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Abbie Hoffman Dies
Abbie Hoffman Dies
On this day in 1989, Worcester native Abbie Hoffman died from a drug overdose. A hero of the 1960s counter culture, Hoffman once told a reporter, "I never left Worcester." He was 30 when he...
Supreme Court Strikes Down "Separate but Equal"
Supreme Court Strikes Down "Separate but Equal"
On this day in 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the doctrine of separate but equal. "Segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race . . . deprives the children of...
Dorothea Dix Begins Her Crusade
Dorothea Dix Begins Her Crusade
On this day in 1841, Dorothea Dix visited an East Cambridge jail and was appalled to see mentally ill women confined alongside hardened criminals. The 40-year-old teacher and writer had been exposed to the work...
Jury Decides in Favor of Elizabeth "Mum Bett" Freeman
Jury Decides in Favor of Elizabeth "Mum Bett" Freeman
On this day in 1781, a jury in Great Barrington found in favor of "Mum Bett," a black woman who had been a slave in the home of Colonel John Ashley for at least 30...
James Reeb Dies in Alabama
James Reeb Dies in Alabama
On this day in 1965, a white minister from Boston lay near death in an Alabama hospital. As James Reeb's life slipped away, his story was in every morning paper and on every evening news...
Boston Mourns Martin Luther King, Jr.
Boston Mourns Martin Luther King, Jr.
On this day in 1968, Boston crackled with tension. African Americans, enraged by the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in Memphis, took to the streets. Community leaders urged calm, police showed restraint, and while...
Boston Burns
Boston Burns
On this day in 1760, the dreaded cry of "Fire!" roused sleeping Bostonians. Over the next ten hours, the worst fire to strike a colonial American city ravaged the capital of Massachusetts. Beginning in a...
Quakers Outlawed in Plymouth
Quakers Outlawed in Plymouth
On this day in 1658, Plymouth Court ordered that any boat carrying Quakers to Sandwich be seized to prevent the religious heretics from landing. A year earlier, Quakers in Sandwich had established the first Friends‘...
Skater Nancy Kerrigan Assaulted
Skater Nancy Kerrigan Assaulted
On this day in 1994, Nancy Kerrigan of Stoneham was practicing for the U.S Figure Skating championships. As she left the ice and stopped to speak to a reporter, a man assaulted her with a...
Herman Melville Sails from New Bedford
Herman Melville Sails from New Bedford
On this day in 1841, Herman Melville boarded the whaleship Acushnet and sailed out of New Bedford, the whaling capital of the world. As he later wrote about his character Ishmael, that ship would be...