On this day in 1848, James Wilson Marshall (October 8, 1810 – August 10, 1885) found a gold nugget at Sutter’s Mill in northern California. The discovery led to the gold rush of ’49’.
The spot where Marshall first discovered the gold that started the California Gold Rush.
John Sutter’s sawmill in 1850. The historians at Marshall Gold State Historic Park concluded the person seen in the above photo was the photographer’s assistant who was used to show scale.
On this day in 1968, North Korea seized the U.S. Navy ship Pueblo, charging it had intruded into the nation’s territorial waters on a spying mission. The crew was released 11 months later.
The Pueblo’s mission began in early January, 1968, when the crew set off from the U.S. Navy base on Yokosuka, Japan with orders to conduct surveillance on Soviet Navy and North Korean signal and electronic intelligence activity.
The captured crew (above) were beaten and nearly starved in the incident that almost led to another war.
Pueblo on display in North Korea, 2012.
North Koreans raise their fists during a rally in 2010 in front of the U.S. Navy spy ship Pueblo.
On this day in 1977, the TV mini-series "Roots," began airing on ABC. The show was based on the Alex Haley novel. Roots received 37 Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won nine. It also won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. It received unprecedented Nielsen ratings for the finale, which still holds a record as the third-highest-rated episode for any type of television series, and the second-most watched overall series finale in U.S. television history.
LeVar Burton as Kunta Kinte, a warrior of the Mandinka people in Gambia who is captured by slavers and taken to Annapolis, Md.
John William Carson(October 23, 1925 – January 23, 2005)
On this day in 1981, Iran released 52 Americans that had been held hostage for 444 days. The hostages were flown to Algeria and then to a U.S. base in Wiesbaden, West Germany. The release occurred minutes after the U.S. presidency had passed from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan. The Iranians waited until the hour President Reagan was sworn in before allowing the plane with the hostages to take off.
President Ronald Reagan being sworn into office on this day1981.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy takes the Oath of Office and becomes the 35th President of the United States on this day in 1961. At age 43, he is the youngest man and the first Roman Catholic ever elected, winning by one of the smallest margins of victory, only 115,000 popular votes. Lyndon B. Johnson, 51, is his Vice President.
President John F. Kennedy During his inaugural speech on Jan. 20, 1961.
Stewart Robert "Bob" Einstein (November 20, 1942 – January 2, 2019)
(Variety) –Bob Einstein, an offbeat comedian and writer whose career stretched from “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour” to “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” has died.
Einstein died Wednesday in Indian Wells, Calif. He had been recently diagnosed with cancer.
Bob Einstein, aka Super Dave Osborne, The World’s Greatest Daredevil Stuntman.
