TODAY IN HISTORY: Nellie Bly returns to New York

In AD 749, Emperor Leo IV of Byzantium was born. He led the Eastern Christian Church away from iconoclasm and towards a restoration of icons.

In 1533, England’s King Henry VIII secretly married his second wife, Anne Boleyn. She gave birth to Queen Elizabeth I but was later executed.

In 1759, poet Robert Burns was born in Alloway, Scotland. Best known for his descriptions of country life and for satires against the religious and political hypocrisy of the day, Burns wrote much of his poetry in his broad Scots dialect. He lived a life of hard labour and poverty while struggling with his father on a series of poor farms. Burns nearly emigrated to Jamaica in 1786, the year his first volume of poetry was published to great acclaim. Burns later helped support himself as a tax collector. He died in 1796.

In 1791, the British Parliament approved a bill splitting the old province of Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada. Upper Canada later became the province of Ontario, while Lower Canada became Quebec.

In 1858, Britain’s Princess Victoria, the eldest daughter of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, married Crown Prince Frederick William (the future German Emperor and King of Prussia) at St. James’ Palace.

In 1890, reporter Nellie Bly of the New York World returned home, completing an around-the-world journey in 72 days, six hours and 11 minutes. That beat the fictional 80-day trip of Jules Verne’s Phileas Fogg.

In 1915, Alexander Graham Bell inaugurated transcontinental telephone service in North America – more than 40 years after developing the invention in Brantford, Ont. The call was from New York to San Francisco.

In 1924, the first Winter Olympics began in Chamonix, France. (Hockey and figure skating competitions had been staged in conjunction with previous Summer Olympics.)

In 1969, Vietnam War peace talks resumed in Paris, with the inclusion of representatives from South Vietnam and the Viet Cong.

In 1971, Charles Manson and three young women were convicted in Los Angeles in the August 1969 slayings of actress Sharon Tate and six other people. Manson died in prison in 2017.

In 1978, four women in Dubuque, Iowa – bucking mind-boggling odds – were dealt perfect bridge hands in the same game, allowing that spades is the true perfect hand.

In 1980, musician Paul McCartney was released from a Japanese jail where he had been held for nine days on charges of smuggling marijuana into the country. He was immediately deported.

In 1981, the 52 Americans held hostage by Iran for 444 days arrived in the United States.

In 2001, Celine Dion gave birth to a boy, ReneCharles, the result of in vitro fertilization. Her efforts to have a child had been well-publicized as she and her husband Rene Angelil battled infertility. In 2010, Dion gave birth to twin boys, also born through IVF.

In 2007, Ford Motor Company posted the biggest loss in its 103-year history – US$12.7 billion in fiscal 2006.

In 2022, GoFundMe froze the $4.2 million raised from 55,000 donors in support of the “Freedom Convoy” of truckers. It said fundraisers must be transparent about the flow of funds and have a clear plan for how those funds will be spent and that it had contacted the page’s organizer to verify that information. The GoFundMe page said the money would go to food, fuel and accommodation for the big-riggers taking part in the protest, which had been condemned by the Canadian Trucking Association.