August 7: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

August 7, 2024 Brooklyn Eagle History

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ON THIS DAY IN 1913, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported, “MANHATTAN — Lis pendens was filed yesterday in the County Clerk’s office by Harold Swain, plaintiff’s attorney, in an action entitled, ‘City Real Estate Company vs. John Schrank, also known as John Flamming.’ So short is a notoriety acquired these busy days that many people will not even remember that John Schrank was the attempted assassin of ex-President [Theodore] Roosevelt, last summer, at Milwaukee. The City Real Estate Company is connected with the Title Guarantee and Trust Company and the mortgage to be foreclosed amounts to $13,000 on premises, 433 East Eighty-first street, a tenement house. The payment of principal and interest had been guaranteed on the mortgage, and as the interest has not been paid, foreclosure has resulted. It is unusual to find a man who is by profession an anarchist, and at the same time the owner of an income-producing tenement house in New York City.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1929, the Eagle reported, “Bears staged a final drive in the closing hour today and succeeded in getting many stocks, particularly the utilities, down to new low levels for the session. The late reaction was the second of the day and followed a sharp rally from the early decline.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1945, the Eagle reported, “ABOARD U.S.S. AUGUSTA WITH PRESIDENT TRUMAN (U.P.) — President Truman, jubilant over the development of the atomic bomb, expects to arrive in Washington tomorrow to begin preparing his report to the nation on the Big Three meeting at Potsdam. No definite date has been set as yet for the President’s radio address but it undoubtedly will be made within a few days after his return. Mr. Truman is expected to take occasion in his report to warn the Japanese again that destruction from a new source awaits them if they stay in the war. The President himself broke the news of the awesome atomic bomb to officers and men aboard the cruiser during the ‘chow’ hour. ‘We have just dropped a bomb on Japan that is more powerful than 20,000 tons of TNT,’ he said. ‘The experiment has been an overwhelming success.’ The President said the announcement was the happiest he ever made because it meant a quicker end to the war, a saving of American lives. The men cheered.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1946, the Eagle reported, “BOSTON (U.P.) — John F. Kennedy, handsome, blue-eyed son of the former Ambassador to Britain, revived a family tradition when he ran for nomination for Congress — and won. Though his father never held an elective post, Kennedy’s two grandfathers — former Mayor John F. Fitzgerald and the late U.S. Senator Patrick J. Kennedy — were men of winning ways, both in and out of politics. Kennedy, 29 and a Harvard graduate, decided to enter politics while lying on a hospital bed, recovering from wounds suffered as a PT boat skipper during the war. ‘It was either politics or the newspaper business,’ he said. ‘And the Kennedys always have been interested in politics. That probably tipped the scales.’ Kennedy won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Representative from the 11th Massachusetts District, and since nomination is tantamount to election, he undoubtedly will succeed 71-year-old James M. Curley in Congress.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1952, the Eagle reported, “NASHVILLE (U.P.) — Tennessee Democrats turned out in the clammy heat to nominate a U.S. Senator and a Governor with an unexpected record-breaking primary election vote today. Chiefly at stake were an unprecedented seventh term for Senator Kenneth D. McKellar, 83, Senate president pro tempore and Appropriations Committee chairman, and a third straight term for Gov. Gordon Browning. Also at stake in both races were a bid of E. H. Crump, Memphis political leader, to recoup Statewide political power he lost four years ago, and, to some extent, the political future of Senator Estes Kefauver. With dozens of other posts ranging from county offices to State legislative seats on the ballot, voting was expected to top the 700,000 mark. McKellar’s seat was sought by Representative Albert Gore, 44, and Browning was opposed in one of the most bitter races in State history by Clifford Allen, Frank Clement and Clifford Pierce.”

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Charlize Theron
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP

Wayne Knight
Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP

NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN ON THIS DAY include “A Prairie Home Companion” creator Garrison Keillor, who was born in 1942; Pro Football Hall of Famer and jurist Alan Page, who was born in 1945; TV producer Marty Appel, who was born in Brooklyn in 1948; political activist and author Alan Keyes, who was born in 1950; “Seinfeld” star Wayne Knight, who was born in 1955; Iron Maiden singer Bruce Dickinson, who was born in 1958; “The X-Files” star David Duchovny, who was born in 1960; Reason editor-at-large Nick Gillespie, who was born in Brooklyn in 1963; 2010 World Series MVP Edgar Renteria, who was born in 1975; Oscar-winning actress Charlize Theron, who was born in 1975; fashion designer Charlotte Ronson, who was born in 1977; “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” star Cirroc Lofton, who was born in 1978; “Limitless” star Abbie Cornish, who was born in 1982; Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby, who was born in 1987; and three-time American League MVP Mike Trout, who was born in 1991.

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HEART OF A WARRIOR: On this day in 1782, at Newburgh, N.Y., Gen. George Washington ordered the creation of a Badge of Military Merit. The badge consisted of a purple cloth heart with a silver braided edge. Only three are known to have been awarded during the Revolutionary War. The award was reinstituted on the bicentennial of Washington’s birth, Feb. 22, 1932, and recognizes those wounded in action.

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LET’S PLAY THE FEUD: On this day in 1882, the long-simmering tension between two Appalachian families who lived near Tug Fork on the Kentucky-West Virginia border erupted into full-scale violence when brothers Tolbert, Pharmer and Randolph McCoy knifed and shot Ellison Hatfield. The Hatfield family captured the three McCoys. When Ellison died on Aug. 9, the Hatfields executed the brothers. The feud continued with much loss of life. In 1888, when Kentucky authorities sought to detain the murder suspects and West Virginia authorities complained, the dispute went all the way to the Supreme Court, which decided in Kentucky’s favor. The feud sputtered out by the end of the century.

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Special thanks to “Chase’s Calendar of Events” and Brooklyn Public Library.

Quotable:

“Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a purpose.”

— humorist Garrison Keillor, who was born on this day in 1942