Today in History for Aug. 26, 2016

George E. Day

Aug. 26, 1346 – During the Hundred Years' War, the military supremacy of the English longbow over the French combination of crossbow and armoured knights was established at the Battle of Crécy.

Aug. 26, 1768 – Captain James Cook set sail from England on board the HMS Endeavour.

Aug. 26, 1776 - Falsely confident that the British would not attack New York’s Manhattan Island, General George Washington poured additional reinforcements into the lines around Brooklyn Heights, then considered part of rural Long Island. Washington also ordered the dispersal of certain documents among the Hessians, about which he wrote “The papers designed for the foreign (Hessian) Troops, have been put into several Channels, in order that they may be conveyed to them, and from the Information I had yesterday, I have reason to believe many have fallen into their Hands.” The “papers” induced Hessian troops to desert the British army.

Aug. 26, 1778 – The first recorded ascent of Triglav, the highest mountain in Slovenia, took place.

Aug. 26, 1791 – John Fitch was granted a United States patent for the steamboat.

Aug. 26, 1804 - Following the death of Sergeant Charles Floyd on their journey of exploration to the Pacific, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark promoted Patrick Gass as his replacement. Two days later, the captains held an election among the men to determine Floyd’s replacement. Private Patrick Gass of Pennsylvania received a majority of the votes.

Aug. 26, 1847 – Safronia Caroline Martin was born to John Singleton Martin and Martha Sims. At the age of 20, she would marry Lewis Lavon Peacock on Sept. 26, 1867.

Aug. 26, 1858 –John Trotwood Moore, who lived in Monterey in Butler County for four years and Pine Apple in Wilcox County for two years, was born in Marion in Perry County. An author, novelist, magazine publisher, newspaper editor and columnist, teacher and State Librarian for Tennessee, he passed away in Nashville, Tenn. on May 10, 1929.

Aug. 26, 1861 – During the Civil War, Union forces were defeated at Cross Lanes, W.V.

Aug. 26, 1861 - Confederate Genearl John Floyd occupied the bluffs overlooking Carnifex Ferry on the Kanawha River in Virginia.

Aug. 26, 1861 – During the Civil War, the Federal vessels Cumberland, Fanny, Harriet Lane, Minnesota, Monticello, Pawnee, Susquehanna and the Wabash, under the command of U.S. Navy Commodore Silas Stringham, in conjunction with Union Major General Benjamin F. Butler, sailed from Hampton Roads, Va., for the North Carolina Coast at Cape Hatteras with 900 Union soldiers to attack Forts Clark and Hatteras.

Aug. 26, 1861 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought at Wayne Court House and Blue's Hosue, West Virginia.

Aug. 26, 1862 - Confederate cavalry troops under General Fitzhugh Lee entered Manassas Junction and captured the rail center. This event set the stage for the Second Battle of Bull Run, which began on August 29. Union General John Pope’s Army of Virginia was soon on its way, and the two armies would clash on August 29.

Aug. 26, 1862 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought near Rienzi, Miss. with Colonel Philip H Sheridan commanding Federal forces.

Aug. 26, 1862 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought at Bristoe Station, Bull Run Bridge, Gainesville, Hay Market and Sulphur Springs, Va. as Confederate Major General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson pushed his Confederate army corps of the Army of Northern Virginia through Thoroughfare Gap in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Aug. 26, 1863 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought near Bayou Meto, Arkansas; at Perryville in the Indian Territory as Union Major General James G. Blunt movd against Confederate Brigadier General William Steele and Confederate Colonel Stand Watie; at Clear Fork, Missouri; and at Sutton and Moorefield, West Virginia.

Aug. 26, 1863 – During the Civil War, an engagement was fought at Rocky Gap, near White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, with Federal cavalry forces under the command of Union Brigadier General William W. Averell.

Aug. 26, 1864 – During the Civil War, Federal operations took place at the Chattahoochee railroad bridge and at Pace’s and Turner’s Ferries, Ga. as Union Major General James Schofield, part of Union Major General William T Sherman’s command, attempted to surround Confederate Lieutenant General John Bell Hood near Atlanta, Ga.

Aug. 26, 1864 – During the Civil War, skirmishes were fought at Bayou Tensas, Louisiana; Pleasant Hill, Missouri; and at Halltown and near Charlestown, West Virginia. An affair also occurred at Williamsport, Maryland.

Aug. 26, 1864 – During the Civil War, Confederate 4th Cpl. Lewis Lavon Peacock was issued a passport to return home to the community of Rocky Head in Dale County, Ala. A little over a month earlier, he’d been admitted to General Hospital at Howard’s Grove in Richmond, Va. for sickness after the Bermuda Hundred campaign. Three days before being issued the passport mentioned above, he was granted a 45-day furlough.

Aug. 26, 1867 – Physician and state representative from Monroe County, Dr. William Cunningham, passed away at Burnt Corn.

Aug. 26, 1873 – Inventor Lee de Forest was born in Council Bluff, Iowa. De Forest has been called "the father of radio" and "the grandfather of television" because he invented the Audion vacuum tube. Prior to the invention of the transistor in the 1940s, the Audion was the chief component involved in transmitting, receiving, and amplifying radio signals.

Aug. 26, 1873 – The St. Louis, Mo. school board authorized the first public kindergarten in the United States.

Aug. 26, 1880 – French poet and art critic Guillaume Apollinaire was born Wilhelm Albert Vladimir Alexander Apollinaire de Kostrowitzky in Rome, Italy to a former Italian military officer and a Polish noblewoman.

Aug. 26, 1883 – The Krakatoa volcano in the Dutch East Indies began erupting continuously on this day, sending a black cloud of ash 17 miles high. The next day, four enormous explosions took place, said to be the loudest in human history, heard more than 3,000 miles away. Each of these explosions was accompanied by a tsunami, believed to be over 100 feet high in places.

Aug. 26, 1885 - Prof. Eugene A. Smith, Alabama’s State Geologist, was in Monroeville on this Wednesday, and was in Monroe County examining the county’s “many marl heds.”

Aug. 26-27, 1895 – Monroe County, Alabama’s court was in session on this Monday and Tuesday. “The docket was unusually heavy, there being over 30 cases,” according to The Monroe Journal.

Aug. 26, 1901 – German SS officer and engineer Hans Kammler was born in Stettin, German Empire.

Aug. 26, 1902 - G.R. Boulware came up to Evergreen on this day to bring the election returns from Brooklyn.

Aug. 26, 1904 – British novelist and playwright Christopher Isherwood was born in rural Cheshire.

Aug. 26, 1905 – A protracted meeting was scheduled to begin at Pleasant Hill Baptist Church near Manistee, Ala. on this Saturday, and each male member of the church was requested to meet on that day. A graveyard and church cleanup day was also scheduled for Aug. 24.

Aug. 26, 1906 – Walter King Wilson Jr. was born in Fort Barrancas, Fla. He went on to become a lieutenant general in the U.S. Army and is most noted for begint the Army’s Chief of Engineers during years 1961 to 1965. The state of Alabama named the “Dolly Parton Bridge” in honor of Wilson, a long-term resident of Mobile, after the completion of the bridge’s construction in 1980.

Aug. 26, 1906 – Albert Sabin, the developer of the oral polio vaccine, was born in Bialystok, Poland.

Aug. 26-27, 1906 - Prof. L.K. Benson spent this Sunday and Monday with his brother at Camden, according to The Monroe Journal.

Aug. 26, 1907 - Author Louise Clarke Pyrnelle died in Birmingham, Ala.

Aug. 26, 1910 – Nobel Peace Prize-winning Roman Cathlic nun and missionary Mother Teresa was born Anjeze Gonxhe Bojaxhiu in Skopje (in modern Macedonia), which was then a part of the Ottoman Empire.

Aug. 26, 1914 – The Louisville & Nashville Railroad announced that it would inaugurate an all-steel passenger train between New Orleans and New York, starting on Jan. 1, 1915. This train was to be the finest south of the Ohio River with electric lights, made of solid steel and fitted with all modern conveniences.

Aug. 26, 1915 – The Monroe Journal reported that the new steel bridge across Limestone Creek, the miles northwest of Monroeville, Ala., was complete and that the earth fills on each end of the bridge were being put in. The bridge was scheduled to be open to the public within the next week to 10 days. Preparations were also being made to begin work on the steel bridge across Flat Creek near the site of the old Graham Bridge, which collapsed several weeks before.

Aug. 26, 1914 – Monroeville and Brewton’s baseball teams played to an 11-inning scoreless tie in a game that was called due to darkness in Brewton, Ala.

Aug. 26, 1915 – Oscar Baxley, a member of the Brewton Military Co., was accidentally shot in the foot by a fellow soldier on this day while encamped in Montgomery and died from the effects of the wound the following day.

Aug. 26, 1916 - Tresidence of S.P. Dunn was destroyed by fire about noon on this Saturday in Evergreen. The fire department, as well as citizens, hurried to the scene of the fire, which was just across the street from where the Page residence burned a short time before. The fire originated from the stove flue and in a few minutes was burning fiercely. At one time, it seemed that the building was doomed to total destruction, but by hard work this was prevented, although the structure was badly damaged. Dunn planned to begin the work of rebuilding at once, according to The Conecuh Record.

Aug. 26, 1916 – Confederate veteran William Burgamy, 96, “one of the oldest and most respected citizens of Conecuh County” passed away on this Saturday morning at his home near Owassa.

Aug. 26, 1920 – The 19th amendment to United States Constitution took effect, giving women the right to vote.

Aug. 26, 1927 – B.E. Carpenter and E.R. Carpenter was scheduled to open their new modern dry cleaning plant, the French Dry Cleaners, in Evergreen, Ala. in the former pressing shop they’d bought from T.A. Gantt. Visitors to the new business on this day were to receive free tickets to the Arcade Theatre to see “The Lost Trail,” starring Tom Mix on this night.

Aug. 26, 1939 - The first televised major league baseball games were shown on station W2XBS. The event was a double-header between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Aug. 26, 1941 – American writer Barbara Ehrenreich was born in Butte, Montana.

Aug. 26, 1942 - The Conecuh County Health Office moved from the Jones-Deming Building to the building owned by Dr. G.G. Newton, located on the north side of the courthouse square in Evergreen, Ala. Dr. E.L. Kelly, County Health Officer, said the move was made to secure more room.

Aug. 26, 1947 – Daniel Robert “Dan” Bankhead, a native of Empire, Ala., became the first black pitcher in major league baseball, when he made his major league debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbetts Field. In his first major league at bat, he hit a home run off Fritz Ostermueller of the Pittsburgh Pirates. He also gave up 10 hits in 3-1/3 innings pitching in relief that day.

Aug. 26, 1951 – The All-Stars from teams of the Conecuh Amateur Baseball League were scheduled to meet Bolling, the top team of the Butler County

Semi-Pro League, in an exhibition game on this Sunday in McKenzie, Ala. at 3 p.m.

Aug. 26, 1964 - Lyndon B. Johnson was nominated to run for the presidency at the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey. His running mate would be Hubert H. Humphrey. Former Vice President Johnson had assumed the reigns of government in November 1963 when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.

Aug. 26, 1964 - The Joint Chiefs of Staff sent a memorandum to the Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara, concurring with an August 19 cable from Ambassador Maxwell Taylor in Saigon who called for “a carefully orchestrated bombing attack on North Vietnam” to prevent “a complete collapse of the U.S. position in Southeast Asia.

Aug. 26, 1967 - Badly injured after ejecting when his North American F-100F was shot down over North Vietnam, Major George E. Day was captured and severely tortured. He later managed to escape and eventually made it to the DMZ. After several attempts to signal U.S. aircraft, he was ambushed and recaptured, and was later moved to prison in Hanoi, where he continued to strongly resist to his captors. Finally released in 1973, Major Day was awarded the Medal of Honor for his conspicuous gallantry while a POW.

Aug. 26, 1968 - The Democratic National Convention opened in Chicago and, immediately, a conflict erupted over the party’s Vietnam platform. An antiwar faction led by Senators Eugene McCarthy (D-Minnesota) and George McGovern (D-South Dakota) advocated unconditionally halting the bombing of North Vietnam; negotiating a mutual withdrawal of U.S. and North Vietnamese forces from South Vietnam; encouraging the Saigon regime to open negotiations with the National Liberation Front; the acceptance of a coalition government; and the reduction of U.S. combat operations in the South. The other faction endorsed the Johnson administration’s handling of the war, applauding the president’s efforts to scale down U.S. commitment and begin peace talks.

Aug. 26, 1973 – The baseball classic “Bang the Drum Slowly,” starring Robert De Niro, debuted in theaters.

Aug. 26, 1974 – American pilot and explorer Charles Lindbergh passed away at the age of 72 in Kipahulu, Maui, Hawaii.

Aug. 26, 1977 – Excel opened the 1977 football season with a 6-0 win over Southern Normal in Brewton, Ala.

Aug. 26, 1980 - Monroe County and Repton public school students began the 1980-81 school year on this Tuesday.

Aug. 26, 1982 – The First National Bank Building (also known as the Timmerman Building) in Andalusia, Ala. was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Aug. 26, 1983 – Southern Normal defeated Excel, 27-13, in Brewton, Ala.

Aug. 26, 1987 – The Robbins Hotel in Beatrice, Ala. which burned down on Oct. 12, 2012, was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Aug. 26, 1989 – Excel opened the 1988 football season with a 28-0 win over A.L. Johnson at Thomaston, Ala.

Aug. 26, 1990 - The 55 Americans at the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait left Baghdad by car and headed for the Turkish border.

Aug. 26, 1992 - A "no-fly zone" was imposed on the southern third of Iraq. The move by the U.S., France and Britain was aimed at protecting Iraqi Shiite Muslims.

Aug. 26, 1996 - Barbara Jewell asked U.S. President Bill Clinton to clear her son's name in connection with the Centennial Olympic Park bombing. Richard Jewell was later cleared by the Justice Department.

Aug. 26, 1998 - U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno ordered a review of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Aug. 26, 2002 - U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney said that White House lawyers had told President Bush that he would not need congressional approval to attack Iraq.

Aug. 26, 2005 – The Kalpoe brothers were rearrested along with a new suspect, 21-year-old Freddy Arambatzis, in connection with the disappearance of 18-year-old Natalee Holloway of Mountain Brook, Ala.

Aug. 26, 2011 – Excel opened the 2010 football season with a 27-8 win over J.U. Blacksher at Uriah, Ala.