1502 — Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Christopher Columbus, departs Spain on his fourth and final voyage to the New World. Context: Columbus would spend much of this voyage shipwrecked in Jamaica for over a year. He never returned to Spain in good health and died in 1506, still believing he had reached Asia.
1536 — Opening day of Anne Boleyn’s trial for treason, adultery and incest. It does not go well for Henry VIII’s young queen. Context: The charges were almost certainly fabricated. Anne was convicted and beheaded on May 19th, just three days after this trial began. Henry VIII was betrothed to Jane Seymour the very next day.
1602 — English navigator Bartholomew Gosnold discovers Cape Cod. Context: Gosnold named it for the abundant cod fish he found there. He was also a key organizer of the 1607 Jamestown expedition, the first permanent English settlement in the Americas, though he died of illness shortly after arriving.
1643 — Four-year-old Louis XIV ascends to the throne of France on the death of his father, Louis XIII. Dubbed “The Sun King,” he famously declared, “L’état, c’est moi!” — “I am the state.” Context: Louis XIV would reign for 72 years — the longest of any major European monarch — transforming France into the dominant power of Europe and building the Palace of Versailles as a monument to royal absolutism.
1647 — Peter Stuyvesant arrives in Nieuw Amsterdam to serve as governor of the Dutch New Netherlands colony. Context: The peg-legged Stuyvesant was a capable but autocratic ruler. He would govern the colony until 1664, when a British fleet sailed into the harbor and he was forced to surrender without a shot — renaming the settlement New York.
1655 — The island of Jamaica is captured by a 50-ship British fleet under Admiral William Penn. Context: Penn’s son — also named William — would later found the colony of Pennsylvania. Jamaica became one of Britain’s most valuable Caribbean possessions, largely due to its sugar production fueled by enslaved labor.
1752 — American Renaissance man Benjamin Franklin tests his first lightning rod. He somehow survives. Poor Richard is glad. Context: Franklin’s experiment demonstrated the electrical nature of lightning and led directly to the invention of the lightning rod, saving countless buildings and ships from fire. It also made him one of the most celebrated scientists in the world.
1775 — Led by Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold, American militia crosses Lake Champlain to capture Fort Ticonderoga from the British. Context: The fort’s captured cannons were famously dragged 300 miles through the winter wilderness by Henry Knox to Boston, where their placement on Dorchester Heights forced a British evacuation of the city in March 1776.
1775 — The Second Continental Congress names Virginian George Washington as Supreme Commander of the newly formed Continental Army. Context: Washington was chosen partly for his military experience, but also for strategic reasons — a Virginia leader commanding a largely New England army helped unify the colonies. He would serve without pay throughout the war.
1776 — The Virginia Convention instructs its delegates to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia to propose a resolution of independence from Great Britain. Context: This was the crucial push that moved the Continental Congress from resistance to independence. Virginia’s instruction directly triggered Richard Henry Lee’s formal independence resolution on June 7th, which in turn led to the drafting of the Declaration.
1779 — Death of John Stuart Mill (b. 1806), the brilliant English parliamentarian and philosopher of individual liberty. He was an outspoken advocate of free markets and free speech, and became an early proponent of women’s rights. Context: Mill’s landmark work On Liberty (1859) remains one of the most influential defenses of individual freedom ever written. His support for women’s suffrage — radical for his time — was decades ahead of any legislative action on the matter.
1861 — In recognition of Virginia’s late — but decisive — secession from the United States, the Confederate States of America names Richmond as its capital. Context: The choice of Richmond, just 100 miles from Washington, was as much symbolic as strategic — it tied the Confederacy’s fate to Virginia’s defense. It also made Richmond the primary target of Union military campaigns for the next four years.
1862 — As the War Between the States heats up, the United States Naval Academy moves from Annapolis, Maryland to Newport, Rhode Island. Context: Maryland was a border state with strong Confederate sympathies, making Annapolis an uncomfortable — and potentially dangerous — location for the federal academy. The Academy returned to Annapolis in 1865 after the war ended.
1863 — Stonewall Jackson dies of pneumonia, contracted after being accidentally shot by his own men at the Battle of Chancellorsville. Context: Jackson’s death was a catastrophic loss for the Confederacy. General Lee’s comment said it all: “Jackson has lost his left arm; I have lost my right.” Many historians argue the South never recovered from losing his aggressive tactical genius.
1864 — The Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, the third sequential engagement in U.S. Grant’s Overland Campaign to capture Richmond. The battle’s climax at the “Bloody Angle” saw hand-to-hand fighting across trenches filled with the fallen. Context: Though technically a Confederate tactical victory, Spotsylvania so weakened Lee that he could never again seize the strategic initiative. Grant’s relentless “continuous battle” doctrine was grinding the Army of Northern Virginia down to nothing.
1865 — U.S. Army soldiers capture Confederate President Jefferson Davis at Irwinville, Georgia. He spends two years in custody at Fortress Monroe in Hampton, Virginia — his cell open to visitors today at the Casemate Museum. Context: Davis was captured wearing his wife’s shawl over his shoulders against the morning cold, leading to Northern newspapers mocking him for fleeing in women’s clothing. He was indicted for treason but never tried; the charges were eventually dropped.
1869 — Meeting at Promontory Point, Utah, the nation’s first transcontinental railroad is completed with a golden spike. Telegraph wires carried the moment live to Washington, DC. Context: The railroad collapsed travel time across the continent from months to days, transforming commerce, migration, and the settlement of the West. It also had devastating consequences for the Plains Indians, whose way of life depended on the vast buffalo herds the railroad would help decimate.
1871 — The Treaty of Frankfurt am Main ends the Franco-Prussian War. France cedes Alsace and Lorraine to Germany and is saddled with reparations of 5 billion francs. Context: The humiliation of 1871 planted the seeds of French revanchism that festered for four decades and helped ignite World War I. The very railroad car used to sign the 1918 Armistice was later dragged out by Hitler to accept France’s surrender in 1940 — a deliberate act of historical revenge.
1884 — Birth of Harry S. Truman (d. 1972). Context: The 33rd president made some of the most consequential decisions in modern history: authorizing the atomic bombings of Japan, launching the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe, and committing the U.S. to the defense of South Korea. The “S” in his name stood for nothing — a compromise between two grandfathers.
1884 — Death of Cyrus McCormick (b. 1809), inventor of the mechanical reaper, which enabled viable economic farming across the vast Great Plains. Context: McCormick’s reaper effectively ended subsistence-level grain farming and made large-scale commercial agriculture possible, fueling America’s westward expansion. His company formed the foundation of International Harvester, later Case IH.
1888 — Birth of Irving Berlin (d. 1989). The Russian immigrant became the quintessential American songwriter, producing over 1,500 pieces — including “White Christmas,” “God Bless America,” and “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.” Context: Berlin arrived in America as a child with virtually nothing. He never formally learned to read music and played piano only in the key of F-sharp, using a specially built transposing piano. “White Christmas” remains one of the best-selling singles in history.
1889 — Death of John Cadbury (b. 1801), English grocer whose temperance beliefs led him to explore cocoa as an alternative to the alcohol he saw destroying working-class lives. Cadbury PLC is now one of the world’s premier chocolate manufacturers. Context: Cadbury’s Quaker faith also made him a progressive employer; his Bournville “model village” near Birmingham provided workers with decent housing, gardens, and recreational facilities — radical concepts in Victorian industry.
1902 — Mount Pelée, on the Caribbean island of Martinique, erupts, killing over 30,000 people. Context: The city of Saint-Pierre was effectively erased in under two minutes by a superheated pyroclastic flow. Among the handful of survivors was a prisoner in a thick-walled jail cell who later toured with Barnum & Bailey as “the man who survived the end of the world.”
1914 — Birth of Joe Louis (d. 1981), the “Brown Bomber,” heavyweight champion from 1937 to 1949, who successfully defended his title 26 times. Context: Louis’ rematch demolition of Max Schmeling in 1938 carried enormous symbolic weight — an American Black man defeating the supposed embodiment of Nazi racial supremacy before a global audience. President Roosevelt reportedly squeezed Louis’ arm beforehand and said, “Joe, we need muscles like yours to beat Germany.”
1925 — Birth of Lawrence Peter “Yogi” Berra (d. 2015), legendary catcher for the New York Yankees, Navy gunner’s mate at Normandy, and accidental poet of the American vernacular. Context: A 10-time World Series champion and 18-time All-Star, Berra was arguably the greatest clutch player in baseball history. His malapropisms — “It ain’t over ’til it’s over,” “Nobody goes there anymore, it’s too crowded” — have entered the permanent fabric of American speech.
1928 — Mickey Mouse makes his first appearance in a cartoon, the originally silent short “Plane Crazy.” Context: “Plane Crazy” actually preceded the more famous “Steamboat Willie” (the first cartoon with synchronized sound), but was released to theaters later. Mickey’s voice in “Steamboat Willie” was supplied by Walt Disney himself — a tradition Disney maintained for over 20 years.
1933 — Mahatma Gandhi begins a 21-day fast against British rule in India, undertaken in the name of the Untouchable caste, whom he called “Harijans” — the Children of God. Context: Gandhi used fasting as a form of moral and political pressure throughout his career. This particular fast was aimed at forcing better treatment of Untouchables within the independence movement itself, not just from the British. His refusal to eat risked sparking mass unrest, which gave the fast enormous leverage.
1937 — Ventriloquist Edgar Bergen and his wooden alter-ego Charlie McCarthy make their radio debut. They are a hit. Context: The success of a ventriloquist act on radio — a purely auditory medium — is one of the great ironies in entertainment history. Bergen’s gift was clearly comedy and character rather than the technical skill of ventriloquism, and audiences loved him for it.
1940 — The German Wehrmacht crosses the Meuse River into France, bypassing the vaunted Maginot Line and revealing that the war in the West would not be settled cheaply. The decisive pivot point was, again, the city of Sedan. Context: The German plan — “Sichelschnitt” (sickle cut) — was considered impossibly reckless by many German generals. Armored columns pushed through the supposedly impassable Ardennes Forest, completely outflanking Allied defenses and leading to the fall of France in just six weeks.
1940 — The submarine USS Sailfish (SS-192) is commissioned into the U.S. Navy — formerly USS Squalus, raised after a disastrous test dive that killed 26 sailors. Context: Sailfish went on to earn 10 battle stars in the Pacific. In a tragic twist, she later sank a Japanese carrier transporting American POWs — some of whom had helped rescue the Squalus survivors years before.
1941 — A Royal Navy corvette, HMS Bulldog, captures the German submarine U-110, including its current code books and, most critically, its Enigma coding machine — a secret kept for over seven months. Context: The capture of an intact Enigma machine was arguably one of the most important intelligence coups of the war. Combined with the mathematical work at Bletchley Park, it allowed the Allies to read German naval communications with enough regularity to dramatically turn the Battle of the Atlantic.
1941 — Nazi Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess parachutes into Scotland in a bizarre solo attempt at peace negotiations with Britain — just weeks before Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. Context: Hitler publicly disavowed Hess, claiming he was mentally ill. Whether the flight was an unauthorized personal mission or a covert feeler from Hitler himself remains debated. Hess spent the rest of his life in prison, dying at Spandau in 1987 as its sole remaining inmate.
1944 — Birth of filmmaker George Lucas, who gave the world American Graffiti, Star Wars, and Indiana Jones — and also, regrettably, the prequels. Context: The original Star Wars (1977) transformed Hollywood permanently — pioneering blockbuster marketing, modern special effects, and the now-standard model of franchise merchandising. Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney in 2012 for $4 billion.
1946 — Birth of Candice Bergen — yes, Edgar’s daughter. Context: Candice Bergen became one of America’s most respected actresses, earning five Emmy Awards for her role as Murphy Brown. She has written candidly about her unusual childhood, growing up with Charlie McCarthy having his own bedroom in the Bergen house.
1947 — Scuderia Ferrari makes its independent racing debut with the revolutionary V-12 powered Tipo 125. The car leads until the fuel pump fails with two laps to go. Enzo Ferrari is very pleased. Context: Ferrari’s Formula 1 program became the most storied in the sport’s history. The Scuderia has competed in every Formula 1 World Championship season since 1950 — the only team to do so — and has claimed 16 Constructors’ titles.
1948 — With the expiration of the British Mandate over Palestine, David Ben-Gurion proclaims the State of Israel from a museum in Tel Aviv — with Syrian, Jordanian, and Egyptian artillery already audible in the background. Context: The United States recognized the new state just 11 minutes after the proclamation. The Arab-Israeli War that immediately followed ended in armistice agreements in 1949, with Israel controlling more territory than originally allocated under the UN partition plan.
1949 — Frustrated by the stunning success of the Berlin Airlift, the Soviet Union ends the Berlin Blockade — the first battle of the Cold War. Air deliveries of food and supplies had eventually surpassed pre-blockade rail shipments. Context: At its peak, Allied aircraft were landing in West Berlin every 45 seconds. The airlift’s success was a decisive moral and political victory for the West and led directly to the formal establishment of West Germany on May 23, 1949.
1955 — West Germany joins NATO, settling — at least for the time — the lingering question of post-war German rearmament. Context: West Germany’s entry into NATO prompted the Soviet Union to formalize its own alliance the same week, creating the Warsaw Pact. The two competing blocs would face each other across the Iron Curtain for the next 35 years.
1955 — The Warsaw Pact treaty is signed in the city of Warsaw. Context: Unlike NATO, which was built on mutual defense agreements among sovereign states, the Warsaw Pact functioned largely as a mechanism for Soviet control of Eastern Europe — as Hungary (1956) and Czechoslovakia (1968) discovered to their cost.
1957 — Great Britain detonates its first hydrogen bomb, a high-altitude air burst, over Christmas Island in the South Pacific. Context: The British H-bomb test confirmed Britain as the world’s third thermonuclear power, after the U.S. and USSR. It also provided crucial leverage for renewing the U.S.-UK nuclear sharing agreement, which had been suspended after the 1946 Atomic Energy Act.
1963 — Last flight of Project Mercury: Gordon Cooper completes 22 Earth orbits over 34 hours — the first American to sleep in space and the final American to orbit solo. Context: Cooper’s re-entry, guided largely by manual calculations after a computer failure, landed him just four miles from the recovery ship — arguably the most accurate splashdown in the Mercury program. Project Gemini, with two-man crews, would follow the next year.
1974 — The House Judiciary Committee opens formal impeachment hearings against President Richard Nixon. Context: The hearings centered on the Watergate break-in and, more broadly, Nixon’s alleged obstruction of justice. Nixon resigned in August 1974 before the full House could vote on impeachment — the only U.S. president ever to do so.
1981 — Death of Jamaican icon Bob Marley (b. 1945). Context: Marley died of acral lentiginous melanoma — a cancer that began under his toenail and which he declined to have treated, partly on religious grounds. He was 36. His posthumous influence on global music has arguably exceeded his fame during his lifetime.
1981 — Pope John Paul II survives an assassination attempt by Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Ağca, in a plot with roots in Bulgaria — and possibly beyond. Context: The Pope was shot four times in St. Peter’s Square. He later visited Ağca in prison and publicly forgave him. John Paul II credited his survival to the intercession of Our Lady of Fátima — the attempt having occurred on the anniversary of her first apparition.
1988 — Death of Kim Philby (b. 1912), British intelligence officer and Soviet mole who fed secrets to Moscow from the 1930s until his defection in 1963 — one of the most damaging spies in Western history. Context: As head of MI6’s anti-Soviet section, Philby was uniquely positioned to identify and betray British agents operating against the USSR. His treachery cost an unknown number of lives. He died in Moscow, decorated by the Soviet state, but by most accounts a lonely and heavily alcoholic exile.
1994 — Nelson Mandela is inaugurated as the first Black President of South Africa, ending decades of apartheid rule. Context: Mandela had spent 27 years in prison — much of it breaking rocks on Robben Island. His inauguration was attended by leaders from across the globe and was widely regarded as one of the most significant moments of the 20th century. His speech called for reconciliation, not retribution.
1998 — Death of Frank Sinatra (b. 1915). THE Voice of voices. Context: Sinatra’s career spanned six decades and reinvented itself multiple times — from swooning teen idol of the 1940s, to the mature, introspective Capitol Records era of the 1950s (widely considered his artistic peak), to elder statesman of American song. He sold an estimated 150 million records worldwide.
2006 — A 300-foot slab of rock is growing out of the dome in the crater of Mount St. Helens at a rate of 4–5 feet per day, providing a graphic demonstration of the forces still at work beneath the surface. Context: Mount St. Helens’ catastrophic 1980 eruption killed 57 people and flattened 230 square miles of forest. The renewed dome growth in the mid-2000s reminded volcanologists that the mountain remains very much alive. The USGS classified dome growth as quasi-dormant by January 2008.
About the Author
Not the entire police department. A couple of them are good honorable officers.
I hope she doesn't hold her breathe.
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It was a great place to live until everyone moved here and decided to make it like where they came…
Dang, there you all go again. This lady deserves more than a double rude welcome. She deserves an apology. If…