From Cape Canaveral, Florida, John Herschel Glenn Jr. was
successfully launched into space aboard the Friendship 7
spacecraft on the first orbital flight by an American astronaut
on this day in 1962.
Glenn, a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps, was
among the seven men chosen by the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration (NASA) in 1959 to become
America’s first astronauts.
On February 19, 1847, the first rescuers reached surviving members
of the Donner Party, a group of 89 California-bound emigrants led
by the Donner and Reed families, stranded by snow in the Sierra
Nevada Mountains. Three additional rescue parties arrived later.
The trip back to Sutter’s Fort was also brutally hard. Only 45 of the original 89 members of the Donner Party survived.
JOHN BELMONT
Ralph Dale Earnhardt Sr.
(April 29, 1951 – February 18, 2001)
On February 17, 1801, Thomas Jefferson was elected the third
president of the United States. He served until 1809. The election constitutes the first peaceful transfer of power from one political
party to another in the United States. Jefferson had previously
served as the second vice president under John Adams.
On February 17, 1972, the 15,007,034th Volkswagen Beetle came off
the assembly line, breaking a world car production record held for
more than four decades by the Ford Motor Company’s iconic Model
T, which was in production from 1908 and 1927.
After more than 60 years and over 21 million vehicles produced, the
last original Beetle rolled off the line in Puebla, Mexico, on July 30,
2003.
