TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT 1979

America’s worst commercial nuclear accident occurred with a partial meltdown inside the Unit 2 reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pennsylvania.

ALSO ON THIS DATE 1797

Nathaniel Briggs of New Hampshire received a patent for a washing machine.

1898

The U.S. Supreme Court, in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, ruled 6-2that Wong, who was born in the United States to Chinese immigrants, was an American citizen.

1935

The notorious Nazi propaganda film “Triumph des Willens”, directed by Leni Riefenstahl, premiered in Berlin with Adolf Hitler present.

1941

Novelist and critic Virginia Woolf, 59, drowned herself near her home in Lewes, East Sussex, England.

1942

During World War II, British naval forces staged a successful raid on the Nazi-occupied French port of St. Nazaire in Operation Chariot, destroying the only dry dock on the Atlantic coast capable of repairing the German battleship Tirpitz.

1969

The 34th president of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower, died in Washington, D.C., at age 78.

1977

“Rocky” won best picture at the 49th Academy Awards; Peter Finch was honored posthumously as best actor for “Network” while his co-star, Faye Dunaway, was recognized as best actress.

1978

In Stump v. Sparkman, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld, 5-3, the judicial immunity of an Indiana judge against a lawsuit brought by a young woman who’d been ordered sterilized by the judge when she was a teenager.