Entries from Now @ MPL... tagged with 'History'
Birthday of Clarence Darrow
Clarence Darrow, the most renowned American lawyer of the early 1900's, was born on April 18, 1857. He became famous as a defender of labor after representing Eugene V. Debs and other union officials who were arrested for supporting the...
"Everywhere the Glint of Gold"
February 16 marks an important day in the history of archeology. It was on this day that after six years of searching and months of digging,Tutankhamun's burial chamber was finally opened. Howard Carter, the chief archeologist on the dig, described...
The Birthday of Jules Verne
Jules Verne, the author sometimes referred to as the father of science fiction, was born on February 8, 1828 in Nantes, France. Although his works were written before the invention of the airplane, they predicted not only planes, but television,...
L'assassinat du citoyen Marat
On July 13, 1793, Charlotte Corday, a Royalist sympathizer, stabbed to death Jean Paul Marat, one of the most outspoken leaders of the French Revolution. Regarding Marat an an arch enemy of France, she planned to kill him at the...
The Eruption of Mount St. Helens
On the morning of May 18, 1980, an earthquake shook the volcanic Mount St. Helens in southwestern Washington, triggering a gigantic landslide of ice and rock followed by a violent explosion of steam and gases. The eruption killed 57 people,...
50th Anniversary of the Freedom Ride Movement
On May 4, 1961, the civil rights group CORE (Congress of Racial Equality) organized the freedom rides, integrated bus rides meant to draw attention to failures to adhere to a Supreme Court decision prohibiting discrimination in interstate travel. Volunteers, black...
Sidney Poitier Wins the Oscar for Best Actor
On April 13, 1964, at the 36th annual Academy Awards ceremony, Sidney Poitier became the first African-american to win an Oscar for Best Actor. In the film Lilies of the Field, Poitier portrays an unemployed construction worker who is hired...
2001: A Space Odyssey
April 6, 1968 marked the debut of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Co-written by Kubrick and science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke, the movie became a landmark in film history. To generations that have grown up on fast-paced, special...
Happy Birthday, Eiffel Tower!
Construction on the Eiffel Tower was completed 122 years ago today. It took 2 years, 2 months and 5 days to build and was only expected to last for 20 years. The Eiffel Tower still stands today and has almost...
Exxon Valdez Oil Spill
Twenty-two years ago today the Exxon Valdez oil tanker struck the Bligh Reef and dumped 11 million gallons of oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound. The spill damaged more than 1,300 miles of shoreline, killed hundreds of thousands of birds...
"Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death"
On March 23, 1775, orator and statesman Patrick Henry gave a rousing speech to the Virginia Provincial Convention, urging that the Virginia militia be armed for defense of the colony against England. The text of the speech was not published...
The Scarlet Letter
On March 16, 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel The Scarlet Letter was published. This masterpiece of American literature, like many other of Hawthorne's works, is set in the Puritan New England of the 17th century, a time period which haunted the...
February 23, 1945 - U.S. Flag Raised on Iwo Jima
The World War II Battle of Iwo Jima was immortalized in what would become the only photograph to win the Pulitzer Prize for Photography in the same year as its publication, and has come to be considered one of the...
Fifty Years Ago Today
Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy. One way to commemorate this day is to go to the Website of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. From this site you can access...
Quoth the Raven, "Happy Birthday to You"
Edgar Allen Poe, one of America's most famous men of letters, was born on January 19th, 1809 to a pair of travelling actors. His father abandoned the family while Poe was an infant, and his mother died before his third...
The Golden Gate Bridge
On January 5, 1933, construction began on one of America's most famous landmarks: the Golden Gate Bridge connecting San Francisco and Marin County, California. Since opening to the public in May 1937, almost two billion vehicles have crossed the bridge....
It Was 30 Years Ago Today
It was a cold and snowy December in 1980 New York City and it seemed to get a lot colder on the 8th, when fans around the world started hearing the news that John Lennon, former member of the seminal...
Mrs. Parks and the Cleveland Avenue Bus
On December 1, 1955, seamstress and civil rights activist Rosa Parks refused a city bus driver's orders to give up her seat for a white passenger. Although her action was not the first of its kind, it became the trigger...
The Sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald
On November 10, 1975, the Edmund Fitzgerald, a giant transport ship, was caught in a raging storm while crossing Lake Superior. Late that afternoon, the ship's captain radioed that "Big Fitz" was taking on water and had top-side damage. The...
Feliz cumpleaños to Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, considered the preminent writer in Spanish literature and one of the greatest authors in any language, was born on or about September 29, 1547. His life experiences, which ranged from being an avid reader and a...
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