On This Date In 1521 The Jiajing (or Chia-ching) Emperor ruled as Emperor of China from 1521 to 1567, and was the 11th emperor of the Ming dynasty. Born Zhu Houcong (September 16, 1507 - January 23, 1567), he was the Zhengde Emperor's cousin. His era name means “Admirable tranquility”.
On This Date In 1647 The first execution of an alleged witch in America took place in Salem, Massachusetts.
On This Date In 1703 After winning access to the Baltic Sea through his victories in the Great Northern War, Czar Peter I founded the city of St. Petersburg as the new Russian capital.
On This Date In 1775 The Battle of Chelsea Creek was the second military engagement of the Boston campaign of the American Revolutionary War, and was fought May 27 - May 28, on Chelsea Creek and on salt marshes, mudflats, and islands of Boston Harbor, northeast of the Boston peninsula. The British colonists met their goal of strengthening the siege of Boston by removing livestock and hay on those islands from the reach of the British regulars. The British armed schooner Diana was also destroyed and its weaponry was appropriated by the Colonial side. This was the first naval capture of the war, and it was a significant boost to the morale of the Colonial forces.
On This Date In 1813 Former President Thomas Jefferson wrote former President John Adams to let him know that their mutual friend, Dr. Benjamin Rush, had died. Rush's passing caused Jefferson to meditate upon the departure of the Revolutionary generation. He wrote, “We too must go; and that ere long. I believe we are under half a dozen at present; I mean the signers of the Declaration.”
On This Date In 1827 Edgar Allen Poe enlisted in the United States Army as a private. Using the name “Edgar A. Perry”, he claimed he was 22 years old even though he was 18. He first served at Fort Independence in Boston Harbor for five dollars a month. That same year, he released his first book, a 40-page collection of poetry, Tamerlane and Other Poems, attributed with the byline “by a Bostonian”.
On This Date In 1831 Jedediah Smith, one of the nation's most important trapper-explorers, was killed by Commanche Indians on the Santa Fe Trail.
On This Date In 1837 Frontiersman, lawman, army scout, gambler, and legendary marksman James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok was born in Troy Grove, Illinois.
On This Date In 1862 The Battle of Hanover Court House, also known as the Battle of Slash Church, was fought in Hanover County, Virginia, as part of the Peninsula Campaign of the American Civil War, and won by Union forces.
On This Date In 1863 Chief Justice Roger B. Taney of Maryland issues Ex parte Merryman, challenging the authority of President Abraham Lincoln and the U.S. military to suspend the writ of habeas corpus (the legal procedure that prevents the government from holding an individual indefinitely without showing cause) in Maryland.
On This Date In 1864 The Battle of Pickett's Mill was fought in Paulding County, Georgia during the American Civil War between Union and victorius Confederate forces.
On This Date In 1896 The 1896 St. Louis - East St. Louis tornado was an historic tornado event as part of a major tornado outbreak across the Central United States on the 27th, and continuing across the Eastern United States on the 28th. Four hundred killed and twelve hundred injured, and over $10 million (1896) were reported on this St. Louis devastation.
On This Date In 1905 During the Russo-Japanese War, the Russian Baltic Fleet was nearly destroyed at the Battle of Tsushima Strait. The decisive defeat, in which only 10 of 45 Russian warships escaped to safety, convinced Russian leaders that further resistance against Japan's imperial designs for East Asia was hopeless. Japan emerged from the conflict as the first modern non-Western world power and set its sights on greater imperial expansion. However, for Russia, its military's disastrous performance in the war was one of the immediate causes of the Russian Revolution of 1905.
On This Date In 1916 “Police”, Charlie Chaplin's 14th film from Essanay, was released. It was made at the Majestic Studio in Los Angeles.
On This Date In 1918 The Third Battle of the Aisne (French: 3e Bataille de L'Aisne) was a battle of the German Spring Offensive during World War I that focused on capturing the Chemin des Dames Ridge before the American Expeditionary Force could arrive completely in France. Heavy casualties on both sides of this conflict initially saw Germany as victorius through its bombardments and poison gas drops. The Allied forces fought back through the days until June 6, when they were successful in halting the German advances.
On This Date In 1933 A Century of Progress International Exposition was held to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the incorporation of the City of Chicago.
On This Date In 1937 San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge was opened to the public for the first time for “Pedestrian Day,” marking the start of the weeklong “Golden Gate Bridge Fiesta” held to celebrate its completion. More than 200,000 people paid twenty-five cents each to walk the bridge. The following day at noon President Franklin Roosevelt, from across the continent at the White House, pressed a telegraph key and the Golden Gate Bridge was officially opened for vehicular use.
On This Date In 1939 Ronald Reagan starred as Treasury Department agent Brass Bancroft in “Code of the Secret Service”, the second film in Warner Bros.'s Secret Service series.
On This Date In 1940 The British evacuation of Dunkirk turned savage as Germans committed atrocity – More here: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/british-evacuation-of-dunkirk-turns-savage-as-germans-commit-atrocity After the war, a British military tribunal in Hamburg found the German officer who gave the "Fire" order, Captain Fritz Knochlein, guilty of a war crime. He was hanged.
On This Date In 1941 President Franklin D. Roosevelt announced a state of unlimited national emergency in response to Nazi Germany's threats of world. In a speech on this day, he repeated his famous remark from a speech he made in 1933 during the Great Depression: the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
On This Date In 1941 The British navy sank the German battleship Bismarck in the North Atlantic near France. The German death toll was more than 2,000.
On This Date In 1944 The Battle of Changsha, also known as the Battle of Hengyang or Campaign of Changsha-Hengyang, was a successful invasion of the Chinese province of Hunan by Japanese troops near the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War.
On This Date In 1948 “Melody Time”, an animated feature produced by Walt Disney, was released to theatres by RKO Radio Pictures. It was the tenth animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series
On This Date In 1954 “Johnny Guitar”, a Republic Pictures feature film starring Joan Crawford, Sterling Hayden, Mercedes McCambridge, and Scott Brady, was released.
On This Date In 1957 “That'll Be The Day” was released as a single, credited to the Crickets to try to bypass Decca's claimed legal rights (because Decca had the original “That'll Be the Day”, it was determined to be unwise to use Buddy Holly's name in the credits). When the song became a hit, Decca decided not to press its claim. http://www.history-of-rock.com/buddy_holly.htm
On This Date In 1963 Bob Dylan released his second album, “The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan”, which goes on to transform him from a popular local act to a global phenomenon.
On This Date In 1965 Augmenting the vital role played by U.S. aircraft carriers, whose planes participated in many of the raids over South and North Vietnam, U.S. warships from the 7th Fleet began to fire on Viet Cong targets in the central area of South Vietnam. At first, this gunfire was limited to 5-inch-gun destroyers, but other ships would eventually be used in the mission.
On This Date In 1971 Sweden Foreign Minister Torsten Nilsson revealed Sweden had been providing assistance to the Viet Cong, including some $550,000 worth of medical supplies. Similar Swedish aid was to go to Cambodian and Laotian civilians affected by the Indochinese fighting. This support was primarily humanitarian in nature and included no military aid.
On This Date In 1972 Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev and U.S. President Richard Nixon, meeting in Moscow, signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) agreements. At the time, these agreements were the most far-reaching attempts to control nuclear weapons ever.
On This Date In 1972 Mark Donohue won the Indianapolis 500 with an average speed of 163.645 miles an hour, six miles an hour faster than the previous speed record.
On This Date In 1975 The 1975 Stanley Cup Final championship series was played by the Buffalo Sabres, making their first Finals appearance and the defending champion Philadelphia Flyers. The Flyers would win the best-of-seven series four games to two. The 1975 Stanley Cup playoffs marked the first time two expansion teams met in the finals. http://www.legendsofhockey.net/LegendsOfHockey/jsp/SilverwareTrophyWinner.jsp?tro=STC&year=1974-75
On This Date In 1985 Through June 9, the Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Boston Celtics four games to two in the best-of-seven NBA Finals series to conclude the 1984-85 NBA season. The victory gave the Lakers their ninth NBA championship and third in the last six seasons.
On This Date In 1994 Two decades after being expelled from the USSR, Nobel laureate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn returned to Russia in an emotional homecoming. Solzhenitsyn died of heart failure in Moscow on August 3, 2008 at the age of 89.
On This Date In 1997 A tornado in Jarrell, Texas, destroyed the town and killed nearly 30 people. This F5 tornado - a rating indicating it had winds of more than 260 miles per hour - was unusual in that it traveled south along the ground; nearly all tornadoes in North America move northeast.
On This Date In 1999 A UN tribunal indicted Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic for crimes against humanity, holding the Yugoslav president personally respsonsible for terrorism in Kosovo.
On This Date In 2003 The 2003 Stanley Cup Finals featured the Eastern Conference finalist, the second-seeded New Jersey Devils, against the Western Conference finalist, the seventh-seeded Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. The Devils defeated the Mighty Ducks in seven games to win their third Stanley Cup in less than a decade.
On This Date In 2006 The May 2006 Java earthquake occurred in the Indian Ocean around 25 km (15 miles) south-southwest of the Indonesian city of Yogyakarta, near Galur, on the southern side of the island of Java, 10 km below the seabed, with a magnitude of 6.3. Two aftershocks, measured at 4.8 and 4.6, occurred between 4 and 6 hours later.
On This Date In 2006 In Swakopmund, Namibia, actors Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt welcomed the arrival of their first biological child, a daughter named Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt.
On This Date In 2009 North Korea withdrew from the 1953 Armistice that ended the Korean war, and warned it could launch a military attack on the South, two days after testing an atomic bomb for the second time.
On This Date In 2010 The head of the troubled U.S. agency that oversees offshore drilling - which President Obama said was “plagued by corruption” at the beginning of his presidency - resigned under pressure, as the president moved more aggressively to take charge of the Gulf oil spill. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/05/27/politics/main6523948.shtml
On This Date In 2010 The South Korean Navy held a large-scale anti-submarine drill in the Yellow Sea amid rising tensions between South Korea and Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).
Hat tip to any included contributing sources, along with: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page , http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history , http://timelines.com/
Happy Birthday Dolores Hope (1909), Henry Kissinger (1923), Harlan Ellison (1934), Lee Meriwether (1935), Sue Simmons (1943), Fritz Coleman (1948), Cynthia McFadden (1956), Nick Lowery (1956), Peri Gilpin (1961), Adam Carolla (1964), Todd Bridges (1965), Joseph Fiennes (1970), Jamie Oliver (1975), and Jose Cortez (1975).
RIP Cornelius Vanderbilt (1794 – 1877), Absalom Willis Robertson (1887 – 1971), Rachel Carson (1907 – 1964), Vincent Price (1911 – 1993), and Lisa Lopes (1971 – 2002).
Quotes:
Memorial Day is the occasion this nation sets aside to remember, to grieve, and to honor those who chose or were compelled to sacrifice their lives in behalf of a cause they believed or were told was just. Those of us who have known war hear the cries of the dying forever echo in our minds and suffer the pain and loss each day of our lives. We need no holiday to remind us. Camillo Mac Bica
Are they dead that yet speak louder than we can speak, and a more universal language? Are they dead that yet act? Are they dead that yet move upon society and inspire the people with nobler motives and more heroic patriotism? Henry Ward Beecher
To protect the home of the brave and the land of the free, brave men and women of our armed forces daily defend this nation's principles of Freedom and Liberty. Tom Baker aka The Pondering Man
Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it. Mark Twain
Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime. Adlai E. Stevenson
The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism.... It should be the highest ambition of every American to extend his views beyond himself, and to bear in mind that his conduct will not only affect himself, his country, and his immediate posterity; but that its influence may be co-extensive with the world, and stamp political happiness or misery on ages yet unborn. George Washington
Courtesy YouTube et al:
Storm Chasers Jeff Piotrowski and Kathryn Piotrowski tracked the Joplin Tornado through the city of Joplin, MO. This is just a small sampling of the video that was shot during this severe weather event. Jeff and Kathryn were first on the scene of the tornado's destructive path and stopped to help pull persons out of the rubble. Also Jeff Facebooked and Tweeted sending out pleas for help. Tragic, this tornado will go down in the history books.
I was the first helicopter on the scene. Shot with an iPhone 4. Massive damage and many fatalities.
I FILMED IT! http://secularstupidest.com Herman Cain lead a Q&A session at the Douglas County Tea Party when a young woman asked him about the attack by the Left on our Judeo-Christian heritage in America...He addressed her question, then went to the last question of the night, and the crowd was not expecting what happened next...
Remember, Honor and Celebrate:
Our freedom to do so brought to us by those whose acts of heroism and patriotism allow us our tomorrows – yes, Happy Memorial Day!
Lyrics (Francis Scott Key 1814):
O! say can you see by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming.
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave,
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines on the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
O! say can you see by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming.
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave,
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines on the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
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