Tuesday, August 9

This Day In History

• 1848   The Free-Soil Party nominated Martin Van Buren for president at its convention in Buffalo, N.Y.
  
• 1831   The first steam locomotive train began its inaugural run, between Albany and Schenectady, in New York.
  
• 1854   Henry David Thoreau published ''Walden,'' which described his experiences living near Walden Pond in Massachusetts.
  
• 1859   Nathan Ames of Saugus, MA patented the escalator.
  
• 1902   Edward VII was crowned king of England following the death of his mother, Queen Victoria.
  
• 1910   Alva J. Fisher of Chicago, IL received a patent for the electric washing machine.
  
• 1936   Jesse Owens won his fourth gold medal at the Berlin Olympics as the United States took first place in the 400-meter relay.
  
• 1945   ‘Fat Man’, a plutonium bomb carried by the U.S.A. B-29 bomber, "Bock’s Car", was scheduled to be dropped on the Japanese city of Kokura. It was three days after the U.S. had dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The weather made visibility poor, so the aircraft passed Kokura and chose its secondary target, Nagasaki. Fat Man destroyed over half of Nagasaki and killed more than 70,000 people. This was the end of World War II. Japan surrendered unconditionally the following day.
  
• 1965   Singapore proclaimed its independence from the Malaysian Federation.
  
• 1969   Actress Sharon Tate and four other people were found murdered in Los Angeles; cult leader Charles Manson and a group of his followers were later convicted of the crime.
  
• 1974   Gerald Ford was sworn in as the 38th president of the United States following the resignation of Richard Nixon.
  
• 1985   A federal judge in Norfolk, Va., found retired Navy officer Arthur J. Walker guilty of seven counts of spying for the Soviet Union.
  
• 1988   President Ronald Reagan nominated Lauro Cavazos to be secretary of education and the first Hispanic to serve in the Cabinet.
  
• 1995   Rock musician Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead died in San Francisco of a heart attack at age 53.
  
• 2000   Bridgestone/Firestone Inc. announced it was recalling 6.5 million tires that had been implicated in hundreds of accidents and at least 46 deaths.
  
• 2001   A suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a central Jerusalem pizzeria, killing 15 other people.
  
• 2001   President George W. Bush approved federal funding only for existing lines of embryonic stem cells.
  
• 2002   Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants hit his 600th homer, becoming the fourth major leaguer to reach the mark.
  
• 2003   Dancer-actor Gregory Hines died at age 57.
  

Happy Birthday To

• 1593   Isaac (Isaak) Walton (fishing expert, author: The Compleat Angler; died Dec 15, 1683)
  
• 1957   Melanie Griffith (actress)
  
• 1963   Whitney Houston (Grammy Award-winning singer)
  
• 1968   Gillian Anderson (actress: The X Files)