Today
in History ~ May 17
Norwegian Independence Day
Events
0352 - Liberius begins his reign as Catholic Pope replacing Julius I
0884 - St Adrian III begins his reign as Catholic Pope
1525 - Battle at Zabern: duke of Lutherans beats rebels
1536 - Anne Boleyn's 4 "lovers" executed
1544 - Scot earl Matthew van Lennox signs secret treaty with Henry VIII
1620 - 1st merry-go-round seen at a fair (Philippapolis, Turkey)
1630 - Italian Jesuit Niccolo Zucchi, 1st to see 2 belts on Jupiter surface
1631 - Earl Johann Tilly attacks Maagdenburg
1672 - Frontenac becomes governor of New France (Canada)
1673 - Louis Joliet & Jacques Marquette begin exploring Mississippi
1733 - England passes Molasses Act, putting high tariffs on rum & molasses imported to the colonies from a country other than British possessions
1742 - Frederick great (Emperor of Prussia) beats Austrians
1756 - Britain declares war on France (7 Years' or French & Indian War)
1792 - 24 brokers meet to found the New York Stock Exchange
1792 - 24 merchants form NY Stock Exchange at 70 Wall Street. These brokers sat down to fix rates on commissions on stocks and bonds. In those days when weather was poor the brokers met in a coffee house and when the day was sunny, the brokers sat under a buttonwood tree on Wall Street to conduct their business.
1803 - John Hawkins & Richard French patent the Reaping Machine
1804 - Lewis & Clark begin exploration of Louisiana Purchase
1809 - Papal States annexed by France
1845 - Rubber band patents
1864 - Battle of Adairsville Georgia, Union forces Confederates to retreat
1871 - Indian fighter Gen Sherman escapes in ambulance vs Comanches
1875 - The first running of the Kentucky Derby took place at Churchill Downs in
Louisville, Ky. The winner was "Aristides."
1876 - 7th US Cavalry under Custer leaves Ft Lincoln
1881 - Frederick Douglass appointed recorder of deeds for Wash DC
1883 - Buffalo Bill Cody's 1st wild west show premieres in Omaha
1884 - Alaska becomes a US territory
1885 - Geronimo flees Arizona reservation [H]
1904 - Maurice Ravel's "Scheherarazade," premieres in Paris
1909 - White firemen on Georgia RR strike to protest hiring blacks
1915 - National Baptist Convention chartered
1921 - President Harding opens (via telephone) 1st Valencia Orange Show
1926 - Chiang Kai-shek is made supreme war lord and "generalissimo" in Canton
1938 - Congress approves Vinson Naval Act, which funds a two-ocean navy
1939 - Britain's King George VI and Queen Elizabeth arrived in Quebec on the
first visit to Canada by reigning British sovereigns.
1940 - Germany occupies Brussels, Belgium & begins invasion of France
1940 - Nazi's bombs Middelburg/B IJzerdrat begins illegal defiance
1942 - Dutch SS vows loyalty to Hitler
1943 - The Memphis Belle, one of a group of American bombers based in Britain, becomes the first B-17 to complete 25 missions over Europe.
1944 - General Eisenhower sets D-Day for June 5th
1946 - President Truman seized control of the
nation's railroads, delaying a threatened strike by engineers and trainmen.
1948 - Soviet Union recognized Israel
1949 - British government recognizes Republic of Ireland
1954 - In a major civil rights victory, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down an unanimous decision in Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka that ruled that racial segregation in public educational facilities was unconstitutional.
Reversed 1896 "separate but equal" Plessy Vs Ferguson decision [H]
1961 - Castro offers to exchange Bay of Pigs prisoners for 500 bulldozers
1970 - Thor Heyerdahl on The Ra II set sail for Morocco
1971 - Stephen Schwartz' musical "Godspell," premieres off-Broadway
1973 - Senate Watergate Committee begins its hearings
1974 - Los Angeles Police Attack Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) Headquarters [H]
1975 - NBC paid $5M for rights to show "Gone with the Wind" one time
1977 - Menahem Begin's Likud-party wins election in Israel
1980 - Major race riot erupted in Miami's Liberty City after an all-white jury
in Tampa acquitted four former Miami police officers of fatally beating black
insurance executive Arthur McDuffie. - 16 killed, 300 injured
1987 - 37 American sailors were killed when an Iraqi warplane attacked the
U.S. Navy frigate USS Stark in the Persian Gulf. with Exocet missiles (Iraq and
the United States called the attack a mistake. The ship's top officers were
reprimanded and retired.)
1989 - Longest Cab Ride Ever: 14,000 miles cost $16,000!
1989 - 1 million people demonstrated for democratic reforms in Beijing. The
number of students fasting reached 3,000.
1990 - Joseph Fama, 19, accused in New York's Bensonhurst racial slaying, was
convicted of murder for taking part in an attack by a mob of bat-wielding whites
that left a black teenager dead. The next day, accused ringleader Keith Mondello,
19, was cleared of murder and manslaughter but convicted of lesser charges.
1990 - European court rules pension rights for both men & women
1991 - The Commerce Department announced that the U.S. trade deficit had fallen
to $4.05 billion in March, the
lowest in eight years.
1992 - Pro-democracy protests began in Thailand; in four days of clashes with
troops, 44 people reportedly were killed, although activists charged that
hundreds died.
1993 - Intel's new Pentium processor is unveiled
1994 - Al Unser Sr. announced his retirement from auto racing, ending one of the greatest Indy Car careers of all time.
1994 - The U.N. Security Council approved sending troops to secure the airport
in the civil war-torn African nation
of Rwanda.
1994 - A 30-year dictatorship in Malawi ended with the election of a new
president in the African nation.
1995 - A preliminary report by the Senate Select Committee on Ethics found
"substantial credible evidence" that Sen.
Bob Packwood, R-Oregon, made unwanted sexual advances toward a number of women.
1995 - Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, acknowledged he had invested $7500 in 1974 in
what he'd been told was going to
be an R-rated movie spoof of beauty contests. The film was never made.
1996 - President Clinton signed a measure requiring
neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in. (Megan's Law, as it's
known, is named for Megan Kanka, a 7-year-old New Jersey girl who was raped and
slain in 1994.)
1997 - Rebel leader Laurent Kabila declared himself president of the Democratic
Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire.
1997 - Russia's Mir space station got a new oxygen generator and a fresh
American astronaut, courtesy of the space shuttle Atlantis.
1997 - "Silver Charm" won the Preakness, two weeks after winning the
Kentucky Derby. (However, Silver Charm failed to win the Belmont Stakes.)
1999 - Israel's hawkish prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, lost his bid for
re-election as Israeli voters elected Ehud Barak, head of the center-left Israel One coalition, as their new prime
minister.
2000 - Prosecutors in Birmingham, Ala., charged two longtime suspects in the
deaths of four little girls in a church bombing
in 1963 that became a watershed event in the civil rights movement.
2001 - President Bush unveiled his energy plan, bracing Americans for a summer
of blackouts, layoffs, business closings and skyrocketing fuel costs and warning
of "a darker future" without his aggressive plans to drill for more
oil and gas and rejuvenate nuclear power.
Birthdays
Today
1444 - Sandro Botticelli, Italian painter (Birth of Venus)
1749 - Edward Jenner, England, physician, discovered vaccination for smallpox
1836 - Joseph Norman Lockyer, discoverer (Helium)/founder (Nature magazine)
1866 - Erik Satie, composer
1900 - Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran's ayatollah (1979-89)
1911 - Maureen O'Sullivan (actress: Tarzan films: Jane; Hannah and Her Sisters, Peggy Sue Got Married, The River Pirates)
1912 - Archibald Cox, special prosecutor (Watergate)
1914 - Stewart Alsop (journalist)
1915 - Carl Liscombe (hockey)
1918 - Birgit Nilsson, Karup Sweden, operatic soprano (Isolde, Turandot, Elektra, Salome)
1921 - Bob Merrill (song writer: If I Knew You Were Comin' I'd've Baked a Cake, Doggie in the Window, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Funny Girl w/ Jules Styne)
1924 - Dick Hixson (trombonist)
1932 - Jackie (John) McLean (jazz musician: alto sax; composer, playwright; educator: University of Hartford, CT)
1933 - Ozzie Virgil (baseball)
1934 - Earl Morrall (football: backup QB: San Francisco '49ers; Pittsburgh Steelers; Detroit Lions; NY Giants; Baltimore Colts: NFL Player of the Year [1968], Super Bowls III, V; Miami Dolphins: AFC Player of the Year [1971], Super Bowls VII, VIII)
1936 - Dennis Hopper (actor: Easy Rider, Apocalypse Now, Rebel without a Cause, Giant, Hoosiers, Flashback, Blue Velvet, Super Mario Brothers, True Romance, Speed, Waterworld; director: Chasers)
1940 - Taj Mahal (Henry St. Claire Fredericks) (entertainer, songwriter: for film, Sounder; singer: urban folk-blues)
1945 - Tony Roche (tennis: French Open Champion [1966])
1948 - Carlos May (baseball)
1948 - Pat Toomay (football: Dallas Cowboys defensive end: Super Bowl V, VI)
1949 - Bill Bruford (drummer: group: Yes: Owner of a Lonely Heart)
1955 - Bill Paxton (actor: True Lies, Aliens, Apollo 13, Future Shock, The Terminator)
1956 - Bob Saget (actor: Full House; TV host: America's Funniest Home Videos)
1956 - Sugar Ray Leonard (boxer: Olympic gold medalist: Junior Welterweight [1976]; World Welterweight [1979] and World Junior Middleweight Champion [1981], WBC Heavyweight and Super Middleweight [1988])
Famous
deaths
1727 - Catherine I, Empress of Russia (1725-27), dies
1838 - Charles-Maurice duke of Talleyrand-Perigord, French bishop/revolutionary, dies at 84
1864 - Nathaniel Hawthorne, writer, dies at 59
1883 - Lydia Estes Pinkham, patent-medicine manufacturer, dies
1981 - Jeannette Ridlon Piccard, 1st US woman free balloon pilot, dies
1987 - Gunnar Myrdal, Sweden, economist (Nobel 1974), dies at 88
1989 - Robert Webber, actor (Nuts, SOB, Assassin, 10), dies at 74
1992 - Lawrence Welk, conductor/accordionist (Lawrence Welk Show), died in Santa
Monica, Calif., at age 89.
If
you have other Birthdays or events to add for this day please
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