Today in History May 22

334 BC – The Macedonian army of Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of the Granicus

760 – 14th recorded perihelion passage of Halley’s Comet

1570 – First atlas ‘Theatrum Orbis Terrarum‘ (Theatre of the World), published by Abraham Ortelius in Antwerp with 70 maps

1761 – First life insurance policy in North America issued in Philadelphia

1803 – First public library opens  in Connecticut

1807 – Former Vice President Aaron Burr is tried for treason in Richmond, Virginia and acquitted

1819 – First steam propelled vessel Savannah to cross Atlantic

1826 – The HMS Beagle departs on its first voyage

1842 – Farmers Lester Howe and Henry Wetsel discover Howe Caverns when they stumble upon a large gaping hole in the ground.

1868 – Great Train Robbery-Seven men make off with $98,000 in cash

1892 – Dr Washington Sheffield invents toothpaste tube

1906 – Wright Brothers patent an aeroplane

1915 – Lassen Peak erupts with a powerful force, and is the only mountain, other than Mount St. Helens, to erupt in the continental US during the 20th century.

1931 – Canned rattlesnake meat goes on sale in Florida

1939 – Hitler and Mussolini sign “Pact of Steel”

1947 – First US ballistic missile fired

1964 – LBJ presents “Great Society”

1967 – “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” debuts

	Richard Nixon

1973 – President Nixon confesses his role in Watergate cover-up

1985 – US sailor Michael L Walker arrested for spying for USSR

1992 – Johnny Carson’s final appearance as host of Tonight Show

2002 – In Washington, DC, the remains of the missing Chandra Levy are found in Rock Creek Park.

2002 – American civil rights movement: a jury in Birmingham, Alabama, convicts former Ku Klux Klan member Bobby Frank Cherry of the 1963 murders of four girls in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church.

2004 – The town of Hallam, Nebraska, is wiped out by a powerful F4 tornado that broke a width record at an astounding 2.5 miles wide

2010 – Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus’ remains are reburied in Frombork Cathedral, Poland after a 200 year search for his tomb

2011 – An EF5 Tornado strikes the city of Joplin, Missouri killing at least 158 people, the single deadliest US tornado since modern record keeping began in

1950

1813 – Richard Wagner, Leipsig Germany, composer

1844 – Mary Cassatt, US, Impressionist painter (Woman Bathing)

1859 – Arthur Conan Doyle, UK, author brought Sherlock Holmes to life twice

1907 – Laurence Olivier, England, actor (Rebecca, Hamlet, Jazz Singer)

1928 – T Boone Pickens, CEO (Shamrock, Mesa Petroleum Co)

1938 – Richard Benjamin, NYC, director/actor (Goodbye Columbus, He & She)

1950 – Bernie Taupin, lyricist (writes with Elton John)

1980 – Marlo Thomas and Phil Donahue marry

2001 – Jane Fonda  divorces Ted Turner

337 – Constantine the Great, Emperor of Rome (306-37) dies at 47

1967 – Langston Hughes, American poet  and playwright

1990 – Rocky Graziano, boxer, dies at 71 of heart failure