Today in History

[goofywife]

That house is beautiful.

Originally Posted by katcarasella

When I first got married I lived 4 blocks from this house in Oak Park. (15 min. away now.)

Attachment 2842
This extraordinary building in Oak Park, Illinois was the Wright family residence from 1889 to 1909. Wright began the construction of this house in 1889 shortly after his marriage to Catherine Tobin, using $5,000 borrowed from Louis Sullivan. The Wright family - Frank and Catherine, and their six children - lived here while he developed his architectural practice, creating what became the "Prairie Style" of architecture.

[DianaB]

It's called Price Tower. It's suppose to be the only skyscraper that he built. Here's some pictures--

http://www.merryweatherphoto.com/web/price.html#

http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/o...ice/price.html

[goofywife]

1970: Apollo 13 blasts off

NASA today launched Apollo 13, America's third manned moon-landing mission, from Cape Kennedy, Florida. NASA officials had almost postponed the mission when crew member Thomas Mattingly was exposed to the German measles. Instead, Mattingly was replaced less than 24 hours before lift-off by backup astronaut John Swigert, Jr.

"The target for man's third lunar mission is the mountainous Fra Mauro region where the astronauts hope to find rocks dating perhaps five billion years to the beginning of the moon. In the most difficult space maneuver ever attempted, [James] Lovell and [Fred] Haise are to steer their lunar lander toward a precision touchdown in a narrow valley surrounded by high hills, ridges, craters and rocks as big as automobiles," reported The News on April 12, 1970.

NOTE: Two days after the launch, an oxygen tank on the spacecraft exploded, forcing the astronauts to abandon their mission. Although they had only a small supply of oxygen, water and power, the Apollo 13 crew managed to safely return to Earth in the spaceship's lunar module.

1968: Johnson signs Civil Rights Act

President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968 today, which prohibited housing discrimination and provided protection for civil rights workers. "President Johnson, voicing outrage at the slaying of Dr. Martin Luther King and the violence that followed it, has signed an historic open-housing bill," informed The Daily Times-News on April 12, 1968. "The new law will prohibit discrimination in 80 per cent of all housing sales and rentals by 1970, but much of it takes effect next Jan. 1. The law also makes it a federal crime to use threats or violence to interfere with anyone seeking to exercise his civil rights and prohibits the crossing of state lines with intent to incite rioting."

1961: Nazi war crime trial begins

Adolf Eichmann, a high-ranking Nazi accused of playing a central role in the Holocaust, went on trial in an Israeli courthouse today. "After 16 years in hiding and in jail, Eichmann walked into public view when he entered the bullet proof glass defendant's box in the court room at 8:58 a.m.," reported the Middlesboro Daily News on April 11, 1961. "Except for a moment of apparent nervousness as he first looked about the court room through heavy horn-rimmed glasses, the accused mass murderer was still very much the Nazi colonel." NOTE: Eichmann was later convicted on all charges and was hanged in a prison near Tel Aviv.

1947: Dodgers sign Jackie Robinson

Jackie Robinson made history today when the president of the Brooklyn Dodgers, Branch Rickey, announced the purchase of his contract from the Montreal Royals. The purchase made Robinson the first African American to play baseball in the major leagues, breaking baseball's color barrier. "He is confident he can make good in the majors, thus opening the door for others of his race to compete on equal footing as they do in boxing, college and professional football, college and professional basketball and as jockeys," explained The Fresno Bee on April 11, 1947. NOTE: Robinson went on to appear in six World Series with the Dodgers and was named Rookie of the Year in 1947.

1945: U.S. forces liberate Buchenwald

United States forces liberated a concentration camp in Buchenwald, Germany today. "Twenty thousand inmates of one of the most dreaded of German concentration camps were free today after its capture by Berlin-bound American troops unfolded a story of horror dating from the inception of the Nazi regime in 1933," reported The Lowell Sun on April 14, 1945. "In those years approximately 200,000 persons doomed to sadistic death or a living hell passed through the gates of the electrically-charged barbed-wire enclosure as infamous as the camps at Dachau and Oranienburg."

1899: Treaty ends Spanish-American war

"The final ceremony in the re-establishment of peaceful relations between the United States and Spain took place at the White House at 2 o'clock this afternoon, when the president and Ambassador Cambon, the latter acting for Spain, exchanged ratifications of the treaty of peace," informed The News on April 11, 1899. NOTE: The treaty marked the formal end to the Spanish-American war, and in conjunction with the peace agreement, Spain ceded several of its colonies to the United States, including the island of Puerto Rico.

[katcarasella]

1970: Apollo 13 blasts off

I remember watching this while I was holding Jenny, she was only 2 weeks old.
Good Grief I really feel old now.

[goofywife]

1961: Russia sends man into space

The Soviet Union successfully launched the first man into space today. Yuri Gagarin, a 27-year-old air force major, endured intense physical and psychological examinations before making the historic trip.

"By the Soviet account, Maj. Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin rode a five-ton spaceship once around the earth in an orbit taking an hour and 20 minutes. He was in the air a total of an hour and 48 minutes," reported The Appleton Post Crescent on April 13, 1961. According to the article, Soviet Premier Khrushchev sent "a message of congratulations telling Gagarin the 'entire Soviet people acclaim your valiant feat which will be remembered down the centuries as an example of courage, gallantry and heroism in the name of service to mankind.'"

While U.S. President Kennedy congratulated the Soviets on "a most impressive scientific accomplishment," he told Americans that he hoped the U.S. would achieve other scientific firsts, because "the Soviet Union will remain ahead of the United States for some time in the space race," according to the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune.

2002: Hugo Chavez forced out of office

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was forced out of office today by a military coup. "The development stunned a nation that had seen one of the biggest civilian demonstrations against the 47-year-old Chavez's three-year rule. It came only three days after Chavez, a fiery populist and former army paratrooper who had led a failed 1992 coup, had vowed to crush a general strike organized by Venezuela's largest business and labor groups," reported the Sentinel & Enterprise on April 12, 2002. NOTE: Chavez resumed the presidency the following day after thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets in protest.

1981: First space shuttle is launched

The United States launched its first space shuttle mission today, exactly 20 years after Yuri Gagarin became the first human to travel into space. "Launched into a clear, still morning, the trim, milk-white space plane lifted from the launch pad on the largest solid rocket engines ever flown, nearly 6-million pounds of thrust beginning the 54-hour journey," informed the Winnipeg Free Press on April 13, 1981. "Shaking the earth and rapidly gathering speed, Columbia climbed straight up, leaving behind a white vapor trail as it climbed to an altitude of 50 kilometres and separated from its expended boosters."

1955: Polio vaccine cleared for use

The University of Michigan School of Public Health declared that the polio vaccine created by Dr. Jonas Salk was safe and effective today. "The mother with a dozen children or the mother with one, could not ask for a better gift today or any other day than a cure against polio. And that cure came today in the form of a long awaited announcement from the University of Michigan, that the Salk vaccine has been proven 80 to 90 percent effective in combating poliomyelitis," explained The Daily Intelligencer on April 12, 1955.

1945: President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies

After serving as U.S. president for 12 years, Franklin D. Roosevelt died today from a massive cerebral hemorrhage at his retreat in Warm Springs, Georgia. Roosevelt's death catapulted Vice President Harry S. Truman to the highest office in the land. "Around the world, the humble and the great paid mournful tribute today to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in words of praise and sorrow," The Evening Tribune reported on April 13, 1945. "The flags of virtually all nations flew at half mast. Many governments decreed a period of mourning. Expressions of sympathy streamed into the White House from world capitals."

1864: Hundreds die in Fort Pillow massacre

Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest captured the Union stronghold at Fort Pillow today. During the attack, Forrest and his men killed many of the Union's African-American defenders. Forrest claimed the soldiers were trying to escape; however, Union sources countered this claim, arguing the soldiers had surrendered and were massacred by Confederate troops. On April 18, 1864, The New York Times reported, "According to Gen. Sherman, loss was fifty-three white troops killed, and one hundred wounded, and three hundred black troops murdered in cold blood after the surrender."

[katcarasella]

I remember the nuns having us line up in the hallway for those first polio shots.
(St. Mels-Holy Ghost Catholic school, I haven't seen that name for decades.)
Michelle, you're bringing back such fond memories,

[Janet]

Originally Posted by katcarasella

I remember the nuns having us line up in the hallway for those first polio shots.
(St. Mels-Holy Ghost Catholic school, I haven't seen that name for decades.)
Michelle, you're bringing back such fond memories,

Isn't she the sweetest for doing this everyday? I am enjoying it so much...thanks Michelle.

[goofywife]

1910: Mark Twain dies
Writer and humorist Mark Twain, born Samuel Clemens, died today after a brief illness at the age of 74. In 1909, he predicted his death, noting, "I came in with Halley's Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it."

"Samuel Langhorne Clemens was considered the best-known American man of letters. Often he was referred to as the 'Dean of American Literature.' He was known far beyond the boundaries where English is spoken as the greatest humorist, using that tongue, if not actually the greatest humorist and satirist living. His famous telegram to a newspaper publishing a report of his death, when it happily was untrue, has been quoted and requoted everywhere. 'The report of my death,' he wired. 'Is greatly exaggerated,'" reported The Washington Post on April 22, 1910.

NOTE: Mark Twain wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn along with many, many other novels, stories, and articles. Nobel Prize winning author William Faulkner once noted that Twain was "the first truly American writer, and all of us since are his heirs." Twain continues to be widely read and well-loved today.


1986: Al Capone's vault is opened
Geraldo Rivera, host of the two-hour special The Mystery of Al Capone's Vault, witnessed the opening of Al Capone's legendary vault today, only to find a few old bottles and dust. The vault, located under the Lexington Hotel in Chicago, was predicted to hold whiskey, money and the bones of his enemies. "The discovery came before a worldwide TV audience and special agent Dennis Sansone of the Internal Revenue Service, which didn't want to miss a shot at collecting its due from one of the nation's most notorious tax evaders," informed The Capital on April 22, 1986.

1966: Grounation Day“His Imperial Majesty, Haile Selassie I, Emperor of Ethiopia, King of Kings, Conquering Lion of Judah, arrived in Jamaica yesterday afternoon to a welcome of superlatives,” reported The Gleaner on April 22, 1966. “And he wept.” Selassie I was heralded as the second coming of Jesus by the Rastafarian faith, a claim that he never endorsed but also never discouraged. This arrival became the second-most important Rastafarian holy day after the Emperor’s coronation day. NOTE: During the visit, Emperor Selassie I told elder Rastafarian leaders that they should not emigrate to Ethiopia until they had liberated the people of Jamaica, a doctrine that became known as “liberation before repatriation.”

1930: Ohio prison fire kills more than 300
More than 300 prisoners died at the Ohio State Penitentiary in Columbus after a fire broke out today. "The blaze was believed set by a band of vengeful lifers who supposedly conceived the fire as a means of inciting a mutiny that would deliver the prison into their hands," explained The Chronicle Telegram on April 22, 1930.


1912: Giants, Yankees raise money for Titanic survivors
The New York Giants and the Yankees played an exhibition game to benefit the survivors of the Titanic today. On April 22, 1912, the Trenton Evening Times reported, "At the baseball game between the Giants and the Yankees at the Polo Grounds yesterday for the benefit of the Titanic survivors the attendance was 14,083 and the receipts $9,425.25."

[katcarasella]

1986: Al Capone's vault is opened

Here are some of his quotes:

Vote early and vote often. (Very popular here)

When I sell liquor, it's called bootlegging; when my patrons serve it on Lake Shore Drive, it's called hospitality.

You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.

[Dobie]

I can remember watching Capone's vault being opened - it was like a 2 hour special with Geraldo - absolutely nothing was in it. I think that's when Geraldo stopped being a legitimate reported in the eyes of a lot of people.