Also on this day

Rio de Janeiro is founded.

Composer Frederic Chopin, pictured, is born in Warsaw.

The Hoover Dam is completed.

prison cell. In April, instructions were received for delivering the money. It was paid, and the Lindberghs were told their son was in a boat off the New England coast. There was no sign of him or the boat.

In May, the body was found. Pathologists established that the child died the night of the kidnapping. Suspicion fell on household staff – one British maid, Violet Sharp, was questioned by heavy-handed police and later took her own life. An alibi confirmed her innocence.

It was more than two years before the police got a breakthrough – one of the marked notes from the ransom turned up at a petrol station. It was traced to Bruno Hauptmann, a Geman immigrant – and when his home was searched more of the money was recovered.

The case was circumstantial (he claimed he had been given the cash) but he was convicted and went to the electric chair in 1936.

The case shocked America, and saw the passing of the Lindbergh Law, making kidnapping across state lines a federal offence. Questions are asked of the conviction to this day, and Hauptmann’s wife Anna fought to clear his name until her death in 1994, aged 95.

Question: On this day in 1872, the first national park in the world was established. What is it called?

Last week I asked which US president, whose father was the second president, died February 23, 1848. The answer is JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.