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Eric Carle Museum Opens in Amherst
Eric Carle Museum Opens in Amherst
On this day in 2002, the nation's first museum of picture book art opened in Amherst. A decade earlier, children's book author and illustrator Eric Carle had visited a picture book museum in Tokyo and...
Red Sox Win World Series
Red Sox Win World Series
On this day in 2004, the Boston Red Sox ended an 86-year drought and buried the "Curse of the Bambino." They won the World Series! Their sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals was almost —...
Legislature Designates Day of Remembrance for Armenian Genocide
Legislature Designates Day of Remembrance for Armenian Genocide
On this day in 1990, the 75th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, the Massachusetts legislature officially designated the date as a Day of Remembrance for the million and a half Armenians killed in the first...
Annie Oakley Purchases Smith & Wesson Gun
Annie Oakley Purchases Smith & Wesson Gun
On this day in 1888, Annie Oakley, the star female sharpshooter in Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show, purchased a Model 3 handgun made by the Springfield firm of Smith & Wesson. Horace Smith and...
Harvard Awards Bowditch Honorary Degree
Harvard Awards Bowditch Honorary Degree
On this day in 1802, Harvard College awarded Nathaniel Bowditch an honorary Master's Degree. The Salem-born astronomer, mathematician, and navigator was almost entirely self-educated. His formal schooling ended when he was ten. While apprenticed to...
Boston Doctors Appeal for Mental Hospital
Boston Doctors Appeal for Mental Hospital
On August 20, 1810, two Boston doctors circulated an appeal for "a hospital for the reception of lunatics and other sick persons." (Some sources, including, until recently, Mass Moments, erroneously date the letter to August...
Loyalist Despairs at British Defeat
Loyalist Despairs at British Defeat
On this day in 1781, Loyalist lawyer Ward Chipman of Boston wrote despairingly to his friend Jonathan Sewall who had gone into exile in London. Chipman confessed, "the mortification of seeing our Enemies . ....
USS Constitution Launched in Boston
USS Constitution Launched in Boston
On this day in 1797, USS Constitution was launched in Boston. It took three attempts to set the immense ship, reinforced with heavy diagonal planking and copper sheathing, afloat. Shipyard officials warned townspeople to be...
Ted Shawn Theater Opens at Jacob's Pillow
Ted Shawn Theater Opens at Jacob's Pillow
On this day in 1942, the first theater in the nation dedicated exclusively to dance opened at Jacob's Pillow in Becket, a small town in the Berkshire Hills. The building was named for Ted Shawn,...
John Howe Spies on Concord, or Not
John Howe Spies on Concord, or Not
On this day in 1775, John Howe arrived in Concord to spy for British General Gage. He quickly gained the trust of the town's leading patriots. They took him to a storehouse, showed him the...