Today is Monday, July 18, the 199th day of 2022. There are 166 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On July 18, 1969, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., left a party on Chappaquiddick Island near Martha’s Vineyard with Mary Jo Kopechne, 28; Kennedy’s car later went off a bridge into the water. Kennedy was able to escape, but Kopechne drowned.
On this date:
In 1863, during the Civil War, Union troops spearheaded by the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, made up of Black soldiers, charged Confederate-held Fort Wagner on Morris Island, S.C. The Confederates were able to repel the Northerners, who suffered heavy losses; the 54th’s commander, Col. Robert Gould Shaw, was among those who were killed.
In 1918, South African anti-apartheid leader and president Nelson Mandela was born in the village of Mvezo.
In 1944, Hideki Tojo was removed as Japanese premier and war minister because of setbacks suffered by his country in World War II. American forces in France captured the Normandy town of St. Lo.
In 1947, President Harry S. Truman signed a Presidential Succession Act which placed the speaker of the House and the Senate president pro tempore next in the line of succession after the vice president.
In 2005, an unrepentant Eric Rudolph was sentenced in Birmingham, Alabama, to life in prison for an abortion clinic bombing that killed an off-duty police officer and maimed a nurse.
In 2013, Detroit, which was once the very symbol of American industrial might, became the biggest U.S. city to file for bankruptcy, its finances ravaged and its neighborhoods hollowed out by a long, slow decline in population and auto manufacturing.
Today’s Birthdays: Skating champion and commentator Dick Button is 93. Olympic gold medal figure skater Tenley Albright is 87. Singer Dion DiMucci is 83. Actor James Brolin is 82. Baseball Hall of Famer Joe Torre is 82. Singer Martha Reeves is 81. Business mogul Richard Branson is 72. Singer Ricky Skaggs is 68. World Golf Hall of Famer Nick Faldo is 65. Actor Elizabeth McGovern is 61. Actor Vin Diesel is 55. Actor Kristen Bell is 42.
