IOPList.Org

Federal prisoners land on Alcatraz





1934
August 11




A group of federal prisoners classified as “most dangerous” arrives at Alcatraz Island, a 22-acre rocky outcrop
situated 1.5 miles offshore in San Francisco Bay, on August 11, 1934. The convicts—the first civilian prisoners
to be housed in the new high-security penitentiary—joined a few dozen military prisoners left over from the
island’s days as a U.S. military prison.

Alcatraz was an uninhabited seabird haven when it was explored by Spanish Lieutenant Juan Manuel de Ayala in
1775. He named it Isla de los Alcatraces, or “Island of the Pelicans.” Fortified by the Spanish, Alcatraz was sold
to the United States in 1849. In 1854, it had the distinction of housing the first lighthouse on the coast of California.
Beginning in 1859, a U.S. Army detachment was garrisoned there, and from 1868 Alcatraz was used to house
military criminals. In addition to recalcitrant U.S. soldiers, prisoners included rebellious Indian scouts, American
soldiers fighting in the Philippines who had deserted to the Filipino cause, and Chinese civilians who resisted the
U.S. Army during the Boxer Rebellion. In 1907, Alcatraz was designated the Pacific Branch of the
United States Military Prison.

In 1934, Alcatraz was fortified into a high-security federal penitentiary designed to hold the most dangerous
prisoners in the U.S. penal system, especially those with a penchant for escape attempts. The first shipment of
civilian prisoners arrived on August 11, 1934. Later that month, more shiploads arrived, featuring, among other
convicts, infamous mobster Al Capone. In September, George “Machine Gun” Kelly, another luminary of organized
crime, landed on Alcatraz.

In the 1940s, a famous Alcatraz prisoner was Richard Stroud, the “Birdman of Alcatraz.” A convicted murderer,
Stroud wrote an important study on birds while being held in solitary confinement in Leavenworth Prison in Kansas.
Regarded as extremely dangerous because of his 1916 murder of a guard at Leavenworth, he was transferred to
Alcatraz in 1942. Stroud was not allowed to continue his avian research at Alcatraz.

Although some three dozen attempted, no prisoner was known to have successfully escaped “The Rock.” However,
the bodies of several escapees believed drowned in the treacherous waters of San Francisco Bay were never found.
The story of the 1962 escape of three of these men, Frank Morris and brothers John and Clarence Anglin, inspired
the 1979 film Escape from Alcatraz. Another prisoner, John Giles, caught a boat ride to the shore in 1945 dressed in
an army uniform he had stolen piece by piece, but he was questioned by a suspicious officer after disembarking and
sent back to Alcatraz. Only one man, John Paul Scott, was recorded to have reached the mainland by swimming, but
he came ashore exhausted and hypothermic at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge. Police found him lying unconscious
and in a state of shock.

In 1963, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy ordered Alcatraz closed, citing the high expense of its maintenance.
In its 29-year run, Alcatraz housed more than 1,500 convicts. In March 1964 a group of Sioux Indians briefly occupied
the island, citing an 1868 treaty with the Sioux allowing Indians to claim any “unoccupied government land.”
In November 1969, a group of nearly 100 Native American students and activists began a more prolonged occupation
of the island, remaining there until they were forced off by federal marshals in June 1971.

In 1972, Alcatraz was opened to the public as part of the newly created Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which
is maintained by the National Park Service. More than one million tourists visit Alcatraz Island and the former prison annually.




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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
2014
Oscar-winning actor Robin Williams
dies at 63

Robin Williams, the prolific Oscar-winning actor and
comedian, died by suicide on August 11, 2014.
He was 63.  On the big screen, Williams, who was
born in Chicago in 1951, made his debut in the 1977
low-budget comedy “Can I Do it ‘Til I Need Glasses?”
then went on to appear in ...
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1960S
1965
Watts Rebellion begins

In the predominantly Black Watts neighborhood of
Los Angeles, racial tension reaches a breaking point
after two white policemen scuffle with a Black motorist
suspected of drunken driving. A crowd of spectators
gathered near the corner of Avalon Boulevard and
116th Street to watch ...
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MIDDLE EAST
1952
Hussein succeeds to Jordanian throne

Prince Hussein is proclaimed the king of Jordan after his
father, King Talal, is declared unfit to rule by the
Jordanian Parliament on grounds of mental illness.
Hussein was formally crowned on November 14, 1953,
his 18th birthday. Hussein was the third constitutional king of ...
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WORLD WAR II
1943
Germans begin to evacuate Sicily

On August 11, 1943, German forces begin a six-day
evacuation of the Italian island of Sicily, having been
beaten back by the Allies, who invaded the island in July.
The Germans had maintained a presence in Sicily since
the earliest days of the war. But with the arrival of Gen. ...
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VIETNAM WAR
1972
Last U.S. ground combat unit departs
South Vietnam

The last U.S. ground combat unit in South Vietnam, the
Third Battalion, Twenty-First Infantry, departs for the
United States. The unit had been guarding the U.S. air
base at Da Nang. This left only 43,500 advisors, airmen,
and support troops left in-country. This number did ...
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COLD WAR
1984
Reagan jokes about bombing Russia

On August 11, 1984, President Ronald Reagan makes
a joking but controversial off-the-cuff remark about
bombing Russia while testing a microphone before a
scheduled radio address. While warming up for the speech,
Reagan said “My fellow Americans,
I am pleased to tell you today ...
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WESTWARD EXPANSION
1806
Meriwether Lewis is shot in the leg

While hunting for elk along the Missouri River,
Meriwether Lewis is shot in the hip, probably by
one of his own men. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
had embarked on their epic journey to the Pacific
two years earlier. The 33 members of the Corps of
Discovery had experienced ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1973
Hip hop is born at a birthday party in the Bronx

Like any style of music, hip hop has roots in other forms,
and its evolution was shaped by many different artists,
but there’s a case to be made that it came to life precisely
on August 11, 1973, at a birthday party in the recreation
room of an apartment building in the west ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1973
"American Graffiti" opens

On August 11, 1973, the nostalgic teenage coming-of-age
movie American Graffiti, directed and co-written by
George Lucas, opens in theaters across the United States.
Set in California in the summer of 1962, American Graffiti
was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best ...
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CRIME
1980
Carol Bundy confesses her connection
to the “Sunset Slayer”

Nurse Carol Bundy confesses her connection to the
“Sunset Slayer,” the killer who had been murdering
and mutilating young women in Hollywood, California,
all summer, to co-workers. “I can’t take it anymore.
I’m supposed to save lives, not take them,”
she reportedly said. Her ...
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CIVIL WAR
1864
Confederate General Early
abandons Winchester, Virginia

Confederate General Jubal Early pulls out of Winchester,
Virginia, as Union General Philip Sheridan approaches
the city. Wary of his new foe, Early moved away to
avoid an immediate conflict. Since June, Early and his
14,000 troops had been campaigning in the
Shenandoah Valley and ...
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WORLD WAR I
1919
Weimar Constitution adopted in Germany

On August 11, 1919, Friedrich Ebert, a member of
the Social Democratic Party and the provisional president
of the German Reichstag (government), signs a new
constitution, known as the Weimar Constitution, into law,
officially creating the first parliamentary democracy in Germany. ...
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Skeleton of Tyrannosaurus Rex discovered






1990
August 12



On August 12, 1990, fossil hunter Susan Hendrickson discovers three huge bones jutting out of a cliff
near Faith, South Dakota. They turn out to be part of the largest-ever Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ever
discovered, a 65 million-year-old specimen dubbed Sue, after its discoverer.

Amazingly, Sue’s skeleton was over 90 percent complete, and the bones were extremely well-preserved.
Hendrickson’s employer, the Black Hills Institute of Geological Research, paid $5,000 to the land owner,
Maurice Williams, for the right to excavate the dinosaur skeleton, which was cleaned and transported to
the company headquarters in Hill City. The institute’s president, Peter Larson, announced plans to build a
non-profit museum to display Sue along with other fossils of the Cretaceous period.

In 1992, a long legal battle began over Sue. The U.S. Attorney’s Office claimed Sue’s bones had been seized
from federal land and were therefore government property. It was eventually found that Williams, a part-Native
American and member of the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, had traded his land to the tribe two decades earlier
to avoid paying property taxes, and thus his sale of excavation rights to Black Hills had been invalid.
In October 1997, Chicago’s Field Museum purchased Sue at public auction at Sotheby’s in New York City for
$8.36 million, financed in part by the McDonald’s and Disney corporations.

Sue’s skeleton went on display at the Field Museum in May 2000. The tremendous T.rex skeleton—13 feet high
at the hips and 42 feet long from head to toe, with a 2,000-pound skull and 58 teeth—is displayed in a special
exhibition space.

Sue’s extraordinarily well-preserved bones have allowed scientists to determine many things about the life of
T.rex. They have determined that the carnivorous dinosaur had an incredible sense of smell, as the olfactory
bulbs were each bigger than the cerebrum, the thinking part of the brain. In addition, Sue was the first T.rex
skeleton to be discovered with a wishbone, a crucial discovery that provided support for scientists’ theory that
birds are a type of living dinosaur.




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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
2014
Hollywood icon Lauren Bacall dies

On August 12, 2014, actress Lauren Bacall, who shot to
fame in her debut film, 1944’s “To Have and Have Not,”
in which she appeared opposite Humphrey Bogart, with
whom she would have a legendary romance, dies at her
New York City home at age 89. In a career that spanned
nearly 70 ...
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SPORTS
1973
American golfer Jack Nicklaus sets title record

On August 12, 1973, American golfer Jack Nicklaus wins
the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) championship
for his 14th major title, surpassing Bobby Jones’ record of
13 major championships. Nicklaus shot a seven-under-par
277 at Canterbury Golf Club in Beachwood, Ohio, to ...
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COLONIAL AMERICA
1676
King Philip’s War ends

In colonial New England, King Philip’s War effectively comes
to an end when Philip, chief of the Wampanoag tribe, is
assassinated by a Native American in the service of the English.
In the early 1670s, 50 years of peace between the Plymouth
colony and the local Wampanoag Indians ...
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NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
1985
JAL flight 123 crashes into Mount Otsuka

At 6:50 p.m. local time, a Japan Air Lines Boeing 747SR crashes
into Mount Otsuka, 70 miles northwest of Tokyo. There were 524
people aboard, and all but four were dead by the time rescuers
reached the remote crash site 12 hours later. JAL flight 123 took
off from Tokyo’s Haneda ...
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ANCIENT EGYPT
30 B.C.
Cleopatra dies by suicide

Cleopatra, queen of Egypt and lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony,
takes her life following the defeat of her forces against Octavian, the
future first emperor of Rome. Cleopatra, born in 69 B.C., was made
Cleopatra VII, queen of Egypt, upon the death of her father, Ptolemy ...
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19TH CENTURY
1898
Armistice ends the Spanish-American War

The brief and one-sided Spanish-American War comes to an end
when Spain formally agrees to a peace protocol on U.S. terms:
the cession of Cuba, Puerto Rico and Manila in the Philippines to
the United States pending a final peace treaty.
The Spanish-American War had its origins in ...
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WORLD WAR II
1941
FDR and Churchill meet on ship,
map out Atlantic Charter

On August 12, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and
Prime Minister Winston Churchill meet on board a ship at
Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, to confer on issues ranging
from support for Russia to threatening Japan to postwar peace.
When Roosevelt and Churchill met for the first ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1939
“The Wizard of Oz” movie premieres in
Oconomowoc, Wisconsin

The Wizard of Oz, starring Judy Garland and featuring words
and music by E.Y. “Yip” Harburg and Harold Arlen, receives
its world premiere in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, on August 12, 1939.
The beloved characters and familiar plot points were mostly
all there in the original children’s ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1964
James Bond creator Ian Fleming dies

On August 12, 1964, the British author and journalist Ian Fleming,
creator of James Bond, the world’s most famous fictional spy,
dies of a heart attack at age 56 in Kent, England. Fleming’s series
of novels about the debonair Agent 007, based in part on their
dashing author’s ...
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NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
2000
Russian sub, the “Kursk,” sinks with 118 onboard

A Russian nuclear submarine sinks to the bottom of the
Barents Sea on August 12, 2000; all 118 crew members
are later found dead. The exact cause of the disaster remains
unknown. Kursk left port on August 10 to take part in war
games with the Russian military. Russian ships, ...
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CRIME
1964
Great Train robber escapes from prison

On August 12, 1964, Charlie Wilson, part of the gang who
pulled off the 1963 Great Train Robbery, one of the biggest
heists of its kind, escapes from Winson Green Prison in
Birmingham, England. Several men broke into the
maximum-security facility to free Wilson, who remained on ...
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AMERICAN REVOLUTION
1776
General Washington anticipates British strategy

On August 12, 1776, General George Washington writes
to Major General Charles Lee that the Continental Army’s
situation had deteriorated due to an outbreak of smallpox
and problems with desertion. Washington feared that the
superior British navy might blockade New York, thus ...
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WORLD WAR II
1938
Hitler encourages Germans to have
multiple children with the Mother’s Cross

On August 12, 1938, Adolf Hitler institutes the Mother’s Cross,
to encourage German women to have more children, to be
awarded each year on August 12, Hitler’s mother’s birthday.
The German Reich needed a robust and growing population
and encouraged couples to have large ...
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Berlin is divided








1961
August 13



Shortly after midnight on August 13, 1961, East German soldiers begin laying down barbed wire and bricks
as a barrier between Soviet-controlled East Berlin and the democratic western section of the city.

After World War II, defeated Germany was divided into Soviet, American, British and French zones of occupation.
The city of Berlin, though technically part of the Soviet zone, was also split, with the Soviets taking the eastern
part of the city. After a massive Allied airlift in June 1948 foiled a Soviet attempt to blockade West Berlin, the
eastern section was drawn even more tightly into the Soviet fold. Over the next 12 years, cut off from its western
counterpart and basically reduced to a Soviet satellite, East Germany saw between 2.5 million and 3 million of
its citizens head to West Germany in search of better opportunities. By 1961, some 1,000 East Germans—including
many skilled laborers, professionals and intellectuals—were leaving every day.

In August, Walter Ulbricht, the Communist leader of East Germany, got the go-ahead from Soviet Premier
Nikita Khrushchev to begin the sealing off of all access between East and West Berlin. Soldiers began the work
over the night of August 12-13, laying more than 100 miles of barbed wire slightly inside the East Berlin border.
The wire was soon replaced by a six-foot-high, 96-mile-long wall of concrete blocks, complete with guard towers,
machine gun posts and searchlights. East German officers known as Volkspolizei (“Volpos”) patrolled the
Berlin Wall day and night.

Many Berlin residents on that first morning found themselves suddenly cut off from friends or family members
in the other half of the city. Led by their mayor, Willi Brandt, West Berliners demonstrated against the wall, as
Brandt criticized Western democracies, particularly the United States, for failing to take a stand against it.
President John F. Kennedy had earlier said publicly that the United States could only really help West Berliners
and West Germans, and that any kind of action on behalf of East Germans would only result in failure.

The Berlin Wall was one of the most powerful and iconic symbols of the Cold War. In June 1963, Kennedy gave
his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner” (“I am a Berliner”) speech in front of the Wall, celebrating the city as a symbol
of freedom and democracy in its resistance to tyranny and oppression. The height of the Wall was raised to 10 feet
in 1970 in an effort to stop escape attempts, which at that time came almost daily. From 1961 to 1989, a total
of 5,000 East Germans escaped; many more tried and failed. High profile shootings of some would-be defectors
only intensified the Western world’s hatred of the Wall.

Finally, in the late 1980s, East Germany, fueled by the decline of the Soviet Union, began to implement a number
of liberal reforms. On November 9, 1989, masses of East and West Germans alike gathered at the Berlin Wall and
began to climb over and dismantle it. As this symbol of Cold War repression was destroyed, East and West Germany
became one nation again, signing a formal treaty of unification on October 3, 1990.





ALSO ON THIS DAY



U.S. PRESIDENTS
1981
Reagan signs Economic Recovery Tax Act (ERTA)

On August 13, 1981, at his California home Rancho del Cielo,
Ronald Reagan signs the Economic Recovery Tax Act (ERTA),
a package of tax and budget reductions that set the tone
for his administration’s trickle-down economic policy.
During his campaign for the White House in 1980, ...
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LATIN AMERICA
1926
Fidel Castro born

Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro is born in the Oriente
province of eastern Cuba. The son of a Spanish immigrant
who had made a fortune building rail systems to transport
sugar cane, Fidel attended Roman Catholic boarding
schools in Santiago de Cuba. He became involved in ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1952
“Hound Dog” is recorded for the first time
by Big Mama Thornton

Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog” (1956) is one of the biggest
and most instantly recognizable pop songs in history. It’s
a song so closely associated with the King of Rock and Roll,
in fact, that many may mistakenly assume that it was a
Presley original. In fact, the story of the song ...
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ANCIENT AMERICAS
1521
Aztec capital falls to Cortés
After a three-month siege, Spanish forces under
Hernán Cortés capture Tenochtitlán, the capital of the
Aztec empire. Cortés’ men leveled the city and
captured Cuauhtémoc, the Aztec emperor. Tenochtitlán
was founded in 1325 A.D. by a wandering tribe of
hunters and gatherers on ...
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SPORTS
1995
New York Yankees star Mickey Mantle dies

Former New York Yankees star Mickey Mantle dies of
liver cancer at the age of 63. While “The Mick” patrolled
center field and batted clean-up between 1951 and 1968,
the Yankees won 12 American League pennants and
seven World Series championships.
Mantle was born in Spavinaw, ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1982
Fast Times at Ridgemont High debuts

On August 13, 1982, the teenage coming-of-age comedy
Fast Times at Ridgemont High opens in theaters around the
United States. Written by Cameron Crowe and directed by
Amy Heckerling, the film follows a year in the life of
high school students Stacy (Jennifer Jason Leigh), Linda ...
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INVENTIONS & SCIENCE
1878
First victim of Memphis yellow fever epidemic dies

On August 13, 1878, Kate Bionda, a restaurant owner,
dies of yellow fever in Memphis, Tennessee, after a man
who had escaped a quarantined steamboat visited her
restaurant. The disease spread rapidly and the resulting
epidemic emptied the city. Yellow fever, which is carried by ...
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CRIME
1961
Yosemite killer Cary Stayner born

Cary Stayner, the serial killer convicted in the grisly
murders of four women near Yosemite National Park,
is born on August 13, 1961. In 1972, Stayner’s childhood
took a tragic turn when his younger brother Steven,
then seven, was kidnapped while walking
home from school in the ...
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COLD WAR
1948
Record day for the Berlin Airlift

Responding to increasing Soviet pressure on western Berlin,
U.S. and British planes airlift a record amount of supplies
into sections of the city under American and British control.
The massive resupply effort, carried out in weather so bad
that some pilots referred to it as ...
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INVENTIONS & SCIENCE
1902
Rotary engine inventor Felix Wankel born

The German engineer Felix Wankel, inventor of a rotary engine
that will be used in race cars, is born on August 13, 1902,
in Lahr, Germany. Wankel reportedly came up with the basic
idea for a new type of internal combustion gasoline engine
when he was only 17 years old. In 1924, ...
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AMERICAN REVOLUTION
1781
Patriots ambush Loyalists as French set sail

On August 13, 1781, Patriot forces led by Colonel William
Harden and Brigadier General Francis Marion, known as the
“Swamp Fox,” lure British commander Major Thomas Fraser
and his 450 soldiers into an ambush at Parker’s Ferry,
30 miles northwest of Charleston, South Carolina. ...
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The terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal is captured






1994
August 14



Terrorist Illich Ramirez Sanchez, long known as Carlos the Jackal, is captured in Khartoum, Sudan,
by French intelligence agents. Since there was no extradition treaty with Sudan, the French agents
sedated and kidnapped Carlos. The Sudanese government, claiming that it had assisted in the arrest,
requested that the United States remove their country from its list of nations that sponsor terrorism.

Sanchez, who was affiliated with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Organization for
Armed Arab Struggle, and the Japanese Red Army, was widely believed to be responsible for numerous
terrorist attacks between 1973 and 1992. In 1974, he took the French ambassador and 10 others
hostage at the Hague, demanding that French authorities release Yutaka Furuya of the Japanese Red Army.

On June 27, 1975, French police officers tried to arrest Sanchez in a Paris apartment, but he killed two
officers in an ensuing gun battle and escaped. In June 1992, Sanchez was tried in absentia for these
murders and convicted.

On December 21, 1975, Sanchez and a group of his men took 70 OPEC officials hostage at a Vienna
conference. They made it to safety with somewhere between $25 million and $50 million in ransom money,
but not before killing three hostages.Sanchez claimed responsibility for these crimes in an interview with
the Arab magazine, Al Watan al Arabi.

In the subsequent trial that resulted in his imprisonment, Sanchez was represented by Jacque Verges,
who had reportedly helped to organize a failed rocket attack on a French nuclear power plant in 1982.
Verges was also accused of sending a threatening letter fromSanchez to the French authorities so that
Sanchez’s girlfriend (possibly his wife), German terrorist Magdalena Kopp, could be released.

He bitterly denied the charges.





ALSO ON THIS DAY



EXPLORATION
1784
Russians settle Alaska

On Kodiak Island, Grigory Shelikhov, a Russian fur trader,
found Three Saints Bay, the first permanent Russian
settlement in Alaska. The European discovery of Alaska
came in 1741, when a Russian expedition led by Danish
navigator Vitus Bering sighted the Alaskan mainland. ...
read more


2003 Blackout
21ST CENTURY
2003
Blackout hits Northeast United States

A major outage knocked out power across the eastern
United States and parts of Canada on August 14, 2003.
Beginning at 4:10 p.m. ET, 21 power plants shut down
in just three minutes. Fifty million people were affected,
including residents of New York, Cleveland and Detroit, as ...
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WORLD WAR II
1945
Japan’s surrender made public

In what later became known as Victory Day, an official
announcement of Japan’s unconditional surrender to the
Allies is made public to the world on August 14, 1945.
(Because of time-zone differences, it was August 15 in Japan.)
Japan formally surrendered in writing two weeks ...
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SPORTS
1971
Pitching ace Bob Gibson throws first no-hitter

On August 14, 1971, St. Louis Cardinals ace Bob Gibson
throws the first no-hitter of his storied career. Gibson’s
heroics helped his team sail to an 11-0 victory over the
Pittsburgh Pirates. Gibson overcame numerous childhood
ailments—including rickets, asthma and a heart ...
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U.S. PRESIDENTS
1935
FDR signs Social Security Act

President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs into law the
Social Security Act on August 14, 1935. Press photographers
snapped pictures as FDR, flanked by ranking members
of Congress, signed into law the historic act, which
guaranteed an income for the unemployed and retirees. FDR ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1985
Michael Jackson takes control of the
Beatles’ publishing rights

It was during their collaboration on 1983’s “Say Say Say” that
former Beatle Paul McCartney is said to have advised King of
Pop Michael Jackson to invest some of his enormous wealth
in music publishing. It was sound financial advice that McCartney
may have come to regret giving ...
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CRIME
1751
A daughter poisons her father

Francis Blandy falls into a coma and dies in his home outside
London, England. Later that night, Blandy’s daughter Mary
offered one of the family’s servants a large sum of money to
help her get to France immediately. Mary was forced to flee
on her own when he refused, but she was ...
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WORLD WAR I
1917
China declares war on Germany

On August 14, 1917, as World War I enters its fourth year,
China abandons its neutrality and declares war on Germany.
From its inception, the Great War was by no means confined
to the European continent; in the Far East, two rival nations,
Japan and China, sought to find their ...
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Woodstock festival opens in
Bethel, New York







1969
August 15




On August 15, 1969, the Woodstock music festival opens on a patch of farmland in White Lake, a hamlet
in the upstate New York town of Bethel.

Promoters John Roberts, Joel Rosenman, Artie Kornfield and Michael Lang originally envisioned the festival
as a way to raise funds to build a recording studio and rock-and-roll retreat near the town of Woodstock, New York.
The longtime artists’ colony was already a home base for Bob Dylan and other musicians. Despite their
relative inexperience, the young promoters managed to sign a roster of top acts, including the Jefferson Airplane,
the Who, the Grateful Dead, Sly and the Family Stone, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Creedence Clearwater Revival
and many more.

Plans for the festival were on the verge of foundering, however, after both Woodstock and the nearby town
of Wallkill denied permission to hold the event. Dairy farmer Max Yasgur came to the rescue at the last minute,
giving the promoters access to his 600 acres of land in Bethel, some 50 miles from Woodstock.




Early estimates of attendance increased from 50,000 to around 200,000, but by the time the gates opened on
Friday, August 15, more than 400,000 people were clamoring to get in. Those without tickets simply walked
through gaps in the fences, and the organizers were eventually forced to make the event free of charge.
Folk singer and guitarist Richie Havens kicked off the event with a long set, and Joan Baez and Arlo Guthrie also
performed on Friday night.

Though Woodstock had left its promoters nearly bankrupt, their ownership of the film and recording rights more
than compensated for the losses after the release of a hit documentary film in 1970. Later music festivals
inspired by Woodstock’s success failed to live up to its standard, and the festival still stands for many as an
example of America’s 1960s youth counterculture at its best.






ALSO ON THIS DAY



AMERICAN REVOLUTION
1780
“Swamp Fox” routs loyalists
while Gates’ men fall ill

On August 15, 1780, American Lieutenant Colonel
Francis Marion, the “Swamp Fox,” and his irregular
cavalry force of 250 rout a party of Loyalists commanded
by Major Micajah Gainey at Port’s Ferry, South Carolina.
Meanwhile, General Horatio Gates’ men
consumed half-baked bread, ...
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GREAT BRITAIN
1057
King Macbeth is killed by Malcolm Canmore

At the Battle of Lumphanan, King Macbeth of Scotland is
slain by Malcolm Canmore, whose father, King Duncan I,
was murdered by Macbeth 17 years earlier. Macbeth was
a grandson of King Kenneth II and also had a claim to
the throne through his wife, Gruoch, who was the ...
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COLD WAR
1961
Berlin Wall built

Two days after sealing off free passage between East and
West Berlin with barbed wire, East German authorities
begin building a wall—the Berlin Wall—to permanently
close off access to the West. For the next 28 years, the
heavily fortified Berlin Wall stood as the most tangible ...
read more





LANDMARKS
1914
Panama Canal open to traffic

The American-built waterway across the Isthmus of
Panama, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans,
is inaugurated with the passage of the U.S. vessel Ancon,
a cargo and passenger ship. The rush of settlers to
California and Oregon in the mid
19th century was the initial ...
read more





MIDDLE EAST
1947
India and Pakistan win independence

The Indian Independence Bill, which carves the
independent nations of India and Pakistan out of
the former Mogul Empire, comes into force at the
stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947. The
long-awaited agreement ended 200 years of British
rule and was hailed by Indian independence ...
read more





WORLD WAR II
1945
Emperor Hirohito announces Japan’s surrender

Emperor Hirohito broadcasts the news of Japan’s surrender
to the Japanese people on August 15, 1945
(August 14 in the West because of time-zone differences). 
Although Tokyo had already communicated to the Allies its
acceptance of the surrender terms of the Potsdam Conference ...
read more






WORLD WAR I
1914
Japan gives ultimatum to Germany

On August 15, 1914, the government of Japan sends an
ultimatum to Germany, demanding the removal of all
German ships from Japanese and Chinese waters and
the surrender of control of Tsingtao—the location of
Germany’s largest overseas naval bases,
located on China’s Shantung ...
read more


VIETNAM WAR
1968
Heavy fighting erupts in and around the DMZ

Heavy fighting intensifies in and around the DMZ, as
South Vietnamese and U.S. troops engage a
North Vietnamese battalion. In a seven and a half hour
battle, 165 enemy troops were killed. At the same time,
U.S. Marines attacked three strategic positions
just south of the DMZ, ...
read more


ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1979
"Apocalypse Now" released in theaters

Apocalypse Now, the acclaimed Vietnam War film directed
by Francis Ford Coppola, opens in theaters around the
United States on August 15, 1979. The film, inspired in part
by Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novella Heart of Darkness,
among other sources, told the story of an Army captain ...
read more




CRIME
2006
Wife of slain minister released from jail

Mary Winkler, who confessed to fatally shooting her pastor
husband Matthew Winkler in his sleep at their church
parsonage in Selmer, Tennessee, is released from jail
on $750,000 bail. Winkler was later convicted in his killing,
but served only a short time in prison. On March 22, ...
read more





INVENTIONS & SCIENCE
1899
Henry Ford leaves Edison
to start automobile company

On August 15, 1899, in Detroit, Michigan, Henry Ford
resigns his position as chief engineer at the Edison
Illuminating Company’s main plant in order to concentrate
on automobile production. Henry Ford left his family’s
farm in Dearborn, Michigan, at age 16 to work in the machine ...
read more

Gold discovered in the Yukon






1896
August 16



While salmon fishing near the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory on August 16, 1896, George Carmack
reportedly spots nuggets of gold in a creek bed. His lucky discovery sparks the last great gold rush in the
American West.

Hoping to cash in on reported gold strikes in Alaska, Carmack had traveled there from California in 1881.
After running into a dead end, he headed north into the isolated Yukon Territory, just across the Canadian border.
In 1896, another prospector, Robert Henderson, told Carmack of finding gold in a tributary of the Klondike River.
Carmack headed to the region with two Native American companions, known as Skookum Jim and Tagish Charlie.
On August 16, while camping near Rabbit Creek, Carmack reportedly spotted a nugget of gold jutting out from
the creek bank. His two companions later agreed that Skookum Jim–Carmack’s brother-in-law—actually
made the discovery.

Regardless of who spotted the gold first, the three men soon found that the rock near the creek bed was thick
with gold deposits. They staked their claim the following day. News of the gold strike spread fast across Canada
and the United States, and over the next two years, as many as 50,000 would-be miners arrived in the region.
Rabbit Creek was renamed Bonanza, and even more gold was discovered in another Klondike tributary,
dubbed Eldorado.

“Klondike Fever” reached its height in the United States in mid-July 1897 when two steamships arrived from the
Yukon in San Francisco and Seattle, bringing a total of more than two tons of gold. Thousands of eager young men
bought elaborate “Yukon outfits” (kits assembled by clever marketers containing food, clothing, tools and other
necessary equipment) and set out on their way north. Few of these would find what they were looking for, as most
of the land in the region had already been claimed. One of the unsuccessful gold-seekers was 21-year-old Jack London,
whose short stories based on his Klondike experience became his first book, The Son of the Wolf (1900).

For his part, Carmack became rich off his discovery, leaving the Yukon with $1 million worth of gold. Many individual
gold miners in the Klondike eventually sold their stakes to mining companies, who had the resources and machinery
to access more gold. Large-scale gold mining in the Yukon Territory didn’t end until 1966, and by that time the
region had yielded some $250 million in gold. Today, some 200 small gold mines still operate in the region.




ALSO ON THIS DAY





SPORTS
2009
Usain Bolt sets 100-meter dash world record

On August 16, 2009, under the lights of Berlin’s Olympic Stadium
at the World Championships, 22-year-old Usain Bolt strikes a
lightning-bolt pose and grins before taking his mark. Then the
Jamaican, already the fastest man in the world, shatters his own
world record in the ...
read more





SPORTS
1954
"Sports Illustrated" magazine debuts

On August 16, 1954, a new magazine dedicated to covering sports
appears on American newsstands. Announcing itself with a striking
cover photo of Milwaukee Braves third baseman Eddie Mathews,
his swinging bat a blur against the dramatic backdrop of a
crowded Milwaukee County ...
read more





SPORTS
1920
MLB player hit in head by pitch, dies next day

On August 16, 1920, a gloomy day at the Polo Grounds, home of
the New York Yankees, Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray “Chappie” Chapman
steps into the batter's box to lead off the top of the fifth inning.
The first pitch from the Yankees' Carl Mays strikes the
un-helmeted Chapman ...
read more





WAR OF 1812
1812
U.S. surrenders Fort Detroit to the British

During the War of 1812, American General William Hull surrenders
Fort Detroit and his army to the British without a fight. Hull,
a 59-year-old veteran of the American Revolution, had lost hope
of defending the settlement after seeing the large English and
Indian force gathering ...
read more


ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1977
Elvis Presley dies

Music icon Elvis Presley dies in Memphis, Tennessee. He was 42.
The death of the “King of Rock and Roll” brought legions of mourning
fans to Graceland, his mansion in Memphis. Doctors said he died
of a heart attack, likely brought on by his addiction to prescription
barbiturates. ...
read more





SPORTS
1948
Babe Ruth dies

On August 16, 1948, baseball legend George Herman “Babe” Ruth
dies from cancer in New York City. For two days following, his body
lay in state at the main entrance to Yankee Stadium, and tens of
thousands of people stood in line to pay their last respects.
He was buried in ...
read more





CRIME
1984
Los Angeles jury clears John Z. DeLorean
of drug charges

After close to 30 hours of deliberation, a jury of six men and six
women unanimously acquits the former automaker John Z. DeLorean
of eight counts of drug trafficking in Los Angeles, California,
on August 16, 1984. A Detroit native and the son of an autoworker,
DeLorean began ...
read more





WORLD WAR II
1945
Senior U.S. POW is released

On August 16, 1945, Lt. Gen. Jonathan Wainwright,
(captured by the Japanese on the island of Corregidor, in the Philippines),
is freed by Russian forces from a POW camp in Manchuria, China.
When President Franklin Roosevelt transferred Gen.
Douglas MacArthur from his command in ...
read more





VIETNAM WAR
1967
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution is challenged in Senate

On August 16, 1967, President Johnson’s broad interpretation of
the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution is attacked in the Senate Foreign
Relations Subcommittee by the Chairman, Senator William Fulbright
of Arkansas, who feels that Johnson has no mandate to conduct
the war on the present ...
read more


U.S. PRESIDENTS
1841
President Tyler is burned in effigy outside White House

President John Tyler vetoes a second attempt by Congress to
re-establish the Bank of the United States. In response, angry
supporters of the bank gathered outside the White House and
burned an effigy of Tyler. The protestors were comprised primarily
of members of Tyler’s own ...
read more


ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1974
The Ramones play their first public gig
at CBGB in downtown Manhattan

Five years to the day after half a million rain-soaked hippies
grooved and swayed to the psychedelic sounds of the
Grateful Dead at Woodstock, four young men from
Forest Hills, Queens, took to the stage of an East Village
dive bar in jeans, motorcycle jackets and Converse ...
read more





1980S
1987
Plane crashes into highway

A plane crash at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in Michigan
kills 156 people on August 16, 1987. A four-year-old girl
was the sole survivor of the accident, which was caused by
pilot error. Northwest Flight 255 was headed to California
with a stopover in Phoenix when it pulled away ...
read more

Woodstock Music Festival concludes






1969
August 17



On August 17, 1969, one of the all-time grooviest events in music history–the Woodstock Music & Art Fair–draws
to a close after three days of peace, love and rock ‘n’ roll in upstate New York.

Conceived as “Three Days of Peace and Music,” Woodstock was a product of a partnership between John Roberts,
Joel Rosenman, Artie Kornfield and Michael Lang. Their idea was to make enough money from the event to build
a recording studio near the arty New York town of Woodstock. When they couldn’t find an appropriate venue in
the town itself, the promoters decided to hold the festival on a 600-acre dairy farm in Bethel, New York—some
50 miles from Woodstock—owned by Max Yasgur.

By the time the weekend of the festival arrived, the group had sold a total of 186,000 tickets and expected no
more than 200,000 people to show up. By Friday night, however, thousands of eager early arrivals were pushing
against the entrance gates. Fearing they could not control the crowds, the promoters made the decision to open
the concert to everyone, free of charge. Close to half a million people attended Woodstock, jamming the roads
around Bethel with eight miles of traffic.

Soaked by rain and wallowing in the muddy mess of Yasgur’s fields, young fans best described as “hippies”
euphorically took in the performances of acts like Janis Joplin, Arlo Guthrie, Joe Cocker, Joan Baez,
Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Sly and the Family Stone and
Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. The Who performed in the early morning hours of August 17, with Roger Daltrey
belting out “See Me, Feel Me,” from the now-classic album Tommy just as the sun began to rise. The most
memorable moment of the concert for many fans was the closing performance by Jimi Hendrix, who gave a
rambling, rocking solo guitar performance of “The Star Spangled Banner.”

With not enough bathroom facilities and first-aid tents to accommodate such a huge crowd, many described the
atmosphere at the festival as chaotic. There were surprisingly few episodes of violence, though one teenager
was accidentally run over and killed by a tractor and another died from a drug overdose. A number of musicians
performed songs expressing their opposition to the Vietnam War, a sentiment that was enthusiastically shared
by the vast majority of the audience. Later, the term “Woodstock Nation” would be used as a general term to
describe the youth counterculture of the 1960s.

A 25th anniversary celebration of Woodstock took place in 1994 in Saugerties, New York. Known as Woodstock II,
the concert featured Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills and Nash as well as newer acts such as Nine Inch Nails and
Green Day. Held over another rainy, muddy weekend, the event drew an estimated 300,000 people. Another,
less successful Woodstock was held in 1999. A major 50th anniversary festival was planned for 2019,
but never came to fruition.





ALSO ON THIS DAY




SPORTS
1957
Foul balls batter unlucky
Philadelphia Phillies fan

On August 17, 1957, Alice Roth experiences what
surely is one of the worst days any spectator has
had at a Major League Baseball game. After being
struck by a foul ball off the bat of future Hall of Famer
Richie Ashburn, Roth is being treated for a
broken nose when the ...
read more





BLACK HISTORY
1968
The first Miss Black America pageant takes place

At nearly three in the morning, Saundra Williams walked
across a stage with a cream rhinestone cape around her
shoulders, a sash across her torso and a scepter in her hand,
ready to be crowned as pageant royalty. Though it was the
same night as the Miss America pageant, Williams’ ...
read more





EXPLORATION
1978
Balloon crosses the Atlantic

The Double Eagle II completes the first transatlantic balloon
flight when it lands in a barley field near Paris, 137 hours
after lifting off from Presque Isle, Maine. The helium-filled
balloon was piloted by Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and
Larry Newman and flew 3,233 miles in the ...
read more





WORLD WAR II
1943
General George S. Patton wins race to Messina

U.S. General George S. Patton and his 7th Army arrive in
Messina several hours before British Field Marshal Bernard L.
Montgomery and his 8th Army, winning the unofficial
“Race to Messina” and completing the Allied conquest of Sicily.
Born in San Gabriel, California, in 1885, ...
read more





NATIVE AMERICAN HISTORY
1862
Dakota uprising begins in Minnesota

Minnesota erupts in violence as members of the Dakota tribe
attack white settlements along the Minnesota River. The Dakota
were eventually overwhelmed by the U.S. military six weeks
later. The Dakota were more commonly referred to as the Sioux,
They were composed of four bands, ...
read more


HOLOCAUST
1987
Rudolf Hess, Hitler’s last living henchman, dies

Rudolf Hess, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s former deputy, is found
strangled to death in Spandau Prison in Berlin at the age of 93,
apparently the victim of suicide. Hess was the last surviving
member of Hitler’s inner circle and the sole prisoner at Spandau
since 1966. Hess, an ...
read more





U.S. PRESIDENTS
1998
Clinton testifies before grand jury

On August 17, 1998, President Bill Clinton becomes the first
sitting president to testify before the Office of Independent Counsel
as the subject of a grand-jury investigation. The testimony came
after a four-year investigation into
Clinton and his wife Hillary’s alleged ...
read more





WESTWARD EXPANSION
1877
Billy the Kid kills his first man

Though only a teenager at the time, Billy the Kid wounds an
Arizona blacksmith who dies the next day. He was the famous
outlaw’s first victim. Just how many men Billy killed is uncertain.
Billy himself reportedly once claimed he had killed 21
men—“One for every year of my life.” ...
read more


COLD WAR
1962
East Germans kill man trying to cross Berlin Wall

East German guards gun down a young man trying to
escape across the Berlin Wall into West Berlin and leave
him to bleed to death. It was one of the ugliest incidents
to take place at one of the ugliest symbols of the Cold War. ...
read more

Soviet hard-liners launch coup against Gorbachev







1991
August 18



On August 18, 1991, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev is placed under house arrest during a coup by
high-ranking members of his own government, military and police forces.

Since becoming leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1988, Gorbachev had pursued
comprehensive reforms of the Soviet system. Combining perestroika (“restructuring”) of the economy—including
a greater emphasis on free-market policies—and glasnost (“openness”) in diplomacy, he greatly improved
Soviet relations with Western democracies, particularly the United States. Meanwhile, though, within the USSR,
Gorbachev faced powerful critics, including conservative, hard-line politicians and military officials who thought
he was driving the Soviet Union toward its downfall and making it a second-rate power. On the other side were
even more radical reformers–particularly Boris Yeltsin, president of the most powerful socialist republic,
Russia–who complained that Gorbachev was just not working fast enough.

The August 1991 coup was carried out by the hard-line elements within Gorbachev’s own administration, as
well as the heads of the Soviet army and the KGB, or secret police. Detained at his vacation villa in the Crimea,
he was placed under house arrest and pressured to give his resignation, which he refused to do. Claiming Gorbachev
was ill, the coup leaders, headed by former vice president Gennady Yanayev, declared a state of emergency and
attempted to take control of the government.

Yeltsin and his backers from the Russian parliament then stepped in, calling on the Russian people to strike and
protest the coup. When soldiers tried to arrest Yeltsin, they found the way to the parliamentary building blocked
by armed and unarmed civilians. Yeltsin himself climbed aboard a tank and spoke through a megaphone, urging
the troops not to turn against the people and condemning the coup as a “new reign of terror.” The soldiers backed
off, some of them choosing to join the resistance. After thousands took the streets to demonstrate, the coup
collapsed after only three days.

Gorbachev was released and flown to Moscow, but his regime had been dealt a deadly blow. Over the next few
months, he dissolved the Communist Party, granted independence to the Baltic states, and proposed a looser,
more economics-based federation among the remaining republics. In December 1991, Gorbachev resigned.
Yeltsin capitalized on his defeat of the coup, emerging from the rubble of the former Soviet Union as the most
powerful figure in Moscow and the leader of the newly formed Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).





ALSO ON THIS DAY


WOMEN’S HISTORY
1920
19th Amendment ratified
thanks to one vote

A dramatic battle in the Tennessee House of Representatives
ends with the state ratifying the 19th Amendment to the
United States Constitution on August 18, 1920. After decades
of struggle and protest by suffragettes across the country, the
decisive vote is cast by a 24-year-old ...
read more


ANCIENT CHINA
1227
Genghis Khan dies

Genghis Khan, the Mongol leader who forged an empire
stretching from the east coast of China west to the Aral Sea,
dies in camp during a campaign against the Chinese kingdom
of Xi Xia. The great Khan, who was over 60 and in failing health,
may have succumbed to injuries incurred ...
read more


COLONIAL AMERICA
1590
Roanoke Colony deserted

John White, the governor of the Roanoke Island colony in
present-day North Carolina, returns from a supply-trip to
England to find the settlement deserted. White and his men
found no trace of the 100 or so colonists he left behind, and
there was no sign of violence. Among the ...
read more


WORLD WAR II
1941
Hitler suspends euthanasia program

Adolf Hitler orders that the systematic murder of the
mentally ill and handicapped be brought to an end
because of protests within Germany on August 18, 1941. 
In 1939, Dr. Viktor Brack, head of Hitler’s Euthanasia
Department, oversaw the creation of the T.4 program,
which began ...
read more


SPORTS
1992
Boston Celtics forward Larry Bird hangs it up

On August 18, 1992, celebrated Boston Celtics forward
Larry Bird retires. Bird was a high school basketball star
in his native Indiana. After graduation, he received a
scholarship to play for legendary coach Bobby Knight
at Indiana University, one of the finest teams in the ...
read more





U.S. PRESIDENTS
1795
George Washington signs Jay Treaty with Britain

On August 18, 1795, President George Washington signs
the Jay (or “Jay’s”) Treaty with Great Britain. This treaty,
known officially as the “Treaty of Amity Commerce and
Navigation, between His Britannic Majesty; and The
United States of America” attempted to diffuse the tensions ...
read more


ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1958
Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita” is published in the U.S.

Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial novel Lolita is published
in the U.S. on August 18, 1958. The novel, about a man’s
obsession with a 12-year-old girl, had been rejected by
four publishers before G.P. Putnam’s Sons accepted it.
The novel became a bestseller that allowed Nabokov to ...
read more





NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
1931
Yangtze River peaks in China

On August 18, 1931, the Yangtze River in China peaks
during a horrible flood that kills 3.7 million people directly
and indirectly over the next several months. This was
perhaps the worst natural disaster of the 20th century.
The Yangtze River runs through southern China, one ...
read more




CRIME
1988
A Seattle judge involved in a sex scandal
dies by suicide

The Honorable Gary M. Little shoots himself just hours
before the Seattle Post-Intelligencer releases an article
accusing him of abusing his power by sexually exploiting
juvenile defendants who appeared before him. The
front-page article also suggested that he had exploited his ...
read more

The Beatles kick off first U.S. tour
at San Francisco’s Cow Palace







1964
August 19



The Beatles took America by storm during their famous first visit, wowing the millions who watched
them during their historic television appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964. But after
the first great rush of stateside Beatlemania, the Beatles promptly returned to Europe, leaving their
American fans to make do with mere records. By late summer of that same year, however, having
put on an unprecedented and still unmatched display of pop-chart dominance during their absence,
the Beatles finally returned. On August 19, 1964, more than six months after taking the East Coast
by storm, the Fab Four traveled to California to take the stage at the Cow Palace in San Francisco for
opening night of their first-ever concert tour of North America.

Although in retrospect it would seem a laughable underestimation of their drawing power in America,
Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein chose venues like the 17,000-seat Cow Palace for the 1964 tour
expressly because he feared that the Beatles might not sell out large sports stadiums like San Francisco’s
Candlestick Park, where they would play their final official concert in 1966. Suffice it to say that the
Beatles had no difficultly filling the Cow Palace, which was packed with 17,130 screaming fans when
the group bounded to the stage shortly after 9:00 p.m. on this day in 1964 and launched into
“Twist And Shout.”


The Beatles’ set that night and throughout the tour that followed featured only 12 songs,
most often in this order:

”Twist and Shout”

“You Can’t Do That”

“All My Loving”

”She Loves You”

“Things We Said Today”

“Roll Over Beethoven”

“Can’t Buy Me Love”

“If I Fell”

“I Want to Hold Your Hand”

“Boys”

“A Hard Day’s Night”

“Long Tall Sally”

At other stops on the tour, the Beatles’ performances would last approximately 33 minutes, but the
show that night in San Francisco lasted some five minutes longer—not because of any difference in
the Beatles’ performance, but because of police intervention to stem the growing pandemonium.
Within the first few seconds of the first song that night, at least one radio journalist traveling with
the Beatles had been trampled to the ground along with a young female fan who broke a leg in the
melee. And thanks to an offhand comment  by George Harrison about the group’s favorite candy in
the days leading up to the show, the Beatles themselves were pelted with flying jelly beans throughout
that night’s set. Though John, Paul, George and Ringo were uninjured, they left the Cow Palace that
night by ambulance after their limousine was swarmed by berserk fans. It was a scene that would
become familiar to them as they continued on their first historic tour of America in the months ahead.




ALSO ON THIS DAY



EARLY US
1791
Benjamin Banneker writes to Thomas Jefferson,
urging justice for African Americans

On August 19, 1791, the accomplished American
mathematician and astronomer Benjamin Banneker
pens a letter to then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson.
Jefferson corresponds prolifically with luminaries from
around the world, but Banneker is unique among
them: the son of a free ...
read more


CRIME
2011
“West Memphis Three” released from prison
after 18 years

On August 19, 2011, three men, Damien Echols,
Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley, who were
convicted as teenagers in 1994 of the murders of
three boys in Arkansas, are released from prison
in a special legal deal allowing them to maintain their
innocence while acknowledging that ...
read more





U.S. PRESIDENTS
1946
Bill Clinton is born

On August 19, 1946, William Jefferson Blythe III is born
in Hope, Arkansas. His father died in a car accident before
he was born, and young Bill later took the last name of
his stepfather, Roger Clinton. In 1992, Bill Clinton would
be elected as the 42nd president of the United ...
read more


WAR OF 1812
1812
Old Ironsides earns its name

During the War of 1812, the U.S. Navy frigate Constitution
defeats the British frigate Guerrière in a furious engagement
off the coast of Nova Scotia. Witnesses claimed that the
British shot merely bounced off the Constitution‘s sides,
as if the ship were made of iron rather than ...
read more


COLD WAR
1960
Captured U.S. spy pilot sentenced in Russia

In the USSR, captured American U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers
is sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for his confessed
espionage. On May 1, 1960, Powers took off from Pakistan
at the controls of an ultra-sophisticated Lockheed U-2 high-altitude
reconnaissance aircraft. A ...
read more





SPORTS
1909
First race is held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway

On August 19, 1909, the first race is held at the Indianapolis
Motor Speedway, now the home of the world’s most famous
motor racing competition, the Indianapolis 500. Built on 328
acres of farmland five miles northwest of Indianapolis, Indiana,
the speedway was started by local ...
read more


WORLD WAR I
1919
President Wilson appears before the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee

On August 19, 1919, in a break with conventional practice, U.S.
President Woodrow Wilson appears personally before the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee to argue in favor of its
ratification of the Versailles Treaty, the peace settlement that
ended the First World War. The ...
read more


WESTWARD EXPANSION
1895
John Wesley Hardin killed in Texas

John Wesley Hardin, one of the bloodiest killers of the Old West,
is murdered by an off-duty policeman in a saloon in El Paso,
Texas. Born in central Texas on May 26, 1853, Hardin killed
his first man when he was only 15 during the violent period
of post-Civil War Reconstruction. ...
read more





ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1993
Kim Basinger and Alec Baldwin marry

The actors Kim Basinger and Alec Baldwin marry
in East Hampton, New York on August 19, 1993.
The Hollywood power couple reportedly became
involved on the set of the romantic comedy
The Marrying Man (1991), in which they played lovers.
The film was a box-office flop, as was a ...
read more





CRIME
1991
A Jewish youth is killed by a mob

Yankel Rosenbaum, a visiting student from Australia,
is stabbed to death by a mob in the Crown Heights
section of Brooklyn, New York. The crowd, consisting
of young Black men, had been intent on seeking revenge
for the death of seven-year-old Gavin Cato,
who had been struck by a ...
read more





COLD WAR
1953
CIA-assisted coup overthrows government of Iran

The Iranian military, with the support and financial assistance
of the United States government, overthrows the government
of Premier Mohammad Mosaddeq and reinstates the Shah of Iran.
Iran remained a solid Cold War ally of the United States until
a revolution ended the Shah’s ...
read more





WORLD WAR II
1934
Adolf Hitler becomes president of Germany

On August 19, 1934, Adolf Hitler, already chancellor, is also
elected president of Germany in an unprecedented
consolidation of power in the short history of the republic.
In 1932, German President Paul von Hindenburg, old, tired,
and a bit senile, had won re-election as ...
read more

U.S. Marines deployed to Lebanon







1982
August 20



During the Lebanese Civil War, a multinational force including 800 U.S. Marines lands in Beirut
to oversee the Palestinian withdrawal from Lebanon. It was the beginning of a problem-plagued
mission that would stretch into 17 months and leave 262 U.S. servicemen dead.

In 1975, a bloody civil war erupted in Lebanon, with Palestinian and leftist Muslim guerrillas battling
militias of the Christian Phalange Party, the Maronite Christian community, and other groups.
During the next few years, Syrian, Israeli, and United Nations interventions failed to resolve the
factional fighting, and in August 1982 a multinational force arrived to oversee the Palestinian
withdrawal from Lebanon.

The Marines left Lebanese territory on September 10 but returned on September 29 following the
massacre of Palestinian refugees by a Christian militia. The next day, the first U.S. Marine to die
during the mission was killed while defusing a bomb. On April 18, 1983, the U.S. embassy in Beirut
was devastated by a car bomb, killing 63 people, including 17 Americans. Then, on October 23,
Lebanese terrorists evaded security measures and drove a truck packed with explosives into the
U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241 U.S. military personnel. Fifty-eight French soldiers were
killed almost simultaneously in a separate suicide terrorist attack. On February 7, 1984, President
Ronald Reagan announced the end of U.S. participation in the peacekeeping force.




ALSO ON THIS DAY



SPORTS
1945
17-year-old becomes youngest
to hit MLB home run

On August 20, 1945, 11 days after the atomic
bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, Brooklyn Dodgers
utility player Tommy Brown homers to drive in
his team's only run in an 11-1 loss to the Pittsburgh
Pirates. It seems insignificant, aside from the fact
that, at 17 years old, Brown remains ...
read more





Slavery in Jamestown
SLAVERY
1619
First enslaved Africans arrive in Jamestown,
setting the stage for slavery in North America

On August 20, 1619, “20 and odd” Angolans, kidnapped
by the Portuguese, arrive in the British colony of Virginia
and are then bought by English colonists. The arrival of
the enslaved Africans in the New World marks a
beginning of two and a half centuries of slavery in North ...
read more


MEXICO
1940
Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky
assassinated in Mexico

Exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky is fatally
wounded by an ice-ax-wielding assassin at his compound
outside Mexico City. The killer—Ramón Mercader—was
a Spanish communist and probable agent of Soviet
leader Joseph Stalin. Trotsky died from his wounds
the next day. Born in ...
read more





SPACE EXPLORATION
1975
Viking 1 launched to Mars

Viking 1, an unmanned U.S. planetary probe, is
launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on a mission
to Mars. On June 19, 1976, the spacecraft entered
into orbit around Mars and devoted the next month
to imaging the Martian surface with the purpose of
finding an appropriate landing ...
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COLD WAR
1968
Soviets invade Czechoslovakia

On the night of August 20, 1968, approximately
200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 5,000 tanks invade
Czechoslovakia to crush the “Prague Spring”—a brief
period of liberalization in the communist country.
Czechoslovakians protested the invasion with public
demonstrations and other ...
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INVENTIONS & SCIENCE
1911
First around-the-world telegram sent,
66 years before Voyager II launch

On August 20, 1911, a dispatcher in the New York
Times office sends the first telegram around the
world via commercial service. Exactly 66 years later,
the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
(NASA) sends a different kind of message–a
phonograph record containing ...
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VIETNAM WAR
1954
United States decides to support
Ngo Dinh Diem

President Eisenhower approves a National Security
Council paper titled “Review of U.S. Policy in the
Far East.” This paper supported Secretary of State Dulles’
view that the United States should support Vietnamese
prime minister Ngo Dinh Diem, while encouraging
him to broaden ...
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SPORTS
1920
Professional football is born

On August 20, 1920, seven men, including legendary
all-around athlete and football star Jim Thorpe, meet
to organize a professional football league at the Jordan
and Hupmobile Auto Showroom in Canton, Ohio.
The meeting led to the creation of the
American Professional Football ...
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U.S. PRESIDENTS
1833
Benjamin Harrison is born

Future President Benjamin Harrison is born in
North Bend, Ohio on August 20, 1833. Politics
had long been the Harrison family business. At
the time of his birth, Harrison’s father was
serving Ohio in the United States House of
Representatives, while his grandfather,
William Henry ...
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WESTWARD EXPANSION
1804
Corps of Discovery suffers its only death

Sergeant Charles Floyd dies three months into
the voyage of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark,
becoming the only member of the Corps of
Discovery to die during the journey. Lewis and
Clark left St. Louis the previous May, heading
up the Missouri River with a party of 35 men, ...
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ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1918
“Valley of the Dolls” author Jacqueline Susann born

On August 20, 1918, Jacqueline Susann, the author
of Valley of the Dolls, the 1966 mega-hit novel
about the showbiz lives of three women
(reportedly modeled in part after Judy Garland,
Marilyn Monroe and Grace Kelly), is born in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Like her characters in ...
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CRIME
1989
The Menendez brothers murder their parents

Lyle and Erik Menendez shoot their parents,
Jose and Kitty, to death in the den of the family’s
Beverly Hills, California, home. They then drove up
to Mulholland Drive, where they dumped their
shotguns before continuing to a local movie theater
to buy tickets as an alibi. When ...
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CIVIL WAR
1862
Horace Greeley’s
“The Prayer of Twenty Millions” is published

New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley publishes
a passionate editorial calling on President Abraham
Lincoln to declare emancipation for all enslaved
people in Union-held territory. Greeley’s blistering
words voiced the impatience of many Northern
abolitionists; but unbeknownst ...
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UNITED STATES
1794
Battle of Fallen Timbers

On August 20, 1794, General “Mad Anthony” Wayne
proves that the fragile young republic can counter
a military threat when he puts down Shawnee
Chief Blue Jacket’s confederacy near present-day
Toledo, Ohio, with the newly created 3,000-man
strong Legion of the United States at the ...
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