This Week in History: Aug. 28th-Sep. 3rd

Aug 28- 1830: “Tom Thumb,” America’s first locomotive, races a horse-drawn stagecoach from downtown Baltimore to Ellicott Mills. Surprisingly, the race was won by the horse, when “Tom Thumb” experienced mechanical problems, perhaps spawning the expression “healthy as a horse?” 1917: Ten members of the National Woman’s Party, including Alice Paul and Lucy Burns, are arrested for obstructing traffic outside the White House. The “Silent Sentinels” would be treated harshly while incarcerated, resulting in publicity and a public outcry, and President Woodrow Wilson’s decision to become a supporter of women’s suffrage. The 19th Amendment would be ratified in August 1920. 1963: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers his famous “I Have A Dream” speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

Aug 29- 1862: The Second Battle of Bull Run is fought during the American Civil War, with Confederate forces under General Robert E. Lee again routing Union troops. 1997: Netflix is founded in Scotts Valley, CA by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph as a DVD mail order company. 2005: Hurricane Katrina makes landfall in southeastern Louisiana, killing more than 1,800 people and causing over $108 billion in damage, making it one of the worst natural disasters in US history.

New Orlean’s Lower Ninth Ward after Hurricane Katrina
(Photo: National Wildlife Federation)

Aug 30- 1905: Future baseball Hall of Famer Ty Cobb debuts for the Detroit Tigers, contributing a two-base hit in their 5-3 victory over the NY Highlanders. 1914: The Battle of Tannenberg (WWI) ends with the destruction of Russia’s Second Army, as upwards of 150,000 men are killed, injured, or captured. 1963: The “hotline” linking the US Pentagon and the Soviet Union’s Kremlin is established. Even at the start, there was never a phone, red or any color (ruining the image of generals clustered around a “Bat-phone), instead starting off with secured teletype machines, followed by fax and eventually secure email. 1976: Tom Brokaw debuts as a news anchor on NBC’s “Today Show.” 1979: The European Space Agency records the first instance of a comet hitting the Sun. The SOLWIND satellite measured the energy released by comet Howard-Koomen-Michels’ collision as equivalent to ONE MILLION HYDROGEN BOMBS!

Aug 31- 1854: A cholera outbreak in the Soho section of London, England is studied by Dr. John Snow, who is able to identify the source of the outbreak as a single water pump on Broad St. He is credited as one of the founders of modern epidemiology, and an early pioneer in advancing the germ theory of disease. 1888: The body of Mary Ann Nichols is found near Whitechapel in London’s east end. She was the first victim of the notorious murderer known as Jack the Ripper, whose killings remain unsolved to this day. 1897: Thomas Edison patents his “Kinetoscope” camera which is able to photograph and record moving pictures. 1997: Diana, Princess of Wales, dies in a car accident in a Paris, France tunnel as her driver tries to avoid large numbers of news photographers and “paparazzi.”

Sept 1- 1878: Emma Nutt, the first female telephone operator, starts working for the Edwin Holmes Telephone Company in Boston, MA. (And anyone who has even HEARD of a “telephone operator” officially qualifies as old!). 1914: The world’s last passenger pigeon, named Martha, dies in Ohio’s Cincinnati Zoo. 1939: German troops invade Poland, marking the start of World War II. 1962: The UN announces that the world’s population has reached three billion. (Just 60 years later, the total population figure would be EIGHT billion!)

Sept 2- 1666: The Great Fire of London starts around 2:00 AM when a spark from Thomas Farriner’s bakery oven on Pudding Lane ignites dry flour sacks or firewood. 80% of the city would be destroyed. 1864: Union forces under the command of General William T. Sherman capture and occupy Atlanta, GA during the US Civil War. They would set fire to much of the city when leaving two months later on Sherman’s devastating “March to the Sea.” 1945: Japan’s Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signs the Instrument of Surrender aboard the battleship USS Missouri, officially ending World War II and sparking widespread celebration (and relief) as Americans celebrate V-J Day. 1969: The USA’s first Automated Teller Machine (ATM) is installed at Chemical Bank in Rockville Center, NY.

Sept 3- 1752: The British Empire (including their colonies in North America) adopts the Gregorian Calendar (dropping the previously used Julian Calendar), with everyone retiring in the evening of September 2 and waking up on the morning of September 14. According to legend, small groups of British citizens engaged in protests and riots, demanding that the government return the eleven days of their lives that had been “stolen!” 1777: The US Flag, with 13 stars and stripes, flies for the first time in a skirmish at Cooch’s Bridge, DE during the American Revolution, which officially ends in 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris by British and American officials. 1967: The country of Sweden officially switches from driving on the left side of the road to driving on the right, an event known as “Dagen Högertrafikomlāggningen.” (Why didn’t they just call it “chaos?”).