October 24
Today in America's Present Past
1788 | Author Sarah Josepha Hale was born.
1821 | Politician Elias Boudinot died.
1830 | Lawyer Belva Ann Lockwood was born.
1838 | Educator and stuntwoman Annie Edson Taylor was born.
1852 | Lawyer and politician Daniel Webster died.
1855 | Politician James S. Sherman was born.
1861 | Statehood: West Virginia secedes from Virginia.
1871 | Civil Rights: Los Angeles “anti-Chinese” riots break out.
1881 | Levi P Morton, US ambassador to France, drives the first rivet in the Statue of Liberty in Paris, France.
1889 | Softball rules adopted by Mid Mid-Winter Indoor Baseball League.
1893 | Director Merian C. Cooper was born.
1896 | Entrepreneur Marjorie Stewart Joyner was born.
1911 | Chemist Nathaniel Wyeth was born.
1920 | Scientist Julius Youngner was born.
1926 | Harry Houdini’s last performance occurred in Detroit, Michigan.
1929 | “Black Thursday”, start of the stock market crash of 1929, Dow Jones Industrial Average drops 12.8%.
1929 | Activist Moorfield Storey died.
1931 | The George Washington Bridge linking New York City and New Jersey was dedicated.
1935 | Outlaw Abe Landau shot dead.
1936 | Actor David Nelson was born.
1939 | Actor F. Murray Abraham was born.
1944 | WWII: Naval pilot David McCampbell sets a combat mission record by shooting down 9 Japanese planes in the Philippines.
1945 | The Charter of the United Nations takes effect.
1946 | A camera on board the V-2 No. 13 rocket, launched from White Sands, US, takes the first photograph of Earth from outer space.
1947 | Actor Kevin Kline was born.
1949 | Construction begins on the United Nations headquarters in New York City, New York.
1954 | POTUS: Republican President Eisenhower pledges US support to South Vietnam.
1956 | Civil Rights: Margaret Towner becomes the first woman to be ordained into the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA).
1962 | Film: “The Manchurian Candidate” debuted.
1968 | Journalist Robert Wilonsky was born.
1972 | Baseballer Jackie Robinson died.
1989 | Televangelist Jim Bakker is sentenced to 45 years in prison for fraud.
1991 | Author Gene Roddenberry died.
2005 | Activist Rosa Parks died.
2010 | Playwright Joseph Stein died.
2011 | Computer scientist John McCarthy died.
2015 | Actress Maureen O’Hara died.
2017 | Musician Fats Domino died.