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 Flag Day - United States ... On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress replaced the British symbols of the Grand Union flag with a new design featuring 13 white stars in a circle on a field of blue and 13 red and white stripes – one for each state. [hidden image - please register] On the same day, the United States Army celebrates its birthday. |
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The first Vacuum cleaner ... June 8, 1869, the American inventor Ives W. McGaffey patented the world's first vacuum cleaner, named him "Whirlwind" [hidden image - please register] The bulky device worked with a belt driven fan cranked by hand that made it awkward to operate, although it was commercially marketed with mixed success. |
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Sex Pistols - “The gig that changed the world” ... Only a few dozen punters turned up to see the London punk rockers at Manchester's Lesser Free Trade Hall in June 04. 1976 - but they went on to shape modern music and popular culture [hidden image - please register] What was the most important gig of all time? Woodstock? Live Aid? The Beatles’ first night at The Cavern? Some say it was a show watched by about 40 surly Mancunians at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in Manchester in 1976. [hidden image - please register] That early Sex Pistols gig may not sound like the stuff of revolution but it changed the music scene forever. |
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June 03. 1785 - Birthday of Parachute ... The earliest evidence for the parachute dates back to the Renaissance period. The first sketch of a parachute was painted by Leonardo da Vinci in 1483. [hidden image - please register] The modern parachute was invented in the late 18th century by Louis-Sébastien Lenormand in France, who made the first recorded public jump in 1783. Lenormand also sketched his device beforehand. [hidden image - please register] Two years later, in 1785, Lenormand coined the word "parachute" by hybridizing a Latin prefix para, an imperative form of parare = to avert, defend, resist, guard, shield or shroud, from paro = to parry, and chute, the French word for fall, to describe the aeronautical device's real function. In June 03. 1785, Jean-Pierre Blanchard demonstrated it a means as of safely disembarking from a hot-air balloon. Blanchard's first parachute demonstrations were conducted with a dog as the passenger, he later claimed to have had the opportunity to try it himself in 1793 when his hot air balloon ruptured and he used a parachute to descend. |
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Big Ben goes into operation in London ... The famous tower clock known as Big Ben, located at the top of the 320-foot-high St. Stephen’s Tower, rings out over the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, London, for the first time on this day May 31 in 1859. [hidden image - please register] The name “Big Ben” originally just applied to the bell but later came to refer to the clock itself. Two main stories exist about how Big Ben got its name. Many claim it was named after the famously long-winded Sir Benjamin Hall, the London commissioner of works at the time it was built. Another famous story argues that the bell was named for the popular heavyweight boxer Benjamin Caunt, because it was the largest of its kind. |
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May 30. 1431 - Joan of Arc martyred ...
On This Day at Rouen in English-controlled Normandy,[hidden link - please register] , the peasant girl who became the savior of France, is burned at the stake for heresy. [hidden image - please register] Joan’s village of Domremy lay on the frontier between the France of the Dauphin and that of the Anglo-Burgundians. In the midst of this unstable environment, Joan began hearing “voices” of three Christian saints—St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret. When she was about 16, these voices exhorted her to aid the Dauphin in capturing Reims and therefore the French throne. In May 1428, she traveled to Vaucouleurs, a stronghold of the Dauphin, and told the captain of the garrison of her visions. Disbelieving the young peasant girl, he sent her home. In January 1429, she returned, and the captain, impressed by her piety and determination, agreed to allow her passage to the Dauphin at Chinon. |
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May 29. 1985. - One of the blackest pages in the history of world football ...
Thirty-nine people died and 600 were injured when fans were crushed against a wall that then collapsed during the European Cup final between Liverpool and Juventus on the stadion Heysel, after crowd trouble culminated in a surge by Liverpool supporters towards the Italian team's fans. [hidden image - please register] Among those killed were 32 Italians, four Belgians, two French fans and one from Northern Ireland. It resulted in all English football clubs being banned from playing in Europe for five years. Fourteen Liverpool fans were found guilty of manslaughter and each jailed for three years. [hidden link - please register] |
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Volkswagen is founded ... [hidden image - please register] On this day May 28.1937, the government of Germany–then under the control of Adolf Hitler of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party–forms a new state-owned automobile company, then known as Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung des Deutschen Volkswagens mbH. [hidden image - please register] Later that year, it was renamed simply Volkswagenwerk, or “The People’s Car Company.” |
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 Dracula goes on sale in London ... The first copies of the classic vampire novel Dracula, by Irish writer Bram Stoker, appear in London bookshops on this day, 26 May in 1897. [hidden image - please register] Think of books that gave you the chills; books you'd curl up with in front of a fireplace, maybe when you were a traveler at an inn in the dead of winter, or perhaps all alone in a your castle at night. Then think of "Dracula" and you'll instantly be transposed to another time. |
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On This Day - Star Wars opens ... On this day in 1977, Memorial Day weekend opens with an intergalactic bang as the first of George Lucas’ blockbuster Star Wars movies hits American theaters. The incredible success of Star Wars–it received seven Oscars, and earned $461 million in U.S. ticket sales and a gross of close to $800 million worldwide–began with an extensive, coordinated marketing push by Lucas and his studio, 20th Century Fox, months before the movie’s release date. “It wasn’t like a movie opening,” actress Carrie Fisher, who played rebel leader Princess Leia, later told Time magazine. “It was like an earthquake.” Beginning with–in Fisher’s words–“a new order of geeks, enthusiastic young people with sleeping bags,” the anticipation of a revolutionary movie-watching experience spread like wildfire, causing long lines in front of movie theaters across the country and around the world. |
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This Day In History: The Brooklyn Bridge opens ... It's been called the "Eighth Wonder of the World," and on Wednesday, the Brooklyn Bridge turns 134 years old. The Brooklyn Bridge opened on May 24, 1883. [hidden image - please register] German engineer John A. Roebling was hired to design the bridge. He was chosen because he was known for perfecting the suspension bridge by adding a web truss on either side for stabilization. It took 14 years and $15 million (which amounts to more than $320 million in today's dollars) to complete the bridge. When it was finally completed, it was the longest suspension bridge in history at the time. |
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Police kill famous outlaws Bonnie and Clyde ... On this day in May 23. 1934, notorious criminals [hidden link - please register] are shot to death by Texas and Louisiana state police while driving a stolen car near Sailes, Louisiana. [hidden image - please register] All told, the Barrow Gang was believed responsible for the deaths of 13 people, including nine police officers. Parker and Barrow are still seen by many as romantic figures, however, especially after the success of the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, starring Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty. |
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Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle - (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) It’s the birthday of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of master sleuth Sherlock Holmes.... [hidden image - please register] Doyle was born in Scotland and studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh, where he met Dr. Joseph Bell, a teacher with extraordinary deductive reasoning power. Bell partly inspired Doyle’s character Sherlock Holmes years later. |
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May 21. 1904. - Founded (FIFA) [hidden image - please register] The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) was founded in the rear of the headquarters of the Union Française de Sports Athlétiques at the Rue Saint Honoré 229 in Paris on 21 May 1904. [hidden image - please register] The first FIFA Statutes were laid down and the following points determined: the reciprocal and exclusive recognition of the national associations represented and attending; clubs and players were forbidden to play simultaneously for different national associations; recognition by the other associations of a player's suspension announced by an association; and the playing of matches according to the Laws of the Game of the Football Association Ltd. |
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In Germany, opened is a passenger traffic on the world's first electric tram ... The world’s first electric tram, the Groß-Lichterfelde Tramway, began operation on May 16, 1881 in the Lichterfelde neighborhood of Berlin, Germany and was produced by Werner von Siemens. [hidden image - please register] Direct current was supplied through the rails. The tram car is 5m long by 2m wide and weighs 4.8 tonnes. It travels at a maximum speed of 40 kilometres per hour and carries 20 people at a time. In the first three months of operation the tram had already carried 12,000 passengers. |
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