Atlanta magazine writer Margaret Mitchell (above) earned the
Pulitzer Prize in Novels for her breathtaking work of historical
fiction, "Gone with the Wind," on this day in history, May 3, 1937.
"Gone with the Wind," Mitchell’s 1,000-page Civil War saga, is
one of the world’s most successful novels. Even today, it enjoys
a global following.
“Soul Brother #1,”The Godfather of Soul,” “Mr. Dynamite,”
“Sex Machine,” “The Minister of the New New Super Heavy
Funk.” These are some of the names by which the world
would eventually know James Joseph Brown, Jr., the
revolutionary musical figure who was born on May 3, 1933.
The story Brown himself would often tell is that he appeared
stillborn when he first came into the world, but that an aunt
attending his birth managed to breathe life into him.
James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006)
The modern legend of the Loch Ness Monster is born when a
sighting makes local news on May 2, 1933. The newspaper
Inverness Courier relates an account of a local couple who
claim to have seen “an enormous animal rolling and plunging
on the surface.” The story of the “monster” (a moniker chosen
by the Courier editor) becomes a media phenomenon, with
London newspapers sending correspondents to Scotland and
a circus offering a 20,000 pound sterling reward for capture of
the beast.
Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the September 11,
20011, terrorist attacks in the United States, was killed by U.S.
forces during a raid on his compound hideout in Pakistan.
The notorious, 54-year-old leader of Al Qaeda, the terrorist
network of Islamic extremists, had been the target of a nearly
decade-long international manhunt.
The raid began around 1 a.m. local time (4 p.m. EST on May 1,
2011 in the United States), when 23 U.S. Navy SEALs in two
Black Hawk helicopters descended on the compound in
Abbottabad, a tourist and military center north of Pakistan’s
capital, Islamabad. One of the helicopters crash-landed into
the compound but no one aboard was hurt.
During the raid, which lasted approximately 40 minutes, five
people, including bin Laden and one of his adult sons, were
killed by U.S. gunfire. No Americans were injured in the
assault.
Bin Laden’s body was flown by helicopter to Afghanistan for
official identification, then buried at an undisclosed location
in the Arabian Sea less than 24 hours after his death, in
accordance with Islamic practice.
The grounds of the compound are seen after US Navy Seal
commandos raid.
Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) succumbed to illness exacerbated by alcoholism and passed away at age 48.
McCarthy had been a key figure in the anticommunist hysteria
popularly known as the “Red Scare” that engulfed the United
States in the years following World War II.
McCarthy was born in a small town in Wisconsin in 1908. In
1942, he joined the Marines and served in the Pacific during
World War II. He returned home in 1944 and decided to start
a career in politics.
