On this date...

Nez Perce Tribe

In 1624, Virginia became an English crown colony following the bankruptcy of the London Company.

In 1775, Congress authorized the creation of the post of chief engineer for the army, in anticipation of upcoming battles with British forces.

In 1776, Washington confronted the Revolution’s financial strain. In New York, he sends Congress a warning from the paymaster general: Impending costs will nearly empty the military chest. Washington asks for more money. 

In 1776, John Hancock writes from Philadelphia that a wagon carrying about $22,000 in silver and additional Continental currency will leave the next morning for Canada. It is to call at New York, and Hancock asks Washington to order a guard to escort it onward.

In 1779, US General Anthony Wayne captured Stony Point, New York, inflicting heavy losses on the British.

In 1812, the City Bank of New York (later Citibank) opened for business.

In 1822, Denmark Vesey (aka Telemaque), a Black American carpenter accused of planning a slave rebellion in South Carolina, was tried and convicted, and later executed by hanging.

In 1858, Abraham Lincoln gave the “House Divided” speech.

In 1862, a Union attempt to capture Charleston, South Carolina, is thwarted when the Confederates turn back an attack at Secessionville, just south of the city on James Island.

In 1873, U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant set aside part of the Wallowa Valley in Oregon for the Native American tribe, the Nez Perce. The order is rescinded two years later, and the tribe is forcibly relocated to Oklahoma.

In 1884, the first roller coaster in America opened at Coney Island, in Brooklyn, New York. Known as a switchback railway, it was the brainchild of LaMarcus Thompson, traveled approximately six miles per hour, and cost a nickel to ride.

In 1897, the United States signed a treaty of annexation.

In 1903, Ford Motor Company was incorporated in Detroit, Michigan.

In 1908, the Republican Party convened in Chicago, where President Theodore Roosevelt picked William Howard Taft as his successor.

In 1909, Jim Thorpe made his professional baseball debut for Rocky Mount of the Eastern Carolina League in a 4-2 win, causing him to forfeit his Olympic gold medals.

In 1911, International Business Machines Corporation (IBM), a leading American computer manufacturer, was incorporated.

In 1932, US President Herbert Hoover and Vice President Charles Curtis were renominated by the Republican Convention.

In 1933, the Hundred Days period of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt came to a close, with the bulk of his New Deal legislation passed.

In 1933, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) was created in the United States under the authority of the Federal Reserve Act of 1933.

In 1941, the Washington National Airport (now Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport) opened just before the U.S. entered WWII. The opening was intentionally quiet—lacking speeches or fanfare—to replace the dangerous, traffic-crossed Washington-Hoover Airport.

In 1942, Future President Lyndon B. Johnson was discharged from active duty in the Navy. This occurred after President Franklin D. Roosevelt mandated that all members of Congress who were serving in the armed forces immediately return to their legislative duties in Washington.

In 1952, the landmark, tragic World War II diary, The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, was first published in the United States.

In 1977, Oracle Corporation was incorporated in Redwood Shores, California, as Software Development Laboratories (SDL) by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner, and Ed Oates.

In 1978, President Jimmy Carter and Panamanian leader Omar Torrijos signed the instruments of ratification for the Panama Canal treaties during a ceremony in Panama City.

In 1987, A jury in New York acquitted Bernhard Goetz of attempted murder in the subway shooting of four young blacks he said were going to rob him; he was convicted of illegal weapons possession.

In 1999, Kathleen Ann Soliah, a former member of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), was arrested near her home in St. Paul, Minnesota. Soliah, who now calls herself Sara Jane Olson, had been evading authorities for more than 20 years.

In 2011, Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., announced his resignation from Congress, bowing to the furor caused by his sexually charged online dalliances with a former porn actress and other women.

In 2015, real estate mogul Donald Trump launched his successful campaign for the presidency of the United States with a speech at Trump Tower in Manhattan.

In 2017, US President Donald Trump reinstated travel and business restrictions on Cuba after President Obama had loosened them.

In 2021, a summit between US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva, Switzerland, over issues including cyberattacks and human rights

In 2022, witnesses testified to the Jan. 6 committee that Donald Trump’s closest advisers viewed his last-ditch efforts to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to reject the tally of state electors and overturn the 2020 election as “nuts,” “crazy” and even likely to incite riots.