Today in History for March 10, 2015

Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald

March 10, 1496 - Christopher Columbus concluded his second visit to the Western Hemisphere when he left Hispaniola for Spain.

March 10, 1656 - In the American colony of Virginia, suffrage was extended to all free men regardless of their religion.

March 10, 1769 – David Holmes was born in Hanover, Pa. On June 5, 1815, as the Territorial Governor of Mississippi, he would establish Monroe County by proclamation.

March 10, 1776 - "Common Sense" by Thomas Paine was published.

March 10, 1778 - Congress made this day the official deadline for states to ratify the Articles of Confederation. Virginia was the only state to make the ratification prior to the deadline.

March 10, 1778 - Massachusetts became the ninth state to ratify the Articles of Confederation.

March 10, 1785 - Thomas Jefferson was appointed minister to France, succeeding Benjamin Franklin.

March 10, 1792 - John Stuart, 3rd earl of Bute and advisor to the British king, George III, died in London. Although most Americans had never heard his name, Lord Bute played a significant role in the politics of the British empire that spawned the American Revolution.

March 10, 1804 - In St. Louis, Missouri, a formal ceremony was conducted to transfer ownership of the Louisiana Territory from France to the United States.

March 10, 1848 - The U.S. Senate ratified the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ending the Mexican–American War.

March 10, 1849 - Abraham Lincoln applied for a patent for a device to lift vessels over shoals by means of inflated cylinders.

March 10, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln signed a brief document officially promoting then-Major General Ulysses S. Grant to the rank of lieutenant general of the U.S. Army, tasking the future president with the job of leading all Union troops against the Confederate Army.

March 10, 1865 – During the Civil War, a skirmish occurred in the vicinity of Woodville Station, Ala.

March 10, 1865 - Confederate General William H. C. Whiting died at age 40 in prison at Governors Island in New York from the wounds he had suffered at during the fall of Fort Fisher, North Carolina.

March 10, 1876 – Alexander Graham Bell made the first successful telephone call. He spoke to his assistant, electrical designer Thomas Watson, who was in the next room. He said, “Mr. Watson — come here — I want to see you.”

March 10, 1890 - Juliet Opie Hopkins died at the age of 71 in Washington, D.C. Hopkins served as the Superintendent of Civil War Hospitals established in Richmond by the State of Alabama during the Civil War. She became a Confederate heroine for her efforts and her portrait even appeared on Alabama state bank notes during the Civil War years.

March 10, 1903 – Jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke was born in Davenport, Iowa.

March 10, 1926 – The first Book-of-the-Month Club book, “Lolly Willowes, or The Loving Huntsman” by Sylvia Townsend Warner, was published.

March 10, 1930 – In Lovecraftian fiction, occultist John Grimlan, who some assert was 300 years old, passed away in a small town just outside San Francisco. He first appeared in 1937’s “Dig Me No Grave” by Robert E. Howard.

March 10, 1940 – Playwright and novelist David Rabe was born in Dubuque, Iowa.

March 10, 1941 - The Brooklyn Dodgers announced that their players would begin wearing batting helmets during the 1941 season.

March 10, 1948 – Montgomery, Ala. native and icon of the Jazz Age, Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald, the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald, died at the age of 47 in a hospital fire in Asheville, N.C.

March 10, 1948 – The City of Evergreen was featured as “One of the State’s Finest Cities” in the Alabama Local Government Journal, a bi-weekly newspaper published by the Alabama League of Municipalities.

March 10, 1965 – NFL Hall of Fame safety and cornerback Rod Woodson was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He would go on to play for Purdue, the Pittsburgh Steelers, the San Francisco 49ers, the Baltimore Ravens and the Oakland Raiders.

March 10, 1969 – Army PFC Billy Wayne Pettis, 21, of Castleberry, Ala. arrived in Vietnam. He would be killed in action 82 days later.

March 10, 1969 - James Earl Ray pled guilty in Memphis, Tenn. to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Ray later repudiated the guilty plea and maintained his innocence until his death in April 1998.

March 10, 1978 - CBS began airing the series "The Incredible Hulk."

March 10, 1978 – Sparta Academy senior Gray Stevens played on the South All-Star Team in the Alabama Private School Association’s All-Star Boys Basketball Game at Fort Dale Academy in Greenville, Ala.

March 10, 1982 - Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Pluto and Saturn were all on the same side of the Sun, within a 95 degree wide interval. In 1974, authors John Gribbin and Stephen Plagemann published the bestseller “The Jupiter Effect,” which wrongly predicted that this planetary alignment would cause a number of catastrophes including a huge earthquake on the San Andreas fault on March 10, 1982.

March 10, 1993 – Judge Sam Welch sentenced Wayne Holleman Travis to death by electrocution for the murder of Clarene Haskew in December 1991. Travis was transferred immediately to Holman Prison in Atmore, Ala.

March 10, 1993 - Sherry Davis became the first woman to be the public address voice of a major league team. She was the public address announcer for the San Francisco Giants.

March 10, 2006 - The Cuban national baseball team played Puerto Rico in the first round of the inaugural World Baseball Classic. While the Puerto Rican team was made up of major league All-Stars, the Cuban team was largely unknown to the world. Puerto Rico beat Cuba, 12-2.

March 10, 2009 - In Kinston, Ala., Michael McLendon began a shooting rampage that continued onward into the Geneva County towns of Samson and Geneva. Ten people were killed and six more were wounded before McLendon committed suicide.