Today in History

Posted
1775 George Washington takes command of the Continental Army. 1790 In Paris, the Marquis de Condorcet proposes granting civil rights to women. 1844 American ambassador Caleb Cushing successfully negotiates a commercial treaty with China. 1863 Confederate forces attack the center of the Union line at Gettysburg, but fail to break it. 1878 John Wise flies the first dirigible in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 1901 The Wild Bunch, led by Butch Cassidy, commits its last American robbery near Wagner, Montana, taking $65,000 from a Great Northern train. 1903 The first cable across the Pacific Ocean is spliced between Honolulu, Midway, Guam and Manila. 1944 The U.S. First Army opens a general offensive to break out of the hedgerow area of Normandy, France. 1945 U.S. troops land at Balikpapan and take Sepinggan airfield on Borneo in the Pacific. 1950 U.S. carrier-based planes attack airfields in the Pyongyang-Chinnampo area of North Korea in the first air-strike of the Korean War. 1954 Food rationing ends in Great Britain almost nine years after the end of World War II. 1962 Jackie Robinson becomes the first African American to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. 1967 North Vietnamese soldiers attack South Vietnam's only producing coal mine at Nong Son. Born on July 3 1683 Edward Young, English poet, dramatist and literary critic (Night Thoughts). 1844 Dankmar Adler, architect and engineer. 1871 William Henry Davies, Welsh poet. 1878 George M. Cohan, American entertainer and songwriter. 1883 Franz Kafka, Prague-born German novelist (The Metamorphosis, The Trail). 1908 M.F.K. Fisher, food writer. 1912 Elizabeth Taylor, novelist and short story writer. 1921 Francois-Arnold Reichenbach, documentary filmmaker. 1937 Tom Stoppard, British playwright (Rosencrantz and Guilderstern are Dead).