illegal aliens legal status under an amnesty program.

1992 – The Supreme Court rules that states could not force mentally unstable criminal defendants to take anti-psychotic drugs.

1998 – The U.S. Department of Justice and 20 U.S. states file an anti-trust case against Microsoft. Microsoft and the DOJ reach a settlement in 2001.

2002 – Victor Espinoza riding War Emblem wins the 127th Preakness in 1:56.36.

May 19

1643 – Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Harbor form the United Colonies of New England.

1828 – President John Quincy Adams signs the Tariff of 1828 into law to protect industry in the North. Southerners call it the Tariff of Abominations.

1848 – Mexico signs the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, giving Texas to the U.S., and ending the Mexican-American War.

1862 – The Homestead Act is signed into law by President Lincoln, providing up to 160 acres of free land for settlement of West. A total of 1.6 million people claimed 420,000 square miles of government land.

1865 – Confederate President Jefferson Davis is captured by the Union Cavalry in Georgia. Davis was held at Fort Monroe, Virginia, but he was released after two years.

1884 – The Ringling Brothers circus premieres in Wisconsin. The circus was started by the 5 Ringling Brothers. Ringling Brothers Circus merged with Barnum and Bailey Circus in 1907, and the circuses closed in 2017.

1913 – The California Alien Land Law passes, forbidding “aliens ineligible for citizenship” from owning agricultural land. The bill was primarily directed at the Japanese.

1921 – Congress sharply curbs immigration through the Emergency Quota Act by setting a national quota system. Based on the quota formula, the number of immigrants fell from about 800,000 in 1920 to about 300,000 in 1921-1922.

1958 – The U.S. and Canada form the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD).

1987 – The first American Comedy Awards is held to recognize performers or performances in the field of TV or film comedy. The first funniest male and female performers are Robin Williams and Bette Midler. Watch the first intro:

1999 – Rosie O’Donnell and Tom Selleck have an uncomfortable verbal conversation concerning gun control on Rosie O’Donnell’s talk show. Watch a video of Selleck being a total gentleman:

2005 – “Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith” brings in $50 million on its opening day. “Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace” brought in a (then) record $28.5 million when it opened on the same day in 1999.

May 20

1639 – Dorchester Massachusetts, forms the first school funded by local taxes.

1874 – Levi Strauss markets blue jeans with copper rivets at the price of $13.50 a dozen.

1895 – The first commercial movie performance is in a storefront theater in New York City. It was an 8-minute black and white silent film.

1916 – Codell, Kansas, is hit by tornado on this date and on the next two consecutive years (1917 and 1918).

1916 – The Saturday Evening Post features its first Norman Rockwell painting on the cover, entitled “Boy with Baby Carriage.” Rockwell was paid $75. Rockwell painted 321 covers over the next 47 years.

1926 – Congress passes the Air Commerce Act, which licenses pilots and planes.

1927 – Charles Lindbergh takes off from New York to cross the Atlantic Ocean in the “Spirit of St. Louis.” He landed in Paris the following afternoon.

1932 – Amelia Earhart leaves Newfoundland to become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. She flies on the 5th anniversary of Lindbergh’s flight.

1939 – The first regular airmail and passenger service across the Atlantic Ocean begins when the “Yankee Clipper” takes off from Port Washington, New York.

1959 – Ford wins the battle with Chrysler to call its new car “Falcon.” Ford produced the Falcon from 1960 to 1970. Watch the 1961 Ford Falcon commercial featuring the Peanuts gang:

1985 – The FBI arrests John A. Walker, Jr. His brother, son, and friend were all recruited in the spy ring. They were all convicted of spying for USSR. John would have been eligible for parole, but he died in prison in August 2014 at age 77.

2013 – Yahoo purchases Tumblr, a social networking website created by David Karp in 2007, for $1.1 billion.

2015 – David Letterman hosts the “Late Show with David Letterman” for the last time after 33 years on TV.

Image from pbs.org

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