1999—The FBI puts the name of James “Whitey” Bulger—its partner in crime—on the Most-Wanted List.
1997—Anti-regulation fanatic Carl Drega murders two cops, a selectman, and a judge in Colebrook, N.H. The carnage inspires Vin Suprynowicz, future Signed Member of the Free State Project, to write an essay and a book sympathizing with the killer.
1953—Despite setbacks four days earlier, the CIA’s coup succeeds in Iran. All will be well now, right?
1950—Called “blind,” “stupid,” and “pig-headed,” Rep. Clarence Cannon, [D-Mo.], shouts “I’ve taken all I’m going to” as he rushes Sen. Kenneth McKellar [D-Tenn.]. Senators wrest the gavel from McKellar, 81, before he can apply it to the head of Cannon, 71.
1942—An Allied force of 6,000 lands at Dieppe, France, where 68 percent become casualties. Mountbatten’s censors win the PR battle, though.
1854—Lt. John L. Grattan, a West Pointer from N.H., leads 29 cavalrymen into a Sioux encampment near Ft. Laramie and gets them all killed. The First Sioux War has begun.
1791—Benjamin Banneker, “the sable genius,” sends his just-published almanac to Thomas Jefferson with an admonition to practice what he preaches about the rights of all men.
1692—George Burroughs, Martha Carrier, George Jacobs, John Proctor, and John Willard are hanged as witches by the pious in Salem Village.