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#21
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-16
Last post by remrogers - October 16, 2026, 10:19:25 AM1854
Oct 16
Abraham Lincoln speaks out against slavery
On October 16, 1854, an obscure lawyer and Congressional hopeful from the state of Illinois named Abraham Lincoln delivers a speech regarding the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which Congress had passed five months earlier. In his speech, the future president denounced the act and outlined his views on slavery, which he called "immoral."
Under the terms of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, two new territories—Kansas and Nebraska—would be allowed into the Union and each territory's citizens would be given the power to determine whether slavery would be allowed within the territory's borders. It was believed that the act would set a precedent for determining the legality of slavery in other new territories. Controversy over the act influenced political races across the country that fall. Abolitionists, like Lincoln, hoped to convince lawmakers in the new territories to reject slavery.
Lincoln, who was practicing law at the time, campaigned on behalf of abolitionist Republicans in Illinois and attacked the Kansas-Nebraska Act. He denounced members of the Democratic Party for backing a law that "assumes there can be moral right in the enslaving of one man by another." He believed that the law went against the founding American principle that "all men are created equal." Lincoln was an abolitionist at heart, but he realized that the outlawing of slavery in states where it already existed might lead to civil war. Instead, he advocated outlawing the spread of slavery to new states. He hoped this plan would preserve the Union and slowly eliminate slavery by confining it to the South, where, he believed, "it would surely die a slow death."
Lincoln and his fellow abolitionists were dismayed when Kansans voted a pro-slavery candidate into Congress in November. As Lincoln's political career picked up momentum over the next several years, he continually referred to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the seeming inevitability that Kansas should become a slave state as "a violence...it was conceived in violence, passed in violence, is maintained in violence, and is being executed in violence."
Lincoln continued to actively campaign against slavery in Kansas and helped to raise money to support anti-slavery candidates in that state. Meanwhile he continued his law practice and ran for the U.S. Senate in 1859. Although he lost to Democrat Stephen Douglas, Lincoln began to make a name for himself in national politics and earned increasing support from the North and abolitionists across the nation. It was this constituency that helped him win the presidency in 1860.
Oct 16
Abraham Lincoln speaks out against slavery
On October 16, 1854, an obscure lawyer and Congressional hopeful from the state of Illinois named Abraham Lincoln delivers a speech regarding the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which Congress had passed five months earlier. In his speech, the future president denounced the act and outlined his views on slavery, which he called "immoral."
Under the terms of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, two new territories—Kansas and Nebraska—would be allowed into the Union and each territory's citizens would be given the power to determine whether slavery would be allowed within the territory's borders. It was believed that the act would set a precedent for determining the legality of slavery in other new territories. Controversy over the act influenced political races across the country that fall. Abolitionists, like Lincoln, hoped to convince lawmakers in the new territories to reject slavery.
Lincoln, who was practicing law at the time, campaigned on behalf of abolitionist Republicans in Illinois and attacked the Kansas-Nebraska Act. He denounced members of the Democratic Party for backing a law that "assumes there can be moral right in the enslaving of one man by another." He believed that the law went against the founding American principle that "all men are created equal." Lincoln was an abolitionist at heart, but he realized that the outlawing of slavery in states where it already existed might lead to civil war. Instead, he advocated outlawing the spread of slavery to new states. He hoped this plan would preserve the Union and slowly eliminate slavery by confining it to the South, where, he believed, "it would surely die a slow death."
Lincoln and his fellow abolitionists were dismayed when Kansans voted a pro-slavery candidate into Congress in November. As Lincoln's political career picked up momentum over the next several years, he continually referred to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the seeming inevitability that Kansas should become a slave state as "a violence...it was conceived in violence, passed in violence, is maintained in violence, and is being executed in violence."
Lincoln continued to actively campaign against slavery in Kansas and helped to raise money to support anti-slavery candidates in that state. Meanwhile he continued his law practice and ran for the U.S. Senate in 1859. Although he lost to Democrat Stephen Douglas, Lincoln began to make a name for himself in national politics and earned increasing support from the North and abolitionists across the nation. It was this constituency that helped him win the presidency in 1860.
#22
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-15
Last post by remrogers - October 15, 2026, 11:18:11 AM2004
Oct 15
"Funeral coaches" exempted from car-seat law
On October 15, 2004, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration rules that hearse manufacturers no longer have to install anchors for child-safety seats in their vehicles. In 1999, to prevent parents from incorrectly installing the seats using only their cars' seat belts, the agency had required all carmakers to put the standardized anchors on every passenger seat in every vehicle they built. Though it seemed rather odd, most hearse-builders complied with the rule and many thousands of their vehicles incorporated baby-seat latches on their front and back passenger seats.
However, the year after the agency issued the rule, one of the largest "funeral coach" manufacturers in the United States petitioned for an exemption. "Since a funeral coach is a single-purpose vehicle, transporting body and casket," the petition said, "children do not ride in the front seat." In fact, typically that seat is empty—after all, most people do try to avoid riding in hearses.
On October 15, the agency agreed: All funeral coaches (now officially defined as "a vehicle that contains only one row of occupant seats, is designed exclusively for transporting a body and casket and that is equipped with features to secure a casket in place during the operation of the vehicle") were permanently exempt from all child-safety provisions. According to this formulation, those rare hearses that do have rear seats are not technically funeral coaches; therefore, they are subject to the same child-restraint rules as every other carmaker.
Oct 15
"Funeral coaches" exempted from car-seat law
On October 15, 2004, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration rules that hearse manufacturers no longer have to install anchors for child-safety seats in their vehicles. In 1999, to prevent parents from incorrectly installing the seats using only their cars' seat belts, the agency had required all carmakers to put the standardized anchors on every passenger seat in every vehicle they built. Though it seemed rather odd, most hearse-builders complied with the rule and many thousands of their vehicles incorporated baby-seat latches on their front and back passenger seats.
However, the year after the agency issued the rule, one of the largest "funeral coach" manufacturers in the United States petitioned for an exemption. "Since a funeral coach is a single-purpose vehicle, transporting body and casket," the petition said, "children do not ride in the front seat." In fact, typically that seat is empty—after all, most people do try to avoid riding in hearses.
On October 15, the agency agreed: All funeral coaches (now officially defined as "a vehicle that contains only one row of occupant seats, is designed exclusively for transporting a body and casket and that is equipped with features to secure a casket in place during the operation of the vehicle") were permanently exempt from all child-safety provisions. According to this formulation, those rare hearses that do have rear seats are not technically funeral coaches; therefore, they are subject to the same child-restraint rules as every other carmaker.
#23
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-14
Last post by remrogers - October 14, 2026, 12:31:54 PM1912
Oct 14
Theodore Roosevelt shot in Milwaukee
Before a campaign speech in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, presidential candidate Theodore Roosevelt is shot at close range by saloonkeeper John Schrank while greeting the public in front of the Gilpatrick Hotel. Schrank's .32-caliber bullet, aimed directly at Roosevelt's heart, failed to mortally wound the former president because its force was slowed by a glasses case and a bundle of manuscript in the breast pocket of Roosevelt's heavy coat—a manuscript containing Roosevelt's evening speech. Schrank was immediately detained and reportedly offered as his motive that "any man looking for a third term ought to be shot."
Roosevelt, who suffered only a flesh wound from the attack, went on to deliver his scheduled speech with the bullet still in his body. After a few words, the former "Rough Rider" pulled the torn and bloodstained manuscript from his breast pocket and declared, "You see, it takes more than one bullet to kill a Bull Moose." He spoke for nearly an hour and then was rushed to the hospital.
Despite his vigorous campaign, Roosevelt, who served as the 26th U.S. president from 1901 to 1909, was defeated by Democrat Woodrow Wilson in November. Shrank was deemed insane and committed to a mental hospital, where he died in 1943.
Oct 14
Theodore Roosevelt shot in Milwaukee
Before a campaign speech in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, presidential candidate Theodore Roosevelt is shot at close range by saloonkeeper John Schrank while greeting the public in front of the Gilpatrick Hotel. Schrank's .32-caliber bullet, aimed directly at Roosevelt's heart, failed to mortally wound the former president because its force was slowed by a glasses case and a bundle of manuscript in the breast pocket of Roosevelt's heavy coat—a manuscript containing Roosevelt's evening speech. Schrank was immediately detained and reportedly offered as his motive that "any man looking for a third term ought to be shot."
Roosevelt, who suffered only a flesh wound from the attack, went on to deliver his scheduled speech with the bullet still in his body. After a few words, the former "Rough Rider" pulled the torn and bloodstained manuscript from his breast pocket and declared, "You see, it takes more than one bullet to kill a Bull Moose." He spoke for nearly an hour and then was rushed to the hospital.
Despite his vigorous campaign, Roosevelt, who served as the 26th U.S. president from 1901 to 1909, was defeated by Democrat Woodrow Wilson in November. Shrank was deemed insane and committed to a mental hospital, where he died in 1943.
#24
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-13
Last post by remrogers - October 13, 2026, 11:16:00 AM1307
Oct 13
Mass arrests of the Knights Templar
On Friday, October 13, 1307, around 15,000 members of the Knights Templar are rounded up and arrested in France. The mass arrests signaled the end for the wealthy and powerful order of warrior monks founded after the First Crusade to protect Christian pilgrims visiting Jerusalem.
Officially known as the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, members of the Knights Templar took vows of chastity and poverty. The order received generous donations of land and gold from European nobles to fund its campaigns against Muslim armies in the Holy Land.
After the traditional Crusades to the Holy Land ended in 1291, the Knights Templar grew incredibly wealthy from its vast landholdings and business across Europe, as well as tax-exempt status as a religious order. The order also lent money to nobles and kings, making it arguably the first international bank. In France, where its lavish Paris headquarters was called the Temple, the Knights Templar drew the ire of King Philip IV, whose kingdom was mired in debt.
In the early 1300s, disgruntled former members of the Knights Templar began spreading rumors that the order was not only financially corrupt, but that its members secretly engaged in devil worship and prohibited sex acts inside the Paris headquarters. Philip IV seized on the sordid accusations as an opportunity to take down the order and steal their wealth.
Philip IV ordered the arrest of every person associated with the Knights Templar across France. On a single day, October 13, 1307, French authorities rounded up an estimated 15,000 knights, monks, servants and laborers, including grandmaster Jacques de Molay, the leader of the Knights Templar.
In England, King Edward II, who married Philip's daughter Isabella in January 1308, faced pressure to follow the French king's lead. English and Irish members of the Knights Templar were arrested in 1307 and 1308 and held in the Tower of London. Pope Clement V conducted additional arrests in other parts of Europe.
Prisoners in France were formally accused of 127 heresies, including spitting on the cross, and they were tortured to force their confessions. In France, even elderly knights were starved, hung with weights to dislocate their bones and had their fingers crushed in vises called thumbscrews. Dozens of prisoners died, while others gave false confessions, including de Molay.
In 1314, de Molay was put on display in Paris to publicly admit his crimes and receive a life sentence. Instead, the grandmaster renounced his confession. King Philip IV ordered de Molay be burned at the stake. According to legend, de Molay cursed Philip IV and Pope Clement V from the flames, and both men were dead within a year.
The mass arrests of the Knights Templar on Friday the 13th and de Molay's curse are often cited as one of the origins of Friday the 13th as an "unlucky" day.
Oct 13
Mass arrests of the Knights Templar
On Friday, October 13, 1307, around 15,000 members of the Knights Templar are rounded up and arrested in France. The mass arrests signaled the end for the wealthy and powerful order of warrior monks founded after the First Crusade to protect Christian pilgrims visiting Jerusalem.
Officially known as the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, members of the Knights Templar took vows of chastity and poverty. The order received generous donations of land and gold from European nobles to fund its campaigns against Muslim armies in the Holy Land.
After the traditional Crusades to the Holy Land ended in 1291, the Knights Templar grew incredibly wealthy from its vast landholdings and business across Europe, as well as tax-exempt status as a religious order. The order also lent money to nobles and kings, making it arguably the first international bank. In France, where its lavish Paris headquarters was called the Temple, the Knights Templar drew the ire of King Philip IV, whose kingdom was mired in debt.
In the early 1300s, disgruntled former members of the Knights Templar began spreading rumors that the order was not only financially corrupt, but that its members secretly engaged in devil worship and prohibited sex acts inside the Paris headquarters. Philip IV seized on the sordid accusations as an opportunity to take down the order and steal their wealth.
Philip IV ordered the arrest of every person associated with the Knights Templar across France. On a single day, October 13, 1307, French authorities rounded up an estimated 15,000 knights, monks, servants and laborers, including grandmaster Jacques de Molay, the leader of the Knights Templar.
In England, King Edward II, who married Philip's daughter Isabella in January 1308, faced pressure to follow the French king's lead. English and Irish members of the Knights Templar were arrested in 1307 and 1308 and held in the Tower of London. Pope Clement V conducted additional arrests in other parts of Europe.
Prisoners in France were formally accused of 127 heresies, including spitting on the cross, and they were tortured to force their confessions. In France, even elderly knights were starved, hung with weights to dislocate their bones and had their fingers crushed in vises called thumbscrews. Dozens of prisoners died, while others gave false confessions, including de Molay.
In 1314, de Molay was put on display in Paris to publicly admit his crimes and receive a life sentence. Instead, the grandmaster renounced his confession. King Philip IV ordered de Molay be burned at the stake. According to legend, de Molay cursed Philip IV and Pope Clement V from the flames, and both men were dead within a year.
The mass arrests of the Knights Templar on Friday the 13th and de Molay's curse are often cited as one of the origins of Friday the 13th as an "unlucky" day.
#25
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-12
Last post by remrogers - October 12, 2026, 11:00:00 AM1918
Oct 12
Fire rages in Minnesota
A massive forest fire rages through Minnesota on October 12, 1918, killing hundreds of people and leaving thousands homeless. The fire burned at least 1,500 square miles.
The fire, known as the Cloquet-Moose Lake fire because that is where the damage was worst, began at rail lines near Sturgeon Lake. This region of Minnesota, southwest of Duluth in the eastern part of the state, was ripe for a major disaster of this sort. The area's timber industry used crude slash methods in the thick forests, leaving behind dry scraps that were perfect kindling for wildfires. They also tended to leave these scraps lying around the rail lines that carried wood from the lumber mills. Since train engines of the time often gave off sparks, fires were nearly inevitable.
Making matters even worse, the months leading up to October 1918 were very hot and dry. When the fire began on October 12, it spread quickly due to high winds. In the Moose Lake area, more than 200 people died when the fire came up quickly on the community. Many local residents attempted to flee the raging flames by driving down Highway 73, south of the Kettle River. A sharp curve in the road proved to be too difficult to maneuver for drivers speeding from the flames surrounding them and at least 15 vehicles went off the road, resulting in 25 deaths.
In all, 38 towns and villages were destroyed by the fire. Four hundred and fifty three deaths were reported and another 85 people were seriously burned. Four thousand houses, 6,000 barns and 40 schools all went up in flames. Hundreds of thousands of farm animals also perished in the fire—a huge loss for area farmers. In all, the region suffered close to $100 million in damages.
Oct 12
Fire rages in Minnesota
A massive forest fire rages through Minnesota on October 12, 1918, killing hundreds of people and leaving thousands homeless. The fire burned at least 1,500 square miles.
The fire, known as the Cloquet-Moose Lake fire because that is where the damage was worst, began at rail lines near Sturgeon Lake. This region of Minnesota, southwest of Duluth in the eastern part of the state, was ripe for a major disaster of this sort. The area's timber industry used crude slash methods in the thick forests, leaving behind dry scraps that were perfect kindling for wildfires. They also tended to leave these scraps lying around the rail lines that carried wood from the lumber mills. Since train engines of the time often gave off sparks, fires were nearly inevitable.
Making matters even worse, the months leading up to October 1918 were very hot and dry. When the fire began on October 12, it spread quickly due to high winds. In the Moose Lake area, more than 200 people died when the fire came up quickly on the community. Many local residents attempted to flee the raging flames by driving down Highway 73, south of the Kettle River. A sharp curve in the road proved to be too difficult to maneuver for drivers speeding from the flames surrounding them and at least 15 vehicles went off the road, resulting in 25 deaths.
In all, 38 towns and villages were destroyed by the fire. Four hundred and fifty three deaths were reported and another 85 people were seriously burned. Four thousand houses, 6,000 barns and 40 schools all went up in flames. Hundreds of thousands of farm animals also perished in the fire—a huge loss for area farmers. In all, the region suffered close to $100 million in damages.
#26
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-11
Last post by remrogers - October 11, 2026, 11:34:21 AM1809
Oct 11
Meriwether Lewis dies along the Natchez Trace, Tennessee
On October 11, 1809, the famous explorer Meriwether Lewis dies under mysterious circumstances in the early hours of the morning after stopping for the night at Grinder's Tavern along the Natchez Trace in Tennessee.
Three years earlier, Lewis and his co-commander, William Clark, had completed their exploration of the newly acquired Louisiana Territory and the Pacific Northwest. Famous and celebrated throughout the nation as a result, Lewis nonetheless found his return to civilized eastern life difficult. President Thomas Jefferson appointed him as governor of Louisiana Territory, but Lewis soon discovered that the complex politics and power struggles of the territory were earning him more enemies than friends. At the same time, bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., were questioning the legitimacy of some of the purchases Lewis had made for the expedition in 1803, raising the threat of bankruptcy if he were forced to cover these costs personally. Finally, some three years after the end of his journey, Lewis still had failed to complete the work necessary to publish the critically important scientific and geographical information he and Clark had gathered in their journals-much to the disappointment of his close friend and mentor, Thomas Jefferson.
For all these reasons, most recent historians have concluded that Lewis' death was a suicide brought on by deep depression and the heavy weight of worries he bore. According to the account given by Mrs. Grinder, the mistress of the tavern along the Natchez Trace where Lewis died, during his final hours Lewis began to pace in his room and talk aloud to himself "like a lawyer." She then heard a pistol shot and Lewis exclaiming, "O Lord!" After a second pistol shot, Lewis staggered from his room and called for help, reportedly saying, "O Madam! Give me some water, and heal my wounds." Strangely, Mrs. Grinder did nothing to help him; she later said that she was too afraid. The next morning servants went to his room where they reportedly found him "busily engaged in cutting himself from head to foot" with a razor. Fatally wounded in the abdomen, Lewis died shortly after sunrise.
Based largely on Mrs. Grinder's story, most historians have argued that Lewis tried to kill himself with two pistol shots, and when death did not come quickly enough, tried to finish the job with his razor. However, in a 1962 book, Suicide or Murder? The Strange Death of Governor Meriwether Lewis, the author Vardes Fisher raised questions about the reliability of Mrs. Grinder's story and suggested that Lewis might have actually been murdered, either by Mrs. Grinder's husband or bandits. Since then a minority of historians has continued to raise challenges to the suicide thesis. But ultimately, nearly two centuries after the event, we may never be able to discover exactly what happened that night along the Natchez Trace when one of the nation's greatest explorers died at the young age of 35.
Oct 11
Meriwether Lewis dies along the Natchez Trace, Tennessee
On October 11, 1809, the famous explorer Meriwether Lewis dies under mysterious circumstances in the early hours of the morning after stopping for the night at Grinder's Tavern along the Natchez Trace in Tennessee.
Three years earlier, Lewis and his co-commander, William Clark, had completed their exploration of the newly acquired Louisiana Territory and the Pacific Northwest. Famous and celebrated throughout the nation as a result, Lewis nonetheless found his return to civilized eastern life difficult. President Thomas Jefferson appointed him as governor of Louisiana Territory, but Lewis soon discovered that the complex politics and power struggles of the territory were earning him more enemies than friends. At the same time, bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., were questioning the legitimacy of some of the purchases Lewis had made for the expedition in 1803, raising the threat of bankruptcy if he were forced to cover these costs personally. Finally, some three years after the end of his journey, Lewis still had failed to complete the work necessary to publish the critically important scientific and geographical information he and Clark had gathered in their journals-much to the disappointment of his close friend and mentor, Thomas Jefferson.
For all these reasons, most recent historians have concluded that Lewis' death was a suicide brought on by deep depression and the heavy weight of worries he bore. According to the account given by Mrs. Grinder, the mistress of the tavern along the Natchez Trace where Lewis died, during his final hours Lewis began to pace in his room and talk aloud to himself "like a lawyer." She then heard a pistol shot and Lewis exclaiming, "O Lord!" After a second pistol shot, Lewis staggered from his room and called for help, reportedly saying, "O Madam! Give me some water, and heal my wounds." Strangely, Mrs. Grinder did nothing to help him; she later said that she was too afraid. The next morning servants went to his room where they reportedly found him "busily engaged in cutting himself from head to foot" with a razor. Fatally wounded in the abdomen, Lewis died shortly after sunrise.
Based largely on Mrs. Grinder's story, most historians have argued that Lewis tried to kill himself with two pistol shots, and when death did not come quickly enough, tried to finish the job with his razor. However, in a 1962 book, Suicide or Murder? The Strange Death of Governor Meriwether Lewis, the author Vardes Fisher raised questions about the reliability of Mrs. Grinder's story and suggested that Lewis might have actually been murdered, either by Mrs. Grinder's husband or bandits. Since then a minority of historians has continued to raise challenges to the suicide thesis. But ultimately, nearly two centuries after the event, we may never be able to discover exactly what happened that night along the Natchez Trace when one of the nation's greatest explorers died at the young age of 35.
#27
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-10
Last post by remrogers - October 10, 2026, 10:49:56 AM1767
Oct 10
Mason and Dixon draw a line, dividing the colonies
On October 10, 1767, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon complete their survey of the boundary between the colonies of Pennsylvania and Maryland as well as areas that would eventually become the states of Delaware and West Virginia. The Penn and Calvert families had hired Mason and Dixon, English surveyors, to settle their dispute over the boundary between their two proprietary colonies, Pennsylvania and Maryland.
In 1760, tired of border violence between the colonies' settlers, the British crown demanded that the parties involved hold to an agreement reached in 1732. As part of Maryland and Pennsylvania's adherence to this royal command, Mason and Dixon were asked to determine the exact whereabouts of the boundary between the two colonies. Though both colonies claimed the area between the 39th and 40th parallel, what is now referred to as the Mason-Dixon line finally settled the boundary at a northern latitude of 39 degrees and 43 minutes. The line was marked using stones, with Pennsylvania's crest on one side and Maryland's on the other.
When Mason and Dixon began their endeavor in 1763, colonists were protesting the Proclamation of 1763, which was intended to prevent colonists from settling beyond the Appalachians and angering Native Americans. As the Britons concluded their survey in 1767, the colonies were engaged in a dispute with the Parliament over the Townshend Acts, which were designed to raise revenue for the empire by taxing common imports including tea.
Twenty years later, in late 1700s, the states south of the Mason-Dixon line would begin arguing for the perpetuation of slavery in the new United States while those north of line hoped to phase out the ownership of human chattel. This period, which historians consider the era of "The New Republic," drew to a close with the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which accepted the states south of the line as slave-holding and those north of the line as free. The compromise, along with those that followed it, eventually failed.
One hundred years after Mason and Dixon began their effort to chart the boundary, soldiers from opposite sides of the line let their blood stain the fields of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in the Southern states' final and fatal attempt to breach the Mason-Dixon line during the Civil War. One hundred and one years after the Britons completed their line, the United States finally admitted men of any complexion born within the nation to the rights of citizenship with the ratification of the 14th Amendment.
Oct 10
Mason and Dixon draw a line, dividing the colonies
On October 10, 1767, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon complete their survey of the boundary between the colonies of Pennsylvania and Maryland as well as areas that would eventually become the states of Delaware and West Virginia. The Penn and Calvert families had hired Mason and Dixon, English surveyors, to settle their dispute over the boundary between their two proprietary colonies, Pennsylvania and Maryland.
In 1760, tired of border violence between the colonies' settlers, the British crown demanded that the parties involved hold to an agreement reached in 1732. As part of Maryland and Pennsylvania's adherence to this royal command, Mason and Dixon were asked to determine the exact whereabouts of the boundary between the two colonies. Though both colonies claimed the area between the 39th and 40th parallel, what is now referred to as the Mason-Dixon line finally settled the boundary at a northern latitude of 39 degrees and 43 minutes. The line was marked using stones, with Pennsylvania's crest on one side and Maryland's on the other.
When Mason and Dixon began their endeavor in 1763, colonists were protesting the Proclamation of 1763, which was intended to prevent colonists from settling beyond the Appalachians and angering Native Americans. As the Britons concluded their survey in 1767, the colonies were engaged in a dispute with the Parliament over the Townshend Acts, which were designed to raise revenue for the empire by taxing common imports including tea.
Twenty years later, in late 1700s, the states south of the Mason-Dixon line would begin arguing for the perpetuation of slavery in the new United States while those north of line hoped to phase out the ownership of human chattel. This period, which historians consider the era of "The New Republic," drew to a close with the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which accepted the states south of the line as slave-holding and those north of the line as free. The compromise, along with those that followed it, eventually failed.
One hundred years after Mason and Dixon began their effort to chart the boundary, soldiers from opposite sides of the line let their blood stain the fields of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in the Southern states' final and fatal attempt to breach the Mason-Dixon line during the Civil War. One hundred and one years after the Britons completed their line, the United States finally admitted men of any complexion born within the nation to the rights of citizenship with the ratification of the 14th Amendment.
#28
The Tailgate / Today in history 10-9
Last post by remrogers - October 09, 2026, 01:04:24 PM1963
Oct 9
Landslide kills thousands in Italy
On October 9, 1963, a landslide in Italy leads to the deaths of more than 2,000 people when it causes a sudden and massive wave of water to overwhelm a dam.
The Diga del Vajont dam was built in the Vaiont Gorge to supply hydroelectric power to Northern Italy. Located 10 miles northeast of Belluno, it rose 875 feet above the Piave River below and was a full 75 feet wide at its base. The construction of the dam created a large reservoir, which held more than 300,000 cubic feet of water. While the dam was solidly constructed, its location was a poor choice.
The Vaiont Gorge was located in a section of the Alps known for instability. In 1963, the area experienced heavy rains—about 90 inches by October 9. At 10:41 p.m., the wet land could no longer hold and a massive landslide came crashing down from Mount Toc, causing a huge pile of dirt and rocks to plunge into the reservoir at about 70 miles per hour. The impact of the debris caused an immense wave of water to rise as high as 300 feet above the level of the dam.
Workers living alongside the dam were killed instantly. The displaced water crashed over the dam and into the Piave River below. It stormed down the river and engulfed the town of Longarone. Within minutes the town had virtually vanished and nearly 2,000 people were dead. The tsunami-like wave then rushed down to San Martino, where it killed hundreds more.
In the aftermath of the disaster, Mario Pancini, the engineer of the dam project, was summoned to court to answer questions regarding what was known of the geology of the area prior to the dam's construction. He killed himself before his scheduled appearance.
Oct 9
Landslide kills thousands in Italy
On October 9, 1963, a landslide in Italy leads to the deaths of more than 2,000 people when it causes a sudden and massive wave of water to overwhelm a dam.
The Diga del Vajont dam was built in the Vaiont Gorge to supply hydroelectric power to Northern Italy. Located 10 miles northeast of Belluno, it rose 875 feet above the Piave River below and was a full 75 feet wide at its base. The construction of the dam created a large reservoir, which held more than 300,000 cubic feet of water. While the dam was solidly constructed, its location was a poor choice.
The Vaiont Gorge was located in a section of the Alps known for instability. In 1963, the area experienced heavy rains—about 90 inches by October 9. At 10:41 p.m., the wet land could no longer hold and a massive landslide came crashing down from Mount Toc, causing a huge pile of dirt and rocks to plunge into the reservoir at about 70 miles per hour. The impact of the debris caused an immense wave of water to rise as high as 300 feet above the level of the dam.
Workers living alongside the dam were killed instantly. The displaced water crashed over the dam and into the Piave River below. It stormed down the river and engulfed the town of Longarone. Within minutes the town had virtually vanished and nearly 2,000 people were dead. The tsunami-like wave then rushed down to San Martino, where it killed hundreds more.
In the aftermath of the disaster, Mario Pancini, the engineer of the dam project, was summoned to court to answer questions regarding what was known of the geology of the area prior to the dam's construction. He killed himself before his scheduled appearance.
#29
Non Hunting/Fishing Photos / Re: I don't know what the big ...
Last post by nastygunz - October 09, 2026, 06:00:27 AMThat is pretty cool.
#30
Non Hunting/Fishing Photos / Re: I don't know what the big ...
Last post by nastygunz - October 09, 2026, 05:59:10 AMMy childhood friend stan the mountain man has a semi famous ice fishing shanty with pink elephants painted all over it ha ha ha.