Skeleton of Tyrannosaurus rex discovered
On August 12, 1990, fossil hunter Susan Hendrickson discovers three huge bones jutting out of a cliff near Faith, South Dakota. They turn out to be part of the largest-ever Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ever discovered, a 65 million-year-old specimen dubbed Sue, after its discoverer.
Amazingly, Sue’s skeleton was over 90 percent complete, and the bones were extremely well-preserved. Hendrickson’s employer, the Black Hills Institute of Geological Research, paid $5,000 to the land owner, Maurice Williams, for the right to excavate the dinosaur skeleton, which was cleaned and transported to the company headquarters in Hill City. The institute’s president, Peter Larson, announced plans to build a non-profit museum to display Sue along with other fossils of the Cretaceous period.
In 1992, a long legal battle began over Sue. The U.S. Attorney’s Office claimed Sue’s bones had been seized from federal land and were therefore government property. It was eventually found that Williams, a part-Native American and member of the Cheyenne River Sioux tribe, had traded his land to the tribe two decades earlier to avoid paying property taxes, and thus his sale of excavation rights to Black Hills had been invalid. In October 1997, Chicago’s Field Museum purchased Sue at public auction at Sotheby’s in New York City for $8.36 million, financed in part by the McDonald’s and Disney corporations.
Sue’s skeleton went on display at the Field Museum in May 2000. The tremendous T.rex skeleton–13 feet high at the hips and 42 feet long from head to toe, with a 2,000-pound skull and 58 teeth–is displayed in a special exhibition space.
Sue’s extraordinarily well-preserved bones have allowed scientists to determine many things about the life of T.rex. They have determined that the carnivorous dinosaur had an incredible sense of smell, as the olfactory bulbs were each bigger than the cerebrum, the thinking part of the brain. In addition, Sue was the first T.rex skeleton to be discovered with a wishbone, a crucial discovery that provided support for scientists’ theory that birds are a type of living dinosaur.
ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
2014
Hollywood icon Lauren Bacall dies
On August 12, 2014, actress Lauren Bacall, who shot to fame in her debut film, 1944’s “To Have and Have Not,” in which she appeared opposite Humphrey Bogart, with whom she would have a legendary romance, dies at her New York City home at age 89.
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SPORTS
1973
American golfer Jack Nicklaus sets title record
On August 12, 1973, American golfer Jack Nicklaus wins the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) championship for his 14th major title, surpassing Bobby Jones’ record of 13 major championships. Nicklaus shot a seven-under-par 277 at Canterbury Golf Club in Beachwood, Ohio.
COLONIAL AMERICA
1676
King Philip’s War ends
In colonial New England, King Philip’s War effectively comes to an end when Philip, chief of the Wampanoag tribe, is assassinated by a Native American in the service of the English. In the early 1670s, 50 years of peace between the Plymouth colony and the local Wampanoag Indians.
NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
1985
JAL flight 123 crashes into Mount Otsuka
At 6:50 p.m. local time, a Japan Air Lines Boeing 747SR crashes into Mount Otsuka, 70 miles northwest of Tokyo. There were 524 people aboard, and all but four were dead by the time rescuers reached the remote crash site 12 hours later. JAL flight 123 took off from Tokyo’s Haneda.
ANCIENT EGYPT
30 B.C.
Cleopatra dies by suicide
Cleopatra, queen of Egypt and lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, takes her life following the defeat of her forces against Octavian, the future first emperor of Rome. Cleopatra, born in 69 B.C., was made Cleopatra VII, queen of Egypt, upon the death of her father.
19TH CENTURY
1898
Armistice ends the Spanish-American War
The brief and one-sided Spanish-American War comes to an end when Spain formally agrees to a peace protocol on U.S. terms: the cession of Cuba, Puerto Rico and Manila in the Philippines to the United States pending a final peace treaty.
WORLD WAR II
1941
FDR and Churchill meet on ship, map out Atlantic Charter
On August 12, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill meet on board a ship at Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, to confer on issues ranging from support for Russia to threatening Japan to postwar peace.
ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1939
“The Wizard of Oz” movie premieres in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin
The Wizard of Oz, starring Judy Garland and featuring words and music by E.Y. “Yip” Harburg and Harold Arlen, receives its world premiere in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, on August 12, 1939. The beloved characters and familiar plot points were mostly all there in the original children’s book, from the Kansas farm girl in shiny slippers transported to Munchkin land by a terrible tornado, to the wicked witch, the brainless scarecrow, the heartless tin woodsman and the cowardly lion she encounters once she gets there.
ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1964
James Bond creator Ian Fleming dies
On August 12, 1964, the British author and journalist Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond, the world’s most famous fictional spy, dies of a heart attack at age 56 in Kent, England. Fleming’s series of novels about the debonair Agent 007.
NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
2000
Russian sub, the “Kursk,” sinks with 118 onboard
A Russian nuclear submarine sinks to the bottom of the Barents Sea on August 12, 2000; all 118 crew members are later found dead. The exact cause of the disaster remains unknown. Kursk left port on August 10 to take part in war games with the Russian military.
CRIME
1964
Great Train robber escapes from prison
On August 12, 1964, Charlie Wilson, part of the gang who pulled off the 1963 Great Train Robbery, one of the biggest heists of its kind, escapes from Winson Green Prison in Birmingham, England. Several men broke into the maximum-security facility to free Wilson.
AMERICAN REVOLUTION
1776
General Washington anticipates British strategy
On August 12, 1776, General George Washington writes to Major General Charles Lee that the Continental Army’s situation had deteriorated due to an outbreak of smallpox and problems with desertion. Washington feared that the superior British navy might blockade New York.
WORLD WAR II
1938
Hitler encourages Germans to have multiple children with the Mother’s Cross
On August 12, 1938, Adolf Hitler institutes the Mother’s Cross, to encourage German women to have more children, to be awarded each year on August 12, Hitler’s mother’s birthday. The German Reich needed a robust and growing population and encouraged couples to have large families.
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