This day in history...

On July 24, 1969, the command module Columbia, with Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin aboard, safely splashes down in the Pacific Ocean, completing Apollo 11's successful mission "of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth."


On July 24, 1847,Brigham Young leads 148 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) into Utah's Great Salt Lake Valley, completing a 17-month long journey. Young assumed leadership of the church after Joseph Smith, its founder, was murder 3 months earlier. Young vowed to find the church's 10,000 members "a place on earth nobody else wants." On seeing the Great Salt Valley for the first time, Young reportedly said, "This is the place."


On July 24, 1998, Steven Spielberg's World War II epic, "Saving Private Ryan" premiers in American theatres. Starring Tom Hanks and Matt Damon, the loosely-based-on-a-true-story film about a post-D-Day effort to find one soldier who's brothers had all been killed, will win 5 Oscars and spark renewed interest in preserving the history of the WWII.

 

Not long after I met the future Mrs. mctiger, I helped chaperone her first grade class' field trip to the zoo. Another chaperone was the Mormon mother of a little girl in the class, and I would swear her purpose was to make sure her daughter didn't have too much fun.

 

Sorry I missed this one.....
On July 24, 1983, perhaps the strangest inning in Major League Baseball history is played - or should I say, begun. The New York Yankees lead the Kansas City Royals 4-3 with 2 out in the top of the 9th, when Royals' star 3rd baseman George Brett hits a 2-run homer. As Brett crosses home plate, Yankees manager Billy Martin is there to protest; it had been pointed out earlier in the day to him that the amount of pine tar on the handle of Brett's bat may exceed the legal length, and now seems like a good time to mention it. Home plate umpire Tim McClelland measures the pine tar by laying the bat across home plate, and decides it is indeed illegal. McClelland looks into the KC dugout and calls Brett out....and if Yankee Stadium had a ceiling, Brett would have hit it. His furious argument is denied, his home run is instead the third out - game over..... but wait! The Royals appeal the decision to the league office, and 4 days later, League President Lee MacPhail rules. The only reason for the pine tar rule, he says, is to save money. If a ball is hit with a pine tar-covered bat, it becomes discolored and has to be taken out of play, costing the home team one ball (about $6.00 back then). Since the result of Brett's contact was a home run, the ball was out of play anyway, so the spirit of the rule is not broken. The home run stands, and the game must continue from that point. August 18, an off date for both teams, is selected for the resumption of play. The Yankees announce they will charge fans $2.50 to attend; two lawsuits are quickly filed, and an injunction threatens to delay the game again. Instead, the Yankees relent and say anyone producing a ticket stub from the July 24 game can attend for free, and about 1,200 actually attend. Brett, however, does not; he elects to travel to Baltimore for the start of a series with the Orioles the next day. The resumed game begins with Martin making appeals that Brett failed to touch both first and second bases in his home run trot. Umpire McClelland, incredibly, whips out a typed up affidavit signed by all four umps saying they saw Brett touch every base. Martin's had it. Although he does not protest the game officially, he shows his contempt by putting star pitcher Ron Guidry in centerfield, and first baseman Don Mattingly at second (making him the first left hander to play second in a major league game in nearly 15 years). The next batter for the Royals is retired, the Yanks go down in order in the bottom of the inning to lose 5-4, Brett sells the pine tar bat to a collector for $25,000, but has second thoughts and buys it back, donating it to the baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY (below).

 

On July 25, 1898 during the Spanish-American War, U.S. forces under General Nelson A. Miles (below) invade Puerto Rico, one of Spain’s two principal possessions in the Caribbean. The island is secure by mid-August. In December, the Treaty of Paris ends the Spanish-American War and officially secedes Puerto Rico to the United States.


On July 25, 1943, Benito Mussolini, fascist dictator of Italy, is voted out of power by his own Grand Council and arrested upon leaving his daily meeting with King Vittorio Emanuele, who tells Il Duce that the war is lost. General Pietro Badoglio assumes the duties of prime minister.


On July 25, 1965, Bob Dylan is the headline artist for the annual Newport (Rhode Island) Folk Festival. Five days earlier, Dylan's first venture into the rock and roll genre, "Like A Rolling Stone," hit the radio airwaves, so the audience is not sure what's coming to begin with. The grumbling begins the moment Dylan walks onstage, joined by the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, wearing an electric guitar. Dylan opens with an electric version of his folk hit "Maggie's Farm", and the audience immediately begins jeering. By the third song, its full-on booing and Dylan walks off stage. But "Like A Rolling Stone" is about to hit the top 5 on the rock single charts, and for Dylan there's no turning back in the move from folk to rock.

 

On July 26, 1775, the U.S. postal system is established by the Second Continental Congress, with Benjamin Franklin as its first postmaster general. Franklin, who served as colonial co-postmaster until removed from the position the previous year for his revolutionary activities, put in place the foundation for many aspects of today’s mail system.

On July 26, 1990, President George H.W. Bush signs the Americans with Disabilities Act. The ADA defines the rights of the disabled for the first time in American history. On the same day, 1948, President Harry S. Truman signs an Executive Order desegregating the military.

On July 26, 1933, Joe DiMaggio foreshadows his Hall of Fame future. Held hitless in a Pacific Coast League game for the San Francisco Seals, the 0-fer day ends his 61-game hitting streak, still a PCL record to this day and the second longest consecutive game hitting streak in minor league history (Joe Wilhoit, 69 games, 1919).