On June 29, 1889, five townships bordering Chicago vote to allow themselves to be annexed by the larger city, wishing to take part in its municipal services. They include Hyde Park, which now comprises Chicago's famed South Side. Overnight, Chicago became the nation's largest city in area and second most populated, behind New York. Chicago has since fallen to 36th in the US in area (227 square miles) but is third in population. (1897 film of the corner of Madison and State Streets in Chicago. The intersection was billed as the busiest in the world at the time) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Corner_Madison_and_State_streets,_Chicago_-.webm On June 29, 1943, President Franklin Roosevelt writes a letter (stamped "secret") to Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, thanking the physicist for his work on the Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer was among those who had worked for a year on the project to develop an atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert, and frequently clashed with the project's military director, General Leslie Groves over the living and working conditions endured by the project's civilians. Roosevelt's letter calmed the situation, leading to the project's completion two years later. On June 29, 1990, Oakland Athletics righthander Dave Stewart fires a no-hitter against the Toronto Blue Jays. The game was televised on the U.S. west coast, and among those watching were members of the Los Angeles Dodgers, sitting in their clubhouse before a night game against the St. Louis Cardinals. Lefty Fernando Valenzuela was scheduled to pitch for LA, and catcher Mike Scioscia later said Valenzuela told his teammates, "You just watched a no-hitter on TV, now you're going to see one in person." Valenzuela then delivered on his prediction, making he and Stewart the first major league pitchers to throw no-hitters on the same day since 1898. It was also the first (and only time to date) that no-hitters were thrown in both leagues on the same day.
On the night of June 30, 1520, Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes fights his way out of the Aztec capitol city of Tenochtitlan. Two years earlier, Cortes, the mayor of Santiago, Hispaniola, defied the orders of Cuban governor Diego Velasquez and sailed west with a force of 500 men to establish a colony on the American mainland. After establishing Veracruz on the coast of present-day Mexico, Cortes heard of the Aztec capital and headed west, making allies of Aztec enemies on the way. He took Tenochtitlan without a fight and held it until the spring of 1520, when he learned an expedition sent by Velasquez was on the way to terminate his command with extreme prejudice. Leaving a garrison in charge of the city, Cortes sought out and defeated the expedition, but on his return found the garrison under siege by hostile Aztecs. Aztec emperor Montezuma II was among the casualties as Cortes fled; Cortes' exact losses are unknown. He would return 11 months later and retake Tenochtitlan by force. On June 30, 1934, German chancellor Adolf Hitler launches Operation Hummingbird, the blood purge of potential opponents within his own Nazi Party. The leadership of the Sturmabteilung, the "Brown Shirts", was a specific target. In consolidating his power and preparing to build up the nation's military for war, Hitler knew he would be contradicting the "workers' rights" platform that had helped bring him to power, and thought the SA might oppose him. Over the next 3 nights, 85 Nazis were killed officially; estimates put the actual total anywhere from 700 to 1,000. More than 1,000 were arrested and Hitler's hold on the government was tightened. Historians now call the purge "The Night of the Long Knives," a phrase that had previously referred to any act of vengeance in German folklore. On June 30, 1952, CBS TV network launches the daytime "soap opera" The Guiding Light (re-named Guiding Light in 1975). Based on CBS Radio's drama of the same name that had run since 1937 (and would continue another 4 years), The Guiding Light centered on the experiences of the Bauers, a German immigrant couple living in the fictional Midwestern town of Springfield. The Bauers had been introduced on the radio version of the drama in 1948; they were one of several families who attended the services of the Reverend John Ruthledge, the central character of the radio program. When CBS cancelled the TV show due to low ratings in 2009, it was the longest running TV drama in US history, at 57 seasons. (the soap General Hospital has since claimed the number one spot with 58 seasons, though it is still 800 produced episodes behind Guiding Light). When combined with the radio show, Guiding Light's 72 years on the air make it the 5th longest running program in world broadcast history.
On July 5, 1865, evangelical preacher William Booth and his wife Catherine establish the Christian Mission on London's East End. Other locations would follow, soup kitchens and facilities to tend to the physical and spiritual wellbeing of London's less fortunate. From the beginning, Booth wanted to attack the problems with military efficiency, even modeling his organization on the British army. In 1878 he took the analogy a step further, changing the name from Christian Missions to the Salvation Army. Two years later, he opened his first location in the United States. Today the Salvation Army operates in more than 75 nations and is one of the world's most respected charitable organizations. On July 5, 1954 at Sun Records in Memphis, a young truck driver named Elvis Presley records "That's All Right (Mama)." Roughly a year earlier, Presley had walked into Sun and plunked down $3.98 to record two ballads for his mother as a birthday present. Owner Sam Phillips made a comment to his partner Marion Kriesler, who wrote, "Good ballad singer. Hold," on her notepad. She would remind Phillips about the singing truck driver several times over the next year, and Phillips - who was looking for "a white boy who could sing 'black' r&b" finally brought him in. Presley recorded two bluesy numbers and Phillips called for a break, now thinking he'd made a mistake. But instead of stepping into the alley for a smoke with the studio musicians, Elvis picked up his guitar and began riffing on an Arthur Crudup blues standard, "That's All Right (Mama)." Phillips ordered the studio techs to roll tape, and two days later, WHBQ in Memphis became the first radio station to play an Elvis Presley recording. Elvis Presley.... Thats Alright (Mama)- First Release - 1954 - YouTube
On July 6, 1535, Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, is executed for high treason at age 57. Son of a lawyer, More rose to power through the House of Commons (he was eventually elected Speaker) before being knighted and rising to Chancellor in 1529. A practicing Catholic and philosopher of some note, More opposed the Protestant Reformation in general, and when he refused to acknowledge Henry VIII as head of the Church of England, he was convicted of treason and sentenced to be beheaded. Despite their religious differences, More remained politically loyal to the king; his last words before his head was lowered on the block were reportedly, "I die the king's good servant, and God's first." More was canonized as a martyr in 1935, and in 2000 Pope John Paul II proclaimed him patron saint of statesmen and politicians. On July 6, 1944, the "Big Top" tent of the Ringling Bros-Barnum and Bailey Circus burns down during a performance in Hartford, CT, killing 168 people and injuring more than 700. It's estimated roughly 7,000 people were in the tent for a Thursday matinee performance when the fire started. An estimated 100 of the dead were children in one of the deadliest fires in American history. The cause of the fire was never determined (a known arsonist confessed but later recanted, and was never charged), but investigators determined that the gasoline-based waterproofing agent the circus used to treat the tent greatly accelerated the fire. Several circus officials were convicted on manslaughter charges, and the company paid out about $5 million in damages. On July 6, 1994, Forrest Gump opens in American theaters. Tom Hanks portrays an Alabama simpleton who relates tales from his life to several strangers as he sits at a bus stop preparing to visit his childhood sweetheart. Editors ingeniously inserted Hanks as Forrest into newsreel footage, making it appear he met noted figures like JFK (below), John Lennon and Richard Nixon. Forrest Gump was nominated for 13 Academy Awards and won 6, including Best Picture. It also earned Hanks the Best Actor Oscar for the second year in a row, cementing his transition from light comic performer into an A-list superstar.
On July 8, 1932 - the depths of the Great Depresssion - the Dow Jones hits rock bottom. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is one of the oldest stock market indicators in the world, created 2/16/1885 by financial reporter Charles Dow and statistician Edward Jones. In simple terms it is the sum of the stock prices of 30 select businesses, divided by a figure roughly equivalent to the average price of the same 30 stocks. As currently calculated, a fluctuation of one dollar in the price of any of the 30 stocks translates to 7 points on the DJIA index. On its first day, the Dow closed at 62.76, and through numerous "bull" and "bear" markets, gradually climbed to 381.17 on Sept. 3, 1929. Sept. 4 was "Black Tuesday" and for the next 3 years, the Dow fell steadily until July 8, 1932, when the index closed at 41.22, erasing 33 years of gains in 3 years. It would not reach that previously gained 1929 high mark for another 22 years. (photo: run on NYC's America Union Bank during the Depression) In an unrelated event..... On July 8, 1889, the Wall Street Journal is published for the first time. It is the creation of the aforementioned Charles Dow and Edward Jones, along with journalist Charles Bergstresser. The first publication (page one seen below) is a collection of short news bulletins on the day's investing events. The Journal is published six times a week today, with a circulation of about 2.8 million, including its online version, making it one of the largest publications in the U.S. It has won 37 Pulitzer Prizes since that award was established in 1917. On July 8, 2010, ESPN and LeBron James give us The Decision. In 2003, James - by far the most celebrated high school basketball star since Lew Alcindor in the late 1960's - chose to forego college and was selected first overall in the NBA Draft by his hometown team, the Cleveland Cavaliers. Seven years later, James had a room full of individual honors but no championship ring (the Cavs were beaten 4-0 in their first-ever finals appearance by the San Antonio Spurs in 2008), a failing that was beginning to weigh on both James and Cavalier fans. As of July 1, James was also a free agent, and every one of the league's top TV market teams were quick to make offers. Although (as later became known) James had been talking with fellow NBA star Dewayne Wade about joining Wade with the Miami Heat for nearly 4 years, he put off an announcement for a week and joined with ESPN to put together a prime time special called The Decision, during which he announced his signing with the Heat. On the positive side, the event raised several million dollars for The Boys and Girls Clubs. However, his leaving the home town Cavs quickly earned him the label of most hated man in Cleveland, retired stars Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson criticized him for "championship shopping," and the ESPN broadcast itself was seen as self-aggrandizing (the wording of the announcement - "I'm taking my talents to South Beach" - would be widely copied but often mocked). James would win 2 NBA titles in 4 seasons with the Heat, before returning to Cleveland and finally leading the Cavs to a title in 2016.
On July 9, 1918, two passenger trains collide on the outskirts of Nashville, TN. 101 lives are lost and 171 injured in the worst rail disaster in US history. Interstate Commerce Commission officials would determine that local rail traffic controllers lost track of the No. 1 train inbound from Memphis, which was about a half hour late. The ICC also determined that the wooden construction of the rail cars involved contributed to the high casualty count; most railroad companies immediately began switching to steel passenger cars. On July 9, 1982, Pan Am Flight 759, a regular domestic flight from Miam to San Diego with 2 stops, encounters wind shear seconds after takeoff from New Orleans International Airport and crashes into neighboring Kenner, killing all 145 people aboard the Boeing 727 and 8 people on the ground. Investigators and meteorologists would eventually find the aircraft encountered a microburst, a sudden and powerful downdraft associated with thunderstorms, almost the opposite of a tornado. The tragedy led to the development of equipment that can detect wind shear, and FAA mandates for its installation at all US airports. On July 9, 1922, American swimmer Johnny Weissmuller breaks the world record in the 100-meter freestyle with a time of 58.6, and in doing so is the first to break the "minute barrier" for the event. Hungarian-born, Weissmuller immigrated to America with his family at age 1 and learned to swim in Lake Michigan, showing immediate talent. He would go on to win 5 gold medals combined at the 1924 and '28 Olympics, adding a bronze medal with the '24 US water polo team. He would also win 52 US national championships and set 67 world records. In 1932, Weissmuller retired from competitive swimming and moved to Hollywood. His first work was as an underwear model, but he soon put his athleticism to work on the silver screen, playing Tarzan of the Apes in 12 movies, and then the similar character Jungle Jim in 16 films and a TV series. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and is a member of the International Swimming Hall of Fame. Weissmuller died in 1984.
On July 11, 1656, Ann Austin and Mary Fisher land in Boston. They are the first members of the Religious Society of Friends - the "Quakers" - to emigrate to the American colonies. The Quakers opposed a central church authority (they were historically Protestant), preferring to explore spirituality internally. Austin and Fisher advocated for sexual equality and abolition in the colonies almost from the moment they stepped off the boat, and were soon jailed. Three months later, the Massachusetts Bay Colony banned all Quakers (Austin and Fisher were deported in 1661), but incoming Quakers found homes in other colonies, especially Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. They became more passive in their beliefs in the 1700s (many were prominent in organizing the Underground Railroad). There are about 375,000 Quakers worldwide today, about half live in Africa. American Quakers number roughly 75,000. (photo: a Society of Friends church in Ohio) On July 11, 1893, Japanese entrepreneur Mikimoto Kokichi introduces the cultured pearl. Kokichi became fascinated with pearls as a child, watching divers bring them ashore near his home in Shima Province. Judging a pearl exhibition at age 20, he first noticed the many flaws in pearls and began seeking a method of developing the "perfect" pearl. He started an oyster pearl farm of his own, and after five years of operating at near-bankruptcy, perfected his method of inducing oysters to produce a perfectly spherical pearl. A "cultured" pearl is a natural pearl grown in real oysters in a controlled environment, as opposed to "uncultured" pearls, which occur naturally in the wild, or artificial pearls. Cultured pearls make up about 95% of the worldwide pearl market today. (photo: Kokichi injecting nacre (mother of pearl) into an oyster to stimulate pearl creation) On July 11, 1960, To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee is published. Though the main action of the story centers on Atticus Finch, a white Southern lawyer who defends a black man accused of raping a white woman during the Great Depression, much of the novel's secondary action is autobiographical from the Alabama-born Lee's childhood. She moved to NYC in 1949 at age 23, holding down odd jobs while writing long form stories and one meagerly published novel, called Go Set A Watchman. Her publisher suggested revisions to the novel and also recommended Lee expand on the subplots, and from those suggestions, To Kill A Mockingbird resulted. It earned Lee a Pulitzer Prize, selling 40 million copies to date, and is widely considered the definitive novel of race relations in the Jim Crow-era South. There would be no follow-up from Lee; although she actively helped her good friend Truman Capote with several of his books, including In Cold Blood, her only other novel would be a re-publishing of the original version of Go Set A Watchman, which finds Finch 20 years later having embraced the racists views of his environment. Lee died in 2016 at age 89.
On July 12, 1861, David McCanles, alleged leader of a gang of Nebraska Territory thieves and horse rustlers, enters a freight station at Rock Creek. The story is unclear; some believe McCanles was angry with the station manager about a freight bill and went in alone. Others think he may have learned a station hand was having an affair with his mistress, and entered the station with two members of his gang to seek retribution. There's no dispute that at some point, McCanles was shot and killed by the hand, who was hiding behind a curtain, and may have wounded the two gang members. The story grew in the retelling; Harper's New Monthly published a story about how 24-year old William Hickok shot nine men in the confrontation, and quoted him as saying, "I was wild and I struck savage blows." The legend of "Wild Bill" Hickok was born. On July 12, 70 (CE), the armies of Roman emperor Titus launch their attack against the walls of the city of Jerusalem. The attack is a climax of a 5-month long siege of the city, the center of Jewish rebellion against Roman authority in the province of Judea. Three weeks later, the Romans would breach the city's walls, plundering the city and setting fire to the Second Jewish Temple. On July 12, 1962, a new band debuts at London's Marquee Club, performing a mixed set of blues numbers and rock covers. Slide guitarist Brian Jones would take it upon himself to spontaneously name the band; giving Jazz News a phone interview, Jones looked at a Muddy Waters album lying at his feet and plucked the name of one of the tracks, calling the new band "the Rollin' Stones." He was joined on stage that night by bass guitarist Dick Taylor, keyboardist Ian Stewart, drummer Mick Avory and two members who had been playing in garage bands together since meeting 7 years before, guitarist Keith Richards and vocalist Mick Jagger. Within a few months, bassist Bill Wyman would replace Taylor and drummer Charlie Watts replaced Avory. The Rolling Stones are currently in their 6th decade of performing (only Jagger and Richards remain of the original members), have sold more than 200 million records, have won 3 Grammys (plus a lifetime achievement award), are enshrined in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and are ranked second only to The Beatles on Billboard's list of the greatest acts of all time. (1972 concert photo)
Between 8:30pm and 9:00 on July 13, 1977, a series of lightning strikes throws New York City's power grid into turmoil. Engineers with utility provider Consolidated Edison began a frantic series of moves to reduce the strain on the unaffected areas, but shortly before 9:30, the main power station for the city failed, and all of NYC (except for a few neighborhoods in Queens and Brooklyn) fell into total blackout. It was not until 7:00 the following morning that ConEd began to get even a few circuits back online, and not until 10:30 that night was power fully restored. In the meantime, in addition to the discomfort of no power in mid-July, NYC residents fell under major attack from thieves, looters and arsonists. NYPD would arrest nearly 4,500 looters over the 24-hour period, with more than 500 of their own injured during the crisis. Damages would be estimated at about $300 million (about $1.3 billion in 2022 dollars). There is a popular story in the music biz that the number of record turntables looted during the '77 Blackout led to the start of the hip hop music era. On July 13, 1978, Henry Ford II fires Ford Motor Company president Lee Iacocca. Iacocca joined Ford as an engineer in 1946, but soon moved to sales and commenced a rapid rise up the corporate ladder. By 1960 he was general manager of the Ford Division, FMC's largest shop. His development and marketing of the Mustang as a sporty but affordable car option in 1964 landed him on the cover of Time and Newsweek in the same week, but Iacocca's brash personality was the opposite of Ford II's staid demeanor, and the Chairman of the Board was continuously looking for an excuse to show Iacocca the door. It finally came in 1978 when Iacocca rankled Ford by going to the Board of Directors for a show of support. Ford's loss was Chrysler's gain; the failing 3rd of the American auto industry's "Big 3" quickly hired Iacocca as its president. By 1984, Chrysler was turning record profits. Iacocca died in 2019.
