On Feb. 21, 1965, as he began to address an audience of the group he founded (the Organization of Afro-American Unity), the Black activist and leader Malcolm X was assassinated by three men who rushed the stage carrying pistols and a sawed-off shotgun. It was a violent end for a man who scorned the nonviolent teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., insisting instead that violence was sometimes necessary for self-defense and in the fight against discrimination. Malcolm X was only 39 years old. read more...
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An important event in the U.S. space program’s history occurred on Feb. 20, 1962, when astronaut John H. Glenn, Jr., became the first American to orbit the Earth. In Glenn’s nearly five-hour flight he circled the globe three times, seeing four sunsets as he traveled 81,000 mile while whizzing along at speeds of more than 17,000 miles an hour—nearly five miles every second. When he safely splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean after his epic flight, the already-established American hero received international acclaim. read more...
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Missouri was one of the four slave-holding states (along with Delaware, Kentucky and Maryland) that stayed in the Union during the Civil War, deciding not to secede and join the 11 other slave-holding states that formed the Confederate States of America. However, the question of loyalty to the Union or the Confederacy embroiled Missouri in violence throughout the war, most of it in the form of ruthless guerrilla warfare. Abolitionist and pro-slavery forces raided one another, causing much destruction of property and loss of life. read more...
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On Feb. 19, 1963, a slow, quiet revolution picked up momentum and got louder with the publication of Betty Friedan’s seminal book, The Feminine Mystique, which spurred growth and interest in the feminist movement. This groundbreaking work grew out of a survey Friedan sent to 200 of her fellow Smith College graduates in 1957. She wanted to determine if her ex-classmates were feeling the same sense of dissatisfaction with domestic life that she was struggling with as an at-home mother raising three children. read more...
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Jesse James is one of the most colorful, controversial, and enduring figures in American history. Was he a loyal Confederate soldier who refused to surrender, continuing to defend his hard-working Missouri compatriots after the Civil War from marauding carpet-baggers and Northern humiliations, a nineteenth-century Robin Hood who robbed only the rich and supported the poor? Or was he a cruel, bloodthirsty guerrilla during the war who went on killing and plundering after the rest of Missouri was willing to accept peace and the war’s end? read more...
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The delegates from six seceding states who met in Montgomery, Alabama, on Feb. 4, 1861, for the Provisional Confederate Congress moved quickly to address the monumental task at hand: the formation of a new country. In four days they adopted a provisional constitution; the next day they unanimously elected their provisional president: Jefferson Finis Davis. read more...
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On Feb. 17, 1925, Florence Prag Kahn achieved a notable first when she was elected the first Jewish woman to serve in Congress, only the fifth woman overall. She was elected to represent California’s Fourth Congressional District in a special election to replace her husband, Congressman Julius Kahn, who had a distinguished 25-year career in Congress cut short by his death in San Francisco on Dec. 18, 1924. read more...
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One day in February 1909, the once-feared Apache Chief Geronimo was riding alone near Fort Sill, Oklahoma, when he was thrown from his horse and lay all night in the cold. When found the next day he was seriously ill, and died on Feb. 17, 1909, from pneumonia. Geronimo died—as he had lived the last 22 years of his life—a prisoner of war to the U.S. government. He was 79 years old. read more...
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Thomas Jefferson is consistently ranked one of the greatest presidents in the history of our country. He almost did not get the chance to fulfill that destiny, however, as Aaron Burr nearly beat him in the 1800 presidential election—a tangled, complicated political mess that ended up with an electoral ballot tie that had to be broken by a vote in the House of Representatives. Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr each ended up with 73 electoral votes (the incumbent president, John Adams, finished with 65). read more...
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At 9:40 the night of Feb. 15, 1898, a massive explosion sank the U.S. battleship Maine in Havana Harbor, Cuba, killing over 260 men and whipping the American public into a war frenzy against Cuba’s colonial overlord, Spain. The battleship had entered Havana Harbor on January 25 to protect American interests in the face of a popular insurrection on the island against Spain’s harsh rule. The cause of the explosion remains a mystery to this day, despite four separate investigations, but the verdict with the most impact was the conclusion of the U.S. read more...
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I understand that when writing a blog, it’s necessary to show a picture and say a few words about yourself, so that people don’t think a nameless, faceless committee or advisory board is running the show. Here I am, a real person. My name is Tony Pettinato, and I live in Deerfield, Mass. I did my undergraduate studies in English at Oberlin College, my graduate work in Journalism at UC Berkeley, and have been a reporter for six newspapers. For the past fourteen years I have worked at NewsBank, six of those as a managing editor for the U.S. Congressional Serial Set project – NewsBank’s acclaimed effort that digitized and indexed twelve million pages of primary source documents – that gratified my lifelong interest in American history. And that led me to editing this history blog!
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