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This Week in History: March 14th – 20th

Welcome to this week’s edition of the staff blog’s ‘This Week in History!’ You will find historical facts, happenings, and associated books; #1 box office movies; and #1 NY Times best sellers from years gone by, all with book recommendations included based on each topic. This will be a weekly feature, so make sure to check out each week’s posting! NOTE: Click on any of the below book/movie titles to be taken to them in our online Café catalog!

 

NY Times Fiction Bestsellers

 

#1 Box Office Movies

 

This Week in History

  • March 14th
    • 1879- Albert Einstein is born in Ulm, Germany. (World)
    • 1950- The FBI debuts its “10 Most Wanted Fugitives” List. (United States)
    • 1964- In the first courtroom verdict to be televised in the United States, Jack Ruby is found guilty of the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald. (United States)
  • March 15th
    • 44 BC- Julius Caesar is assassinated on the Ides of March. (World)
    • 1917- Czar Nicholas II abdicates the Russian throne in the lead-up to the Russian Revolution. (World)
    • 2019- A gunman opens fire on two different mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand during Friday Prayer, killing 51 and wounding 40, in the first act of mass gun violence in New Zealand history. (World)
  • March 16th
    • 1802- The U.S. Military Academy at West Point, NY is established. (United States)
    • 1945- The U.S. Marines finally capture the Japanese island of Iwo Jima during WWII after fierce multi-week fighting. (United States/World)
    • 1968- Members of the U.S. Army massacre unarmed Vietnamese men, women, and children at My Lai, one of a cluster of small villages located near the northern coast of South Vietnam. (United States/World)
  • March 17th
    • 461- Saint Patrick, a Christian missionary, bishop, and apostle of Ireland, dies at Downpatrick, Ireland. (World)
    • 1905- Eleanor Roosevelt, niece of President Theodore Roosevelt, marries her distant cousin, Franklin D. Roosevelt, later the U.S. president from 1933-1945. (United States)
    • 1992- Nearly 69% of white South African voters voted to repeal racially discriminatory nationwide laws, effectively endorsing the dismantling of apartheid. (World)
  • March 18th
    • 1766- The British Parliament repeals the Stamp Act of 1765 after violent protests from American colonists. (United States/World)
    • 1925- The deadliest tornado in U.S. history, named the Tri-State Tornado, kills 695 people as it sweeps across eastern Missouri, southern Illinois, and southern Indiana. (United States)
    • 1953- The Boston Braves announce they are moving from Boston to Milwaukee. (Wisconsin/United States)
  • March 19th
    • 1931- Nevada legalizes gambling, paving the way for casinos in the state and the rise of Las Vegas in American popular culture. (United States)
    • 1957- Elvis Presley puts his first down payment on the home that came to be known as Graceland, cementing the house’s place in American pop culture lore. (United States)
    • 2003- U.S. President George W. Bush orders air strikes on Baghdad, thus beginning the Iraq War that would oust dictator Saddam Hussein while causing massive unrest throughout Iraq and much of the Middle East, leading to the rise of ISIS and other Islamic extremist terrorist organizations. (United States/World)
  • March 20th
    • 1854- The Republican Party is founded in Ripon, WI by Free Soilers and Whig party members outraged by passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. (Wisconsin/United States)
    • 1958- An angry mob torches serial killer Ed Gein’s home in Plainfield in response to rumors that it would be purchased at auction and reopened for tourism. (Wisconsin)
    • 1995- Top leaders of AUM Shinrikyo (‘Supreme Truth’ in Japanese), a fringe religious cult in Japan, release nerve gas into a Tokyo subway, killing 12 people and injuring thousands. (World)

Recommended Reading Related to Movies/Historical Happenings:

This Week in History: March 7th – 13th

Welcome to this week’s edition of the staff blog’s ‘This Week in History!’ You will find historical facts, happenings, and associated books; #1 box office movies; and #1 NY Times best sellers from years gone by, all with book recommendations included based on each topic. This will be a weekly feature, so make sure to check out each week’s posting! NOTE: Click on any of the below book/movie titles to be taken to them in our online Café catalog!

 

NY Times Fiction Bestsellers

 

#1 Box Office Movies

 

This Week in History

  • March 7th
    • 1876- Alexander Graham Bell receives a patent for the telephone. (United States/World)
    • 1923- Robert Frost’s famous poem ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’ is first published by the New Republic. The poem would go on to be one that introduced many new students to poetry across public schools in America. (United States)
    • 1965- Civil rights protesters, led by John Lewis, are beaten while trying to cross the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Alabama by white Alabama state troopers. It would become known as ‘Bloody Sunday.’ (United States)
  • March 8th
    • 1917- The Russian Revolution begins in earnest. (World)
    • 1971- Joe Frazier retains his world heavyweight championship by winning in a 15-round decision over former champion Muhammad Ali at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The fight was later dubbed the ‘Fight of the Century.’ (United States)
    • 2014- Malaysia Airlines flight 370 disappears during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. A massive search effort was launched to try to find the plane and any survivors, but it was ultimately called off in early 2017. (World)
  • March 9th
    • 1862- The Battle of the Monitor and Merrimack, two ironclad warships during the American Civil War, takes place. (United States)
    • 1959- The first Barbie doll debuts in New York City. (United States/World)
    • 1997- The rapper Notorious B.I.G is killed in Los Angeles. His murderer is still at large to this day. (United States)
  • March 10th
    • 1864- President Abraham Lincoln signs Ulysses S. Grant’s commission to command the U.S. Army during the Civil War. (United States)
    • 1933- The first German concentration camp of the Nazi regime opens in Munich at Dachau. (World)
    • 1969- James Early Ray pleads guilty to murdering Martin Luther King, Jr. and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He would later recant and say he did not kill King, and several of King’s children supported Ray’s claims of innocence. (United States)
  • March 11th
    • 1985- Mikhail Gorbachev is picked to succeed Konstantin Chernenko to lead the USSR. (World)
    • 2004- Madrid suffers a series of terrorist attacks when 10 bombs, detonated by Islamist militants, explode on four trains at three different rail stations, killing 191 people and injuring almost 1,800 others. (World)
    • 2011- The largest earthquake ever recorded in Japan causes massive devastation, and the ensuing tsunami decimates the Tohoku region of the country. It also causes a nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which is considered to be the second-worst nuclear disaster in history, forcing the relocation of over 100,000 people. (World)
  • March 12th
    • 1933- FDR broadcasts first ‘fireside chat’ during the Great Depression. (United States)
    • 1938- Nazi Germany annexes Austria. (World)
    • 1947- The Truman Doctrine is announced. (United States/World)
  • March 13th
    • 1781- William Hershel discovers Uranus. (World)
    • 2005- Robert Iger is named as Disney’s new CEO. (United States/World)
    • 2020- Breonna Taylor is murdered by Louisville police officers as they burst into her apartment during a botched raid. Her murder, along with that of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, led to massive protests by Black Lives Matter activists and others calling for police/systemic racism reform. (United States)

Recommended Reading Related to Movies/Historical Happenings:

This Week in History: February 28th – March 6th

Welcome to this week’s edition of the staff blog’s ‘This Week in History!’ You will find historical facts, happenings, and associated books; #1 box office movies; and #1 NY Times best sellers from years gone by, all with book recommendations included based on each topic. This will be a weekly feature, so make sure to check out each week’s posting! NOTE: Click on any of the below book/movie titles to be taken to them in our online Café catalog!

 

NY Times Fiction Bestsellers

 

#1 Box Office Movies

 

This Week in History

  • February 28th
    • 1953- The chemical structure of DNA is discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick. (United States/World)
    • 1993- The ATF raids the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. (United States)
    • 2013- Pope Benedict resigns from the papacy. (World)
  • March 1st
    • 1872- Yellowstone National Park is established as the world’s first national park. (United States/World)
    • 1932- Charles Lindbergh’s baby is kidnapped from a bedroom in their home, only to be discovered dead a few days later. The man convicted and executed for the crime two years later, Bruno Hauptmann, was found guilty on extremely flimsy evidence.(United States)
    • 1936- The Hoover Damn is completed on the Colorado River at the Arizona/Nevada border. (United States)
  • March 2nd
    • 1807- Congress abolishes the international African slave trade, but not trade within the states. (United States)
    • 1877- Rutherford B. Hayes is declared the winner of the disputed U.S. presidential election of 1876 after a special Electoral Commission awards him all contested electoral votes. Widely regarded by historians and scholars as an illegitimate victory, Hayes was awarded the presidency in exchange for a guarantee to withdraw federal troops from the South, which effectively ended Reconstruction and allowed for the rise of Jim Crow. (United States)
    • 1962- Wilt Chamberlain scores an NBA record 100 points in an NBA game. (United States)
  • March 3rd
    • 1845- Congress overrides presidential veto for the first time over the protests of President John Tyler. (United States)
    • 1931- The Star-Spangled Banner is officially adopted as the national anthem of the United States by act of Congress. (United States)
    • 1991- LA police officers brutally beat Rodney King following a traffic stop. Despite the assault being videotaped by random witness, the policemen were acquitted in 1992, causing large-scale rioting in the city. (United States)
  • March 4th
    • 1789- The U.S. Government effectively begins under the U.S. Constitution, with the first session of Congress held in New York City. (United States)
    • 1933- FDR is augurated for the first for four presidential terms. (United States)
    • 1952- Ernest Hemingway completes the novel The Old Man and the Sea, which would help him win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954. (United States/World)
  • March 5th
    • 1770- The Boston Massacre occurs on this day, where British troops opened fire on a mob harassing them and kills five American colonists, an event that galvanizes anti-British feelings leading up to the American Revolution. (United States/World)
    • 1946- Winston Churchill delivers his famous ‘Iron Curtain’ speech in Fulton, Missouri. (United States/World)
    • 1953- Joseph Stalin, leader of the USSR since 1924, dies at the age of 74. (World)
  • March 6th
    • 1857- One of the most notoriously awful U.S. Supreme Court cases, Dred Scott v. Sanford, is decided, which further inflames tensions in America over the issue of slavery. (United States)
    • 1899- Bayer patents aspirin, one of the most important drugs ever created in human history. (World)
    • 1964- Boxer Cassius Clay changes his name to Muhammad Ali, which was given to him by his spiritual mentor, Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Nation of Islam. (United States)

Recommended Reading Related to Movies/Historical Happenings:

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