TIME TRAVELING, October 9: 1781 The last major battle of the American Revolutionary War takes place when American troops led by George Washington defeat British forces under the command of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, Va. 1855 American inventor Isaac Singer patents his sewing machine. He begins mass production of the machines at I.M. Singer & Co. one year later, becoming the first to put home sewing machines on the market. 1858 Mail service by stagecoach begins between San Francisco, Calif., and St. Louis, Mo. 1872 Aaron Montgomery launches a mail order business that later becomes Montgomery Wards. 1888 The public is admitted to the Washington Monument for the first time. 1919 The Cincinnati Reds win the World Series. The victory is later tainted when eight Chicago White Sox are charged with throwing the Series for money in an incident that became known as the “Black Sox” scandal. 1930 Aviator Laura Houghtaling Ingalls completes the first transcontinental round-trip flight across the United States by a woman. She travels from New York to California in 30:25 and returns to New York in 25:20. 1936 Boulder Dam, later named Hoover Dam, begins transmitting electricity to Los Angeles, Calif. 1940 St. Paul’s Cathedral in London is bombed by the German Luftwaffe during a heavy nighttime air raid but survives the Blitz largely intact. 1944 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin begin a nine-day conference in Moscow during which they discuss the war with Germany and the future of Europe. 1967 Guerilla leader Che Guevara, 39, is executed by Bolivian soldiers for attempting to incite a revolution in Bolivia. His remains, buried in an unmarked grave, are recovered in 1997 and returned to Cuba, where they are reburied in a ceremony attended by Fidel Castro and thousands of Cubans. 1969 The National Guard is called in to break up demonstrations protesting the trial of the “Chicago Eight,” who were arrested during the 1968 Democratic National Convention for conspiracy to cross state lines with intent to cause a riot. Defendants are David Dellinger, Rennie Davis, Thomas Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Lee Weiner, John Froines, and Bobby Seale. 1974 Oskar Schindler, who is credited with saving the lives of about 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust, dies in Frankfurt, Germany, at the age of 66. 1975 Soviet scientist Andrei Dmitriyevich Sakharov, known as the “father of the hydrogen bomb,” is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his struggle against “the abuse of power and violations of human dignity in all its forms.” The Soviet government forbids him to travel to Oslo, Norway, to accept the award. 1985 Strawberry Fields, a “garden of peace,” opens in New York’s Central Park as a tribute to assassinated musician and former Beatle John Lennon, the tribute made possible thanks to a $1 million donation by Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono. 1994 In response to Saddam Hussein sending thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks toward the Kuwaiti border, President Bill Clinton sends 36,000 troops to the Persian Gulf. 2000 Brett Hull of the Dallas Stars scores his 611th National Hockey League goal, putting him ahead of his father, Bobby Hull, on the all-time scoring list at number 9. 2002 Aileen Wuornos, convicted of killing six men on Florida’s highways, is executed by lethal injection in a Florida prison. 2009 U.S. President Barack Obama is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”
Posted on: Wed, 09 Oct 2013 05:13:55 +0000
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