NewsInHistory Blog

In a similar ceremony exactly 83 years after the cornerstone was laid in 1907, a U.S. president—this time George H. W. Bush instead of Theodore Roosevelt—addressed a crowd celebrating the final stone being laid, as construction was completed on the Washington National Cathedral on Sept. 29, 1990. A national cathedral was envisioned by Pierre L’Enfant, a French-born architect appointed in 1791 by President George Washington to design the nation’s new capital city on the north bank of the Potomac River. Nearly 200 years later, L’Enfant’s dream was a reality. read more...

A national cathedral was part of the plans proposed for Washington, D.C., by Pierre L’Enfant, a French-born architect appointed in 1791 by President George Washington. His task was to design the nation’s new capital city on the north bank of the Potomac River. However, Congress did not act on his cathedral idea for over 100 years, finally granting a charter to the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral Foundation of the District of Columbia on Jan. 6, 1893, to build such a grand edifice. read more...

Baseball, with origins in the English games of rounders and cricket, is an American innovation long recognized as this country’s national pastime. The popularity of baseball increased right after the Civil War, following the exposure of many soldiers to this relatively new game, but the origins of baseball go much deeper into the 19th century, and perhaps even the 18th century. A game called “town ball” was played in many parts of the U.S., and the first “modern” baseball club was the Knickerbockers of New York, founded on Sept. 23, 1845. read more...

By the end of the summer of 1863 the Union seemed well on its way to victory in the Civil War. Two significant losses had sent the Confederacy reeling: defeat at the Battle of Gettysburg on July 3 had stopped General Robert E. Lee’s northern invasion and forced his battered army to retreat back to Virginia; and the next day’s fall of the Mississippi River stronghold of Vicksburg on July 4 placed that mighty waterway under Union control and split the Confederacy in two. Surely the end of the war was near. read more...

President Abraham Lincoln’s determined objective and steadfast focus in waging the Civil War initially was preserving the Union—not freeing the slaves or forever ending slavery in the United States. He personally regarded slavery as an evil and was convinced it would eventually disappear, but on several occasions stated his belief that a president lacked the constitutional authority to abolish slavery. However, in the spring and summer of 1862 Lincoln began to change his mind. On Sept. read more...

Signaled by the boom of a cannon and the sharp report of carbines at exactly noon on Sept. 16, 1893, the “Cherokee Strip” land run began in Oklahoma, one of the wildest, most frenetic spectacles in American history. Over 100,000 impoverished, desperate men and women had been barely surviving in dirty “boomer” camps in southern Kansas for months, awaiting the magical moment when the government would throw open six and a half million acres of public land to anyone who wanted to dash in and claim it. read more...

Even in today’s post-911 world, when innocent people are killed in markets, office buildings and schools, the horror of what happened 48 years ago is still shocking. On Sept. 15, 1963, four young African-American girls were killed when the Ku Klux Klan bombed their church in Birmingham, Alabama. This hate crime sickened the nation and galvanized the Civil Rights Movement. read more...

Phineas P. Gage, a 25-year-old foreman for the Rutland and Burlington Railroad in Vermont, was working with his crew blasting rock outside the town of Cavendish on Sept. 13, 1848, when something astonishing and almost too incredible to believe occurred. Gage was packing blasting powder into a hole with his iron tamping bar when a spark caused an explosion. With terrific force, the thick, heavy, 3½ -foot-long iron bar smashed into his left cheek and up through his brain, blasted out the top of his head, shot high in the air and landed about 80 feet away. read more...