MAY 15th: 1957 : Britain tests first hydrogen bomb on the Christmas Island area in the Pacific Ocean, the arms race between countries continues to escalate as each country tests bigger and more destructive nuclear devices. The Grapple 1 nuclear test was in fact a technological failure. The British hydrogen bomb programme was the ultimately successful British effort to develop hydrogen bombs between 1952 and 1958.
MAY 15th: 1972 : Alabama Governor George Wallace is shot and left paralyzed while campaigning for President of the United States. he was shot five times by Arthur Bremer while campaigning at the Laurel Shopping Center in Laurel, Maryland, at a time when he was receiving high ratings in national opinion polls.
It happened today – this day in history – May 16 1527: Florence becomes a republic. 1532: Sir Thomas More resigns as Lord Chancellor. 1568: Mary, Queen of Scots flees to England. 1605: Camillo Borghese is elected to succeed Pope Leo XI, becomes Paul V. 1770: 14 year-old Marie Antoinette marries the future Louis XVI of France, aged 15. 1792: Denmark abolishes the country’s slave trade. 1831: Birth of David Edward Hughes, inventor of the microphone and the teleprinter. 1836: Author Edgar Allen Poe, 26, marries his 13-year-old cousin Virginia Clemm. 1860: The Republican convention in Chicago selects Abraham Lincoln as the party’s candidate for president of the US. 1868: The US Senate fails to impeach President Andrew Johnson by one vote. 1875: An eathquake in Venezuela & Colombia kills 16,000.people. 1907: In the Pact of Cartagena, Great Britain, France, and Spain agree to maintain the status quo in the Mediterranean and along the Atlantic coast of Europe and Africa. 1920: Joan of Arc is canonised as a saint. 1927: The US Supreme Court rules that bootleggers must pay income tax. 1929: Emil Jannings and Janet Gaynor are winners at the first Academy Awards ceremony. The statuettes are not yet called Oscars. 1943: The Dambusters, 617 Squadron, attacks the Möhne and Eder dams in the Ruhr valley with bouncing bombs On the same day, Jewish resistance in the Polish capital ghetto is crushed after a month of fighting with SS General Jürgen Stroop ordering the burning of the Warsaw Ghetto. 1947: Blues singer Billie Holiday is arrested in her New York apartment for possession of narcotics. 1948: Chaim Weizmann is elected first President of Israel. On the same day, Egypt .enters Gaza. 1953: Death of legendary jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt aged 43. 1955: Rocky Marciano beats Don Cockell by a TKO in the ninth round in San Francisco to retain his world heavyweight boxing title. 1956: England spin bowler Jim Laker takes 10-88 for Surrey v Australia in a tour match at The Oval. 1957: Death of Eliot Ness, the federal agent who ended Al Capone’s reign, aged 54. 1963: Gordon Cooper completes 22 orbits of the Earth in Faith 7, the last flight of the Mercury project. 1965: “The Knack…and How to Get It” directed by Richard Lester and starring Rita Tushingham, Ray Brooks and Michael Crawford, wins the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film at the Cannes Film Festival. 1968: Two women and a man are killed after an entire corner of a new block of flats, Ronan Point in Newham, collapses. 1969: Pete Townshend spends the night in a New York jail for assaulting a man during a Who gig at The Fillmore East. Townshend didn’t know the man who jumped onto the stage was a plain clothes policeman trying to warn the audience that a fire had broken out. 1970: “M*A*S*H” directed by Robert Altman, starring Donald Sutherland and Elliot Gould, wins the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film at the Cannes Film Festival. 1973: AC Milan defeat Leeds United 1-0 to win the European Cup Winner’s Cup in Saloniki.
Today in History May 17th 1990 The WHO deletes homosexuality from its list of mental diseases Note: In 2004 Massachusetts became the first state to legalize same-sex marriages in the United States 1954 The U.S. Supreme Court declares racially segregated public schools unconstitutional Note: Despite this landmark decision, de facto racial segregation was upheld for years in some areas of the United States 1733 England passed the Molasses Act, putting high tariffs on rum and molasses imported to the colonies 1838 Pennsylvania Hall in Philadelphia was burned following an abolitionist meeting. 1845 The rubber band was patented. 1876 The 7th US Cavalry under Custer left Ft. Lincoln. 1881 Frederick Douglass was appointed recorder of deeds for Washington, D.C. 1932 Congress changed the name "Porto Rico" to "Puerto Rico" 1980 Rioting that claimed 18 lives erupted in Miami's Liberty City neighborhood after an all-white jury in Tampa acquitted four former Miami police officers of fatally beating black insurance executive Arthur McDuffie.
MAY 17th: 1963 The first Monterey Folk Festival took place over three days in Monterey, California. The festival featured Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Peter Paul and Mary.
May 17 1900 – The children's novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum, is first published in the United States. The first copy is given to the author's sister. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is an American children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow, originally published by the George M. Hill Company in May 1900.[1] It has since seen several reprints, most often under the title The Wizard of Oz, which is the title of the popular 1902 Broadway musical adaptation as well as the iconic 1939 live-action film. The story chronicles the adventures of a young farm girl named Dorothy Gale in the magical Land of Oz after she and her pet dog Toto are swept away from their home in Kansas by a cyclone.[nb 1] The book is one of the best-known stories in American literature and has been widely translated. The Library of Congress has declared it "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale." Its groundbreaking success, and that of the Broadway musical adapted from the novel led Baum to write thirteen additional Oz books that serve as official sequels to the first story. In January 1901, George M. Hill Company completed printing the first edition, a total of 10,000 copies, which quickly sold out. It had sold three million copies by the time it entered the public domain in 1956.
MAY 17th: 1966 (Dylan goes Electric) During a UK tour, Bob Dylan appeared at The Free Trade Hall in Manchester. This was the concert where a member of the audience shouted out ‘Judas’ at Dylan unhappy with the singers move from acoustic to rock. Dylan replied with ‘You’re a liar’, the entire concert was eventually officially released in The Bootleg Series by Sony Music in 1999. Bob Dylan and the Manchester Free Trade Hall 'Judas' show - BBC News
MAY 17th: 2013 Singer-songwriter Dylan was inducted as an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Dylan was unable to attend the event but had stated he was honored and lucky to receive the membership.
MAY 17th: 2016 Alanis Morissette sued her former manager for fraud saying she was robbed of almost $5m (£3.5m) by her former business manager. In papers filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court, the singer claimed Jonathan Schwartz transferred money to his own accounts without permission. Schwartz said the transfers were made to fund an "investment" in a marijuana-growing business for the singer, and to avoid extra trips to the bank because Morissette "spends a lot of cash".
At the time he wrote this he lived in a magical palace, the Hotel Del Coronado in San Diego, California. The area was a big favorite with theosophists, avant-garde artists, free thinkers and others such as the early hippies from Germany. I lived nearby in La Jolla for a short time and was amazed at the history there.
In the book she was swept away by a cyclone (or Hurricane) in the movie she's swept away by a tornado.........
True, In the movie Judy Garland almost didn't get the role because she was considered too old, but after they saw her sing and dance they hired her on the spot. The only requirement was that in order to look younger she had to wear a corset to hide her emerging adolescent curves, and to lose weight by being put on a diet of chicken soup, black coffee, and (I kid you not) cigarettes
Wallace was shot while under Secret Service protection. After the shooting then President Richard Nixon ordered secret service protection for Senator Ted Kennedy from Massachusetts, who wasn't even running for President. It was Nixon's way of spying on Kennedy and digging up dirt in the event he chose to run in the future.
