1535	French explorer Jacques Cartier sets sail for North America.
1536	Anne Boleyn, the second wife of England’s King Henry VIII, was beheaded after being convicted of adultery.
1568	Defeated by the Protestants, Mary, Queen of Scots, flees to England where Queen Elizabeth imprisons her.
1588	The Spanish Armada set sail for England.
1608	The Protestant states form the Evangelical Union of Lutherans and Calvinists.
1635	Cardinal Richelieu of France intervenes in the great conflict in Europe by declaring war on the Hapsburgs in Spain. Cardinal Richelieu
1643	The French army defeats a Spanish army at Rocroi, France.
1780	Near total darkness descends on New England at noon. No explanation is found.
1856	Senator Charles Sumner speaks out against slavery.
1858	A pro-slavery band led by Charles Hameton executes unarmed Free State men near Marais des Cygnes on the Kansas-Missouri border.
1864	The Union and Confederate armies launch their last attacks against each other at Spotsylvania, Virginia.
1921	Congress sharply curbs immigration, setting a national quota system.
1935	The National Football League adopts an annual college draft to begin in 1936.
1935	T.E. Lawrence, also known as “Lawrence of Arabia,” died in England from injuries sustained in a motorcycle crash.
1962	Actress Marilyn Monroe performed a sultry rendition of “Happy Birthday” for President John F. Kennedy during a fundraiser at New York’s Madison Square Garden. Marilyn Monroe
1964	U.S. diplomats find at least 40 microphones planted in the American embassy in Moscow.
1967	U.S. planes bomb Hanoi for the first time.
1967	The Soviet Union ratified a treaty with the United States and Britain banning nuclear weapons from outer space.
1992	Mary Jo Buttafuoco was shot and seriously wounded in Massapequa, N.Y., by her husband Joey’s teenage lover, Amy Fisher.
1992	The 27th Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits Congress from giving itself midterm pay raises, went into effect.
1994	Former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis died in New York at age 64.
2001	Apple, Inc. opened its first retail stores, in Tysons Corner, Va., and Glendale, Calif.
2004	Specialist Jeremy C. Sivits received a year in prison and a bad conduct discharge in the first court-martial stemming from abuse of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison.
2005	“Revenge of the Sith,” the final chapter of the “Star Wars” saga, opened in movie theaters.
2011	Katie Couric, the first regular solo anchorwoman of a network evening newscast, signed off the “CBS Evening News” for the last time after five years. Katie Couric

Today in History facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, and HistoryOrb.com.

1642	The Canadian city of Montreal was founded.
1643	Queen Anne, the widow of Louis XIII, is granted sole and absolute power as regent by the Paris parliament, overriding the late king’s will.
1652	A law is passed in Rhode Island banning slavery in the colonies but it causes little stir and seems unlikely to be enforced.
1792	Russian troops invade Poland.
1802	Britain declares war on France.
1804	The French Senate proclaimed Napoleon Bonaparte emperor.
1828	The Battle of Las Piedras, between Uruguay and Brazil, ends.
1860	The Republican Party convention in Chicago nominated Abraham Lincoln for president.
1896	The Supreme Court endorsed the concept of “separate but equal” racial segregation in Plessy v. Ferguson, a precedent that was overturned in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.
1897	A public reading of Bram Stoker’s new novel “Dracula, or, The Un-dead” was staged in London. Bram Stoker
1904	Brigand Raizuli kidnaps American Ion H. Perdicaris in Morocco.
1911	Composer Gustav Mahler died in Vienna, Austria, at age 50.
1917	The U.S. Congress passes the Selective Service act, calling up soldiers to fight World War I.
1931	Japanese pilot Seiji Yoshihara crashes his plane in the Pacific Ocean while trying to be the first to cross the ocean nonstop. He is picked up seven hours later by a passing ship.
1933	The Tennessee Valley Authority was created.
1942	New York ends night baseball games for the rest of World War II.
1944	The Allies finally capture Monte Cassino in Italy.
1951	The United Nations moved out of its temporary headquarters in Lake Success, N.Y., for its permanent home in Manhattan.
1969	Two battalions of the 101st Airborne Division assault Hill 937 but cannot reach the top because of muddy conditions.
1969	Apollo 10 was launched on a mission that served as a dress rehearsal for the first moon landing.
1974	India becomes sixth nation to explode an atomic bomb.
1980	After rumbling for two months, Mount Saint Helens, in Washington, erupts 3 times in 24 hours.
1998	The federal government filed a sweeping antitrust case against Microsoft Corp.
2003	“Les Miserables,” the third-longest running show in Broadway history, closed after more than 16 years and 6,680 performances. Les Miserables
2004	Randy Johnson, 40, became the oldest pitcher in major league history to throw a perfect game, leading the Arizona Diamondbacks over the Atlanta Braves 2-0.
2009	Sri Lanka’s 25-year civil war ended with the government announcing it had defeated the Tamil Tiger rebels and killed their leader.

Today in History facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, and HistoryOrb.com.

This is not to say that I am not (somewhat) well-read. I have read the Diary of Anne Frank and the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. I have read the works of Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Edgar Allan Poe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. I have studied Supreme Court opinions, correspondences from America’s Founding Fathers, and the documents that gained our country freedom and established her government. I steadily read more and more, but I find that there is so much to read, sometimes I need direction.

I often ponder, “What pieces of historical literature must I read?”

I would love to use this post as a conversation platform. I genuinely am interested in your responses. To truly appreciate and have a comprehensive understanding of history, what historical literature do I need to read?

1540	Afgan chief Sher Khan defeats Mongul Emperor Humayun at Kanauj.
1630	Italian Jesuit Niccolo Zucchi sees the belts on Jupiter’s surface. Niccolo Zucchi
1681	Louis XIV sends and expedition to aid James II in Ireland. As a result, England declares war on France.
1756	Britain declares war on France.
1792	The New York Stock Exchange was founded by brokers meeting under a tree on what is now Wall Street.
1814	Denmark cedes Norway to Sweden.
1829	John Jay, American statesman and the first chief justice of the Supreme Court, died at age 83.
1863	Union General Ulysses Grant continues his push towards Vicksburg at the Battle of the Big Black River Bridge.
1875	The first Kentucky Derby was run; the winner was Aristides.
1881	Frederick Douglass is appointed recorder of deeds for Washington, D.C. Frederick Douglass
1940	Germany occupies Brussels, Belgium and begins the invasion of France.
1946	President Harry S. Truman seized control of the nation’s railroads, delaying a threatened strike by engineers and trainmen.
1954	The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously rules for school integration in Brown v. Board of Education.
1971	The musical “Godspell” opened off-Broadway.
1973	The Senate began hearings into the Watergate scandal.
1980	Rioting that claimed 18 lives erupted in Miami’s Liberty City neighborhood after an all-white jury in Tampa acquitted four former Miami police officers of fatally beating a black man.
1987	An Iraqi warplane attacked the U.S. Navy frigate Stark in the Persian Gulf, killing 37 American sailors. Iraq and the United States called the attack a mistake.
1992	Orchestra leader Lawrence Welk died at age 89.
1996	President Bill Clinton signed “Megan’s Law,” a measure requiring neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in.
1998	New York Yankees pitcher David Wells became the 13th player in modern major league baseball history to throw a perfect game in a 4-0 victory over the Minnesota Twins. David Wells
1999	Labor Party leader Ehud Barak unseated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israeli elections.
2000	Two former Ku Klux Klansmen were arrested on murder charges in the 1963 church bombing in Birmingham, Ala., that killed four black girls.
2004	Massachusetts became the first state to allow legal same-sex marriages.
2011	Actor and former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issued a statement confirming a Los Angeles Times report that he had fathered a child with a woman on his household staff more than a decade earlier.

Today in History facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, and HistoryOrb.com.

I was sent an article from a reader which I couldn’t help but sharing–World War II’s Strangest Battle: When Americans and Germans Fought Together. This interesting tale is the only recorded time that American and German  troops fought together in World War II. It is a wild–and almost unbelievable–story that you have to check out for yourself.

In research for an essay comparing and contrasting the Executive branches during the American Civil War and World War I, I ran across this insightful timeline. This timeline provides an easy to interpret look at civil liberties–or lack thereof–during periods of war, in American history. In past years we have dealt with loss of privacy, the violation of our constitutional rights, and unwarranted pat-downs from TSA agents. We try to tell ourselves, “This is for our own good. I am willing to endure ‘naked body scanners’ if it means that I can safely fly from point A to point B.” I am guilty of this as well, but it is good to look back over our shoulders (every once in a while) and see the correlations as history unfolds.

In a “too soon” moment, a German opera house has announced that it will be cancelling its Nazi-themed production of a Wagner opera. This opera, having run for less than a week, was cancelled because of the audiences’ complaints about scenes portraying the gassing of Jews. It was reported that the “scenes were so upsetting that some audience members sought medical help following early performances.” So, if you are a fan of Richard Wagner and his operatic masterpiece Tannhäuser, this bit of historical news might be right up your alley.

The last bit of history from the web is an article from DuckRabbits. In his article, Ancient Aliens (and a defense of mythology), the author gives his opinion about History Channel’s Ancient Aliens. The article covers the theory of ‘ancient aliens,’ as well as the possible misinterpretations of gods and angels–you know, the gods and angels that were really aliens… It is a well written article and a great defense of mythology.