Thanks to President Reagan, we celebrate National Ice Cream
Day every third Sunday in July, meaning July 18 this year. The
President wanted to commemorate a treat enjoyed by over 90
percent of the US population. In 1984, he decreed a day for ice
cream, and his proclamation actually glorified the dairy industry
in America. In fact, Americans still lead the world when it comes
to eating this frozen delight: 23 gallons a year to be precise.

Ron & Nancy Reagan enjoy ice cream cones in the Summer
of 1967.

President Abraham Lincoln signed into law a
measure calling for the awarding of a U.S. Army
Medal of Honor, in the name of Congress, “to
such noncommissioned officers and privates
as shall most distinguish themselves by their
gallantry in action, and other soldier-like qualities
during the present insurrection.” The previous
December, Lincoln had approved a provision
creating a U.S. Navy Medal of Valor, which was
the basis of the Army Medal of Honor created by
Congress in July 1862.

The first U.S. Army soldiers to receive what would
become the nation’s highest military honor were
six members of a Union raiding party who in 1862
penetrated Confederate territory to destroy bridges, 
and railroad tracks between Chattanooga, Tennessee, 
and Atlanta, Georgia.

On July 7, 1930, construction of the Hoover Dam began. Over the
next five years, a total of 21,000 men would work ceaselessly to
produce what would be the largest dam of its time, as well as one
of the largest manmade structures in the world.

Although the dam took only five years to build, its construction
was nearly 30 years in the making. Arthur Powell Davis, an
engineer from the Bureau of Reclamation, originally had his
vision for the Hoover Dam back in 1902, and his engineering
report on the topic became the guiding document when plans
were finally made to begin the dam in 1922.

Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964)

On June 27, 1950, President Harry S. Truman (above) announced
he is ordering U.S. air and naval forces to South Korea to aid the democratic nation in repulsing an invasion by communist North
Korea. The United States was undertaking the major military
operation, he explained, to enforce a United Nations resolution
calling for an end to hostilities, and to stem the spread of
communism in Asia. In addition to ordering U.S. forces to Korea,

Truman also deployed the U.S. 7th Fleet to Formosa (Taiwan) to
guard against invasion by communist China and ordered an
acceleration of military aid to French forces fighting communist guerrillas in Vietnam.

Robert Francis Kennedy (November 20, 1925 – June 6, 1968)

On June 5, 1968, presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was
mortally wounded shortly after midnight at the Ambassador Hotel
in Los Angeles. Earlier that evening, the 42-year-old junior senator from
New York was declared the winner in the South Dakota and
California 1968 Democratic Party presidential primaries during
the 1968 United States presidential election. He was pronounced
dead at 1:44 a.m. PDT on June 6, about 26 hours after he had been
shot.