Category Archives: State History

July 3 is:
Compliment Your Mirror Day
Disobedience Day
Stay out of the Sun Day
National Chocolate Wafer Day
Eat Beans Day

July 3, 1608, Québec City was founded by Samuel de Champlain.

1775 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington took command of the Continental Army at Cambridge, Massachusetts.

In 1806, Michael Keens, a market gardener of Isleworth near London, exhibited the first cultivated strawberry that combined size, flavor, and color at the Royal Horticultural Society. The 600 strawberry varieties found today stem from five or six original wild species, and are a member of the rose family. The wild, small, fragrant forest strawberry of Europe was available to the Romans in the Middle Ages. Europeans discovered wild strawberries in Virginia when their ships landed there in 1588, grown by local American Indians. When Virginia sent a better flavored strawberry to England in 1642, and a large white strawberry from Chile was introduced in 1806, the big fruit we know today, emerged. Strawberries are unique, because they are the only fruit with seeds on the outside.

July 3 – 1844: The Great Auk becomes extinct, after the last group was killed in Iceland.

Idaho Admission Day in 1890 as the forty-third state

• Capital: Boise
• Nickname: Gem state
• Bird: Mountain bluebird
• Flower: Syringa (mock orange)
• Tree: Western white pine
• Motto: It is forever

See our page Idaho for more interesting facts and trivia about Idaho.

In 1929, foam rubber was developed at the Dunlop Latex Development Laboratories in Birmingham. British scientist E.A. Murphy whipped up the first batch in 1929, using an ordinary kitchen mixer to froth natural latex rubber. His colleagues were unimpressed – until they sat on it. Within five years it was everywhere, on motorcycle seats, on London bus seats, Shakespeare Memorial Theatre seats, and eventually in mattresses.

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June 25 is Log Cabin Day
Color TV Day
National Columnists Day
National Catfish Day
National Strawberry Parfait Day

June 25, 1630- The fork was introduced to American dining by Gov Winthrop of Massachusetts.

Publication of Federalist Paper #81: The Judiciary and the Distribution of the Judicial Authority written by Alexander Hamilton in 1788.

Virginia Ratification Day
On June 25, 1788 Virginia became the tenth state.

• Capital: Richmond
• Nickname: Old Dominion
• Bird: Cardinal
• Flower: Dogwood
• Tree: Flowering Dogwood
• Motto: Thus always to tyrants

See our page for Virginia for more interesting facts and trivia about Virginia.

Custer Day, Aniversary of “Custer’s Last Stand” at the Battle of Little Big Horn in Montana in 1876. Lt. Col. Custer and the 210 men of U.S. 7th Cavalry were killed by Sioux and Cheyenne Indians

June 25, 1950 – North Korea invaded South Korea, initiating the Korean War.

The Cuban government seized 2.35 million acres under a new agrarian reform law in 1959.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled (in 1962) that the use of unofficial, non-denominational prayer in public schools was unconstitutional.

On June 25, 1968 – Bobby Bonds (San Francisco Giants) hit a grand-slam home run in his first game with the Giants. He was the first player to debut with a grand-slam.

1981 – The U.S. Supreme Court decided that male-only draft registration was constitutional.

1990 – The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of an individual, whose wishes are clearly made, to refuse life-sustaining medical treatment. “The right to die” decision was made in the Curzan vs. Missouri case.

In Clinton v. City of New York, the United States Supreme Court decided (1998) that the Line Item Veto Act of 1996 was unconstitutional.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled (1998) that those infected with HIV are protected by the Americans With Disabilities Act.

2000 – U.S. and British researchers announced that they had completed a rough draft of a map of the genetic makeup of human beings. The project was 10 years old at the time of the announcement.

June 21 is Go Skate Day
Summer Solstice
National Peaches and Cream Day
World Sauntering Day
World Handshake Day

First day of summer

1749 – Halifax, Nova Scotia, was founded.

Publication of Federalist Paper #80: The Powers of the Judiciary written by Alexander Hamilton in 1788.

1788 – The U.S. Constitution went into effect when New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify it.

New Hampshire Day, the ninth state

• Capital: Concord
• Nickname: Granite State
• Bird: Purple finch
• Flower: Purple lilac
• Tree: White birch
• Motto: Live free or die

See our page for New Hampshire for interesting facts and trivia about New Hampshire.

1834 – Cyrus McCormick patented the first practical mechanical reaper for farming. His invention allowed farmers to more than double their crop size.

1877 – The Molly Maguires, ten Irish immigrants convicted of murder, were hanged at the Schuylkill County and Carbon County, Pennsylvania prisons.

June 21, 1838 – Wheatstone’s discovery of the stereoscopic viewer was described in a paper, On some remarkable, and hitherto unobserved Phenomena of Binocular Vision, which he read to the Royal Society, London. This is the visual effect whereby pictures of an object drawn from slightly different viewpoints for individual eyes could be viewed with his stereoscope and give the perception of the object in three dimensions. He read a second part to this paper on 15 Jan 1852. This principle was later popularized with photographs to make stereo view cards.

June 21, 1893 – The Ferris Wheel was introduced at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, IL. It was invented by George Washington Ferris, a Pittsburgh bridge builder, for the purpose of creating an attraction like the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Each of the 36 cars carried 60 passengers, making a full passenger load of 150 tons. Ferris didn’t use rigid spokes: instead, he used a web of taut cables, like a bicycle wheel. Supported by two 140 foot steel towers, its 45 foot axle was the largest single piece of forged steel at the time in the world. The highest point of the wheel was 264 feet. The wheel and cars weighed 2100 tons, with another 2200 tons of associated levers and machinery. Ferris died just four years later, at the age of only 38.

1948 – Columbia Records introduced the long-playing record album in a public demonstration at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, New York. Made of nonbreakable Vinilyte plastic, and designed for the new speed of 33-1/3 r.p.m., the records were developed by Dr. Peter Goldmark of Columbia Records. The 12 inch record could play 23 minutes per side, as compared to only 4 minutes per side on the earlier 78 rpm record. The LP was also an improvement by the quietness of its surfaces and its greatly increased fidelity. The first LP featured violinist Yehudi Menuhin. Columbia originated the term “LP” itself, which was copyrighted. Thus, although many other firms could make long-playing records, only Columbia could make an LP.

1963 – France announced that they were withdrawing from the North Atlantic NATO fleet.

1973 – In handing down the decision in Miller v. California 413 US 15, the Supreme Court of the United States establishes the Miller Test for obscenity in U.S. law. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states may ban materials found to be obscene according to local standards. The Miller Test has three parts:

1. Whether “the average person, applying contemporary community standards”, would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest,
2. Whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by applicable state law,
3. Whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.

1989 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that burning the American flag as a form of political protest was protected by the First Amendment.

2001 – 2001-06-21 – A federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, indicted 13 Saudis and a Lebanese in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 American servicemen.

June 20 is Ice Cream Soda Day
National Vanilla Milkshake Day

In 451 Battle of the Catalaunian Plains: Roman and Visigoths forces defeated Attila the Hun in northeast France.

1782 – The U.S. Congress adopts the Great Seal of the United States in 1782.

1787-  Oliver Ellsworth moves at the Federal Convention of 1787 to call the government the “United States”.

1789 – Deputies of the French Third Estate took the Tennis Court Oath on June 20, 1789.

1819 The U.S. vessel SS Savannah arrived at Liverpool, England. It was the first steam-propelled vessel to cross the Atlantic, although most of the journey was made under sail.

1837 Queen Victoria succeeded to the British throne following the death of her uncle King William IV on this date in 1837. She was 18 years old. She ruled for 63 years till 1901.

Samuel Morse received the patent for the telegraph in 1840.

West Virginia Admission Day on June 20, 1863 as the thirty-fifth state.

• Capital: Charleston
• Nickname: Mountain State
• Bird: Cardinal
• Flower: Rhododendron
• Tree: Sugar Maple
• Motto: Mountaineers are always

See our page for West Virginia for other interesting facts and trivia about West Virginia.

1877 Alexander Graham Bell installed the world’s first commercial telephone service in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

1893 Lizzie Borden was acquitted of the murders of her father and stepmother.

On June 20, 1945, the United States Secretary of State, Edward Reilly Stettinius, Jr., approved the transfer of Wernher von Braun and his team of Nazi rocket scientists to America.

Toast of the Town, later The Ed Sullivan Show, made its television debut in 1948.

The so-called “red telephone” was established between the Soviet Union and the United States following the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1963.

In 1975 the movie “Jaws”, based on the book by Peter Benchley, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Roy Scheider was released.

May 23 is
Lucky Penny Day – “See a penny, pick it up… All day long you’ll have good luck.”
Superstitions related to Lucky Penny

World Turtle Day
National Taffy Day

South Carolina Admission Day 1788 as the eighth state

• Capital: Columbia
• Nickname: Palmetto State
• Bird: Carolina Wren
• Flower: Yellow Jessamine
• Tree: Palmetto
• Motto: Prepared in mind and resources/While I breathe, I hope

See our page on South Carolina for more interesting facts and trivia about South Carolina.

May 23, 1568 – The Netherlands declared independence from Spain.

1701 – After being convicted of piracy and of the murder of gunner, William Moore, Captain William Kidd was hanged in London, England.

1829 – Accordion patent granted to Cyrill Demian in Vienna, Austrian Empire. Demian’s instrument bore little resemblance to modern instruments. It only had a left hand buttonboard, with the right hand simply operating the bellows.

1873 – The Canadian Parliament established the North-West Mounted Police, the forerunner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

1934 – The American bank robbers Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were ambushed by police and killed in Black Lake, Louisiana.

1945 – World War II: Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Schutzstaffel, (Nazi SS) committed suicide while in Allied custody. On Hitler’s behalf, Himmler formed the Einsatzgruppen and built extermination camps. As facilitator and overseer of the concentration camps, Himmler directed the killing of some six million Jews, between 200,000 and 500,000 Romani people, and other victims; the total number of civilians killed by the regime is estimated at eleven to fourteen million people. Most of them were Polish and Soviet citizens.

May 23, 1949 – The Federal Republic of Germany was founded. Commonly called West Germany, it reunited with East Germany in 1990.

International Waffle Day; not to be confused with National Waffle Day, celebrated on August 24th. International Waffle Day began in Sweden and Norway. March 25, is also the Feast of the Annunciation, upon which waffles are typically eaten. The shift from the religious celebration to Waffle Day occurred because the Swedish Vårfrudagen, meaning “Our Lady’s Day” (the Feast of the Annunciation), sounds similar to Våffeldagen (“waffle day”) in faster speech, and so over time Swedes began calling it Waffle Day and celebrating by eating waffles.

Day of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin, celebrating the visit of the Angel Gabriel to announce to Mary that she would be the mother of Jesus.

According to legend, Venice was founded at twelve o’clock noon on March 25, 421.

Sir Walter Raleigh was granted a patent to colonize Virginia in 1584.

The first settlers arrived in Maryland. Maryland Day, a legal holiday in Maryland celebrating the landing of the colonists sent to the New World in 1634 by Lord Baltimore under the leadership of his brother, Leonard Calvert.

Mount Etna in Sicily erupted on March 25, 1669, destroying Nicolosi, killing 20,000.

Publication of Federalist Paper #74:The Command of the Military and Naval Forces, and the Pardoning Power of the Executive written by Alexander Hamilton in 1788. This shortest of all the papers continues the discussion of presidential powers beginning with a short mention of being Commander in Chief of the armed forces and then with the rest of the paper on the power to pardon.

1811 – Percy Bysshe Shelley was expelled from the University of Oxford for his publication of the pamphlet The Necessity of Atheism.
Shelley’s definition of atheism:”

“There Is No God. This negation must be understood solely to affect a creative Deity. The hypothesis of a pervading Spirit co-eternal with the universe remains unshaken.”

A. E. Burnside patents Burnside carbine in 1856.

Birthday of Gutzon Borglum (1867), American sculptor and painter. Best known for the figures of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt on Mount Rushmore.

Birthday of Arturo Toscanini (1867), Italian musician and conductor

1965 – Civil rights activists led by Martin Luther King, Jr. successfully completed their 4-day 50-mile march from Selma to the capitol in Montgomery, Alabama. The route is memorialized as the “Selma To Montgomery Voting Rights Trail,” and is designated as a U.S. National Historic Trail.