Aug. 13
Today in history
Today is Aug. 13. On this date in:
1521: Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés won Mexico for Spain by capturing Tenochtitlán, the capital of the Aztec empire, and Emperor Cuauhtémoc, after a three-month siege. Today, the location is known as Mexico City.
1818: Suffragist Lucy Stone was born in central Massachusetts. She worked for abolition and equal rights for women and kept her own surname when she married – a highly unusual statement at a time when married women could not own property, keep what they earned or enter contracts.
1878: Memphis restaurateur Kate Bionda died of yellow fever after a man who escaped from a quarantined steamboat ate at her food stand. The resulting epidemic killed more than 5% of Memphis residents
by the end of the year, and it is estimated that half the city fled.
1889: Inventor William Gray, of Hartford, Connecticut, received a patent for a “Coin-Controlled Apparatus for Telephones.” A bank in his hometown installed the first public pay phone that same year. Gray got the idea when he needed to call the doctor for his sick wife but couldn’t afford a phone and a local shop wouldn’t let him use theirs.
1910: Florence Nightingale died at 90. The reformer and “Lady with the Lamp” established modern nursing from her experience serving at a hospital during the Crimean War. She also was a groundbreaking public health statistician.
1910: A committee of more than 150 Black ministers wrote President William Taft asking him to suppress lynching after the racist massacre of July 29-30 in Slocum, Texas. They enclosed a three-page appeal to the American people, urging, “There is no wrong that cannot be put away by good men determined to do it.”
1913: English metallurgist Harry Brearley cast the first true stainless steel in Sheffield, England, seeking an erosion-resistant material for rifle barrels. The alloy contained 0.24% carbon and 12.8% chromium. The material resisted etching with acid, making it perfect for cutlery.
1918: Opha Mae Johnson, 39, became the first woman known to have enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. She held a civil service job at the Marine Corps headquarters and enlisted less than a week after the Marines approved women enlistees to replace men in clerical jobs.
1967: “Bonnie and Clyde,” the stylish crime film starring Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, was released. Along with its movie-house popularity, it sparked fashion trends and hit songs.
1969: The United States celebrated the Apollo 11 astronauts in a hectic series of transnational events: a New York City ticker tape parade with a ceremony at the United Nations, a parade in Chicago and a state dinner with President Richard Nixon in Los Angeles. The astronauts had spent three weeks in quarantine.
1997: The animated show “South Park” debuted on Comedy Central. In spite of – or because of – its foul-mouthed child protagonists and off-color subject matter, it was an immediate hit that made stars of creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
– USA TODAY Network
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Today in history, August 13
