This Date in History

  • Thread starter Thread starter nycfan
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies: 463
  • Views: 7K
  • Off-Topic 
donbosco said:
IMG_7599.jpeg
Click to expand...
Wilt said that often people would come up to him and claim they were "in the stands" that night in Madison Square Garden when he scored 100. Wilt said he would just smile and thank them for their support without mentioning the game was played in Hersey, PA
 
IMG_7606.jpeg

#OTD in 1923 Doc Watson was born in Deep Gap, Watauga County, NC. Blind from a childhood eye infection, he attended Gov Morehead School in Raleigh. Musically inclined early, the guitar became his primary instrument-early on he adapted fast fiddle parts with his unique style. The Folk Revival of ‘60s brought him into the light and to the world. Later his son, Merle, joined him. Doc Watson passed in 2012 but a renowned music festival, named Merlefest after his son who pre-deceased him, carries on the music. Guitar Virtuoso “Doc” Watson—A Late Bloomer

When I moved to Boone in the early ‘80s I was fortunate that one of the first people that I met was Merle Watson. It was a fluke — a friend of a friend of a friend introduced us. After that, on occasion he stopped by when I was tending at the Tijuana Fats’ in Blowing Rock, sat at my bar, and had a Dos Equis or two. Those mountains were full of music in those days and by way of that connection I heard some incredible front porch playing by the likes of Merle and friends of his like T. Michael Coleman, Gove Scrivenor, Jack Lawrence, and Joe Smothers - regulars up in the wide and high expanse of Watauga and Avery.

I went to a BBQ joint pretty often back then (the early 1980s) called ‘The Woodlands.’ Butch and Gina ran the place and the food was good and the music tended to match it. Phil Stinson on the piano singing tunes that we all knew was probably my favorite thing about the place but the Q was pretty tasty too. P.B. Scott’s music hall was nearby and among others of lesser renown I caught B.B. King and The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band there before its rude and untimely demise.

I met Doc during that time as well. I probably only had a couple of conversations with him and those only light, pre-show ones. I was kind of awe-struck really. His voice and his presence were big and intense and precise and he was generally friendly though busy and very professional. He clearly had his Way. Showtime was SHOWtime.
 
Last edited:
IMG_7608.jpeg

#OTD (March 3) in 1865 Confederate Home Guard captured and executed Allen (father) and William (son) Lowry. The Lowrys were Lumbee and entangled with a gang of resistors to Rebel conscription and forced labor. The “Lowry Gang” was led by Allen Lowry’s son Henry Berry Lowry. Over the next seven years the resistance continued and the gang became the scourge of whites and heroes to The Lumbee. Henry Berry gained a reputation as “Robin Hood come again” in the press of the day.



(Feb. 16) 1872 Lumbee Legend Henry Berry Lowry and accomplices made their last raid in Robeson Cty, taking $28K. He disappeared 4 days later and was never publicly heard from again. The story is complex & debated. Start reading here: Tar heel junior historian [2000 : spring, v.39 : no.2] - North Carolina Digital Collections

(Image is a painting by Phil Blank after a photo of Lowry - which is also spelled Lowrie.
 
donbosco said:
IMG_7606.jpeg

#OTD in 1923 Doc Watson was born in Deep Gap, Watauga County, NC. Blind from a childhood eye infection, he attended Gov Morehead School in Raleigh. Musically inclined early, the guitar became his primary instrument-early on he adapted fast fiddle parts with his unique style. The Folk Revival of ‘60s brought him into the light and to the world. Later his son, Merle, joined him. Doc Watson passed in 2012 but a renowned music festival, named Merlefest after his son who pre-deceased him, carries on the music. Guitar Virtuoso “Doc” Watson—A Late Bloomer

When I moved to Boone in the early ‘80s I was fortunate that one of the first people that I met was Merle Watson. It was a fluke — a friend of a friend of a friend introduced us. After that, on occasion he stopped by when I was tending at the Tijuana Fats’ in Blowing Rock, sat at my bar, and had a Dos Equis or two. Those mountains were full of music in those days and by way of that connection I heard some incredible front porch playing by the likes of Merle and friends of his like T. Michael Coleman, Gove Scrivenor, Jack Lawrence, and Joe Smothers - regulars up in the wide and high expanse of Watauga and Avery.

I went to a BBQ joint pretty often back then (the early 1980s) called ‘The Woodlands.’ Butch and Gina ran the place and the food was good and the music tended to match it. Phil Stinson on the piano singing tunes that we all knew was probably my favorite thing about the place but the Q was pretty tasty too. P.B. Scott’s music hall was nearby and among others of lesser renown I caught B.B. King and The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band there before its rude and untimely demise.

I met Doc during that time as well. I probably only had a couple of conversations with him and those only light, pre-show ones. I was kind of awe-struck really. His voice and his presence were big and intense and precise and he was generally friendly though busy and very professional. He clearly had his Way. Showtime was SHOWtime.
Click to expand...
Posted in music thread some time ago. In 5th or 6th grade alll us kids went outside and sat in the grass where we watchd and listened to a blind guy sing. Froggy Went a Courtin was the big hit..
 
Last edited:
Re: Doc Watson - Merle once told me about taking bus trips with Doc when he was in his early teens to places like Chicago and New York City in search of blues legends. He said those journeys took them into some inner city situations that scared him to death but Doc was determined. He also said that if Doc could have seen the world around them he might have reconsidered. But the good son was his father’s eyes and persevered. They also found what/who they were looking for often and he said that once Doc pulled out his guitar all was well.
 
1934. NAmerican bank robber John Dillinger made a daring escape from prison at Crown Point, Indiana.
John Dillinger (born June 22, 1903, Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.—died July 22, 1934, Chicago, Illinois) was an American criminal who was perhaps the most famous bank robber in U.S. history, known for a series of robberies and escapes from June 1933 to July 1934.

1741005109759.jpeg

Dillinger, who was born in Indianapolis, had a difficult childhood. When he was three years old, his mother died, and he later had a strained relationship with his stepmother. Often in trouble, he eventually dropped out of school. The family subsequently settled on a farm in nearby Mooresville, but the relocation had little effect on Dillinger’s behaviour. In 1923 he joined the navy and served on the USS Utah before deserting after only a few months. Dillinger then returned to Indiana. In September 1924 he was caught in the foiled holdup of a Mooresville grocer, and he served much of the next decade in Indiana State Prison. While incarcerated, he learned the craft of bank robbery from fellow inmates. Upon parole on May 10, 1933, he turned his knowledge to profit, robbing (with one to four confederates) five Indiana and Ohio banks in four months and gaining his first notoriety as a daring, sharply dressed gunman.
In September 1933 Dillinger was captured and jailed in Ohio. However, the following month he was rescued by five former convict pals whose own escape from Indiana State Prison he had earlier financed and plotted; a sheriff was killed during the incident. Dillinger and his gang next robbed banks in Indiana and Wisconsin and fled south to Florida and then to Tucson, Arizona, where they were discovered and arrested by local police. Dillinger was extradited to Indiana and lodged in the Crown Point jail, which was considered escape-proof. However, on March 3, 1934, he executed his most-celebrated breakout. With a razor and a piece of wood, he carved a fake pistol, blackened it with shoe polish, and used it to force his way past a dozen guards to freedom, singing as he left, “I’m heading for the last roundup.” Dillinger then drove the sheriff’s car to Chicago. By taking a stolen vehicle across state lines, he committed a federal offense, and the FBI launched its own manhunt.

There followed more bank robberies with new confederates, notably Baby Face Nelson. Over the course of Dillinger’s yearlong crime spree, several people were killed by his gang, and he barely escaped FBI entrapments and shootouts in Minnesota and Wisconsin. He eventually made his way to Chicago, where he reportedly had plastic surgery to alter his appearance. His end came through a trap set up by the FBI, Indiana police, and Anna Sage (alias of Ana Cumpanas), a brothel madam who knew Dillinger’s girlfriend. Sage informed law officers that she and the couple would be seeing a movie on the night of July 22, 1934. The trio ultimately went to the Biograph Theater. Although Sage was later described as “the woman in red,” she was actually wearing an orange skirt to make herself easily visible. After a showing of the crime drama Manhattan Melodrama (1934), Dillinger emerged to find FBI agents waiting for him. He attempted to escape but was shot to death in the alley.

Some researchers have claimed that another man, not Dillinger, was killed outside the Biograph and that Dillinger’s allies accomplished a hoax on the FBI, leaving him free to disappear. However, fingerprints from the body matched those taken from Dillinger in previous arrests.
 
On this day in 1943 the Cardinal was designated the North Carolina State Bird. The Tar Heel State has been without a state bird for a decade. There's more though...in 1933 the North Carolina Women's Club held a contest and the Carolina Chickadee was chosen for the honor but a week after the General Assembly's decree the Chickadee was banished from its post for fear that Sub Carolinians and Virginians might latch onto that bird's "other" name and dub North Carolina the Tom-Tit State.

waltermagazine.com

Not a Smooth Flight: The Story of Our State Bird - WALTER Magazine

By 1943, North Carolina was one of only two states without a state bird — here’s how the Northern cardinal got the nod.
waltermagazine.com waltermagazine.com
 
Pretty big deal. Lasted 236 years. (Some may ague not). Will it survive this year?

1789 The U.S. Constitution went into effect as the governing law of the United States, the date having been established by Congress.

Constitution of the United States of America, the fundamental law of the U.S. federal system of government and a landmark document of the Western world. The oldest written national constitution in use, the Constitution defines the principal organs of government and their jurisdictions and the basic rights of citizens. (For a list of amendments to the U.S. Constitution, see below.)

www.archives.gov

The Constitution of the United States: A Transcription

[get-content name="print-page-left" include-tag="false" /] Note: The following text is a transcription of the Constitution as it was inscribed by Jacob Shallus on parchment (the document on display in the Rotunda at the National Archives Museum.) The spelling and punctuation reflect the original.
www.archives.gov www.archives.gov

1741092694941.jpeg
 

IMG_7642.jpeg​

​

“Apartheid amendment fails to catch on​

On this day in 1915: The N.C. Senate rejects Clarence Poe’s plan for a “Great Rural Civilization.”

Fearing that the migration of young people into the already crowded cities was undermining society, Poe — the influential editor of the Progressive Farmer — drafted a plan that strangely foreshadowed Floyd McKissick’s ill-fated Soul City experiment of the 1970s.

While visiting the British Isles in 1912, Poe had interviewed a white South African, who persuaded him that apartheid offered whites the best opportunity to help blacks.

Framed as an amendment to the state constitution, Poe’s plan empowered voters in a rural district to prohibit land sales to persons of the minority race. Although this provision would not force anyone to leave, Poe believed that ultimately the countryside would be dotted with quiet, pastoral villages, either all-white or all-black.

Although Poe enlisted such influential allies as Josiah Bailey, later a U.S. senator, and Julian Carr, the Bull Durham magnate, his plan stirred hornets’ nests of protest across the South.

After the 1915 General Assembly, more concerned with the World War raging in Europe, votes down the proposed amendment, the “Great Rural Civilization” will not be heard of again.”

Poe was from Chatham County and my father knew him, though not well. He was a conundrum and quite a good example of the ‘Progressive’ Paradox that could be NC in the early years of the 20th century.

 

Iconic photo of Che Guevara taken​


Moments before he was shot to death by a soldier of the Bolivian government, the revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara told his executioner, “Shoot, coward! You are only going to kill a man!” Guevara died a short time later, on October 9, 1967 at the age of 39, but he was correct in his assertion that this would not be the end of his legacy. Today, that legacy almost always takes the form of a single photograph, Guerrillero Heroico, which some have called the most famous photograph in the world.

1741181280834.jpeg

That photo was taken on March 5, 1960, seven years before Guevara’s death, at a funeral for workers killed in an explosion in a Cuban port that Fidel Castro’s revolutionary government blamed on the Americans. Guevara, a general in the revolution and the intellectual heavyweight of Castro’s regime, looked on as Castro delivered his fiery funeral oration. For about thirty seconds, he stepped to the front of a crowd near Castro’s rostrum, into the view of newspaper photographer Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez, also known as Alberto Korda. Korda snapped two shots of Guevara, his face resolute and his long hair flowing from under his trademark beret, before Guevara retreated back into the crowd. Perhaps due to his background as a fashion photographer, Korda took a liking to one of the images and cropped it into a portrait, even though the newspaper La Revolución declined to use it.

For several years, the now-iconic photo remained nothing more than a personal favorite of the man who took it. Korda named the picture Guerrillero Heroico—“Heroic Guerrilla Warrior”—and hung it on his wall, occasionally handing out copies to guests. It was not until 1967 that the public would first see the image, which appeared in the magazine Paris Match alongside an article about Latin American guerilla movements.

Guevara was killed in October of that year, captured while fighting with Bolivian revolutionaries. During his memorial service in Havana, an enormous print of Guerrillero Heroico was hung over the façade of the Ministry of the Interior. The service marked Che’s canonization as a martyr of global revolution, as well as the ascendance of Korda’s image as an icon of rebellion.

The following year the image of Guevara went viral. It appeared on the cover of a copy of Guevara's memoirs, published in Italy. It was also used as the cover of a literary journal advertised on the New York City subway. In the same year, Irish artist Jim Fitzpatrick created a stylized version of the image, setting a black-and-white Guevara against a red background, and distributed it as widely as he could to honor Guevara’s legacy. A poster bearing Fitzpatrick’s image was shown at the Arts Laboratory in London. 1968 was a year of upheaval across the world, and Guevara's image featured prominently during the student riots that swept France in May, the populist protests of Italy’s “Hot Autumn” and the nonviolent, surrealist-inspired demonstrations of the Dutch “Provos.”

In addition to being held aloft at protests or hung in the homes of his admirers, Guevara's image has become popular as a fashion statement, adorning t-shirts and posters wherever counterculture is revered. Rage Against the Machine used a modified version of the image as the cover for their 1993 single “Bombtrack,” and Madonna referenced it on the cover of her 2003 album American Life. Korda succeeded in stopping Smirnoff Vodka from using his photo in one of its campaigns, but it has appeared in countless other advertisements, including ads by Nike and a campaign by Taco Bell which featured a Chihuahua in revolutionary garb.
 

Attachments

  • 1741180945059.jpeg
    1741180945059.jpeg
    20.1 KB · Views: 1
Lots of good stuff today. Going wiith this. Everyone I know who visited came away with "much smaller than I thought".

Alamo, 18th-century Franciscan mission in San Antonio, Texas, U.S., that was the site of a historic resistance effort by a small group of determined fighters for Texan independence (1836) from Mexico.

1741267585533.jpeg

The building was originally the chapel of the Mission San Antonio de Valero, which had been founded between 1716 and 1718 by Franciscans. Before the end of the century, the mission had been abandoned and the buildings fell into partial ruin. After 1801 the chapel was occupied sporadically by Spanish troops. Apparently, it was during that period that the old chapel became popularly known as “the Alamo” because of the grove of cottonwood trees in which it stood.

December 1835, at the opening of the Texas Revolution (War of Texas Independence), a detachment of Texan volunteers, many of whom were recent arrivals from the United States, drove a Mexican force from San Antonio and occupied the Alamo. Some Texan leaders—including Sam Houston, who had been named commanding general of the Texas army the month before—counseled the abandonment of San Antonio as impossible to defend with the small body of troops available, but the rugged bunch of volunteers at the Alamo refused to retire from their exposed position.

On February 23, 1836, a Mexican army, variously estimated at 1,800–6,000 men and commanded by Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna, arrived from south of the Rio Grande and immediately began a siege of the Alamo. Estimates of the size of the small defending force (including some later arrivals) usually vary between 183 and 189 men, though some historians believe that figure may have been larger. That force was commanded by Colonels James Bowie and William B. Travis and included the renowned frontiersman Davy Crockett. At the beginning of the siege, Travis dispatched “To the People of Texas & all Americans in the world” an impassioned letter requesting support. For 13 days the Alamo’s defenders held out, but on the morning of March 6 the Mexicans stormed through a breach in the outer wall of the courtyard and overwhelmed the Texan forces. Santa Anna had ordered that no prisoners be taken, and virtually all the defenders were slain (only about 15 persons, mostly women and children, were spared). The Mexicans suffered heavy casualties as well; credible reports suggest between 600 and 1,600 were killed and perhaps 300 were wounded.

1741267677439.jpeg

For many years after 1845—the year that Texas was annexed by the United States—the Alamo was used by the U.S. Army for quartering troops and storing supplies. In 1883 the state of Texas purchased the Alamo, and in 1903 it acquired the title to the remainder of the old mission grounds. The Alamo and its adjacent buildings have been restored and are maintained as a state historic site. They are managed on a daily basis by the Daughters of the Republic of Texas (1891), a women’s organization composed of descendants of Texan pioneers. In 2015 the Alamo along with four other 18th-century Spanish missions nearby and a historic ranch to the southeast in Floresville were collectively designated a UNESCO World Heritage site.
 
grimes70 said:
Lots of good stuff today. Going wiith this. Everyone I know who visited came away with "much smaller than I thought".

Alamo, 18th-century Franciscan mission in San Antonio, Texas, U.S., that was the site of a historic resistance effort by a small group of determined fighters for Texan independence (1836) from Mexico.

1741267585533.jpeg

The building was originally the chapel of the Mission San Antonio de Valero, which had been founded between 1716 and 1718 by Franciscans. Before the end of the century, the mission had been abandoned and the buildings fell into partial ruin. After 1801 the chapel was occupied sporadically by Spanish troops. Apparently, it was during that period that the old chapel became popularly known as “the Alamo” because of the grove of cottonwood trees in which it stood.

December 1835, at the opening of the Texas Revolution (War of Texas Independence), a detachment of Texan volunteers, many of whom were recent arrivals from the United States, drove a Mexican force from San Antonio and occupied the Alamo. Some Texan leaders—including Sam Houston, who had been named commanding general of the Texas army the month before—counseled the abandonment of San Antonio as impossible to defend with the small body of troops available, but the rugged bunch of volunteers at the Alamo refused to retire from their exposed position.

On February 23, 1836, a Mexican army, variously estimated at 1,800–6,000 men and commanded by Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna, arrived from south of the Rio Grande and immediately began a siege of the Alamo. Estimates of the size of the small defending force (including some later arrivals) usually vary between 183 and 189 men, though some historians believe that figure may have been larger. That force was commanded by Colonels James Bowie and William B. Travis and included the renowned frontiersman Davy Crockett. At the beginning of the siege, Travis dispatched “To the People of Texas & all Americans in the world” an impassioned letter requesting support. For 13 days the Alamo’s defenders held out, but on the morning of March 6 the Mexicans stormed through a breach in the outer wall of the courtyard and overwhelmed the Texan forces. Santa Anna had ordered that no prisoners be taken, and virtually all the defenders were slain (only about 15 persons, mostly women and children, were spared). The Mexicans suffered heavy casualties as well; credible reports suggest between 600 and 1,600 were killed and perhaps 300 were wounded.

1741267677439.jpeg

For many years after 1845—the year that Texas was annexed by the United States—the Alamo was used by the U.S. Army for quartering troops and storing supplies. In 1883 the state of Texas purchased the Alamo, and in 1903 it acquired the title to the remainder of the old mission grounds. The Alamo and its adjacent buildings have been restored and are maintained as a state historic site. They are managed on a daily basis by the Daughters of the Republic of Texas (1891), a women’s organization composed of descendants of Texan pioneers. In 2015 the Alamo along with four other 18th-century Spanish missions nearby and a historic ranch to the southeast in Floresville were collectively designated a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Click to expand...
I’d read and heard about how small the Alamo is; so, when I visited it, I had the opposite feeling - it was larger than I expected.
 
Zoo_View said:
I’d read and heard about how small the Alamo is; so, when I visited it, I had the opposite feeling - it was larger than I expected.
Click to expand...
That was a problem the defenders had and why some advocated abandoning the site. The perimeter was too big for the numbers they had. This made it easier for the Mexicans to breech the wall and overwhelm the defenders.
In his autobiography, US Grant said he would have hung Santa Ana as a war criminal if he had been Sam Houston for wiping out the garrison.
 
IMG_7679.jpeg

#OTD (March 7) in 1914 19 year old George Herman Ruth hit his 1st Professional HR in Fayetteville and gained the nickname ‘Babe.’ The Baltimore Orioles, his team, was headed to Florida for spring practice and had stopped to play a game. His manager Jack Dunn had legally adopted the young ball player and combined with his playfulness teammates dubbed him ‘Babe.’

The Babe later remarked, “I got to some bigger places than Fayetteville after that but darn few as exciting.”

Spring training was then, and is now, underway but as we are in the very heart of the Madness of March at present in honor of the month the photo is from 1921 and shows Babe Ruth in the uniform of the “Ruth All Stars” of Passaic, New Jersey. A newspaper wrote that he played like “an enthusiastic elephant.” That season once on the diamond he hit .378 with 59 home runs for hated The Yankees.

“Babe” Ruth Gets His Nickname in Fayetteville

For a bit about his time as a cager read here: Babe Ruth: Baller
 
Timing. Just purchashed a satelite phone rental for my brother's Australia cruise. How things have changed.

On March 7, 1876, 29-year-old Alexander Graham Bell receives a patent for his revolutionary new invention: the telephone.

The Scottish-born Bell worked in London with his father, Melville Bell, who developed Visible Speech, a written system used to teach speaking to the deaf. In the 1870s, the Bells moved to Boston, Massachusetts, where the younger Bell found work as a teacher at the Pemberton Avenue School for the Deaf. He later married one of his students, Mabel Hubbard.

1741355052358.jpeg

While in Boston, Bell became very interested in the possibility of transmitting speech over wires. Samuel F.B. Morse’s invention of the telegraph in 1843 had made nearly instantaneous communication possible between two distant points. The drawback of the telegraph, however, was that it still required hand-delivery of messages between telegraph stations and recipients, and only one message could be transmitted at a time. Bell wanted to improve on this by creating a “harmonic telegraph,” a device that combined aspects of the telegraph and record player to allow individuals to speak to each other from a distance.

10 Things You May Not Know About Alexander Graham Bell

With the help of Thomas A. Watson, a Boston machine shop employee, Bell developed a prototype. In this first telephone, sound waves caused an electric current to vary in intensity and frequency, causing a thin, soft iron plate–called the diaphragm–to vibrate. These vibrations were transferred magnetically to another wire connected to a diaphragm in another, distant instrument. When that diaphragm vibrated, the original sound would be replicated in the ear of the receiving instrument. Three days after filing the patent, the telephone carried its first intelligible message—the famous “Mr. Watson, come here, I need you”—from Bell to his assistant.

Not your normal Watson Come here:

 
⚖️ On This Day in History – 1774: King George III Acts Against Boston ⚖️


On March 7, 1774, King George III formally charged the colonists in Boston with attempting to harm British commerce, following the rebellious actions of the Boston Tea Party. In response to the colonists’ protest against British taxation, where they had thrown an entire shipment of tea into Boston Harbor, the British government began to take punitive measures. The charge paved the way for the Intolerable Acts, which included the closure of the Boston Port—effectively strangling the city’s economy as punishment for the Tea Party.

The harsh response from the British government only fueled anger and resentment among the colonists, uniting them in their opposition to British rule. This confrontation marked a turning point, one that would soon lead to the outbreak of the American Revolution.

🎙️ #OnThisDay #BostonTeaParty #TheDigPodcast
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top