Today in history On Dec. 17, 1777, Gen. George Washingtons army returned to Valley Forge, Pa. In 1791, the first one-way street in the US was established in New York City. In 1819, the Congress of Angostura established Columbias independence from Spain. In 1843, Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol was first published. In 1852, the 1st Hawaiian Calvary was organized. In 1862, US Gen. Ulysses S. Grant issued Order #11, ordering the expulsion of Jews from Tennessee. In 1900, a first prize of 100,000 French francs was offered for evidence of communications with extraterrestrials, but Martians were excluded because that was considered too easy. In 1903, Orville Wright took an airplane for a 12-second flight - in the first successful piloted, powered flight in history. In 1914, Turkish forces expelled the Jews from Tel Aviv. In 1925, US Col. William Billy Mitchell was court-martialed for insubordination. In 1935, the first flight of the Douglas DC-3 was made. In 1939, the German pocket battleship Graf Spee was scuttled by its crew off the coast of Uruguay. In 1941, German troops under the command of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel began retreating from North Africa, In 1944, the US Army announced the end of the exclusion of Japanese Americans form the West Coast, and all such detainees were released. In 1955, Carl Perkins wrote Blue Suede Shoes, and less than 48 hours later, he recorded it at Sun Studios, in Memphis, Tenn. In 1957, the last episode of The Nat King Cole Show was aired on NBC. In 1959, On the Beach became the first US film to be shown on both sides of the Iron Curtain. In 1969, the US Air Force closed Project Blue Book, concluding that there was no evidence behind thousands of UFO sightings. In 1971, the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever premiered in the US. In 1976, WTCG-TV, in Atlanta, Ga., became WTBS, the first satellite television station to cover the entire United States. In 1977, Elvis Costello and The Attractions appeared on television for the first time, on Saturday Night Live. In 1988, USS Tennessee, the first American submarine to carry Trident 2 missiles, was commissioned. In 1989, The Simpsons premiered on Fox. In 1991, the Cleveland Cavs beat the Miami Heat by 68 points - the largest-ever margin of victory in an NBA game. In 2003, SpaceShipOne made its first super-sonic flight. And in 2013, Cat Stevens, Hall & Oates, KISS, Linda Ronstadt and Nirvana were elected to the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame.
Posted on: Wed, 17 Dec 2014 14:53:27 +0000
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