This Day in History

On this day in 1911, the U.S. Army adopted John Browning’s Model 1911 as its standard issue sidearm.  

An updated design, the 1911A1, was introduced in 1924, and remained the standard issue sidearm until its untimely replacement in 1985.

This Day In History

Texas was admitted to the Union as the 28th state in 1845.

The Massacre at Wounded Knee happened in 1890, effectively ending the Indian Wars. 

In 1975, a terrorist bomb detonated at LaGuardia airport killing 75 and injuring 75.  Although we think we know who did it, the crime remains officially unsolved.

This Day In History

Barbed wire was patented in 1874 by Joseph F. Glidden of Dekalb, Illinois.

General Joseph Mobutu seized power in the Congo in 1965.  His tyranny didn’t end until 1997, when he was replaced by another tyrant.

Justus Falckner was ordained as the first American Lutheran Pastor in 1703.

This Day In History

The Battle of Lutzen was fought between Gustavus Adolfus’s Swedes and Wallenstein’s Imperials in 1632.  Adolfus, the Lion of the North, won the battle, but lost his life.

Fort Washington was captured by the British, using mostly Hessian troops, on this day in 1776. 

On this day in 1798, Kentucky became the 1st state to nullify an act of Congress.  Kentucky nullified the Alien and Sedition Acts on the grounds that the federal government had no right to exercise powers not delegated to it by the Constitution.  The resolution was written by Thomas Jefferson.

This Day In History

Winston Churchill was captured by the Boers in 1899.

The Articles Of Confederation were adopted by the Continental Congress in 1777.  They would be ratified 3 1/2 years later. 

In 1977, President Jimmy Carter receives the Shah of Iran into the White House.

This Day In History

Charles VI, King of France, was crowned this day in 1380.  He was 12.  His greatest accomplistment was that he gave sole rights to the aging of Roquefort cheese to the village of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon, and all Roquefort must still be aged in the caves there today.

Herman Melville’s Moby Dick was first published in 1851.

This Day In History

Adolf Hitler attempted to seize power in Germany with his failed Beer Hall Putsch in 1923. 

In another Hitler event, Johann Georg Elser failed by a matter of inches in his assasination attempt against Hitler in 1939.  Elser placed a bomb in a podium where Hitler spoke, but Hitler left 10 minutes before the bomb exploaded.  Strangely, Elser was not immediately executed.  He was kept in concentration camps until 1945, when he was executed by the Gestapo 2 weeks before the Allies arrived.  Things like this are a reminder that history often turns on as little as 10 minutes. 

The first all jet combat took place in 1950 when Lt. Russell J. Brown shot down a NK MiG-15 in his F-80C.

This Day In History

Abraham Lincoln (R-Ill) was elected as POTUS in 1860.

1 year later, in 1861, Jefferson Davis was elected as POTCSA.

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan trounced Mondale to earn a second term.  Reagan won every state except Minnesota.

This Day In History

The Catholics tried to blow up Parliment in 1605 in The Gunpowder Plot.

In 1688, William of Orange, A.K.A. King William III, landed on thr British shore to launch the Glorious Revolution.

Frederick The Great led his magnificent Prussian army to victory against the French at Rossbach in 1757.

This Day In History

The hated Stamp Act went into effect in 1765.  It sparked the Revolution over a 3% tax.  Today, we pay, on average, nearly 45% of our income in taxes.

In 1922, the Ottoman Empire was abolished.  The world has been searching for a place to rest our feet ever since.

Mike burst onto the scene in 1952 as the first thermonuclear device to be detonated.  Mike was more powerful than the combined power of all of the allied bombs dropped on Europe in WWII.

This Day In History

In 1485, King Henry VIII founded the Yeoman Of The Guard as the sovereign’s personal bodyguard.

Tsar Nicholas II granted basic civil rights to the Russian people in his “October Manifesto” (note: the date of the document is from before the Russians switched calendars).

Orson Welles broadcast “The War Of The Worlds” in 1938.

This Day In History

The now infamous “Publius” publishe the first of The Federalist Papers in 1787.

Theodore Roosevelt was born in 1858.  He also married Alice Hathaway Lee on this same day in 1880.

More recently, in 1997, the DOW fell 554.26 points to close at 7,161.15, third largest dollar loss in history, down 7.18%.  Trading was halted twice during the day, which was the first interruption since the.March 30, 1981 assassination attempt on President Reagan.

This Day In History

There’s really only one item in my list for today, but it’s huge…

On this day in 1943 in the small town of Denton, Texas, Harry Whitney Owens and his wife Mary Francis Pearman Owens gave birth to their 4th child (3rd daughter), who went on to give birth to me 31 years later. 

Happy Birthday, Mom.

This Day In History

In 1415, the intrepid Henry V led his army to vistory at the Battle of Agincourt.

The hated George III ascended the British throne in 1760.  His policies would lead to the dismemberment of the British empire.

In 1983, the US Marines invaded and occupied Grenada, thus stopping the communist advance in the Western hemisphere.  Here’s my favorite quote from the whole affair (with a little lead-in):

Unexpected reception. After meeting surprisingly heavy resistance, U.S. commanders summoned reinforcements, and troop levels climbed beyond 5,000. Grenada’s own small Army did almost no fighting, leaving most combat to the force of Cubans described by Havana as construction workers.

The 500 Cubans the Americans expected to encounter turned out to be upward of 1,100, armed with rifles, Soviet-made antitank weapons, antiaircraft guns and machine guns. “For people who were supposed to be construction workers,” said one American official, “they fought very well.”

*chuckle*

This Day In History

The Treaty of Westphalia, signed this day in 1648, ended the 30 Years War between France and Sweden. 

On a sad note, the UN Charter became effective on this day in 1945.

In 1971, the first game was played in Texas Stadium.  The Cowboys won against the Patriots 44-22.  There were 65, 708 fans in attendance.