(FOX NEWS) – Founding Father John Jay, a towering
figure among the intellectual giants who forged the
nation, was sworn in as first chief justice of the
Supreme Court of the United States on this day in
history, Oct. 19, 1789.

The New York native held the title until resigning in
1795, among the shortest tenures for the prestigious
lifetime appointment.

Only 16 other people have held the title of Supreme
Court chief justice in the 227 years since.

Hopelessly trapped at Yorktown, Virginia, British General
Lord Cornwallis surrendered 8,000 British soldiers and
seamen to a  larger Franco-American force on October
19, 1781, effectively bringing an end to the American
Revolution.

   
Thomas Edison was born in 1847 in Milan, Ohio.

Thomas Alva Edison, one of the most prolific inventors in history, 
died in his home in West Orange, New Jersey of complications of
diabetes. He was 84.

By the time he died, Thomas Edison had amassed a record 1,093
patents: 389 for electric light and power, 195 for the phonograph.
150 for the telegraph, 141 for storage batteries and 34 for the
telephone.

The Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company‘s new
steamship, the Columbia, was the first commercial
application for Edison’s incandescent light bulb in
1880.

On October 18, 1867, the U.S. formally took possession of Alaska
after purchasing the territory from Russia for $7.2 million, or less
than two cents an acre.

Indigenous peoples had settled the unforgiving territory thousands
of years earlier. The Alaska purchase comprised 586,412 square
miles, about twice the size of Texas, and was championed by
William Henry Seward, the enthusiastically expansionist secretary
of state under President Andrew Johnson.

The $7.2 million check used to pay for Alaska, equivalent
to $129 million in 2023. 

William Henry Seward (1801 – 1872)