A Brief History On November 28, 1893, the women of New Zealand became the first women in the world to vote in a national election. Of course, women had voted in local and regional elections before this date, but never in a nationwide election. Digging Deeper Women in democratic countries had long, but largely fruitlessly, campaigned for the right to vote (suffrage), especially since 1804 when the International Woman Suffrage Alliance was founded in Berlin, Germany. By the late 19th Century the Women’s Suffrage movement was growing throughout the civilized world, and with it demands for other Civil Rights and…
Browsing: November 28
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A Brief History On November 28, 1895, the first American auto race took place, the Chicago Times-Herald Race, a 54 mile event with a grand prize of $5,000. (If that prize sounds lame, remember that this is worth over $140,000 in today’s money.) Digging Deeper As the automobile was a new-fangled invention at the time, a proper name for the motorized conveyance had not yet been agreed upon and the Times-Herald called their event a “Moto-cycle Race.” Originally meant to be a race from Chicago to Milwaukee, the roads of the day were not smooth enough for those primitive cars…
A Brief History On November 28, 1967, the Number 1 song in the United States was “Daydream Believer” by the Monkees, a made-for-television rock band with its own zany television show. Certainly a Number 1 song is a big deal, and television gave us much iconic music and many iconic musical performances. Here 10 such instances are listed, some famous, some less famous. Digging Deeper 10. Rhythm Heritage, “Theme from S.W.A.T.,” 1976. Upon reaching Number 1 on the U.S. music charts in February of 1976, the “Theme from S.W.A.T.” became the first television theme song to hit that lofty height. Three months later…
A Brief History On this date, November 28, 1942, in the middle of World War II, the United States suffered mass carnage on the home front! Digging Deeper Digging deeper, we find that November 28, 1942 was the date of the infamous Cocoanut Grove fire, a blaze that took 492 lives. This horrible fire remains the second deadliest single building fire in U.S. history, second only to a theater fire in 1903 Chicago that killed 602 people. Of course, the human toll did not end with those deaths, but also included many more (hundreds?) burned or otherwise injured non-fatally. Since…