This Day…

1864 – Yosemite Grant Act signed by President Abraham Lincoln bestowing 200,000 acres to the state of California, establishes America’s first state-controlled park [1]

1924 – Theatrical revue “Ziegfeld Follies of 1924”, featuring Billie Burke and W.C. Fields, opens at the New Amsterdam Theatre, NYC

1876 – Battle of the Little Bighorn: US 7th Cavalry under Brevet Major General George Armstrong Custer wiped out by Sioux and Cheyenne warriors led by Chiefs Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull in what has become famously known as “Custer’s Last Stand“

1851 – Fire destroys part of San Francisco, including City Hall and Jenny Lind Theatre, city’s seventh fire in 2 years

1910 – Father’s Day is celebrated for the first time, in Spokane, Washington

1928 – Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly across the Atlantic   Wilmer Stultz piloted the Fokker F.VII aircraft, Earhart kept the flight log. They arrived at Burry Port in Wales, the United Kingdom, 20 hours and 40 minutes later.

1811 – American author Harriet Beecher Stowe—whose novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin fueled antislavery sentiment and was cited among the causes of the Civil War—was born in Litchfield, Connecticut

1931 – Al Capone is indicted on 5,000 counts of prohibition and perjury

1860 – 1st US “dime novel” published: “Malaseka, The Indian Wife of the White Hunter,” by Mrs Ann Stevens

1909 – Mary Pickford makes her screen debut at the age of 16