TODAY IN HISTORY

 

Samuel Morse unveils the telegraph, revolutionizing communication

On January 6, 1838, Samuel Morse’s telegraph system is demonstrated for the first time at the Speedwell Iron Works in Morristown, New Jersey. The telegraph, a device which used electric impulses to transmit encoded messages over a wire, would eventually revolutionize long-distance communication, reaching the height of its popularity in the 1920s and 1930s.

Samuel Finley Breese Morse was born April 27, 1791, in Charlestown, Massachusetts. He attended Yale University, where he was interested in art, as well as electricity, still in its infancy at the time. After college, Morse became a painter. In 1832, while sailing home from Europe, he heard about the newly discovered electromagnet and came up with an idea for an electric telegraph. He had no idea that other inventors were already at work on the concept.

Morse spent the next several years developing a prototype and took on two partners, Leonard Gale and Alfred Vail, to help him. In 1838, he demonstrated his invention using Morse code, in which dots and dashes represented letters and numbers. In 1843, Morse finally convinced a skeptical Congress to fund the construction of the first telegraph line in the United States, from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore. In May 1844, Morse sent the first official telegram over the line, with the message: “What hath God wrought!”

Over the next few years, private companies, using Morse’s patent, set up telegraph lines around the Northeast. In 1851, the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company was founded; it would later change its name to Western Union. In 1861, Western Union finished the first transcontinental line across the United States. Five years later, the first successful permanent line across the Atlantic Ocean was constructed and by the end of the century telegraph systems were in place in Africa, Asia and Australia.

Because telegraph companies typically charged by the word, telegrams became known for their succinct prose–whether they contained happy or sad news. The word “stop,” which was free, was used in place of a period, for which there was a charge. In 1933, Western Union introduced singing telegrams. During World War II, Americans came to dread the sight of Western Union couriers because the military used telegrams to inform families about soldiers’ deaths.

Over the course of the 20th century, telegraph messages were largely replaced by cheap long-distance phone service, faxes and email. Western Union delivered its final telegram in January 2006.

Samuel Morse died wealthy and famous in New York City on April 2, 1872, at age 80.

21ST CENTURY

2021

U.S. Capitol riot

On the afternoon of January 6, 2021, a mob of President Donald Trump’s supporters descend on the U.S. Capitol, attempting to interfere with the certification of electoral votes from the 2020 presidential election. 

ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY

1975

"Wheel of Fortune" premieres

Wheel of Fortune, one of the the longest-running syndicated game show in American television, premieres on NBC on January 6, 1975. Created by television legend Merv Griffin and hosted since the early 1980s by Pat Sajak and Vanna White, Wheel is one of the most popular television shows in the world. Griffin, who had already created another iconic game show, Jeopardy!, conceived of Wheel as a combination between Hangman and roulette. Contestants guess letters as they attempt to solve a Hangman-like puzzle, spinning the wheel to determine how much money they will earn for a correct guess, with the ultimate goal being to solve the puzzle and accumulate as much money as possible. Since the show's inception, the price of a vowel has stood at $250 and has not been adjusted for inflation. The phrases "I'd like to buy a vowel" and "I'd like to solve the puzzle" have entered the American cultural lexicon. 

MIDDLE AGES

1412

Joan of Arc is born

Joan of Arc, the "Maid of Orléans," is believed to have been born on January 6, 1412. She lived only 19 years, but she would become a Roman Catholic saint and a national hero of France for her pivotal role in the Hundred Years’ War. Joan was born to Jacques d'Arc and Isabelle Romée in a small town in northeastern France. At the time of her birth, the English and their allies controlled much of France, including Paris, Bordeaux, and Reims. In addition to the English threat, a faction loyal to the Duke of Burgundy challenged the right of the Dauphin (heir apparent), Charles of Orléans, to the French throne. Joan claimed that she first received divine instruction at the age of 13, in her father's garden, when Saints Michael, Catherine, and Margaret told her to drive the English from the country. At age 16, she correctly predicted the outcome of a battle to a French commander, who then agreed to take her to Charles.

U.S. PRESIDENTS

1919

Theodore Roosevelt dies

Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president of the United States, dies at Sagamore Hill, his estate overlooking New York’s Long Island Sound. A dynamic and energetic politician, Theodore Roosevelt is credited with creating the modern presidency. 

US GOVERNMENT

1912

New Mexico joins the Union

On January 6, 1912, New Mexico is admitted into the United States as the 47th state. Spanish explorers passed through the area that would become New Mexico in the early 16th century, encountering the well-preserved remains of a 13th-century Pueblo civilization.

GREAT BRITAIN

1066

Harold II crowned king of England

Following the death of Edward the Confessor, Harold Godwineson, head of the most powerful noble family in England, is crowned King Harold II. On his deathbed, Edward supposedly designated Harold the royal heir, but this claim was disputed by William, duke of Normandy and cousin  of the late king. In addition, King Harald III Hardraade of Norway had designs on England, as did Tostig, brother of Harold.

US GOVERNMENT

2001

Congress certifies George W. Bush winner of 2000 elections

After a bitterly contested election, Vice President Al Gore presides over a joint session of Congress that certifies George W. Bush as the winner of the 2000 election. In one of the closest Presidential elections in U.S. history, George W. Bush was finally declared the winner more than five weeks after the election due to the disputed Florida ballots. Gore became the third Presidential candidate to win the popular vote but lose the election after the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to halt Florida’s manual recount. The ruling in effect gave Florida’s 25 electoral votes to Bush giving him 271 to Gore’s 266—where 270 is needed to win the election. George W. Bush took the oath of office on January 20, 2001, to become the 43rd President of the United States.

VIETNAM WAR

1971

Army drops charges of My Lai cover-up

The Army drops charges of an alleged cover-up in the My Lai massacre against four officers. After the charges were dropped, a total of 11 people had been cleared of responsibility during the My Lai trials. The trials were a result of action that occurred in March 1968. 

U.S. PRESIDENTS

1941

Franklin D. Roosevelt speaks of Four Freedoms

On January 6, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt addresses Congress in an effort to move the nation away from a foreign policy of neutrality. The president had watched with increasing anxiety as European nations struggled and fell to Hitler’s fascist regime and was intent on rallying public support for the United States to take a stronger interventionist role. In his address to the 77th Congress, Roosevelt stated that the need of the moment is that our actions and our policy should be devoted primarily–almost exclusively–to meeting the foreign peril. For all our domestic problems are now a part of the great emergency.

WESTWARD EXPANSION

1798

Frontiersman Jedediah Smith is born

Jedediah Strong Smith, one of America’s greatest trapper-explorers, is born in Bainbridge, New York. Smith explored a stunningly large area of the American West during his short life. He began his western voyages in 1822, when he joined the pioneering fur trader William Ashley on a trip up the Missouri River. Unlike earlier fur traders, who depended on Native Americans to actually trap or hunt the furs, Ashley eliminated the Natives as middlemen and instead sent out independent Anglo trappers like Smith to do the job.

ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY

1975

Two thousand Led Zeppelin fans trash the Boston Garden

On January 6, 1975, a crowd of 2,000-plus lines up outside Boston Garden to buy tickets to the rock band Led Zeppelin. Some in the crowd then entered into the near-empty arena and caused thousands of dollars in damage. "For years and years, we had people line up overnight to wait for tickets," recalls Steven Rosenblatt, the ticket-office manager at Boston Garden on that January night, "but we never had anything like this." Someone pried open the Garden's locked doors around midnight, and soon hundreds of beer-drinking, bottle-throwing Led Zeppelin fans had the run of Boston Garden. "You couldn't have this kind of crowd running around un-tethered inside the building," says Rosenblatt, "so we decided to open the ticket windows." The near-riot was calmed by around 2:30 a.m. when the Garden staff began selling tickets hours ahead of schedule. By 6:00 a.m., all 9,000 seats were sold out and the crowd had dispersed, but not before causing upwards of $50,000 of damage to the Garden and infuriating the Boston's mayor, Kevin H. White.

ART, LITERATURE, AND FILM HISTORY

2008

Disney-MGM Studios becomes Disney’s Hollywood Studios

At the close of business on January 6, 2008, the Walt Disney World Resort theme park known as Disney-MGM Studios officially shut its doors after almost a decade of operation. Fans didn’t have to worry too much, however, as the park would reopen the next morning under its new name, Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Debuting on May 1, 1989, Disney-MGM Studios was the third theme park to open at Disney World in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, after the Magic Kingdom in 1971 and Epcot Center in 1982. The project began with an idea for a movie-themed pavilion, resembling a film soundstage, to be built at Epcot; it was later expanded into its own theme park, which now stretches over 135 acres. The name of the park was the result of a 1985 licensing contract between Disney and the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio, which allowed Disney the right to use the MGM name and logo for a studio-themed park.

NATURAL DISASTERS & ENVIRONMENT

1996

Blizzard of 1996 begins

On January 6, 1996, snow begins falling in Washington, D.C., and up the Eastern seaboard, beginning a blizzard that kills 154 people and causes over $1 billion in damages before it ends. The Blizzard of 1996 began in typical fashion, as cold air from Canada pushed down and collided with relatively warm winds from the Gulf of Mexico. The clashing weather fronts caused a terrible combination of snow and wind. Snow began to fall in the District of Columbia about 9 p.m.; 12 inches fell over the course of the next 24 hours. In Lynchburg, Virginia, it was worse: A record 20 inches of snow fell in a single day. Since wind gusts were reaching up to 50 miles per hour, snow drifts piled up in many areas and travel was nearly impossible.

CRIME

1994

Skater Nancy Kerrigan attacked

Olympic hopeful Nancy Kerrigan is attacked at a Detroit ice rink following a practice session two days before the Olympic trials. A man hit Kerrigan with a club on the back of her knee, causing the figure skater to cry out in pain and bewilderment. 

AMERICAN REVOLUTION

1777

George Washington sets up winter quarters in Morristown, NJ

After two significant victories over the British in Trenton and Princeton, New Jersey, General George Washington marches north to Morristown, New Jersey, where he set up winter headquarters for himself and the men of the Continental Army on January 6, 1777. 

WORLD WAR II

1942

FDR commits to biggest arms buildup in U.S. history

President Franklin D. Roosevelt announces to Congress that he is authorizing the largest armaments production in the history of the United States. Committed to war in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, the U.S. had to reassess its military preparedness, especially in light of the fact that its Pacific fleet was decimated by the Japanese air raid. Among those pressing President Roosevelt to double U.S. armaments and industrial production were Lord William Beaverbrook, the British minister of aircraft production, and members of the British Ministry of Supplies, who were meeting with their American counterparts at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington. Beaverbrook, a newspaper publisher in civilian life, employed production techniques he learned in publishing to cut through red tape, improve efficiency, and boost British aircraft production to manufacturing 500 fighters a month, and he felt the U.S. could similarly beef up armament production.