December 11: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

December 11, 2024 Brooklyn Eagle History

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ON THIS DAY IN 1874, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle said, “The official acceptance by Great Britain of the invitation of the United States to send a Commission to the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia is a complete acknowledgement on the part of John Bull that his rebellious youngster Jonathan has achieved an honorable success since he went into the business of nationality making himself.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1892, the Eagle said, “From present indications one of the prettiest fights for places in the coming President’s cabinet will be over the attorney generalship. One evening this week the Texas congressmen held a meeting at the Metropolitan hotel and indorsed their colleague, Representative Culberson, for this place. The same night the Virginia delegation caucused and announced themselves for Mr. Randolph Tucker of the Old Dominion. The friends of both of these men are skillful politicians, and say that they will stick to their candidates through thick and thin, even if by so doing they make it the fight of the administration.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1930, the Eagle reported, “Cash sales of more than $7,500 worth of tickets for the Army-Navy game Saturday were sold up to 6 p.m. yesterday at the Biltmore Hotel and more than $1,000 of tickets were sold at the Curb Exchange. Cash sales of tickets at the Biltmore have totaled approximately $30,000 since Monday. The proceeds from the game will go to the Salvation Army’s fund for the unemployed.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1939, the Eagle reported, “GENEVA (U.P.) ― A special League of Nations committee tonight will send an ultimatum to the Soviet Union giving her 24 hours in which to agree to withdraw her troops from Finland and participate in a peaceful discussion of Finnish-Russian problems. The committee, it was learned, will send its ultimatum as a move designed to re-establish peace between Finland and Russia. Meanwhile a survey of leading delegations indicated a trend toward condemnation of the Red Army’s invasion of Finland as an act of aggression, and the organization of feasible material, moral and legal aid for the Finns.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1943, the Eagle reported, “Mayor LaGuardia predicts an increase in the use of airplanes so tremendous as to require air police to control traffic. The city executive, conducting a tour of Idlewild Airport in Queens, revealed that commercial airlines have already asked for more accommodations than will be available there. The project, now held up because of priorities, will be five times as large as LaGuardia Field and will employ some 40,000 workers. Railroad men are now studying plans for an extension of the Long Island Railroad’s Rockaway branch to the field. In predicting traffic police, the Mayor contended we must be prepared for a tremendous increase in private as well as commercial travel. He declared the $100,000,000 field would pay for itself and revealed plans which call for construction of 32 hangars, each one larger than Madison Square Garden and each to cost $2,500,000. The first phase of the airport’s problem, he reported, has been completed with the redemption of 2,268 acres, mostly by addition of 26,000,000 cubic yards of fill. Grading and drainage jobs will follow in the near future.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1949, the Eagle published the following United Press article by Federico Cardinal Tedeschini, Archpriest of St. Peter’s Basilica and Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Property of St. Peter’s: “VATICAN CITY ― The Holy Year, the holy and blessed jubilee year which our beloved Pontiff has deigned to grant us, is a year of grace, of pardon, of new life ― for all peoples, for all the children of the Church and for all those who are not children of the Church. To reach all the faithful who read the Catholic press, to reach all those who depend on other newspapers, as well as all those souls who, while not of the Catholic Communion of Christ, and to reach, finally, all those who, even deprived of the light of the faith, have nonetheless tired of the world and feel an intimate thirst for a supernatural life, I send a salute ― not in my name alone but in the name of Peter, whom Christ named Rock of His Church; Peter, the name of that great but humble fisherman of Galilee, who knew how to be fisherman of souls and the harbinger of faith and of civilization, that strong and valiant fisherman of Christ who, even in the form of the cross, gave himself entirely and sacrificed, for all souls and civilization, his own generous life, crucifix of the idea, of liberty and progress! The Holy Year calls all to the immortal tomb of this hero.”

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Hailee Steinfeld
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP

NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN ON THIS DAY include Oscar-winning actress Rita Moreno, who was born in 1931; “Knots Landing” star Donna Mills, who was born in 1940; former Secretary of State John Kerry, who was born in 1943; “Mission: Impossible” star Lynda Day George, who was born in 1944; “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” singer Brenda Lee, who was born in 1944; “My So-Called Life” star Bess Armstrong, who was born in 1953; Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Jermaine Jackson (The Jackson 5), who was born in 1954; Motley Crue co-founder Nikki Sixx, who was born in 1958; Oscar-winning actress Mo’Nique, who was born in 1967; “The Italian Job” star Mos Def, who was born in Brooklyn in 1973; “Boy Meets World” star Rider Strong, who was born in 1979; and “True Grit” star Hailee Steinfeld, who was born in 1996.

Rider Strong
Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP

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STOPPING THE SPREAD: Robert Koch was born on this day in 1843. The great German physician and biologist discovered the bacilli that cause tuberculosis, cholera and anthrax. For his important work on tuberculosis, Koch received the 1905 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. He died in 1910.

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LITTLE BIG MAN: Fiorello La Guardia was born on this day in 1882. Known as the “Little Flower,” he served three terms as mayor of New York City (1934-45), leading it through the Great Depression and World War II. During a newspaper strike, he famously read the “funnies” to radio listeners. He died in 1947.

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

Quotable:

“It makes no difference if I burn my bridges behind me — I never retreat.”

— former New York City Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who was born on this day in 1882