TODAY IN HISTORY
TODAY IS TUESDAY, MAY 24, the 144th day of 2022. There are 221 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT IN HISTORY:
On this date in 1844, Samuel F.B. Morse transmitted the message “What hath God wrought” from Washington to Baltimore as he formally opened America’s first telegraph line.
In 1937, in a set of rulings, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Social Security Act of 1935.
In 1941, the German battleship Bismarck sank the British battle cruiser HMS Hood in the North Atlantic, killing all but three of the 1,418 men on board.
In 1961, a group of Freedom Riders was arrested after arriving at a bus terminal in Jackson, Mississippi, charged with breaching the peace for entering white-designated areas. (They ended up serving 60 days in jail.)
In 1962, astronaut Scott Carpenter became the second American to orbit the Earth as he flew aboard Aurora 7.
In 1974, American jazz composer and bandleader Duke Ellington, 75, died in New York.
In 1976, Britain and France opened trans-Atlantic Concorde supersonic transport service to Washington.
In 1980, Iran rejected a call by the World Court in The Hague to release the American hostages.
In 1994, four Islamic fundamentalists convicted of bombing New York’s World Trade Center in 1993 were each sentenced to 240 years in prison.
In 1995, former British Prime Minister Harold Wilson died in London at age 79. In 2006, “An Inconvenient Truth,” a documentary about former Vice President Al Gore’s campaign against global warming, went into limited release.
In 2011, Oprah Winfrey taped the final episode of her long-running talk show.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS: Actor-comedian-impressionist Stanley Baxter is 96. Jazz musician Archie Shepp is 85. Comedian Tommy Chong is 84. Singer Bob Dylan is 81. Actor Gary Burghoff is 79. Singer Patti LaBelle is 78. Actor Priscilla Presley is 77. Country singer Mike Reid is 75. Actor Jim Broadbent is 73. Actor Alfred Molina is 69. Singer Rosanne Cash is 67. Actors Cliff Parisi and Kristin Scott Thomas are 62. Rock musician Vivian Trimble is 59. Actor John C. Reilly is 57. Actors Dana Ashbrook and Eric Close are 55. Actor Carl Payne and rock musician Rich Robinson are 53. Actor-rapper Jerod Mixon (aka Big Tyme) is 41. Rock musician Cody Hanson (Hinder) is 40.