2003—An ex-gay male escort begins attending White House press briefings with an official pass issued to him under the pseudonym “Jeff Gannon.”
1997—That blue dress gets soiled.
1993—The ATF tries to serve a warrant on a religious community in Waco. It does not go well.
1986—Ronald Reagan calls reporters “sons-of-bitches” for asking questions during a photo-op; press aide Larry Speakes explains he really said, “It’s sunny and you’re rich.”
1958—In New York, a first batch of 27 people die after drinking “King Kong” moonshine.
1947—Hooligans in Taiwan riot over routine government corruption. Koumintang troops—brave anti-Communists—justly massacre thousands.
1933—On Hitler’s say-so, Hindenberg sets the pattern, curtailing civil rights after the Reichstag Fire.
1921—The Kronstadt Rebellion against bolshevism begins in Russia. “Shoot them down like partridges,” orders Leon Trotsky.
1893—Birth of Ben Hecht, newspaperman and author of The Front Page.
1877—The U.S. seizes the Black Hills, in violation of a treaty.
1854—A group of political activists meet in Ripon, Wisc.; they may or may not found the GOP.
1840—Joshua V. Hines begins publishing Signs of the Times, a newspaper devoted to William Miller’s Doomsday prophecies.