TODAY IN HISTORY: 06 SEPTEMBER, 1966; South African apartheid architect, Hendrik Verwoerd assassinated

 

Hendrik Verwoerd

On this day in 1966, a Mozambique immigrant who was also a messenger in the South African Parliament, Demetrio Tsafendas stabbed the South African Prime Minister and apartheid architect, Hendrik Verwoerd, to death during a parliamentary meeting in Cape Town. The assailant, Demetrio Tsafendas, was a mixed racial descent, partly Greek and partly Swazi.

Verwoerd, a South African politician, scholar of applied psychology and sociology, was also a minister of native affairs and later as South African leader. He oversaw the introduction and application of South Africa’s racist apartheid policies. As prime minister from 1958, he instituted an intricate system of racist laws separating whites, Africans (Blacks), Coloureds and Asians, and resettled Black people in backwater reservations. These policies provoked anti-apartheid demonstrations by Black people, which were brutally crushed by government forces at Sharpeville and elsewhere.

Demetrio Tsafendas

In April 1960, Verwoerd who miraculously survived being shot twice in the head by an English farmer, proclaimed that his survival was evidence of God’s approval of his work. During the next few years, Verwoerd’s government arrested anti-apartheid leaders such as Nelson Mandela and sentenced them to long prison terms on the basis of various convictions. He had succeeded in temporarily crushing anti-apartheid resistance, but he could not prevent a mentally ill parliamentary page from walking up to him in the Houses of Assembly and stabbing him to death on September 6, 1966.

Tsafendas, who apparently was not acting in protest of apartheid, was sent to a mental hospital near Johannesburg, where he lived until his death in 1999. Apartheid was abolished in South Africa in 1993.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 05 SEPTEMBER, 1914; World war I: General Joffre orders his troops to attack Germans

General Joseph Joffre

In the evening of 05 September, 1914, General Joseph Joffre, commander in chief of the French army during World War I, readies his troops for a renewed offensive against the advancing Germans at the Marne River in northeastern France, set to begin the following morning.

With the French 6th Army poised to begin an attack from its position against the right flank of the German 1st Army to the northeast of Paris, Joffre was under pressure from Paris’ military governor, General Joseph-Simon Gallieni, to launch a general offensive in support of the attack. On September 3, Joffre made the difficult decision to replace the commander of the 5th Army, General Charles Lanrezac, punishing him for his caution in ordering a retreat at the Battle of Charleroi on August 22-24—which had in fact saved the French left wing from envelopment by the Germans—and replacing him with the more aggressive General Louis Franchet d’Esperey.

The French planned for the 5th Army, having crossed the Marne River east of Paris with the Germans in hot pursuit, to launch a coordinated attack with the 6th Army on the two advancing German armies: the 1st, under General Alexander von Kluck, and the 2nd, led by General Karl von Bulow. To ensure the attack’s success, however, the French wanted the support of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), under the command of Field Marshal Sir John French, who was still coordinating his army’s retreat after its defeat in the Battle of Mons, also on August 24.

At ten o’clock on the night of September 4, Joffre signed the order authorizing the 6th Army’s attack. By the next morning, however, he was still uncertain about the commitment of the British troops. At a meeting later that afternoon, in French’s headquarters, Joffre pleaded with his British counterpart to authorize his troops to join in the attack, promising that the BEF would be supported on either side by the French 5th and 6th Armies. The “supreme moment” had arrived, Joffre insisted, and “the future of Europe” was on the line. “I cannot believe the British Army will refuse to do its share in this supreme crisis….The honor of England is at stake!” After struggling to answer in French, a visibly emotional British commander in chief gave up, reportedly exclaiming to one of his officers: “Damn it, I can’t explain. Tell him that all that men can do, our fellows will do.”

That night, Joffre signed the order proclaiming the attack at the Marne, to be read to his troops the next morning: “At the moment when the battle upon which hangs the fate of France is about to begin, all must remember that the time for looking back is past; every effort must be concentrated on attacking and throwing the enemy back….Under present conditions no weakness can be tolerated.” The decisive four-day-long Battle of the Marne would end in an Allied victory, halting the month-long German advance and sparking a growing recognition on both sides that the war would go on longer than either had anticipated.

Author:

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 05 SEPTEMBER, 1975; Gerald Ford escapes assassination attempt in California

President Gerald R. Ford

On this day in 1975, the 38th American President, Gerald R. Ford survived assassination attempt by a 26 year-old petite and red haired Lynette Fromme, on his life in Sacramento, California.

Fromme approached the president while he was walking near the California Capitol and raised a 45 caliber handgun toward him. But Secret Service agents grabbed and wrestled her to the ground before she was able to fire off a shot. After Fromme’s assassination attempt, Ford stoically continued on to the Capitol to speak before the California legislature. The main topic of his speech was crime.

Seventeen days later, 45 years old Sara Jane Moore, a mentally derailed female accountant, tried to assassinate Ford while he was in San Francisco. Her attempt was thwarted by a bystander who instinctively grabbed Moore’s arm when she raised the gun. Although she fired one shot, it did not find its target. The bystander, a former Marine and Vietnam veteran named Oliver Sipple, was publicly thanked by Ford three days later.

Lynette Fromme

Lynette Fromme, nicknamed “Squeaky,” was a member of the notorious Charles Manson family, a group of drug-addled groupies who followed cult leader Manson. Manson and other members of his “family” were convicted and sentenced to prison for murdering former actress Sharon Tate and others in 1969. Subsequently, Fromme and other female members of the cult started an order of “nuns” within a new group called the International People’s Court of Retribution. This group terrorized corporate executives who headed environmentally destructive businesses. Fromme herself was still so enamored of Manson that she devised the plot to kill President Ford in order to win Manson’s approval.

Sara Jane Moore

Fromme was convicted of attempted murder and was sentenced to life in prison in West Virginia. She escaped in 1979, but was caught within 25 miles of the prison. Strangely, Ford’s second would-be assassin, Moore, was imprisoned in the same facility and escaped in 1989. She turned herself in two days later and, like Fromme, was transferred to a higher-security penitentiary. While Moore was released on parole in 2007; Fromme was also released in 2009. 

TODAY IN HISTORY: 05 SEPTEMBER, 1836; Sam Houston emerges victorious in Texas first presidential election

Sam Houston

On 05 September, 1836, the war hero, Sam Houston was elected first president of the newly Republic of Texas, which earned its independence from Mexico in a successful military rebellion.

Houston who was born in Virginia on 02 March 1793, moved with his family to rural Tennessee after the death of  father in 1807. As a teenager, Houston ran away and lived for several years with the Cherokee tribe. He joined the U.S.  Army to fight against Britain in the 1812 war.  Houston who served under Andrew Jackson in the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, suffered three near fatal wounds on 26 March, 1814 and carried fragments of the musket ball that lodged in his right shoulder until his death.

Having served in the War of 1812 and an interlude of study and teaching, in 1817 Houston was appointed a U.S. subagent assigned to manage the removal of the Cherokee from Tennessee to a reservation in the Arkansas Territory. Sam Houston practiced law in Nashville where he was a senior partner at the Scott, Clawater & Houston, L.L.P and from 1823 to 1827 served as a U.S. congressman before being elected governor of Tennessee in 1827.

A brief, failed marriage led Houston to resign from office and live again with the Cherokee. Officially adopted by the tribe, he traveled to Washington to protest governmental treatment of Native Americans. In 1832, President Andrew Jackson sent him to Texas (then a Mexican province) to negotiate treaties with local Native Americans for protection of border traders. Houston arrived in Texas during a time of rising tensions between U.S. settlers and Mexican authorities, and soon emerged as a leader among the settlers. In 1835, Texans formed a provisional government, which issued a declaration of independence from Mexico the following year. At that time, Houston was appointed military commander of the Texas army.

Though the rebellion suffered a crushing blow at the Alamo in early 1836, Houston was soon able to turn his army’s fortunes around. On April 21, he led some 800 Texans in a surprise defeat of 1,500 Mexican soldiers under General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna at the San Jacinto River. Santa Anna was captured and brought to Houston, where he was forced to sign an armistice that would grant Texas its freedom. After receiving medical treatment for his war wounds in New Orleans, Houston returned to win election as president of the Republic of Texas on September 5. In victory, Houston declared that “Texas will again lift its head and stand among the nations….It ought to do so, for no country upon the globe can compare with it in natural advantages.”

Houston served as the republic’s president until 1838, then again from 1841 to 1844. Despite plans for retirement, Houston helped Texas win admission to the United States in 1845 and was elected as one of the state’s first two senators. He served three terms in the Senate and ran successfully for Texas’ governorship in 1859. As the Civil War loomed, Houston argued unsuccessfully against secession, and was deposed from office in March 1861 after refusing to swear allegiance to the Confederacy. He died of pneumonia on 26 July, 1863 at age of 70 years.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 04 SEPTEMBER, 2014; Joan Rivers dies at 81

Joan Rivers

A sharp-tongued performer and comedy legend, Joan Rivers died on this day in 2014 at the age of 81 in a New York City hospital one week after she went into cardiac arrest while undergoing a medical procedure on her vocal cords at a Manhattan clinic. Rivers, who was one of the best known comedians of her era, during a showbiz career that spanned more than five decades, blazed a trail for women in stand-up comedy  and turned ‘Can we talk? ‘into a national catchphrase.  The irreverent Rivers, who poked fun at her personal life and affinity for plastic surgery, skewered Hollywood celebrities where she once said, “I succeeded by saying what everyone else is thinking.”

Born on the 8th of June, 1933 in Brooklyn, New York, to Russian immigrants, Rivers with birth name Joan Molinsky, attended the Adelphi academy in Brooklyn, and, an excellent student, was Phi Beta Kappa at Barnard College, from which she graduated with a degree in English in 1954. Interested in becoming an actress, she scored parts in Off-Broadway plays and worked office temp jobs to support herself. In the late 1950s, she started performing stand-up comedy in nightclubs as a means to earn money; at the time, there were few other female stand-up comics. In the early 1960s, she did a stint with the Chicago-based Second City comedy troupe. Along the way, at the suggestion of an agent, she changed her last name to Rivers. In 1965, her career took off after she made her first appearance on “The Tonight Show,” hosted by Johnny Carson, who told her she was going to be a star. Rivers went on to rack up numerous guest spots on the program, while also appearing on other TV comedy shows and doing her stand-up act around the country.

In 1983, Rivers was tapped as the permanent guest host on “The Tonight Show.” Three years later, she inked a deal for her own late-night TV show on another network. Afterward, Carson, who reportedly felt betrayed, never spoke to Rivers again (she was blacklisted from “The Tonight Show” until 2014, when host Jimmy Fallon invited her on as a guest). “The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers” debuted in October 1986 but soon sank in the ratings, and Rivers was fired in May 1987. That August, Rivers’ husband, Edgar Rosenberg, who served as a producer of her show, committed suicide.

Rivers’ career temporarily stalled but she eventually signed on to host her own daytime talk show, “The Joan Rivers Show,” which aired from 1989 to 1993. Next, the raspy-voiced comedian added fashion maven to her resume and helped revolutionize red-carpet coverage and popularize the question “Who are you wearing?,” after she and her daughter, Melissa, began hosting E! Entertainment’s pre-award shows for the Golden Globes, Academy Awards and other events, starting in the mid-1990s. From 2010 until her death, Rivers was a co-host of the TV program “Fashion Police,” on which she cattily critiqued the style choices of celebrities. Rivers also published a dozen books during her career, produced a jewelry line for TV shopping channel QVC and supported a variety of charitable causes. After starting out in the 1950s with dreams of working in theater, she earned a Tony Award nomination in the best actress category in 1994 for her role in the Broadway play “Sally Marr…and her escorts,” which she co-wrote.

Rivers gave what turned out to be her last stand-up performance, in Manhattan, on August 27, 2014, the night before the medical procedure that led to her death on September 4. Three days later, the legendary funny woman was memorialized at a star-studded service in New York City. As Rivers had noted in her 2012 book “I Hate Everyone … Starting With Me,” she wanted a send-off that was “a huge showbiz affair with lights, cameras, action."

Author:

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 04 SEPTEMBER, 1886; General Nelson Miles accepts Geronimo’s surrender

Apache Geronimo

On 04 September, 1886, Geronimo surrendered to U.S. government troops and he became the last Native American warrior to formally surrender to U.S. forces which also signaled the end of the Indian Wars in the Southwest. For 30 years, the Native American warrior, Apache Geronimo had battled to protect his tribe’s homeland; however, by 1886 the Apaches were exhausted and outnumbered.

Born in 1829 and grew up in the present day Arizona and Mexico, Geronimo's tribe, the Chiricahua Apaches, clashed with non-Native settlers trying to take their land. In 1858, Geronimo’s family was murdered by Mexicans. Geronimo later led raids against Mexican and American settlers to Seek revenge for the gruesome murder of his family by Mexicans. In 1874, the U.S. government moved Geronimo and his people from their land to a reservation in east-central Arizona. Conditions on the reservation were restrictive and harsh and Geronimo and some of his followers escaped. 

For more than one decade, Geronimo and his people battled American troops and launched raids on white settlements. During this time, Geronimo and his supporters were forced back onto the reservation several times. In May 1885, Geronimo and approximately 150 followers fled one last time. They were pursued into Mexico by 5,000 U.S. troops. In March 1886, General George Crook (1829–90) forced Geronimo to surrender; however, Geronimo quickly escaped and continued his raids. General Nelson Miles (1839–1925) then took over the pursuit of Geronimo, eventually forcing him to surrender that September near Fort Bowie along the Arizona-New Mexico border. 

Geronimo and a band of Apaches were sent to Florida and then Alabama, eventually ending up at the Comanche and Kiowa reservation near Fort Sill, Oklahoma Territory. There, Geronimo became a successful farmer and converted to Christianity. He participated in President Theodore Roosevelt’s inaugural parade in 1905. The Apache leader dictated his autobiography, published in 1906 as Geronimo’s Story of His Life.  He died on 17 February, 1909 at Fort Sill at a ripe age of 80 years.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 03 SEPTEMBER, 1783; American revolution ends with signing of Treaty of Paris

 

Representatives of countries that signed the Treaty of Paris at the Hotel d'York in 1783.

The signing of Treaty of Paris this day in 1783 officially ended the American Revolution. The treaty signed by Franklin, Adams and Jay at the Hotel d'York in Paris, signified America’s status as a free nation and Britain formally recognized the independence of its 13 former American colonies, and the boundaries of the new republic were agreed upon: Florida north to the Great Lakes and the Atlantic coast west to the Mississippi River.

The events that led to the treaty was dated back to April 1775, on a common green in Lexington, Massachusetts, when American colonists answered King George III’s refusal to grant them political and economic reform with armed revolution. On July 4, 1776, more than a year after the first volleys of the war were fired, the Second Continental Congress officially adopted the Declaration of Independence. Five difficult years later, in October 1781, British General Charles Lord Cornwallis surrendered to American and French forces at Yorktown, Virginia, bringing to an end the last major battle of the Revolution.

In September 1782, Benjamin Franklin, along with John Adams and John Jay, began official peace negotiations with the British. The Continental Congress had originally named a five-person committee; including Franklin, Adams and Jay, along with Thomas Jefferson and Henry Laurens to handle the talks. However, both Jefferson and Laurens missed the sessions and Jefferson had travel delays and Laurens had been captured by the British and was being held in the Tower of London. The U.S. delegation, which was distrustful of the French, opted to negotiate separately with the British.

During the talks Franklin demanded that Britain hand over Canada to the United States. This did not come to pass, but America did gain enough new territory south of the Canadian border to double its size. The United States also successfully negotiated for important fishing rights in Canadian waters and agreed among other things, not to prevent British creditors from attempting to recover debts owed to them. Two months later, the key details had been hammered out and on November 30, 1782, the United States and Britain signed the preliminary articles of the treaty. France signed its own preliminary peace agreement with Britain on January 20, 1783, and then in September of that year, the final treaty was signed by all three nations and Spain. The Treaty of Paris was ratified by the Continental Congress on January 14, 1784.

Author

HistoryEditors.com

TODAY IN HISTORY: 01 SEPTEMBER, 2001; U.S. issues first American postage stamp to celebrate Muslim holidays

American stamp celebrating Muslims holidays

After five years of lobbying by the American Muslims, the U.S. Postal Service releases the first American stamp celebrating Muslim holidays on the first day of September, 2001. A blue stamp featuring gold calligraphy was released to celebrate Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha, along with the English words “EID GREETINGS,” the stamp is included alongside stamps celebrating other religious holidays, a victory for Muslim representation in America.

Over the years, many American Muslims had pushed for the creation of a holiday stamp of their own, arguing that their two holiest days (Eid al-Fitr which marks the end of Ramadan fasting, while Eid al-Adha marks the culmination of the haj) deserved the same level of recognition as Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. After a letter-writing campaign in which over 5,000 Muslim children sent messages to the Postmaster General, the Postal Service finally announced the new stamp designed by Calligrapher Mohamed Zakariya in August 2001 and it was released as part of the Postal Service's “Holiday Celebration Series.”

The Eid stamp would receive unwelcome attention, due largely to the 9/11 attacks which took place just ten days after its release. In the wake of the attacks and the subsequent wave of anti-Muslim sentiment in the United States, activists lobbied to make the stamp permanent, symbolizing the right of American Muslims to live peacefully and on equal footing with their fellow Americans. The stamp was reissued in October of 2001 and many times after that—its re-issuing in 2009 sparked rumors among right-wing reactionaries that new President Barack Obama, whom many falsely believed to be Muslim, had ordered its creation. Despite the unfortunate coincidence of its original release, the stamp is a mainstay of the U.S. Postal Service's holiday series, and an updated version is currently available as a Forever stamp.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 01 SEPTEMBER, 1969; Qaddafi overthrows King Idris I of Libya in a bloodless coup

Muammar al-Qaddafi

On the first day of September, 1969, a 27-year old Libyan army captain, Muammar al-Qaddafi, led a successful military coup against King Idris I of Libya. Idris was dethroned and Qaddafi was named chairman of Libya’s new governing body, the Revolutionary Command Council.

Born in a tent in the Libyan desert in 1942 to a Bedouin farmer, Qaddafi was a gifted student, graduated from the University of Libya in 1963 and the Libyan military academy at Banghazi in 1965. The perfervid Arab nationalist plotted with a group of fellow officers to overthrow King Idris, who was viewed as overly conservative and indifferent to the movement for greater political unity among Arab countries. By the time Qaddafi attained the rank of captain, in 1969, the revolutionaries were ready to strike. They waited until King Idris was out of the country, who went for a leg ailment at a Turkish spa, and then toppled his government in a bloodless coup. The monarchy was abolished, and Idris traveled from Turkey to Greece before finding asylum in Egypt. He died there in Cairo in 1983.

Blending Islamic orthodoxy, revolutionary socialism and Arab nationalism, Qaddafi established a fervently anti-Western dictatorship in Libya. In 1970, he removed U.S. and British military bases and expelled Italian and Jewish Libyans. In 1973, he took control of foreign-owned oil fields. He reinstated traditional Islamic laws, such as prohibition of alcoholic beverages and gambling, but liberated women and launched social programmes that enhanced the standard of living in Libya. As part of his stated ambition to unite the Arab world, he sought closer relations with his Arab neighbors, especially Egypt. However, when Egypt and then other Arab nations began a peace process with Israel, Libya became increasingly isolated.

Qaddafi’s government financed a wide variety of terrorist groups worldwide, from Palestinian guerrillas and Philippine Muslim rebels to the Irish Republican Army. During the 1980s, the West blamed him for numerous terrorist attacks in Europe, and in April 1986 U.S. war planes bombed Tripoli in retaliation for a bombing of a West German dance hall. Qaddafi was reportedly injured and his infant daughter killed in the U.S. attack.

In the late 1990s, Qaddafi sought to lead Libya out of its long international isolation by turning over to the West two suspects wanted for the 1988 explosion of an airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland. In response, the United Nations lifted sanctions against Libya. The United States removed its own embargo in September 2004. After years of rejection in the Arab world, Qaddafi also sought to forge stronger relations with non-Islamic African nations such as South Africa, remodeling himself as an elder African statesman.

In February 2011, as unrest spread through much of the Arab world, massive political protests against the Qaddafi regime sparked a civil war between revolutionaries and loyalists. In March, an international coalition began conducting airstrikes against Qaddafi strongholds under the auspices of a U.N. Security Council resolution. On October 20, Libya’s interim government announced that Qaddafi had died after being captured near his hometown of Sirte.

Author:

History.com Editors

Hogan polygraph offers free lie detector test to presidential candidates

Ahead of 2023 general election, a Nigeria’s premier polygraph company, Hogan Polygraph & Investigations Limited, has set to offer a free lie detector test to all presidential and gubernatorial candidates.

Speaking at a press briefing during the week, the Group CEO of Hogan Organization, Paul Ibirogba emphasized that the company will provide the service as a means to ensure that Nigerian populace elects the most honest and ethical leaders in 2023.

Ibirogba who noted that Nigerians are increasingly demanding greater accountability, transparency and integrity from politicians, added that a polygraph could help the electorate discern the leaders who have the nation’s best interest at heart.

He revealed that political candidates who agree to a free lie detector test would be required to sign a waiver allowing the test results to be released to the public.

“Companies across this nation are utilizing polygraph examinations as a tool to eliminate applicants with a fraudulent history in order to protect their revenue from embezzlement and to verify employment history; the same can be done so that the Nigerian public chooses the best political candidates,” Ibirogba said.

Hogan Polygraph made entertainment headlines last year after performing a lie detector test on Nigerian reality TV star Michael Ilesanmi of 90 Day Fiance while on air during a tell-all show for the cast of the United States hit TV show, which is viewed by millions of Americans as well as a global audience.   

TODAY IN HISTORY: 31 AUGUST, 1985; Los Angeles mob attacks high-profiled "Night Stalker" killer

Richard Ramirez

On this day in 1985, angry mob attacked notorious “Night Stalker”, Richard Ramirez, in East Los Angeles, Carlifornia, after being recognized from a photograph shown on television and in the newspapers. Recently identified as the serial killer, Ramirez was pulled from the enraged mob by police officers.

The city of Los Angeles was panic-stricken during the summer of 1985 following the activities of an unknown killer that crept into his victims’ homes at night. The Night Stalker, as the media dubbed the murderer, first turned his attention on the men in the house, usually shot any man in the house with a .22 caliber handgun before raping, stabbing, and mutilating his female victims. He cut out one of his victim’s eyes, and sometimes carved satanic pentagrams on the bodies before he left.

By August in 1985, the Night Stalker has murdered at least a dozen people, and law enforcement officials were desperate to stop him. One witness, who managed to note the license plate of the car in which Ramirez fled, led police to a single, partial fingerprint left in the vehicle.

Apparently, the task force looking for the Night Stalker had already received information that someone named Ramirez was involved, so only the records for men with that name were checked against the fingerprint. Although the Los Angeles Police Department’s new multimillion-dollar computer database of fingerprints only contained the records of criminals born after January 1960, Richard Ramirez, who had a record of petty crimes, had been born in February 1960.

When Ramirez was identified as the chief suspect, authorities debated whether to release his name and picture to the public, fearing that it might give him the chance to escape. Nonetheless, they decided to take the risk, and Ramirez, who was actually traveling back to Los Angeles at the time, arrived to find his face and name on the front of every newspaper.

Ramirez turned his trial into a circus by drawing pentagrams on his palms and making devil’s horns with his fingers. When he was convicted, he shouted at the jury, “You make me sick. I will be avenged. Lucifer dwells within all of us.” After the judge imposed a death sentence, Ramirez said, “Big deal. Death always went with the territory. See you in Disneyland.” Ramirez married a female admirer and penpal while incarcerated at California’s San Quentin Prison in 1996. In 2006, his first appeals were denied and he died in prison on June 7, 2013.

Author:

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 31 AUGUST, 1955; William Cobb exhibits world’s first solar-powered car

First solar car introduced by William Cobb in 1955

On this day in 1955, William G. Cobb of the General Motors Corp (GM) displayed his 15-inch-long world’s first solar-powered automobile, at the General Motors Powerama auto show held in Chicago, Illinois.

Cobb’s Sunmobile introduced, however briefly, the field of photovoltaics–the process by which the sun’s rays are converted into electricity when exposed to certain surfaces–into the gasoline-drenched automotive industry. When sunlight hit 12 photoelectric cells made of selenium (a nonmetal substance with conducting properties) built into the Sunmobile, an electric current was produced that in turn powered a tiny motor. The motor turned the vehicle’s driveshaft, which was connected to its rear axle by a pulley. Visitors to the month-long, $7 million Powerama marveled at some 250 free exhibits spread over 1 million square feet of space on the shores of Lake Michigan. In addition to Cobb’s futuristic mini-automobile, Powerama visitors were treated to an impressive display of GM’s diesel-fueled empire, from oil wells and cotton gins to submarines and other military equipment.

But today, 67 years after Cobb debuted the Sunmobile, a mass-produced solar car has yet to hit the market anywhere in the world. Solar-car competitions are held worldwide, however, in which design teams pit their sun-powered creations against each other in road races such as the 2008 North American Solar Challenge, a 2,400-mile drive from Dallas, Texas, to Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Author;

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 31 AUGUST, 1997; Princess Diana dies at 36 in an auto crash

Princess Diana

On 31 August, 1997, Princess Diana, the Princess of Wales, who was fondly called “ the People’s Princess” died in a ghastly car crash in Paris, shortly after midnight. Her Egyptian-born socialite boyfriend, Dodi Fayed and the driver of the car, Henri Paul, also died in the crash.

Princess Diana who died at 36, was one of the most popular public figures in the world. Her death was met with a massive outpouring of grief. Mourners began visiting Kensington Palace immediately, leaving bouquets at the home where the princess, also known as Lady Di, would never return. Piles of flowers reached some 30 feet from the palace's gate.

Diana and Dodi—who had been vacationing in the French Riviera—arrived in Paris earlier the previous day. They left the Ritz Paris just after midnight, intending to go to Dodi’s apartment on the Rue Arsène Houssaye. As soon as they departed the hotel, a swarm of paparazzi on motorcycles began aggressively tailing their car. About three minutes later, the driver lost control and crashed into a pillar at the entrance of the Pont de l'Alma tunnel.

The car where Princess Diana died

Dodi and the driver were confirmed dead at the scene. Diana was taken to the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital and declared dead at 6:00 am. (A fourth passenger, Diana’s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, was seriously injured but survived.) Diana's former husband Prince Charles, as well as her sisters and other members of the Royal Family, arrived in Paris that morning. Diana’s body was then taken back to London.

Like much of her life, her death became a full-blown media sensation, and the subject of many conspiracy theories. At first, the paparazzi hounding the car were blamed for the crash, but later it was revealed that the driver was under the influence of alcohol and prescription drugs. A formal investigation concluded the paparazzi did not cause the collision. 

Diana’s funeral in London, on September 6, was watched by over 2 billion people. She was survived by her two sons, Prince William, who was 15 at the time, and Prince Harry, who was 12. 

TODAY IN HISTORY: 30 AUGUST, 1967, Thurgood Marshall becomes first African American Supreme Court justice

Thurgood Marshall

On this day in 1967, Thurgood Marshall emerged the first African American to be confirmed as a Supreme Court justice. He served in that capacity for 24 years when he retired in 1991 for health reasons leaving a legacy of upholding the rights of the individual as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.

From a young age, Marshall seemed destined for a place in the American justice system. His parents instilled in him an appreciation for the Constitution, a feeling that was reinforced by his schoolteachers, who forced him to read the document as punishment for his misbehavior. After graduating from Lincoln University in 1930, Marshall sought admission to the University of Maryland School of Law, but was turned away because of the school’s segregation policy, which effectively forbade Black students from studying with whites. Instead, Marshall attended Howard University Law School, where he graduated magna cum laude in 1933. He later sued Maryland School of Law for their unfair admissions policy.

Setting up a private practice in his home state of Maryland, Marshall quickly established a reputation as a lawyer for the “little man.” In a year’s time, he began working with the Baltimore NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People), and went on to become the organization’s chief counsel by the time he was 32, in 1940. Over the next two decades, Marshall distinguished himself as one of the country’s leading advocates for individual rights, winning 29 of the 32 cases he argued in front of the Supreme Court, all of which challenged in some way the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine that had been established by the landmark case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). The high-water mark of Marshall’s career as a litigator came in 1954 with his victory in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. In that case, Marshall argued that the ‘separate but equal’ principle was unconstitutional, and designed to keep Black people “as near [slavery] as possible.”

In 1961, Marshall was appointed by then-President John F. Kennedy to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, a position he held until 1965, when Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, named him solicitor general. Following the retirement of Justice Tom Clark in 1967, President Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court, a decision confirmed by the Senate with a 69-11 vote. Over the next 24 years, Justice Marshall came out in favor of abortion rights and against the death penalty, as he continued his tireless commitment to ensuring equitable treatment of individuals—particularly minorities—by state and federal governments.

Author;

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 29 AUGUST, 1987, Florida home of three HIV brothers sets ablaze

On 29 August, 1987, the Arcadia, Florida home of the Ray brothers; three HIV-positive Florida boys, burns down in what was almost certainly a case of arson. The story of the three brothers, who faced intense discrimination due their HIV status, has been a reminder of the brutal reality of America's reaction to the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 80s. Luckily the Ray brothers were not in the house at the time the house was set on fire.

The three brothers; Richard, Robert and Randy Ray, who were 10, 9 and 8 at the time, were all born with hemophilia, a condition that required them to receive blood transfusions. As was all too common in the 1980s, before the government and medical establishment had fully grappled with the scope of HIV/AIDS and how best to manage the epidemic, the brothers contracted HIV from HIV-positive blood donors. Although it was widely known by the late 80s that this was a common way of contracting HIV, and that HIV affected people of all sexual orientations, many Americans still considered the virus a “gay disease,” compounding the stigma of the illness with homophobia.

When the boys’ HIV status became public knowledge, they were rejected from their church and their friends and barred from attending school due to widespread misconceptions around how the virus could be spread. The Rays’ parents took DeSoto County to federal court, demanding that their sons be allowed to attend, and eventually won the case. Locals responded with a partial boycott of the boys’ school and with threatening phone calls to the Rays, which prompted the family to stay over elsewhere. Although they avoided the fire, which reportedly started in the boys’ bedroom, they were forced to leave their hometown forever.

Speaking with newsmen a day after the fire incidence, Clifford, the father of Ray brothers said, “Arcadia is no longer our home. That much was made clear to us last night.” Ricky Ray died of an AIDS-related illness in 1992, at age 15. In 1998, Congress passed the Ricky Ray Relief Act, establishing a fund to help cover expenses for hemophiliacs who contracted HIV/AIDS. Robert Ray died in 2000 at age 22. 

TODAY IN HISTORY: 29 AUGUST, 1958 American pop singer, Michael Jackson is born

Michael Jackson

On this day in 1958, the American pop singer, songwriter, dancer and philanthropist, Michael Jackson was born in Gary, Indiana.

Jackson who was regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century began performing with his four brothers in the pop group the Jackson 5 when he was a child. The group scored its first No. 1 single in 1969, with “I Want You Back.” By age 11, Jackson was appearing on TV, and by age 14 he had released his first solo album. 

A Jackson 5 TV cartoon series which appeared in the early ’70s, Jackson family including sister Janet Jackson launched a TV variety show called the Jacksons that ran for one season. Michael Jackson who piped vocals in his high voice for “ABC”, I’ll Be There,” and many other Top 20 hits, got media attention throughout the 70s.

Jackson who became the first solo artist to score four Top 10 hits from one album including, “She’s Out of My Life” and “Rock with You,” released several solo albums in the ’70s, but his great breakthrough came in 1979 with Off the Wall. He became the first solo artist to score four Top 10 hits from one album, including. His 1983 album, Thriller became the biggest selling album up to that time, selling some 45 million copies around the world. This time, he scored seven Top 10 singles, and the album won eight Grammies. Although his next album, Bad (1987), sold only about half as many copies as Thriller, it was still a tremendous best-seller. In 1991, Jackson signed an unprecedented $65 million record deal with Sony. That year, he released Dangerous.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Jackson developed a reputation as an eccentric recluse. He moved to a 2,700-acre ranch called Neverland, which he outfitted with wild animals and a Ferris wheel. He underwent a facelift and nose job and was rumored to have lightened his skin through chemical treatment, though he claimed his increasing pallor was due to a skin disease. In 1993, scandal broke when Jackson was publicly accused of child molestation and underwent investigation. The case settled out of court. In 1994, Jackson married Lisa Marie Presley; the couple later divorced. Jackson married Deborah Rowe in 1996, and the couple had two children, Prince and Paris, before divorcing in 1999.

On 13 June, 2005, Jackson was acquitted of sexual molestation of a young boy, Gavin Arvizo, in criminal court. 

Michael Jackson died on June 25, 2009, in Los Angeles, California, just weeks before a planned concert tour billed as his “comeback.” He was 50 years old. 

A 2019 documentary, Leaving Neverland, raised two more credible allegations of sexual abuse from when Jackson was alive. Jackson's family and estate continue to deny the claims. 

TODAY IN HISTORY: 26 AUGUST, 1957, Russia tests an intercontinental ballistic missile

On this day in 1957, the Soviet Union announces that it has successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of being fired “into any part of the world.” The announcement caused great concern in the United States, and started a national debate over the “missile gap” between America and Russia.

For years after World War II, both the United States and the Soviet Union had been trying to perfect a long-range missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Building on the successes of Nazi Germany in developing the V-1 and V-2 rockets that pummeled Great Britain during the last months of World War II, both American and Russian scientists raced to improve the range and accuracy of such missiles. (Both nations relied heavily on captured German scientists in their efforts.) In July 1957, the United States seemed to win the race when the Atlas, an ICBM with a speed of up to 20,000 miles an hour and an effective range of 5,000 miles, was ready for testing. The test, however, was a disaster. The missile rose only about 5,000 feet into the air, tumbled, and plunged to earth. 

Just a month later, the Soviets claimed success by announcing that their own ICBM had been tested, had “covered a huge distance in a brief time,” and “landed in the target area.” No details were given in the Russian announcement and some commentators in the United States doubted that the ICBM test had been as successful as claimed. Nevertheless, the Soviet possession of this “ultimate weapon,” coupled with recent successful test by the Russians of atomic and hydrogen bombs, raised concerns in America. If the Soviets did indeed perfect their ICBM, no part of the United States would be completely safe from possible atomic attack.

Less than two months later, the Soviets sent the satellite Sputnik into space. Concern quickly turned to fear in the United States, as it appeared that the Russians were gaining the upper hand in the arms and space races. The American government accelerated its own missile and space programs. The Soviet successes–and American failures–became an issue in the 1960 presidential campaign. Democratic challenger John F. Kennedy charged that the outgoing Eisenhower administration had allowed a dangerous “missile gap” to develop between the United States and the Soviet Union. Following his victory in 1960, Kennedy made missile development and the space program priorities for his presidency.

Author:

History.com Editors

TODAY IN HISTORY: 20 AUGUST, 1920, Professional football is born by four Ohio league teams owners

The  first professional football team in 1920

On this day in 1920, the four Ohio league teams owners, the Akron Pros, Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Indians and Dayton Triangles, met to establish a new professional league. The seven men, including legendary all-around athlete and football star Jim Thorpe, met to organize a professional football league at the Jordan and Hupmobile Auto Showroom in Canton, Ohio. 

The meeting that led to the creation of the American Professional Football Conference (APFC), was the forerunner to the hugely successful National Football League. Jim Thorpe who was believed that his fame would help the league to be taken seriously, emerged the new president of the league.

The American Professional Football Conference (APFC) was changed to American Professional Football Association (APFA) on 17 September, when the league met second time and officially elected Jim Thorpe as the league’s first president.

Professional football was evolved in Pennsylvania in the 1890s, as local athletic clubs engaged in increasingly intense competition. A former Yale football star, William “Pudge” Heffelfinger who was hired by the Allegheny Athletic Association to play in a game against their rival the Pittsburgh Athletic Club in November 1892, became the first-ever professional football player. And by 1896, the Allegheny Athletic Association was made up entirely of paid players, making it the sport’s first-ever professional team. As football became more popular, local semi-pro and pro teams were organized across the country.

With the establishment of The Ohio League in the 1910s, professional football demonstrated itself as a viable spectator sport. Canton, the premiere team in the league, featured legendary decathlete and football star Jim Thorpe. From his play with the Carlisle School to his gold medal in the decathlon in Stockholm in 1912 and his time in the outfield with John McGraw’s New York Giants, Thorpe was an international star who brought legitimacy to professional football. The crowds that Thorpe and the Canton team drew created a market for professional football in Ohio and beyond. Still, the league was struggling due to escalating player salaries, a reliance on college players who then had to forfeit their college eligibility and a general lack of organization.

The APFA officially began football match fixture on September 26, between the Rock Island Independents of Illinois and St. Paul Ideals, who was defeated 48-0 by the Rock Island Independent of Illinois. A week later, Dayton beat Columbus 14-0 in the first game between two teams from the APFA, the forerunner of the modern NFL.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 19 AUGUST, 1946, Former U.S President, Bill Clinton is born

Former U.S. President, Bill Clinton

The 42nd American President, Bill Clinton was born on this day in 1946. The former U.S. President with birth name, William Jefferson Blythe III was born in a small town of Hope, Arkansas. His father, who was a traveling salesman, died in an automobile accident three months before he was born. Young Bill later took the last name of his stepfather, Roger Clinton. In 1993, Bill Clinton was elected president of the United States.

Bill Clinton who attended Georgetown University and won a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford in 1968, where he bagged a degree in Law from Yale, was inspired to join politics after meeting 35th U.S President John F. Kennedy at White House as a high school student in 1963. The meeting lasted just seconds, but the brief interaction with John F. Kennedy inspired teenager Bill Clinton to a life of public service and helped lead to his own election as President 30 years later.

In 1974, Clinton lost a bid for Congress in Arkansas’ Third District. He married fellow Yale Law graduate Hillary Rodham in 1975, and in 1980, their daughter Chelsea was born.

Elected Arkansas attorney general in 1976, Bill Clinton at age of 32 was elected governor in 1978 and he became the youngest governor to be elected in the United States in four decades. Though he lost his first reelection campaign in 1980, he regained the office four years later and was reelected comfortably three more times. In 1992, he won the Democratic nomination for president. In a campaign that revolved largely around economic issues, Clinton’s youth and the promise of change won over many voters, propelling him to victory over the incumbent George H.W. Bush and upstart third-party candidate Ross Perot.

Issues that arose during the first two years of his administration—including an ethics investigation into the Clintons’ involvement with the Whitewater housing development in Arkansas and a bitter debate in Congress over Clinton’s health care initiative—helped fuel a Republican takeover of the Senate and the House of Representatives in the midterm elections of 1994. Nevertheless, the improving economic climate during Clinton’s presidency resulted in a low unemployment and inflation rate and a balanced budget (even a budget surplus), and in 1996 he became the first Democratic president after Franklin D. Roosevelt to win a second term in office.

In 1998, scandal erupted over Clinton’s alleged involvement with a young female White House intern, Monica Lewinsky. On the basis of an investigation by independent counsel Kenneth Starr, Clinton was accused of perjury and obstruction of justice over his repeated denials of the affair; he eventually apologized to his family and to the American public for his dishonesty. He became only the second U.S. president to be impeached by the House of Representatives, but was acquitted of the charges by the Senate in 1999.

Even throughout the tumult surrounding the Lewinsky affair, Clinton enjoyed high approval ratings at home. He was also popular on the world stage, confronting foreign policy challenges including war in Bosnia and Herzegovina; continuing hostility between Israelis and Palestinians; and Iraq’s refusal to comply with United Nations weapons inspections. He was praised for his peacemaking efforts in Ireland and Northern Ireland, and became the first U.S. president to visit Vietnam since the end of the Vietnam War.

After leaving the White House, Clinton remained active in global affairs and as a public speaker. He heads up the William J. Clinton Foundation, a philanthropic organization that has addressed issues such as HIV/AIDS and the environment. Meanwhile, his wife launched her own political career, winning election to the U.S. Senate from New York in 2000 and running her own presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2016. She served as secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama.

TODAY IN HISTORY: 19 AUGUST, 2013, President Jonathan creates new army division, send 8,000 troops after Boko Haram

Former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan

On this day in 2013, the former Nigerian President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan boosted the strength of the military in the insurgency infested North-east after indications emerged that about 8,000 troops were being sent after Islamic Boko Haram sect, ravaging the region.

The troops, according to security sources, will form the nucleus of an army division to be established in Maiduguri, Borno State capital.

The newsmen gathered that the need to establish the new army division in the stronghold of the Boko Haram Islamist group is to firm up the successes recorded by special forces of the Joint Task Force (JTF) which have reportedly dislodged the insurgents from the forests and mountains of the North-east.

The move came to light barely 48 hours after the United States (US) said security efforts were necessary to protect  innocent Nigerians, prevent Boko Haram’s acts of violence, capture and prosecute its leaders.

The US under the then Secretary of State, Wendy Sherman, who gave the recipe to ending the insurgency challenge in Nigeria on behalf of her home government, spoke in Abuja at the opening session of the US-Nigeria Bi-national Commission’s Regional Security Cooperation Working Group.

Also reacting to the move, an ex-Inspector General of Police and the then Chairman of Police Service Commission (PSC), Mr Mike Okiro, advocated the establishment of a civil force to complement the efforts of security agencies at the grassroots to curb terrorism and other crimes.