On this day:

BarnBuster said:

U.S. postal system established​

On this day in 1775, the U.S. postal system is established by the Second Continental Congress, with Benjamin Franklin as its first postmaster general. Franklin (1706-1790) put in place the foundation for many aspects of today’s mail system. During early colonial times in the 1600s, few American colonists needed to send mail to each other; it was more likely that their correspondence was with letter writers in Britain. Mail deliveries from across the Atlantic were sporadic and could take many months to arrive. There were no post offices in the colonies, so mail was typically left at inns and taverns. In 1753, Benjamin Franklin, who had been postmaster of Philadelphia, became one of two joint postmasters general for the colonies. He made numerous improvements to the mail system, including setting up new, more efficient colonial routes and cutting delivery time in half between Philadelphia and New York by having the weekly mail wagon travel both day and night via relay teams. Franklin also debuted the first rate chart, which standardized delivery costs based on distance and weight. In 1774, the British fired Franklin from his postmaster job because of his revolutionary activities. However, the following year, he was appointed postmaster general of the United Colonies by the Continental Congress. Franklin held the job until late in 1776, when he was sent to France as a diplomat. He left a vastly improved mail system, with routes from Florida to Maine and regular service between the colonies and Britain. President George Washington appointed Samuel Osgood, a former Massachusetts congressman, as the first postmaster general of the American nation under the new U.S. constitution in 1789. At the time, there were approximately 75 post offices in the country.

Today, the United States has over 40,000 post offices and the postal service delivers 212 billion pieces of mail each year to over 144 million homes and businesses in the United States, Puerto Rico, Guam, the American Virgin Islands and American Samoa. The postal service is the nation’s largest civilian employer, with over 700,000 career workers, who handle more than 44 percent of the world’s cards and letters. The postal service is a not-for-profit, self-supporting agency that covers its expenses through postage (stamp use in the United States started in 1847) and related products. The postal service gets the mail delivered, rain or shine, using everything from planes to mules. However, it’s not cheap: The U.S. Postal Service says that when fuel costs go up by just one penny, its own costs rise by $8 million.

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LOL they should consider making a stamp for that.

on this day: i woke up with no one padding in the face with a shovel...

1896 - Vitascope Hall, 1st permanent for-profit movie theatre, opens in New Orleans


An image of Vitascope Hall at 623 Canal Street in New Orleans, as published in the July 15, 1916, edition of the trade journal The Moving Picture World. Opened in July of 1896 by businessman William Rock, the business is recognized as the first-ever permanent, for-profit movie theater in the world. (National Archives)

https://www.nola.com/300/2017/06/vitascope_hall_new_orleans_fir.html

1914 - Foxtrot 1st danced at New Amsterdam Roof Garden, in NYC, by Harry Fox


1978 - 600,000 attend the "Summer Jam" rock festival at Watkins Glen, New York, at the time the largest ever audience at a pop festival

1932 - "White Zombie" - 1st feature length zombie film directed by Victor Halperin and starring Béla Lugos is released in the US

1868
14th Amendment adopted


Following its ratification by the necessary three-quarters of U.S. states, the 14th Amendment, guaranteeing to African Americans citizenship and all its privileges, is officially adopted into the U.S. Constitution.

Two years after the Civil War, the Reconstruction Acts of 1867 divided the South into five military districts, where new state governments, based on universal manhood suffrage, were to be established. Thus began the period known as Radical Reconstruction, which saw the 14th Amendment, which had been passed by Congress in 1866, ratified in July 1868. The amendment resolved pre-Civil War questions of African American citizenship by stating that “all persons born or naturalized in the United States…are citizens of the United States and of the state in which they reside.” The amendment then reaffirmed the privileges and rights of all citizens, and granted all these citizens the “equal protection of the laws.”

In the decades after its adoption, the equal protection clause was cited by a number of African American activists who argued that racial segregation denied them the equal protection of law. However, in 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that states could constitutionally provide segregated facilities for African Americans, so long as they were equal to those afforded white persons. The Plessy v. Ferguson decision, which announced federal toleration of the so-called “separate but equal” doctrine, was eventually used to justify segregating all public facilities, including railroad cars, restaurants, hospitals, and schools. However, “colored” facilities were never equal to their white counterparts, and African Americans suffered through decades of debilitating discrimination in the South and elsewhere. In 1954, Plessy v. Ferguson was finally struck down by the Supreme Court in its ruling in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.

During the Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover orders the U.S. Army under General Douglas MacArthur to evict by force the Bonus Marchers from the nation’s capital.

Two months before, the so-called “Bonus Expeditionary Force,” a group of some 1,000 World War I veterans seeking cash payments for their veterans’ bonus certificates, had arrived in Washington, D.C. Most of the marchers were unemployed veterans in desperate financial straits. In June, other veteran groups spontaneously made their way to the nation’s capital, swelling the Bonus Marchers to nearly 20,000 strong. Camping in vacant government buildings and in open fields made available by District of Columbia Police Chief Pelham D. Glassford, they demanded passage of the veterans’ payment bill introduced by Representative Wright Patman.

While awaiting a vote on the issue, the veterans conducted themselves in an orderly and peaceful fashion, and on June 15 the Patman bill passed in the House of Representatives. However, two days later, its defeat in the Senate infuriated the marchers, who refused to return home. In an increasingly tense situation, the federal government provided money for the protesters’ trip home, but 2,000 refused the offer and continued to protest. On July 28, President Herbert Hoover ordered the army to evict them forcibly. General MacArthur’s men set their camps on fire, and the veterans were driven from the city. Hoover, increasingly regarded as insensitive to the needs of the nation’s many poor, was much criticized by the public and press for the severity of his response.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/07/28/the-veterans-were-desperate-gen-macarthur-ordered-u-s-troops-to-attack-them/
https://www.npr.org/2011/11/11/142224795/the-bonus-army-how-a-protest-led-to-the-gi-bill

BarnBuster said:

Bonus Marchers evicted by U.S. Army​

During the Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover orders the U.S. Army under General Douglas MacArthur to evict by force the Bonus Marchers from the nation’s capital.

Two months before, the so-called “Bonus Expeditionary Force,” a group of some 1,000 World War I veterans seeking cash payments for their veterans’ bonus certificates, had arrived in Washington, D.C. Most of the marchers were unemployed veterans in desperate financial straits. In June, other veteran groups spontaneously made their way to the nation’s capital, swelling the Bonus Marchers to nearly 20,000 strong. Camping in vacant government buildings and in open fields made available by District of Columbia Police Chief Pelham D. Glassford, they demanded passage of the veterans’ payment bill introduced by Representative Wright Patman.

While awaiting a vote on the issue, the veterans conducted themselves in an orderly and peaceful fashion, and on June 15 the Patman bill passed in the House of Representatives. However, two days later, its defeat in the Senate infuriated the marchers, who refused to return home. In an increasingly tense situation, the federal government provided money for the protesters’ trip home, but 2,000 refused the offer and continued to protest. On July 28, President Herbert Hoover ordered the army to evict them forcibly. General MacArthur’s men set their camps on fire, and the veterans were driven from the city. Hoover, increasingly regarded as insensitive to the needs of the nation’s many poor, was much criticized by the public and press for the severity of his response.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/07/28/the-veterans-were-desperate-gen-macarthur-ordered-u-s-troops-to-attack-them/
https://www.npr.org/2011/11/11/142224795/the-bonus-army-how-a-protest-led-to-the-gi-bill

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Etta Moten's voice showcased the pathos of that event.

"There were 1,196 heroes aboard the USS Indianapolis when she was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-58 on the night of 29-30 July, 1945. Some of them had only recently reported aboard, but most of the crew had already distinguished themselves in some of the most critical battles of the Pacific War. Her crew had already succeeded in close-in shore bombardments supporting U.S. Marines and shooting down multiple kamikaze suicide aircraft, any one of which could have crippled or sunk a critical U.S. aircraft carrier. While serving as the flagship for one of the largest and most costly naval battles in history off Okinawa, the Indianapolis was hit and nearly sunk by a kamikaze; she was saved only by the skill, courage, and determination of her crew. All of those aboard when she was torpedoed were instrumental in the successful accomplishment of Indianapolis’ most important mission of the war; the safe delivery at maximum speed of atom bomb components to Tinian Island (her speed record from San Francisco to Pearl Harbor still stands today.) In doing so, the Indianapolis Sailors served to forestall additional years of carnage, in the long run saving many hundreds of thousands of U.S. and Japanese lives.

Beyond the defeat of the sinking itself, USS Indianapolis’ story is compounded by grave errors in U.S. Navy command, control, and intelligence, which, beyond those Sailors who initially went down with their ship due to Japanese torpedo attack, resulted in hundreds of needless and horrific additional deaths to exposure, dehydration and shark attacks. And as if the sinking were not bad enough, the U.S. Navy’s poor handling of casualty notification, and perhaps the most controversial court martial in U.S. Navy history, led to years of bitter recriminations. Why, after 70 plus years should we remember? Because, even in the worst defeats and disasters there is valor and sacrifice that deserves to never be forgotten. The story of USS Indianapolis can serve as inspiration to current and future Sailors enduring situations of mortal peril. There are also lessons learned (and in the case of the Indianapolis, lessons re-learned) that need to be preserved and passed on, so that the same mistakes can be prevented, and lives saved. Lest we forget so we may learn."

Indianapolis : the true story of the worst sea disaster in U.S. naval history and the fifty-year fight to exonerate an innocent man / Lynn Vincent and Sara Vladic.

In Harm's Way: The Sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors by Doug Stanton

Out of the Depths: An Unforgettable WWII Story of Survival, Courage, and the Sinking of the USS Indianapolis by Edgar USMC Harrell and David Harrell

All the Drowned Sailors: Cover-Up of America's Greatest Wartime Disaster at Sea, Sinking of the Indianapolis with the Loss of 880 Lives Because of the Incompetence of Admirals, Officers, & Gentlemen by Lech and Raymond B Lech

1958
NASA created

On this day in 1958, the U.S. Congress passes legislation establishing the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), a civilian agency responsible for coordinating America’s activities in space. NASA has since sponsored space expeditions, both human and mechanical, that have yielded vital information about the solar system and universe. It has also launched numerous earth-orbiting satellites that have been instrumental in everything from weather forecasting to navigation to global communications.

NASA was created in response to the Soviet Union’s October 4, 1957 launch of its first satellite, Sputnik I. The 183-pound, basketball-sized satellite orbited the earth in 98 minutes. The Sputnik launch caught Americans by surprise and sparked fears that the Soviets might also be capable of sending missiles with nuclear weapons from Europe to America. The United States prided itself on being at the forefront of technology, and, embarrassed, immediately began developing a response, signaling the start of the U.S.-Soviet space race.

On November 3, 1957, the Soviets launched Sputnik II,which carrieda dog named Laika. In December, America attempted to launch a satellite of its own, called Vanguard, but it exploded shortly after takeoff. On January 31, 1958, things went better with Explorer I, the first U.S. satellite to successfully orbit the earth. In July of that year, Congress passed legislation officially establishing NASA from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and other government agencies, and confirming the country’s commitment to winning the space race. In May 1961, President John F. Kennedydeclared thatAmerica should put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. On July 20, 1969, NASA’s Apollo 11 mission achieved that goal and made history when astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first person to set foot on the moon, saying “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

NASA has continued to make great advances in space exploration since the first moonwalk, including playing a major part in the construction of the International Space Station. The agency has also suffered tragic setbacks, however, such as the disasters that killed the crews of the Challenger space shuttle in 1986 and the Columbia space shuttle in 2003. In 2004, President George Bush challenged NASA to return to the moon by 2020 and establish “an extended human presence” there that could serve as a launching point for “human missions to Mars and to worlds beyond.”

BarnBuster said:

Japanese sink the USS Indianapolis​

"There were 1,196 heroes aboard the USS Indianapolis when she was torpedoed by the Japanese submarine I-58 on the night of 29-30 July, 1945. Some of them had only recently reported aboard, but most of the crew had already distinguished themselves in some of the most critical battles of the Pacific War. Her crew had already succeeded in close-in shore bombardments supporting U.S. Marines and shooting down multiple kamikaze suicide aircraft, any one of which could have crippled or sunk a critical U.S. aircraft carrier. While serving as the flagship for one of the largest and most costly naval battles in history off Okinawa, the Indianapolis was hit and nearly sunk by a kamikaze; she was saved only by the skill, courage, and determination of her crew. All of those aboard when she was torpedoed were instrumental in the successful accomplishment of Indianapolis’ most important mission of the war; the safe delivery at maximum speed of atom bomb components to Tinian Island (her speed record from San Francisco to Pearl Harbor still stands today.) In doing so, the Indianapolis Sailors served to forestall additional years of carnage, in the long run saving many hundreds of thousands of U.S. and Japanese lives.

Beyond the defeat of the sinking itself, USS Indianapolis’ story is compounded by grave errors in U.S. Navy command, control, and intelligence, which, beyond those Sailors who initially went down with their ship due to Japanese torpedo attack, resulted in hundreds of needless and horrific additional deaths to exposure, dehydration and shark attacks. And as if the sinking were not bad enough, the U.S. Navy’s poor handling of casualty notification, and perhaps the most controversial court martial in U.S. Navy history, led to years of bitter recriminations. Why, after 70 plus years should we remember? Because, even in the worst defeats and disasters there is valor and sacrifice that deserves to never be forgotten. The story of USS Indianapolis can serve as inspiration to current and future Sailors enduring situations of mortal peril. There are also lessons learned (and in the case of the Indianapolis, lessons re-learned) that need to be preserved and passed on, so that the same mistakes can be prevented, and lives saved. Lest we forget so we may learn."

Indianapolis : the true story of the worst sea disaster in U.S. naval history and the fifty-year fight to exonerate an innocent man / Lynn Vincent and Sara Vladic.

In Harm's Way: The Sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors by Doug Stanton

Out of the Depths: An Unforgettable WWII Story of Survival, Courage, and the Sinking of the USS Indianapolis by Edgar USMC Harrell and David Harrell

All the Drowned Sailors: Cover-Up of America's Greatest Wartime Disaster at Sea, Sinking of the Indianapolis with the Loss of 880 Lives Because of the Incompetence of Admirals, Officers, & Gentlemen by Lech and Raymond B Lech

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If I remember, the Indianapolis was on its way back after delivering the two bombs to Tinian Island. If they'd been hit on the way there, I wonder what turns history would have taken.

cannabineer said:

If I remember, the Indianapolis was on its way back after delivering the two bombs to Tinian Island. If they'd been hit on the way there, I wonder what turns history would have taken.

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Although we didn't have any additional assembled devices, all the material was available. I believe all components except the plutonium were on Tinian for a third gadget and they would have been ready to drop one by the end of Aug. (This is from memory, I have not researched) I suspect if they had lost the first 2, LeMay would have stepped up firebombing over flights of the mainland while they assembled/shipped more devices. They really didn't want to proceed with DOWNFALL.

from "Inside the Center: The Life of J. Robert Oppenheimer" by Ray Monk
"Immediately after the Nagasaki bombing the Allies did not possess any more atomic bombs. It is true, as Groves puts it, 'our entire organization both at Los Alamos and at Tinian was maintained in a state of complete readiness to prepare additional bombs', but, as he himself reported to General Marshall, the earliest data at which the next bomb could be assembled for use was 17 August, and almost everybody expected the war to be over by then."

also
https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/index.php
https://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=54
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a528442.pdf

On this day in 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signs Medicare, a health insurance program for elderly Americans, into law. At the bill-signing ceremony, which took place at the Truman Library in Independence, Missouri, former President Harry Truman was enrolled as Medicare’s first beneficiary and received the first Medicare card.

Johnson wanted to recognize Truman, who, in 1945, had become the first president to propose national health insurance, an initiative that was opposed at the time by Congress.

The Medicare program, providing hospital and medical insurance for Americans age 65 or older, was signed into law as an amendment to the Social Security Act of 1935. Some 19 million people enrolled in Medicare when it went into effect in 1966.

In 1972, eligibility for the program was extended to Americans under 65 with certain disabilities and people of all ages with permanent kidney disease requiring dialysis or transplant. In December 2003, President George W. Bushsigned into law the Medicare Modernization Act, which added outpatient prescription drug benefits to Medicare.

Medicare is funded entirely by the federal government and paid for in part through payroll taxes. Medicare is currently a source of controversy due to the strain it puts on the federal budget. Throughout its history, the program also has been plagued by fraud—committed by patients, doctors and hospitals—that has cost taxpayers billions of dollars.

Medicaid, a state and federally funded program that offers health coverage to certain low-income people, was also signed into law by President Johnson on July 30, 1965, as an amendment to the Social Security Act.

1976
Bruce Jenner wins decathlon


On July 30, 1976, American Bruce Jenner wins gold in the decathlon at the Montreal Olympics. His 8,617 points set a world record in the event.

The secret to Jenner’s success was his preparation. In the 1970s, most decathletes trained with other decathletes. Bruce Jenner, however, trained with some of the world’s best athletes in each of the 10 decathlon events. “If you train with a decathlon man,” Jenner told Dave Anderson of The New York Times in 1976, “you can’t visualize that you can do much better. But if you throw the discus with Mac Wilkins or throw the shot with Al Feuerbach, then they’re 20 feet ahead of me. You learn much more that way.”

Although the blond, chiseled, 6-foot-2-inch Nikolai Avilov, the world record-holder and 1972 Olympic champion from the Soviet Union, was considered nearly impossible to beat, Jenner’s intense training paid off at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. After the first day of competition, Jenner was in third place, 35 points off the pace and 17 points behind his rival. With all of Jenner’s best events slated for the second day, though, Jenner knew he could pull off a victory. He later admitted thinking, “If I am within 150 points of the leader after five events, I’ll run away with it.” On July 30, the next five events went exactly as Jenner hoped: He ran efficiently in the 110-meter hurdles, set a personal best in the pole vault, threw the discus and the javelin well and sprinted the last 300 meters of the 1,500-meter event to seal a win. Jenner then took an impromptu victory lap with an American flag before finding his wife Chrystie–who had supported him during his training by working as a flight attendant–for a congratulatory kiss. Avilov finished third, almost 300 points behind the new champion.

After his win, Jenner enjoyed the unofficial title of “world’s greatest athlete” and appeared in movies, on television and, of course, adorned a Wheaties® box. He was voted the 1976 AP Male Athlete of the Year. The 1976 Olympics was his last decathlon.

wonder what poor old chrystie thinks about "bruce" now?

1981
MTV makes its maiden broadcast
“If advertisers make the video disco channel a success, the implications for cable television and the recording industry could be far reaching,” wrote a New York Times business columnist in the summer of 1981 about the upcoming premiere of a new cable television network dedicated exclusively to popular music. This prediction proved to be an understatement of historic proportions, though not exactly overnight. Though the premiere of MTV on this day in 1981 would later be seen as the beginning of a whole new era in popular culture, only a few thousand night-owl subscribers to a single northern New Jersey cable system were able to witness the televised revolution.

It was just after midnight in the early morning hours of August 1, 1981, that the fledgling Music Television network flickered to life. “Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll” were the words that preceded on opening montage featuring a chunky guitar riff playing over the familiar image of an American astronaut planting an unfamiliar flag on the surface of the moon—a flag emblazoned with a big, block capital “M” and the smaller, handwritten letters “TV.” The video that followed was, famously and prophetically, “Video Killed The Radio Star” by the little-known English electronic new wave duo, the Buggles. Pat Benatar’s “You Better Run” followed, and from there a rotation that featured several songs and videos that might be considered classics of the early MTV era (e.g., “Rapture” by Blondie and “Love Stinks” by the J. Geils Band) and many more that might not (e.g., “Can’t Happen Here” by Rainbow and “Little Susie’s On The Up” by PhD).

The roughly 80 different videos that made up that first week’s rotation on MTV probably represented nearly every promotional music video then available. This would change, of course, as MTV proved its ability to break new artists and as record labels responded with ever larger budgets for lavish video productions. But on that first night, as several employees of the fledgling MTV gathered to watch their creation in a New Jersey bar, it is impossible to say how many others actually joined them. Soon enough, however, MTV would spread to cable systems nationwide and begin to exert the cultural influence that has since been credited (or blamed) for everything from Flashdance and Miami Vice to Rick Astley and Attention Deficit Disorder.

i was there, watching . i saw the buggles.....as far as i can recall, it's the only time i ever saw the buggles....

1876
Wild Bill Hickok is murdered



“Wild Bill” Hickok, one of the greatest gunfighters of the American West, is murdered in Deadwood, South Dakota.

Born in Illinois in 1837, James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok first gained notoriety as a gunfighter in 1861 when he coolly shot three men who were trying to kill him. A highly sensationalized account of the gunfight appeared six years later in the popular periodical Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, sparking Hickok’s rise to national fame. Other articles and books followed, and though his prowess was often exaggerated, Hickok did earn his reputation with a string of impressive gunfights.

After accidentally killing his deputy during an 1871 shootout in Abilene, Texas, Hickok never fought another gun battle. For the next several years he lived off his famous reputation, appearing as himself in Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West show. Occasionally, he worked as guide for wealthy hunters. His renowned eyesight began to fail, and for a time he was reduced to wandering the West trying to make a living as a gambler. Several times he was arrested for vagrancy.

In the spring of 1876, Hickok arrived in the Black Hills mining town of Deadwood, South Dakota. There he became a regular at the poker tables of the No. 10 Saloon, eking out a meager existence as a card player. On this day in 1876, Hickok was playing cards with his back to the saloon door. At 4:15 in the afternoon, a young gunslinger named Jack McCall walked into the saloon, approached Hickok from behind, and shot him in the back of the head. Hickok died immediately. McCall tried to shoot others in the crowd, but amazingly, all of the remaining cartridges in his pistol were duds. McCall was later tried, convicted, and hanged.

"The Piper at the Gates of Dawn is the debut album by the English rock band Pink Floyd, and the only one made under founding member Syd Barrett's leadership. The album, named after the title of chapter seven of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows and featuring a kaleidoscopic cover photo of the band taken by Vic Singh, was recorded from February to May 1967 and released on 5 August 4 August 1967. It was produced by Beatles engineer Norman Smith and released in 1967 by EMI Columbia in the United Kingdom and Tower in the United States, in August and October respectively.

The release of the album in the US was timed with the band's tour of the US. In the UK, no singles were released from the album, but in the US "Flaming" was offered as a single. The US version of the album has a rearranged track list, and contains the UK non-album single, "See Emily Play". Two of the album's songs, "Astronomy Domine" and "Interstellar Overdrive", became long-term mainstays of the band's live set list, while other songs were performed live only a handful of times.

Since its release, the album has been hailed as one of the best psychedelic rock albums. In 1973, it was packaged with the band's second album, A Saucerful of Secrets, and released as A Nice Pair to introduce new fans to the band's early work after the success of The Dark Side of the Moon. Special limited editions of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn were issued to mark its thirtieth and fortieth anniversaries in 1997 and 2007, respectively, with the latter release containing bonus tracks. In 2012, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn was voted 347th on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time"."

http://www.pinkfloyd.com/home.php

1957
American Bandstand goes national


Television, rock and roll and teenagers. In the late 1950s, when television and rock and roll were new and when the biggest generation in American history was just about to enter its teens, it took a bit of originality to see the potential power in this now-obvious combination. The man who saw that potential more clearly than any other was a 26-year-old native of upstate New York named Dick Clark, who transformed himself and a local Philadelphia television program into two of the most culturally significant forces of the early rock-and-roll era. His iconic show, American Bandstand, began broadcasting nationally on this day in 1957, beaming images of clean-cut, average teenagers dancing to the not-so-clean-cut Jerry Lee Lewis’ “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” to 67 ABC affiliates across the nation.

The show that evolved into American Bandstand began on Philadephia’s WFIL-TV in 1952, a few years before the popular ascension of rock and roll. Hosted by local radio personality Bob Horn, the original Bandstand nevertheless established much of the basic format of its later incarnation. In the first year after Dick Clark took over as host in the summer of 1956, Bandstand remained a popular local hit, but it took Clark’s ambition to help it break out. When the ABC television network polled its affiliates in 1957 for suggestions to fill its 3:30 p.m. time slot, Clark pushed hard for Bandstand, which network executives picked up and scheduled for an August 5, 1957 premiere.

Renamed American Bandstand, the newly national program featured a number of new elements that became part of its trademark, including the high school gym-like bleachers and the famous segment in which teenage studio guests rated the newest records on a scale from 25 to 98 and offered such criticisms as “It’s got a good beat, and you can dance to it.” But the heart of American Bandstand always remained the sound of the day’s most popular music combined with the sight of the show’s unpolished teen “regulars” dancing and showing off the latest fashions in clothing and hairstyles.

American Bandstand aired five days a week in live national broadcast until 1963, when the show moved west to Los Angeles and began a 24-year run as a taped weekly program with Dick Clark as host.

this came on right before sooouuuuuulllltrrrainn, with Don Cornelious....how a lot of us got introduced to new music before mtv and youtube...not to mention watching all the hot chicks dance, and learning just enough to not look like a spastic chicken when we tried to dance

"On this day in 1945, at 8:16 a.m. Japanese time, an American B-29 bomber, the Enola Gay, drops the world’s first atom bomb, over the city of Hiroshima. Approximately 80,000 people are killed as a direct result of the blast, and another 35,000 are injured. At least another 60,000 would be dead by the end of the year from the effects of the fallout.

U.S. President Harry S. Truman, discouraged by the Japanese response to the Potsdam Conference’s demand for unconditional surrender, made the decision to use the atom bomb to end the war in order to prevent what he predicted would be a much greater loss of life were the United States to invade the Japanese mainland. And so on August 5, while a “conventional” bombing of Japan was underway, “Little Boy,” (the nickname for one of two atom bombs available for use against Japan), was loaded onto Lt. Col. Paul W. Tibbets’ plane on Tinian Island in the Marianas. Tibbets’ B-29, named the Enola Gay after his mother, left the island at 2:45 a.m. on August 6. Five and a half hours later, “Little Boy” was dropped, exploding 1,900 feet over a hospital and unleashing the equivalent of 12,500 tons of TNT. The bomb had several inscriptions scribbled on its shell, one of which read “Greetings to the Emperor from the men of the Indianapolis” (the ship that transported the bomb to the Marianas).

There were 90,000 buildings in Hiroshima before the bomb was dropped; only 28,000 remained after the bombing. Of the city’s 200 doctors before the explosion; only 20 were left alive or capable of working. There were 1,780 nurses before-only 150 remained who were able to tend to the sick and dying.

According to John Hersey’s classic work Hiroshima, the Hiroshima city government had put hundreds of schoolgirls to work clearing fire lanes in the event of incendiary bomb attacks. They were out in the open when the Enola Gay dropped its load.

There were so many spontaneous fires set as a result of the bomb that a crewman of the Enola Gay stopped trying to count them. Another crewman remarked, “It’s pretty terrific. What a relief it worked.”

https://thebulletin.org/collections/hiroshima-nagasaki/?utm_source=Bulletin Newsletter&utm_medium=iContact email&utm_campaign=August3