Fri, Aug 21

2017—During an eclipse, as an aide says, “Don’t look,” President Trump removes protective glasses and stares directly at the sun.

2017—The Navy destroyer U.S.S. McCain collides with a freighter in the Gulf of Molucca; ten sailors die. This, 65 days after the destroyer U.S.S. Fitzgerald hits a freight ship off Honshu, killing seven aboard.

1992—Samuel Weaver, 14, and U.S. Marshal W.F. Degan die in a shootout at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.

1976—A two-day occupation of the Seabrook, N.H. nuke site begins.

1963—Ngo Dinh Nhu’s secret police kill hundreds of Buddhist protestors across Vietnam—for democracy.

1927—Justice Louis Brandeis refuses to hear a request for a stay of execution of anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti.

1911—Vincenzo Peruggia walks out of the Louvre with the Mona Lisa, wrapped in his coat, under his arm.

1863—William A. Quantrill and several hundred of his Raiders attack Lawrence, Kan., and kill hundreds of men, women, and children.

1831—Nat Turner begins a slave rebellion in Virginia. About 60 whites are killed in two days; whites kill twice as many Blacks in response.

1791—Haitians rise in revolt; 12 years later, history’s greatest rebellion of enslaved people ends in victory.

1762—Lady Mary Wortley Montagu utters her last words, “It has all been very interesting.”

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