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Category: Community
Forum: Chat Room
Thread: This Day in History |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 5 1961:
From Cape Canaveral, Florida, Navy Commander Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr. is launched into space aboard the Freedom 7 space capsule, becoming the first American astronaut to travel into space. The suborbital flight, which lasted 15 minutes and reached a height of 116 miles into the atmosphere, was a major triumph for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 6 1937:
The German zeppelin Hindenburg catches fire and is destroyed within a minute while attempting to dock at Lakehurst, New Jersey. Thirty-six people are killed. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 6 1911:
George Maledon, the man who executed at least 60 men for "Hanging Judge" Isaac Parker, dies from natural causes in Tennessee. Few men actively seek out the job of hangman and Maledon was no exception. Raised by German immigrants in Detroit, Michigan, Maledon moved to Fort Smith, Arkansas, in his late teens and joined the city police force. He joined the Union Army during the Civil War, and he then returned to Fort Smith where he was appointed a U.S. deputy marshal. The town also had occasional need of an executioner, and Maledon agreed to take on the grisly task in addition to his regular duties as a marshal. Maledon wound up with more business than he expected. In 1875, President Ulysses S. Grant appointed a young prosecuting attorney named Isaac Parker to be the federal judge of the Western District of Arkansas. Headquartered at Fort Smith, the Western District was one of the most notoriously corrupt in the country, and it included the crime-ridden Indian Territory to the west (in present-day Oklahoma). Indian Territory had become a refuge for rustlers, murderers, thieves, and fugitives, and Parker's predecessor often accepted bribes to look the other way. Assigned an unprecedented force of 200 U.S. marshals to restore order, Parker began a massive dragnet that led to the arrest of many criminals. A friend of the Indians and more sympathetic to the victims of crimes than the criminals, Parker doled out swift justice in his court. In his first months in session he tried 91 defendants and sentenced eight of them to hang. It was Maledon's job to carry out Judge Parker's death sentences. Paid $100 for each hanging, Maledon willingly accepted the work. He tried to be a conscientious hangman who minimized suffering with a quick death. Maledon said he considered the job "honorable and respectable work and I mean to do it well." In all, Maledon is believed to have hanged about 60 men and to have shot five more who tried to escape. Subsequent sensational accounts of the Fort Smith "Hanging Judge" unfairly painted Parker as a cruel sadist with Maledon as his willing henchman. Yet, it is well to keep in mind that 65 marshals were also killed in the line of duty attempting to bring law and order to Indian Territory during Parker's term. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
On May 7:
1915 – World War I: German submarine U-20 sinks RMS Lusitania, killing 1,198 people including 128 Americans. Public reaction to the sinking turns many formerly pro-Germans in the United States against the German Empire. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Lusitania |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 7 1945:
General Alfred Jodl, as the representative of Karl Dönitz, signs unconditional surrender terms at Reims, France, ending Germany's participation in the war. The document takes effect the next day. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 7 1902:
Martinique’s Mount Pele begins the deadliest volcanic eruption of the 20th century. The following day, the city of Saint Pierre, which some called the “Paris” of the Caribbean, was virtually wiped off the map. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 10 1869:
The presidents of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads meet in Promontory, Utah, and drive a ceremonial last spike into a rail line that connects their railroads. This made transcontinental railroad travel possible for the first time in U.S. history. No longer would western-bound travelers need to take the long and dangerous journey by wagon train, and the West would surely lose some of its wild charm with the new connection to the civilized East. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
On May 11:
1997 - "Deep Blue," an IBM computer, defeated Garry Kasparov in a six-game chess match, who lost the match 2.5 to 3.5. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
May 16 1849:
The New York City Board of Health is finally able to establish a hospital to deal with a cholera epidemic that, before it ends, kills more than 5,000 people. The rapidly growing city was ripe for an epidemic of this kind because of poor health conditions and its status as a destination for immigrants from around the world. |
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pcwr
Ace Cruncher England Joined: Sep 17, 2005 Post Count: 10903 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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May 17 1884
----------------------------------------Alaska becomes a U.S. territory  |
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