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1995—A derecho sends hurricane force winds through New York and New England, toppling thousands of trees and killing three people. 1979—President Carter delivers his infamous “malaise” speech, which does not include the word “malaise.” 1974—In Florida, on live TV, newsreader Christine Chubbuck pulls a loaded pistol from a shopping bag and shoots herself dead. 1971—Nixon says he’ll go to China. 1964—The Republican Party saddles itself with candidate Barry Goldwater. 1919—The War Department—accurately named, at least—says 337,000 Americans dodged the recent draft. 1877—John W. Garrett, President of the B & O Railroad, gives his shareholders a 10 percent dividend and his workers a 10 percent pay …

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2004—The GOP tries to ban gay marriage but can’t rise to the occasion. 2000—Five tobacco companies are ordered to pay $145 billion in damages, but they wiggle off the hook. 1989—Alabama tries twice, 19 minutes apart, to electrocute Horace F. Dunkins, who’s Black and developmentally-disabled. The first try fails because the chair is wired wrong. 1981—New Hampshire businessman Max Hugel’s stint as Deputy Director of Operations at the CIA ends after 64 days due to revelations of unseemly stock market shenanigans. 1975—Boss Clarence Kelley confesses to Congress that the FBI has been burglarizing Americans since 1940. 1970—R. Nixon approves the Huston plan to burgle and …

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2024—An alleged Presidential assassination attempt in Butler, Pa. sets a new record for implausibility. 1987—Senator Warren B. Rudman [R-N.H] sets Ollie North straight during the Iran-Contra hearings: “The American people have the constitutional right to be wrong.” 1977—During a heat wave and a financial crisis, with Son of Sam on the loose, lightning strikes cause a blackout in New York City. Chaos ensues. 1959—A sodium-cooled nuclear reactor in Simi Valley, Calif. has a partial meltdown, releasing 300 times more radiation than Three Mile Island—a fact kept secret for 20 years. 1956—The “Dartmouth Workshop” begins. “Artificial Intelligence” is born in N.H. What could go wrong? 1950—A …

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2022—Seabrook sirens go off in error. 2020—A poorly-fought four-day fire leaves the $2 billion USS Bonhomme Richard a $3.6 million pile of scrap. 1982—FEMA pledges that even in a nuclear war, the mail will get through. 1973—A fire in St. Louis, Mo. destroys the service records of 16 to 18 million Army and Air Force veterans. 1917—In Bisbee, Ariz., a 2,000-man posse herds 1,300 striking miners into cattle cars and sends them eastward, with no food and little water. 1892—The Pennsylvania militia arrives at Homestead, Pa. to protect Andrew Carnegie’s right to make a buck. 1872—Orangemen avoid casualties by refraining from marching through Irish tenements …

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2003—Condi Rice lies about White House knowledge of Joe Wilson’s Niger investigation; Ari Fleischer outs Valerie Plame as a CIA officer; Karl Rove lies to Time about Wilson’s wife, Plame; and CIA head George Tenet takes the rap for the White House’s lies about Iraq buying uranium. 1998—Arkansas Governor “Mike” Huckabee’s son David, working as a counselor at a Boy Scout Camp, breaks the Oath by killing a dog. 1991—A defective heater sets a loaded ammunition carrier afire at Camp Doha in Kuwait. It explodes, scattering bomblets; blasts and fires consume 102 other vehicles, including four M1A1 Abrams tanks. The fires injure 49; three die …

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