July 17th
Today in America's Present Past
1744 | Founding Father and Vice President Elbridge Gerry was born.
1763 | Entrepreneur John Jacob Astor was born.
1789 | Indian Wars: Chenoweth Massacre.
1794 | Civil Rights: Richard Allen organizes Philadelphia's Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church.
1850 | Harvard Observatory takes the first photograph of a star (Vega).
1856 | The Great Train Wreck of 1856 between Camp Hill and Fort Washington, Pennsylvania, kills over 60 people.
1861 | Congress: Authorized paper money.
1881 | Frontiersman James Bridger died.
1887 | Nurse Dorothea Dix died.
1889 | Author Erle Stanley Gardner was born.
1899 | Actor James Cagney was born.
1920 | Physicist Gordon Gould was born.
1921 | Baseball Pro Toni Stone was born.
1945 | WWII: President Truman, Joseph Stalin, and Winston Churchill hold their first post-World War II meeting at the Potsdam Conference.
1952 | Actor David Hasselhoff was born.
1954 | Disneyland construction commences in Anaheim, California.
1954 | Outlaw George “Machine Gun” Kelly died.
1959 | Film: North by Northwest debuted.
1959 | Entertainer Billie Holiday died.
1961 | Baseball Pro Ty Cobb died.
1967 | Civil Rights: A Long, hot summer of riots continues in Cairo, Illinois, and New Brunswick, New Jersey.
1967 | Musican John Coltrane died.
1968 | Civil Rights: Akron, Ohio riots.
1969 | Director Taylor Sheridan was born.
1969 | Civil Rights: York, Pennsylvania, race riots.
1976 | Musician Luke Bryan was born.
1984 | Congress: Passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act.
2001 | Publisher Katharine Graham died.
2006 | Writer Frank “Mickey” Spillane died.
2009 | Journalist Walter Cronkite died.