Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Tuesday, May 10

This Day In History

  • 1774   Louis XVI ascended the throne of France.
  • 1775   Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys captured the British-held fortress at Ticonderoga, N.Y.
  • 1818   American patriot Paul Revere died in Boston.
  • 1865   Union forces captured Confederate President Jefferson Davis in Irwinville, Ga.
  • 1899   Actor-dancer Fred Astaire was born in Omaha, Neb.
  • 1908   The first Mother's Day observance took place during church services in Grafton, W.Va., and Philadelphia.
  • 1924   J. Edgar Hoover was given the job of FBI director.
  • 1933   The Nazis staged massive public book burnings in Germany.
  • 1940   British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain resigned, and Winston Churchill formed a new government.
  • 1941   Adolf Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess, parachuted into Scotland on what he claimed was a peace mission.
  • 1968   Preliminary Vietnam peace talks began in Paris.
  • 1994   Former President George H.W. Bush's office released his letter of resignation from the National Rifle Association, in which Bush expressed outrage over its reference to federal agents as ''jackbooted government thugs.''
  • 1994   The state of Illinois executed convicted serial killer John Wayne Gacy for the murders of 33 young men and boys.
  • 1997   An earthquake in northeastern Iran killed at least 2,400 people.
  • 2000   A fire, set deliberately to clear brush from the path of a wildfire, was driven by high winds into a New Mexico canyon, forcing the evacuation of the 11,000 residents of Los Alamos.
  • 2002   A tense 39-day standoff between Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem ended with 13 suspected militants flown into European exile and 26 released into the Gaza Strip.
  • 2003   The New York Times announced on its Web site that one of its reporters, Jayson Blair, had "committed frequent acts of journalistic fraud," according to an investigation conducted by the paper.
Happy Birthday To
  • 1899   Fred Astaire (Austerlitz)
  • 1921   Nancy Walker (Ann Myrtle Swoyer) (actress: McMillan and Wife)

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