1804 – The first self-propelled locomotive on rails was demonstrated in Wales.

1842 – John J. Greenough patented the sewing machine.

1848 – The Communist Manifesto was published by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

1858 – The first electric burglar alarm was installed in Boston, MA.

1866 – Lucy B. Hobbs became the first woman to graduate from a dental school. The school was the Ohio College of Dental Surgery in Cincinnati.

1874 – The Oakland Daily Tribune began publication.

1878 – The first telephone directories issued in the U.S. were distributed to residents in New Haven, CT. It was a single page of only fifty names.

1904 – The National Ski Association was formed in Ishpeming, MI.

1916 – During World War I, the Battle of Verdun began in France. The battle ended on December 18, 1916 with a French victory over Germany.

1925 – The first issue of “The New Yorker” was published.

1932 – William N. Goodwin patented the camera exposure meter.

1943 – “Free World Theatre” debuted on the Blue network (now ABC radio).

1945 – “The Lion and the Mouse” was first broadcast on “Brownstone Theatre.”

1947 – Edwin Land demonstrated the Polaroid Land Camera to the Optical Society of America in New York City. It was the first camera to take, develop and print a picture on photo paper all in about 60 seconds. The photos were black and white. The camera went on sale the following year.

1950 – The first International Pancake Race was held in Liberal, Kansas.

1965 – Malcolm X was assassinated in New York City at the age of 39 by assassins identified as Black Muslims.

1968 – An agreement between baseball players and club owners increased the minimum salary for major league players to $10,000 a year.

1973 – Israeli fighter planes shot down a Libyan Airlines jet over the Sinai Desert. More than 100 people were killed.

1975 – Former U.S. Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman were sentenced to 2 1/2 to 8 years in prison for their roles in the Watergate cover-up.

1988 – In Baton Rouge, LA, TV evangelist Jimmy Swaggart confessed to his congregation that he was guilty of an unspecified sin. He announced that he was leaving the pulpit temporarily. Swaggart had been linked to an admitted prostitute.

1989 – U.S. President George H.W. Bush called Ayatollah Khomeini’s death warrant against “Satanic Verses” author Salman Rushdie “deeply offensive to the norms of civilized behavior.”

1995 – Chicago stockbroker Steve Fossett became the first person to fly solo across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon. He landed in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada.

1999 – India’s Prime Minister Atal Bihair Vajpayee concluded two days of meeting with Pakistan’s Prime Minister Mohammad Nowaz Sharif.

2000 – David Letterman returned to his Late Night show about five weeks after having an emergency quintuple heart bypass operation.

2003 – David Hasselhoff and his wife Pamela were injured in a motorcycle accident. The accident was caused by a strong gust of wind. Hasselhoff fractured his lower back and broke several ribs. His wife fractured her left ankle and right wrist.

2019 – At Cape Canaveral, FL, SpaceIL launched their Beresheet proble. It was the first privately funded mission to the Moon. The probe crash-landed on the Moon on April 11.

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Written By: The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
See Article History

Chicago Seven, group of political activists who were arrested for their antiwar activities during the August 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Illinois. A series of riots occurred during the convention, and eight protest leaders—Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, cofounders of the Youth International Party (Yippies); Tom Hayden, cofounder of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS); Black Panther Chairman Bobby Seale, the only African American of the group; David Dellinger and Rennie Davis of the National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam (MOBE); and John Froines and Lee Weiner, who were alleged to have made stink bombs—were tried on charges of criminal conspiracy and incitement to riot.

Numerous antiwar and anti-establishment groups had converged in Chicago for the convention to protest U.S. participation in the Vietnam War as well as other government policies. The groups participating included SDS, the Yippies, the Black Panthers, and MOBE. Rioting and violence erupted sporadically between August 25 and August 29 as Chicago police, armed with tear gas and billy clubs, tried to enforce 11 pm curfews in the city’s parks (where many of the young protesters planned to camp out) and faced down protesters marching in the streets. Hundreds were arrested, including the “Chicago Eight” (soon to be Seven).

The trial took place in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and lasted five months, from September 24, 1969, to February 18, 1970. From the beginning, many observers found Judge Julius Hoffman to be far short of impartial toward the defendants. Hoffman, for example, rejected many of the pretrial motions of the defense counsel but granted those made by the prosecution. Similarly, during the trial his procedural rulings nearly always favoured the prosecution. Despite the judge’s hostility, Hayden hoped to win the trial by observing courtroom decorum and logically refuting the prosecution’s case. Many of the other defendants, however, especially Rubin and Abbie Hoffman, deliberately disrupted the trial by eating jelly beans, making faces, blowing kisses, wearing outlandish clothing, and cracking jokes. At one point, Judge Hoffman had Seale bound and gagged for allegedly calling the judge a “fascist dog,” a “pig,” and a “racist.” Seale was eventually tried alone and sentenced to four years in prison for contempt of court.

At the trial’s conclusion a jury of 10 whites and two African Americans acquitted all seven remaining defendants—the so-called “Chicago Seven”—of the conspiracy charges. However, they found Hoffman, Rubin, Dellinger, Davis, and Hayden guilty of crossing state boundaries with the intent to incite a riot. Froines and Weiner were acquitted of all charges. Judge Hoffman sentenced the other five defendants to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine, and he sentenced all seven defendants, plus their attorney William Kunstler, to prison terms for contempt of court. The contempt convictions were reversed on appeal in 1972, and, in a separate appeal that same year, all the criminal convictions except Seale’s were also overturned. The appellate court cited, in part, the judge’s “deprecatory and often antagonistic attitude toward the defense.”

After the success of their appeal, the Chicago Seven went their separate ways. Hayden became active in California politics. Abbie Hoffman went into hiding during the 1970s to avoid prison on a cocaine charge; he eventually emerged in 1980 and served a year. Rubin became a businessman and worked on Wall Street in the 1980s. Dellinger, the oldest of the Chicago Seven—at age 54 in 1968—continued his work as a peace activist. Davis became a public speaker on motivation and self-awareness, Froines taught at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Weiner remained an activist, primarily on behalf of Jewish causes. The eighth defendant, Seale, became a writer and lecturer and continued to work against racism.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Jeff Wallenfeldt, Manager, Geography and History.

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1970 – The Chicago Seven defendants were found innocent of conspiring to incite riots at the 1968 Democratic national convention.

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1564 – The artist Michelanglelo died in Rome.

1685 – Robert Cavelier, Sieur de LaSalle established Fort St. Louis at Matagorda Bay, and thus formed the basis for France’s claim to Texas.

1735 – The first opera performed in America. The work was “Flora” (or “Hob in the Well”) and was presented in Charleston, SC.

1841 – The first continuous filibuster in the U.S. Senate began. It lasted until March 11th.

1861 – In Montgomery, AL, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as the President of the Confederate States.

1885 – Mark Twain’s “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” was published in the U.S. for the first time.

1913 – The famous French painting “Nude Descending a Staircase”, by the French artist, Marcel Duchamp, was displayed at an “Armory Show” in New York City.

1930 – Elm Farm Ollie became the first cow to fly in an airplane.

1930 – The planet Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh. The discovery was made as a result of photographs taken in January 1930.

1932 – Sonja Henie won her 6th world women’s figure skating title in Montreal, Canada.

1949 – “Yours Truly Johnny Dollar” debuted on CBS radio.

1952 – Greece and Turkey became members of NATO.

1953 – “Bwana Devil” opened. It was the first three-dimensional feature.

1953 – Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz signed a contract worth $8,000,000 to continue the “I Love Lucy” TV show through 1955.

1964 – “Any Wednesday” opened at the Music Box Theatre in New York City. The play established Gene Hackman as an actor.

1970 – The Chicago Seven defendants were found innocent of conspiring to incite riots at the 1968 Democratic national convention.

1972 – The California Supreme Court struck down the state’s death penalty.

1977 – The space shuttle Enterprise went on its maiden “flight” sitting on top of a Boeing 747.

1984 – Reed Larson (Detroit Red Wings) got two assists to become the highest scoring, American-born player in the history of the National Hockey League. Larson broke the record by scoring his 432nd point.

1987 – The executives of the Girl Scout movement decided to change the color of the scout uniform from the traditional Girl Scout green to the newer Girl Scout blue.

1998 – In Russia, money shortages resulted in the shutting down of three plants that produced nuclear weapons.

1998 – In Nevada, two white separatists were arrested and accused of plotting a bacterial attack on subways in New York City.

2000 – The U.S. Commerce Department reported a deficit in trade goods and services of $271.3 billion for 1999. It was the largest calender-year trade gap in U.S. history.

2001 – NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt, Sr., was killed in a crash during the Daytona 500 race.

2001 – FBI agent Robert Philip Hanssen was arrested and accused of spying for Russia for more than 15 years. He later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

2003 – In South Korea, at least 120 people were killed when a man lit a fire on a subway train.

2006 – American Shani Davis won the men’s 1,000-meter speedskating in Turin. He was the first black athlete to win an individual gold medal in Winter Olympic history.

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