DAILY ALMANAC
Today is Friday, May 20, the 140th day of 2022. There are 225 days left in the year. On this date in:
1862: President Abraham Lincoln signed the Homestead Act, which was intended to encourage settlements west of the Mississippi River by making federal land available for farming.
1927: Charles Lindbergh took off from Roosevelt Field on Long Island, New York, aboard the Spirit of St. Louis on his historic solo flight to France.
1932: Amelia Earhart took off from Newfoundland to become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic. (Because of weather and equipment problems, Earhart set down in Northern Ireland instead of her intended destination, France.)
1948: Chiang Kai-shek was inaugurated as the first president of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
1956: The United States exploded the first airborne hydrogen bomb over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific.
1959: Nearly 5,000 Japanese-americans who renounced their U.S. citizenship during World War II had it restored.
1961: A white mob attacked a busload of Freedom Riders in Montgomery, Alabama, prompting the government to send in U.S. marshals to restore order.
1969: U.S. and South Vietnamese forces captured Ap Bia Mountain, referred to as “Hamburger Hill” by the Americans, following one of the bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.
1985: Radio Marti, operated by the U.S. government, began broadcasting; Cuba responded by attempting to jam its signal.
2009: In a rare bipartisan defeat for President Barack Obama, the Senate voted overwhelmingly, 90-6, to keep the prison at Guantanamo Bay open for the foreseeable future and forbid the transfer of any detainees to facilities in the United States.
2015: Four of the world’s biggest banks – Jpmorgan Chase, Citigroup’s banking unit Citicorp, Barclays and the Royal Bank of Scotland – agreed to pay more than $5 billion in penalties and plead guilty to rigging the currency markets.
2020: President Donald Trump threatened to hold up federal funds for two election battleground states (Michigan and Nevada) that were making it easier to vote by mail during the pandemic. Police ticketed seven people for cutting hair during a protest against coronavirus restrictions outside the Michigan Capitol, where about a dozen barbers and hair stylists defied stay-athome orders to give free haircuts.
Actor David Proval (“The Sopranos”) is 80. Singer-actor Cher is 76. Actor
Dave Thomas (“Grace Under Fire,” “SCTV”) is 74. Musician Warren Cann of Ultravox is 72. Actor Dean Butler (“Little House on the Prairie”) is 66. Guitarist
Jane Wiedlin of The Gogo’s is 64. Actor Bronson Pinchot is 63. Singer Susan Cowsill of The Cowsills is 63. Actor John Billingsley (“True Blood,” “Enterprise”) is 62. Actor
Tony Goldwyn (“Scandal”) is 62. Singer
Nick Heyward of Haircut 100 is 61. TV personality Ted Allen (“Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”) is 57. Actor Mindy Cohn (“Facts of Life”) is 56. Guitarist Tom Gorman of Belly is 56. Rapper Busta Rhymes is 50. Bassist Ryan Martinie of Mudvayne is 47.