Reporting the JFK assassination in 1963.

Walter Leland Cronkite Jr. (November 4, 1916 – July 17, 2009)

Walter Cronkite was a broadcast journalist who served as
anchorman for the CBS Evening News from 1962 to 1981.

Cronkite received numerous honors including two Peabody
Awards, a George Polk Award, an Emmy Award, and the
Presidential Medal of Freedom.

On November 4, 1990, Dances with Wolves, a film about an
American Civil War-era soldier and a group of Sioux Native
Americans that stars Kevin Costner and also marks his
directorial debut, premiered in Los Angeles.

Dances with Wolves took home seven Oscars, including Best
Picture and Best Director, and solidified Costner’s place on
Hollywood’s A-list.

 
CARLATA BRADLEY

The Hughes Flying Boat, at one time the largest aircraft ever built,
was piloted by designer Howard Hughes on its first and only flight
in Long Beach Harbor, California.

Built with laminated birch and spruce (hence the nickname the
Spruce Goose) the massive wooden aircraft had a wingspan
longer than a football field and was designed to carry more than
700 men to battle.

Howard Hughes was a successful Hollywood movie producer when
he founded the Hughes Aircraft Company in 1932. He personally
tested cutting-edge aircraft of his own design and in 1937 broke the transcontinental flight-time record.

Howard Robard Hughes Jr. (1905 – 1976)

The Spruce Goose is now on display at the Evergreen
Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.

In one of the greatest upsets in presidential election
history, Democratic incumbent Harry S. Truman
defeats his Republican challenger, Governor Thomas
E. Dewey of New York, by just over two million popular
votes.

       
In the days preceding the vote, political analysts and
polls were so behind Dewey that on election night,
long before all the votes were counted, the Chicago
Tribune published an early edition with the banner
headline above, “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.”          

Harry Truman (left) and his political rival Thomas Dewey.