In a ceremony held at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, General
Dwight D. Eisenhower (above) appointed Florence Blanchfield to
be a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, making her the first
woman in U.S. history to hold permanent military rank.

A member of the Army Nurse Corps since 1917, Blanchfield secured
her commission following the passage of the Army-Navy Nurse Act
of 1947 by Congress.

Blanchfield had served as superintendent of the Army Nurse Corps during World War II and was instrumental in securing passage of
the Army-Navy Nurse Act.

In 1951, Blanchfield received the Florence Nightingale Award from
the International Red Cross. In 1978, a U.S. Army hospital in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, was named in her honor.

Florence Aby Blanchfield (April 1, 1884 in Shepherdstown,
West Virginia – May 12, 1971)

Connie Francis (Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero)
(December 12, 1937 – July 16, 2025)

(Hollywood Reporter) -  Pop singer Connie Francis died
Wednesday.  A cause of death has not been revealed,
but Francis had been hospitalized earlier this month
after experiencing what she described as "extreme pain."

She underwent a series of tests and examinations while
in intensive care and was later transferred to a private
room.

Francis on the January 31, 1959, cover of
Cashbox magazine.

Disneyland, Walt Disney’s metropolis of nostalgia, fantasy and
futurism, opened on July 17, 1955. The $17 million theme park
was built on 160 acres of former orange groves in Anaheim,
California, and soon brought in staggering profits.

On July 17, 1944, the Port Chicago Naval Magazine near San
Francisco experienced a catastrophic explosion when two
ammunition ships, the SS E.A. Bryan and the SS Quinault
Victory, detonated while loading munitions for Pacific troops.

ROSS SIMPSON

A Piper Saratoga similar to the accident aircraft.

On July 16, 1999, John F. Kennedy Jr. died when the light
aircraft he was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off
Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.

Kennedy’s wife, Carolyn Bessette, and sister-in-law, Lauren
Bessette, were also on board and died.

The Piper Saratoga departed New Jersey‘s Essex County
Airport; its intended route was along the coastline of
Connecticut and across Rhode Island Sound to Martha’s
Vineyard Airport.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy Jr.
(November 25, 1960 – July 16, 1999