American Red Cross founded
In Washington, D.C., humanitarians Clara Barton and Adolphus Solomons found the American National Red Cross, an organization established to provide humanitarian aid to victims of wars and natural disasters in congruence with the International Red Cross.
Barton, born in Massachusetts in 1821, worked with the sick and wounded during the American Civil War and became known as the “Angel of the Battlefield” for her tireless dedication. In 1865, President Abraham Lincoln commissioned her to search for lost prisoners of war, and with the extensive records she had compiled during the war she succeeded in identifying thousands of the Union dead at the Andersonville prisoner-of-war camp.
She was in Europe in 1870 when the Franco-Prussian War broke out, and she went behind the German lines to work for the International Red Cross. In 1873, she returned to the United States, and four years later she organized an American branch of the International Red Cross. The American Red Cross received its first U.S. federal charter in 1900. Barton headed the organization into her 80s and died in 1912.
ROARING TWENTIES
1927
Charles Lindbergh completes the first solo, nonstop transatlantic flight
American pilot Charles A. Lindbergh lands at Le Bourget Field in Paris, successfully completing the first solo, nonstop transatlantic flight and the first ever nonstop flight between New York to Paris.
WOMEN’S HISTORY
1932
Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to make solo, nonstop transatlantic flight
Five years to the day that American aviator Charles Lindbergh became the first pilot to accomplish a solo, nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, female aviator Amelia Earhart becomes the first pilot to repeat the feat, landing her plane in Ireland after flying across the Ocean.
EXPLORATION
1542
Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto dies in American wilderness
On the banks of the Mississippi River in present-day Louisiana, Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto dies, ending a three-year journey for gold that took him halfway across what is now the United States.
WORLD WAR II
1942
Thousands of Jews die in Nazi gas chambers; IG Farben sets up factory
On May 21, 1942, 4,300 Jews are deported from the Polish town of Chelm to the Nazi extermination camp at Sobibor, where all are gassed to death. On the same day, the German firm IG Farben sets up a factory just outside Auschwitz.
WORLD WAR II
1940
Nazis kill “unfit” people in East Prussia
On May 21, 1940, a “special unit” carries out its mission-and murders more than 1,500 hospital patients in East Prussia. Mentally ill patients from throughout East Prussia had been transferred to the district of Soldau, also in East Prussia.
WORLD WAR I
1911
French troops occupy Fez, sparking second Moroccan Crisis
Six years after the First Moroccan Crisis, during which Kaiser Wilhelm’s sensational appearance in Morocco provoked international outrage and led to a strengthening of the bonds between Britain and France against Germany.
U.S. PRESIDENTS
2000
Former president James Garfield’s spine put on display
On May 21, 2000, the bones of President James Garfield’s spine are on display for a final day at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C. The exhibit featured medical oddities from the museum’s archives.
WESTWARD EXPANSION
1539
Black Spanish explorer Estevan is reported killed
Word reaches Fray Marcos that Native Americans have killed his guide Estevan, a Black enslaved man who was the first non-Indian to visit the pueblo lands of the American Southwest. Thought to have been born sometime around 1500 on the west coast of Morocco.
ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY
1999
Soap star Susan Lucci wins first Emmy after 19 nominations
“The streak is over…Susan Lucci!” announces Shemar Moore of The Young and the Restless on this night in 1999, right before presenting the Daytime Emmy Award for Best Actress to the tearful star of ABC’s All My Children.
NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT
1960
Huge earthquake hits Chile
On May 21, 1960, the first tremor of a series hits Valdivia, Chile. By the time they end, the quakes and their aftereffects kill 5,000 people and leave another 2 million homeless. Registering a magnitude of 7.6, the first earthquake was powerful and killed several people.
CRIME
1992
Long Island Lolita is arrested
Amy Fisher, the so-called “Long Island Lolita,” is arrested for shooting Mary Jo Buttafuoco on the front porch of her Massapequa, New York, home. Fisher, only 17 at the time of the shooting, was having an affair with 38-year-old Joey Buttafuoco, Mary Jo’s husband.
CRIME
1924
Murderers Leopold and Loeb gain national attention
Fourteen-year-old Bobby Franks is abducted from a Chicago, Illinois, street and killed in what later proves to be one of the most unusual murders in American history. The killers, Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, were wealthy and intelligent teenagers whose sole motive for killing Franks was the desire to commit the “perfect crime.”
COLD WAR
1956
United States drops hydrogen bomb over Bikini Atoll
The United States conducts the first airborne test of an improved hydrogen bomb, dropping it from a plane over the tiny island of Namu in the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean on May 21, 1956. The successful test indicated that hydrogen bombs were viable airborne weapons.
INVENTIONS & SCIENCE
1901
Connecticut enacts first speed-limit law
On May 21, 1901, Connecticut becomes the first state to pass a law regulating motor vehicles, limiting their speed to 12 mph in cities and 15 mph on country roads. Speed limits had been set earlier in the United States for non-motorized vehicles.
AMERICAN REVOLUTION
1758
Lenape Indians abduct Mary Campbell from western Pennsylvania
On May 21, 1758, 10-year-old Mary Campbell is abducted from her home in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, by Lenape Indians; she becomes an icon of the French and Indian War. After her abduction, Campbell lived among the family of Chief Netawatwees in the Ohio Valley.
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