311 – Emperor Galerius legally recognizes Christians in the Roman Empire
1492 – Columbus is given royal commission to equip his fleet
1789 – George Washington inaugurated as first president of US
1803 – US doubles in size through Louisiana Purchase ($15 million)
1808 – First practical typewriter finished by Italian Pellegrini Turri
1859 – Charles Dickens’ “A Tale Of Two Cities” is first published in literary periodical All the Year Round, continues in weekly installments until Nov 26
1864 – New York becomes first state to charge a hunting license fee
1904 – Ice cream cone makes its debut at the St Louis Exposition
The walk-away edible ice cream cone made its American debut at the 1904 Saint Louis World’s Fair. Ice cream in a cone was served up by several vendors at the Fair. Nobody know for certain who made the first ice cream cone. Paper and metal cones had been used in Europe for some time to hold ice cream and it was known that edible cones were being served in England prior to the 1904 World’s Fair. Italo Marchiony submitted a patent in 1903 for a mold to make an edible cups with handles. On July 23, 1904, Charles Menches of St. Louis, Missouri started filling pastry cones with two scoops of ice cream.
Most historians believe that there were over fifty ice cream cone stands at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair and it is possible that several people invented the ice cream cone at the same time. However, the cone definitely become popular in America by way of the St. Louis World’s Fair.
1925 – Automaker Dodge Brothers, Inc is sold to Dillon, Read & Company for $146 million plus $50 million for charity.
1939 – New York World’s Fair opens One of the first exhibits to receive attention was the Westinghouse Time Capsule, which was not to be opened for 5,000 years (the year 6939). The time capsule was a tube containing writings by Albert Einstein and Thomas Mann, copies of Life Magazine, a Mickey Mouse watch, a Gillette Safety Razor, a kewpie doll, a dollar in change, a pack of Camel cigarettes, millions of pages of text on microfilm, and much more. The capsule also contained seeds of foods in common use at the time: (wheat, corn, oats, tobacco, cotton, flax, rice, soy beans, alfalfa, sugar beets, carrots and barley, all sealed in glass tubes). A small stone plaque marks the position Westinghouse also featured “Electro the Moto-Man” 7 foot tall robot that talked, differentiated colors and even smoked cigarettes
1961 – First shuttle flights between Washington DC, Boston and NYC begin
1975 – Last US helicopter leaves US embassy grounds, Saigon surrenders
1991 – In Bangladesh a cyclone killed over 131,000 and left 9 million homeless
2004 – U.S. media release graphic photos of American soldiers abusing and sexually humiliating Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.
2008 – Two skeletal remains found near Ekaterinburg, Russia, were confirmed by Russian scientists to be the remains of Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia and one of his sisters.
2009 – Chrysler automobile company files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
2009 – Failed attack on the Dutch Royal Family results in 7 deaths and 17 injured.
Births
1877 – Alice B. Toklas, American companion of Gertrude Stein (d. 1967)
Deaths
1829 – George Washington Adams, son of John Q Adams, dies
1883 – Édouard Manet, French impressionist painter dies at 61
1900 – John Luther (Casey) Jones, dies in Cannonball Express train wreck
1945 – Adolf Hitler, German Dictator (1936-45), commits suicide at 56
1983 – George Balanchine, Russian/US ballet composer/choreographer, dies from Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease at 79
1994 – Richard McClure Scarry, US children’s book illustrator/writer, dies at 74
Edited from various sources including historyorb.com, the NYTimes.com and many other Google searches