Today in History for July 7, 2015

Christopher 'Kit' Carson

July 7, 1520 – Spanish conquistadores defeated larger Aztec army at the Battle of Otumba.

July 7, 1534 – During the European colonization of the Americas, the first known exchange between Europeans and natives of the Gulf of St. Lawrence in New Brunswick occurred.

July 7, 1777 – During the American Revolutionary War, American forces retreating from Fort Ticonderoga were defeated by the British in the Battle of Hubbardton, the only Revolutionary War battle to be fought in Vermont.

July 7, 1817 – Walter H. Crenshaw was born at Abbeville Court House, S.C., the eldest son of Judge Anderson Crenshaw, who moved with his family to Butler County, Ala. in 1821. He served as a state representative, Speaker of the State House, state senator, President of the State Senate, officer in the state militia, and Butler County Criminal Court Judge.

July 7, 1834 – In New York City, four nights of rioting against abolitionists began.

July 7, 1846 – During the Mexican–American War, American troops occupied Monterey and Yerba Buena, thus beginning the U.S. acquisition of California. The U.S. annexation of California was proclaimed at Monterey after the surrender of a Mexican garrison there.

July 7, 1852 – According to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories, Dr. John H. Watson, Sherlock Holmes’ sidekick, was born on this day.

July 7, 1860 – Composer Gustav Mahler was born in Kaliště, Bohemia. He wrote 10 symphonies and served as the conductor for both the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

July 7, 1863 – The United States began its first military draft. Exemptions cost $300.

July 7, 1863 – Union Lt. Colonel Christopher "Kit" Carson, perhaps the most famous trapper and guide in the West, left Santa Fe with his troops and started his campaign against the Indians of New Mexico and Arizona.

July 7, 1865 – During the American Civil War, four conspirators in the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln were hanged.

July 7, 1865 – Randolph County, Ala. native Lewis Powell, convicted of repeatedly stabbing Secretary of State William H. Seward in a failed attempt to kill him, was hanged alongside convicted Abraham Lincoln assassination conspirators Mary Surratt, David Herold and George Atzerodt.

July 7, 1865 - Mary Surratt was executed by the U.S. government for her role as a conspirator in Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Many expected President Andrew Johnson to pardon Surratt because the U.S. government had never hanged a woman. Ever since her death, numerous sightings of Mary Surratt’s ghost and other strange occurrences have been reported around Fort McNair. A hooded figure in black, bound at the hands and feet as Surratt had been at the time of her execution, has allegedly been seen moving about. Several children of soldiers have reported a “lady in black” who plays with them.

July 7, 1887 – Artist Marc Chagall was born in Vitebsk, Russia.

July 7, 1898 – U.S. President William McKinley signed the Newlands Resolution annexing Hawaii as a territory of the United States.

July 7, 1900 – Warren Earp, the youngest of the famous clan of gun fighting brothers, was shot and killed by John Boyett in a gunfight at the Headquarters Salone in Willcox, Az. Later, Boyett was tried for murder and found innocent on the grounds that he had acted in self-defense

July 7, 1906 – National Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige was born in Mobile, Ala. He would go on to play for the Cleveland Indians, the St. Louis Browns and the Kansas City Athletics. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1971.

July 7, 1907 – Science fiction writer Robert Heinlein was born in Butler, Mo.

July 7, 1909 – An intruder entered the home of F.M. Rountree in Conecuh County, Ala. and was shot, but the intruder got away.

July 7, 1912 – Jim Thorpe, a former two-time college football All-American, won the pentathlon at the fifth modern Olympics in Stockholm, Sweden.

July 7, 1915 – Author and poet Margaret Walker was born in Birmingham, Ala. Her mother’s relatives lived in Greenville and she set a portion of her 1966 novel, “Jubilee,” in Greenville. Walker is best known for her collections of poetry and her novel, “Jubilee,” which is based on her maternal grandmother's memories of slavery. Walker taught for many years at Jackson State University in Mississippi and she died in 1998.

July 7, 1915 – Mrs. J.G. Barrow suffered a broken collarbone during an automobile accident on this Thursday evening on Cary Street in Evergreen, Ala. She was in the car with her daughter, Mrs. Buford Powell, when their vehicle’s brakes failed going up the street’s steep incline, went down the embankment and overturned. No one else was injured, but the vehicle’s windshield was “demolished.”

July 7, 1928 – The Evergreen Motor Car Co. was scheduled to officially open in its new location inside “the pretty new building recently completed on Rural Street.” All seven models of the New Ford Car were to be on display on this day, several of which have not been shown in Evergreen, Ala. before.

July 7, 1930 – Congress approved the funds to build the Hoover Dam.

July 7, 1933 - Author John Logue was born in Bay Minette, Ala.

July 7, 1933 – Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author David McCullough was born in Pittsburgh, Pa.

July 7, 1937 - During the All-Star Game, Earl Averill hit a line drive that broke one of Dizzy Dean's toes.

July 7, 1947 – The Roswell incident, the (supposed) crash of an alien spaceship, occurred near Roswell in New Mexico.

July 7, 1948 - Photos of an alleged alien, nicknamed 'Tomato Man,' were taken at a UFO crash site in the Mexican state of Nuevo Leon.

July 7, 1948 – Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck bought Satchel Paige’s contract on Paige’s 42nd birthday, and Paige made his MLB debut two days later, entering in the fifth inning against the St. Louis Browns with the Indians trailing, 4-1. Paige gave up two singles in two innings, striking one man out and inducing one batter to hit into a double play. The Indians lost the game, 5-3, in spite of Paige’s contribution.

July 7, 1953 - The Dodgers set a major league record when they got a home run in their 24th consecutive game.

July 7, 1958 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Alaska Statehood Act into law.

July 7, 1964 - Shea Stadium hosted it's first and only All-Star game.

July 7, 1970 – Marine Lance Cpl. David Marshall Haveard of Brewton killed in action in Vietnam.

July 7, 1963 – Edgar Award-winning author Tom Franklin was born in Clarke County, Ala. Raised in Dickinson, he won an Edgar for Best Short Story in 1999 for “Poachers.” His novel, “Hell at the Breech,” a fictionalized version of the Mitcham War of Clarke County, Ala., was published in 2003.

July 7, 1980 – The Reeves Chapel Methodist Church and Cemetery near Camden, Ala. was added to the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage.

July 7, 1987 - Alabama author Sara Henderson Hay died in Pittsburgh, Pa.

July 7, 1988 – The Evergreen Courant reported that new Evergreen High School head football coach Hugh Fountain was asking all boys interested in playing junior varsity and varsity football to meet with him every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the field house.

July 7, 1988 – The Evergreen Courant reported that former Executive Vice President Bill Johnson had been appointed President of Poole Truck Line, Inc. The appointment was announced by John Bowron, President of NEOAX’s I.U. International Truckload Group, Poole’s parent company.

July 7, 1997 – The Turkish Armed Forces withdrew from northern Iraq after assisting the Kurdistan Democratic Party in the Iraqi Kurdish Civil War.

July 2, 2000 - Amazon.com announced that they had sold almost 400,000 copies of "Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire," making it the biggest selling book in e-tailing history.

July 7, 2005 – New Hope Baptist Church in Natchez, Ala. was added to National Register of Historic Places by the U.S. Department of the Interior.

July 7, 2011 – National Baseball Hall of Fame outfielder, third baseman and manager Dick Williams passed away at the age of 82 in Las Vegas, Nev. During his career, he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers, the Baltimore Orioles, the Cleveland Indians, the Kansas City Athletics and the Boston Red Sox, and he went on to manage the Red Sox, the Oakland Athletics, the California Angels, the Montreal Expos, the San Diego Padres and the Seattle Mariners. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2008.