This Day In History

On this day, in a last-ditch effort to deploy their remaining V-2 missiles against the Allies, the Germans launch their long-range rockets from their only remaining launch site, in the Netherlands. Almost 200 civilians in […]

Responding to a 911 call, police raid the Philadelphia home of Gary Heidnik and find an appalling crime scene. In the basement of Heidnik’s dilapidated house is a veritable torture chamber where three naked women […]

On March 25, 1958, Sugar Ray Robinson defeats Carmen Basilio to regain the middleweight championship. It was the fifth and final title of his career. Robinson is considered by many to be the greatest prizefighter […]

When Elvis Presley turned 18 on January 8, 1953, he fulfilled his patriotic duty and legal obligation to register his name with the Selective Service System, thereby making himself eligible for the draft. The Korean War was […]

On this day in 1962, Pakistan’s governor, Ayub Khan, in a gesture of goodwill, gives first lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy a horse named Sardar. Governor Khan and President Kennedy cultivated a close diplomatic relationship between […]

On this day in 1947, James Patterson, one of the world’s top-selling novelists, is born. Best known for his thrillers, Patterson, the creator of the Alex Cross detective series and the Women’s Murder Club series, […]

On this day in 1980, President Jimmy Carter announces that the U.S. will boycott the Olympic Games scheduled to take place in Moscow that summer. The announcement came after the Soviet Union failed to comply with Carter’s February 20, […]

With her smoldering looks and guitar hooks, Joan Jett had rock-star charisma to rival any man’s. Jett burst onto the scene as a solo artist with “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll,” the three-chord anthem that […]

In an attempt to lift the state out of the hard times of the Great Depression, the Nevada state legislature votes to legalize gambling. Located in the Great Basin desert, few settlers chose to live in Nevada after […]

On this day in 1999, the bodies of Carole Sund and Silvina Pelosso are found in a charred rental car in a remote wooded area of Long Barn, Califonia. The women, along with Sund’s daughter […]