Portal:United States/Anniversaries/May/May 22
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- 1807 - A grand jury indicts former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr on a charge of treason.
- 1819 - The SS Savannah leaves port at Savannah, Georgia, United States, on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ship arrived at Liverpool, England on June 20.
- 1843 - Thousands of people and their cattle headed west via wagon train from Independence, Missouri to what would later become the Oregon Territory. It was part of the Great Migration. They followed what is now known as the Oregon Trail.
- 1856 - Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the hall of the United States Senate for a speech Sumner had made attacking Southerners who sympathized with the pro-slavery violence in Kansas ("Bleeding Kansas").
- 1872 - Reconstruction: U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant signs the Amnesty Act of 1872 into law restoring full civil rights to all but about 500 Confederate sympathizers.
- 1906 - Wright brothers are granted U.S. patent number 821,393 for their "Flying-Machine".
- 1915 - Lassen Peak erupts with a powerful force, and is the only mountain to erupt other than Mount St. Helens in the continental US during the 20th century.
- 1942 - The Steel Workers Organizing Committee disbands, and a new trade union, the United Steelworkers, is formed.
- 1947 - In an effort to fight the spread of Communism, U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs an act into law that will later be called the Truman Doctrine. The act grants $400 million in military and economic aid to Turkey and Greece.
- 1964 - U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson announces the goals of his Great Society social reforms to bring an "end to poverty and racial injustice" in America.
- 1967 - Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, the longest-running children's series on U.S. television, airs its first episode.
- 1992 - After 30 years, 66-year-old Johnny Carson hosts The Tonight Show for the last time.
