Upton Sinclair said, “I aimed for the heart and by accident I hit the stomach instead”.
He was discussing the national response to his 1906 novel The Jungle about the Chicago meatpacking industry.
The book was meant to galvanize workers to socialism but instead led to the passage of the first nationwide food and drug control laws.
Born Joseph Louis Barrow (1914-83) near Lafayette, Louisiana, the African-American boxer defeated James J. Braddock for the world heavyweight championship on June 22, 1937. Known as the “Brown Bomber,” Louis held the title for 12 years, from 1937 until he retired in 1949. During this period, he defended his title a record 25 times.
New York socialite Samuel Ward McAllister created the term in 1892, when he planned a party to be held in Mrs. William Astor’s ballroom. Since the ballroom held only 400 people, McAllister limited the invitations to those he decided were the inner elite of New York society.
A Columbia Records (CBS) team led by Dr. Peter Goldmark invented the long-playing 33 1/3 r.p.m. record in 1948 as a successor to the 78 r.p.m. record. To compete with CBS, RCA came up with the handy 45 r.p.m. record in 1949.
Like many top officers in the Civil War, both commanders of the opposing forces at Fort Sumter had fought on the same side in the Mexican War (1846-48). P.G.T. Beauregard was the Confederate general who gave the order to fire on Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, at 4:30 A.M., in the first battle of…
Richard M. Nixon’s running mate in 1960 was Henry Cabot Lodge.
The worst earthquake east of the Mississippi River occurred in Charleston, South Carolina, on August 31, 1886, and registered what would have been 6.6 on the Richter scale. Sixty people were killed.