By Jennifer Thompson
500 years ago - December 1503
December 14- Birthday of Nostradamus, [Michel de Nostre-Dam-us], French astrologist/prophet.
300 years ago - December 1703
December 30- Tokyo hit by Earthquake; about 37,000 die.
150 years ago - December 1853
December 30 - Gadsden Purchase 45,000 mi (120,000 km) by Gila River from Mexico for $10 million. Area is now southern Arizona and New Mexico.
100 years ago - December 1903
December 13- Italo Marcioni of New Jersey patents ice cream cone, and the Wright Brothers make first flight at Kittyhawk.
December 14 - Death of William Ennis, first policeman to die in electric chair.
December 16- Majestic Theater in New York City, becomes the first in the U.S. to employ women ushers.
December 19 - Williamsburg suspension bridge opens between Brooklyn & Manhattan.
December 22- Birthday of Dr. Barbara Moore, who walked across the U.S. in 86 days in 1960.
December 27- Sweet Adaline, a barbershop quartet favorite, is 1st sung.
December 30- Electric lamp sets fire to Iroquois theater in Chicago; 602 die.
75 years ago - December 1928
December 9- K Reinmuth discovers asteroid #1104 Syringa.
December 13 - George Gershwin’s An American In Paris premieres in New York City.
December 19- 1st autogiro (the predecessor of the helicopter) flight in U.S.
December 23- NBC sets up a permanent, coast-to-coast network.
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Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it.
Mark Twain
For every minute you are angry, you lose sixty seconds of happiness.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Published in U S Legacies Magazine December 2003
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