On This Day In History
15 May 1936. Amy Johnson completed a record-breaking return flight from London to Cape Town, South Africa, which began on 4 May 1936. She was greeted by huge crowds when she landed after her monumental trip. pic.twitter.com/WuP0ivRFZP
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 1958. The USSR launched, Sputnik 3, the first space research satellite. At 2,926 pounds, it was, at the time, the heaviest satellite that had orbited. Its battery-powered instruments collected data, but unfortunately the onboard tape recorder failed shortly after launch. pic.twitter.com/UXfL0XcExQ
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 1963. Tottenham Hotspur defeated Atlético Madrid 5-1 at the Feijenoord Stadion in Rotterdam, Netherlands, to win the European Cup Winners’ Cup Final. Tottenham's easy victory made them the first British team to win a major European trophy. pic.twitter.com/kwz2cWDfuZ
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 1970. US President, Richard Nixon, nominated, Colonel Elizabeth P. Hoisington (right), director of the Women's Army Corps and Colonel Anna Mae Hays (left), chief of the Army Nurse Corps, to the rank of brigadier general, making them the first female US generals pic.twitter.com/OGZ96MX7fd
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 1987. Andy Murray was born in Glasgow, Scotland. He’s a 3 time Grand Slam winner having won the US Open and Men’s Singles Championship at Wimbledon twice. He also twice won the Olympic Gold Medal in Men’s Singles, and was part of the Great Britain Davis Cup winning team. pic.twitter.com/NQF59WbYhs
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 1991. Édith Cresson became the first and so far only French woman to have held the office of Prime Minister of France. She held office until 2 April 1992. Her political career ended in scandal as a result of corruption charges while she was a European Commissioner. pic.twitter.com/43AyKhKeSD
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
15 May 2004. Arsenal, managed by Arsène Wenger, won the Premier League Championship having gone through the entire 2003-04 season unbeaten. Preston North End in 1888-89 were the last top division English league club to do this, and be awarded the coveted “Invincibles” title. pic.twitter.com/PlH31VjA4Z
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 15, 2023
May 16th
1920 Joan of Arc (Jeanne D’arc) canonized a saint
1943 Operation Chastise: No. 617 Squadron RAF begins the famous Dambusters Raid, bombing the Möhne and Eder dams in the Ruhr valley with bouncing bombs
1944 1st of 180,000+ Hungarian Jews reach Auschwitz
1989 Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev and Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping meet in Beijing and formally end a 30-year rift
2013 Human stem cells are successfully cloned
Did You Know?
Theodore Maiman operates the first optical laser, at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California
Today in History in 1960
Would You Believe?
US Senate fails to impeach President Andrew Johnson by one vote
Today in History in 1868
This day 75 years ago – 16 May 1945 – Éamon de Valera replied to Winston Churchill, who had criticised Ireland for remaining neutral while Britain was “alone.”
“There is a small nation that stood alone not for one year or two, but for several hundred years against aggression.” pic.twitter.com/pmJ5yVs782
— This Day in Irish History (@ThisDayIrish) May 16, 2020
On this day in 1956, white residents of Delray Beach, Florida, burned a cross to terrorize Black residents and prevent them from accessing the city’s segregated public beach. To overcome racial inequality, we must confront our history. https://t.co/hSUrkgFmMt
— Equal Justice Initiative (@eji_org) May 16, 2023
16 May 1955. Brilliant gymnast, Olga Korbut, was born in Hrodna, USSR (now in Belarus). She was the gymnastic star of the 1972 Munich Olympics. She is widely credited with changing gymnastics from a niche sport to one of the most popular sports in the world. pic.twitter.com/7xhZv1aWrr
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 16, 2023
16 May 1975. Japanese mountain climber, Junko Tabei (then aged 35), became the first woman to reach the 8,763 metre mountaineering summit of Mount Everest (known as the “Hilary Summit”). The actual top height of the highest mountain on Earth is 8,848 metres. pic.twitter.com/lzEGfm9se2
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 16, 2023
16 May 1990. All round entertainer, Sammy Davis Junior, died (aged 64). He had the nickname “Mr Show Business” and was part of the “Rat Pack” of singers including Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. His biggest hit, The Candy Man reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972. pic.twitter.com/owFp97zPiJ
— Prof. Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) May 16, 2023
May 17th
1527 Pánfilo de Narváez departs Spain to explore Florida with 600 men – by 1536 only 4 survive
1792 24 merchants form New York Stock Exchange at 70 Wall Street
1803 John Hawkins & Richard French patent the Reaping Machine
1973 Senate Watergate Committee begins its hearings
2004 Massachusetts becomes the first U.S. state to legalize same-sex marriage
2014 The center-right Hindu Nationalist Party, the BJP, wins landslide election victory in India
Did You Know?
World Health Organization takes homosexuality out of its list of mental illnesses
Today in History in 1990
Would You Believe?
Fidel Castro offers to exchange Bay of Pigs prisoners for 500 bulldozers
Today in History in 1961
https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/may/17
On May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that segregation in public education was unconstitutional, overturning the "separate but equal" doctrine in place since 1896 and sparking massive resistance among white Americans committed to racial inequality.
The Supreme Court's landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education grew out of several cases challenging racial segregation in school districts across America, filed as part of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund's strategy to bar the practice nationwide. In the named case, a Black man named Oliver Brown sued the Topeka, Kansas, Board of Education for refusing to allow his daughter, Linda, to attend the elementary school nearest her house solely due to her race.
When the case made it to the U.S. Supreme Court, NAACP lawyer Thurgood Marshall argued that segregated schools were harmful and saddled Black children with feelings of inferiority. Writing the majority opinion, Chief Justice Earl Warren endorsed this argument and declared that "in the field of public education the doctrine of 'separate but equal' has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal."
The decision outraged white segregationists as much as it energized civil rights activists. Throughout the South, where state constitutions and state law mandated segregated schools, white people decried the decision as a tyrannical exercise of federal power. Many Southern white leaders and their constituents implemented a strategy of "massive resistance" to delay desegregation. These groups, made up of elected officials, business leaders, community residents, and parents, deployed a range of tactics and weapons against the growing movement for civil rights—including bombing and murdering civil rights activists, criminalizing peaceful protest, and wielding economic intimidation and threats to chill Black participation in civil rights activities.
These tactics worked: By 1960, only 98 of Arkansas’s 104,000 Black students attended desegregated schools, as did 34 of 302,000 in North Carolina, 169 of 146,000 in Tennessee, and 103 of 203,000 in Virginia. In the five Deep South states, every single one of 1.4 million Black schoolchildren attended segregated schools until the fall of 1960. By the start of the 1964-65 school year, less than 3% of the South’s African American children attended school with white students, and in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, and South Carolina that number remained substantially below 1%.
The Brown decision signaled the start of a massive cultural shift in racial dynamics in the U.S. and also launched an organized mass movement of opposition. Most white Americans, especially in the South, supported segregation. To learn more about this shift, read EJI's report, Segregation in America.
May 18th
1291 After 100 years of Crusader control, Acre is the last Crusader stronghold reconquered and destroyed by the Mamluks under Sultan al-Ashraf Khalil
1804 Napoleon Bonaparte proclaimed Emperor of France by the French Senate
1896 Khodynka Tragedy: A mass panic on Khodynka Field, Moscow, during the festivities of the coronation of Russian Tsar Nicholas II, results in the deaths of 1,389 people
1974 India becomes the sixth nation to explode an atomic bomb
2009 Sri Lankan Civil War: The LTTE are defeated by the Sri Lankan government, ending almost 26 years of fighting between the two sides.
Did You Know?
US, USSR and other nations sign the Environmental Modification Convention which prohibits weather warfare having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects
Today in History in 1977
Would You Believe?
Roman Emperor Constantine the Great institutes free daily bread rations in Constantinople
Today in History in 332