On Aug. 6, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. On Aug. 9, 1945, a second bombing was dropped on Nagasaki. The atomic bombs instantly took thousands of lives and thousands more in the aftermath from radiation and injury. The bombings led to Japan’s surrender, bringing an end...
Fred Morrison launched a leisure lifestyle with his fantastic plastic flying saucer. His contribution to recreation all over the globe gained air only after he dodged death by piloting fighter-bombers in the skies over Europe in World War II. Morrison, a Southern California beach boy, first called his spinning discs Flyin’ Cake Pans and then...
The United States dared to boldly go where no man had gone before when President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act on this day in history, July 29, 1958. The legislation established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The act was a direct response to the success of the Soviet...
“Saving Private Ryan,” a terrifying account of the physical, mental and moral trauma suffered by American GIs during World War II, debuted in theaters on this day in history, July 24, 1998. “Saving Private Ryan,” writes the website CinemaScholars.com, “makes the claim as being the greatest war film of all time.” Steven Spielberg directed the...
You might say Tito Puente was born to connect cultures. Puente, after all, is the Spanish word for bridge. The New York City native, born to parents from Puerto Rico, found fame the world over as the Latin King, the Mambo King or, simply, El Rey — the King, in Spanish. His story is all...
Man walked on the moon for the first time 55 years ago today, July 20, as America’s Apollo 11 mission achieved a dream bigger than Earth itself. The world was riveted by the event. An estimated 650 million people — nearly 20% of the entire human population at the time — watched the moon landing...
The Potsdam Conference shaped the diplomacy of the end of World War II. And on this day in history, July 17, 1945, following Nazi Germany’s surrender in the war, President Harry S. Truman, British Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill and Soviet leader Josef Stalin began meeting at Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin, Germany, in the...
A startling image of former President Donald J. Trump surviving an assassination attempt on Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania, has become an instant cultural sensation. Moments after a bullet struck his ear and missed a fatal headshot by mere millimeters, the former president and now 2024 GOP presidential nominee rose to his feet with blood streaked...
