August 11

1934

A group of federal prisoners classified as “most dangerous” arrives at Alcatraz Island, a 22-acre rocky outcrop situated 1.5 miles offshore in San Francisco Bay. The convicts—the first civilian prisoners to be housed in the new high-security penitentiary, especially those with a penchant for escape attempts—joined a few dozen military prisoners left over from the island’s days as a U.S. military prison. Later that month, more shiploads arrived, featuring, among other convicts, infamous mobster Al Capone. In September, George “Machine Gun” Kelly, another luminary of organized crime, landed on Alcatraz. In 1963, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy ordered Alcatraz closed, citing the high expense of its maintenance. In its 29-year run, Alcatraz housed more than 1,500 convicts.

1973

The arguable birth of hip hop began at a birthday party at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue, an apartment building in the west Bronx, New York City. The man who was spinning records at that historic party was Clive Campbell—better known to history as DJ Kool Herc, founding father of hip hop. By the summer of 1973, DJ Kool Herc had been using and refining his break-beat style for the better part of a year. His sister’s party on August 11, however, put him before his biggest crowd ever and with the most powerful sound system he’d ever worked. It was the success of that party that would begin a grassroots musical revolution, fully six years before the term “hip hop” even entered the popular vocabulary.

2014

Robin Williams, the prolific Oscar-winning actor and comedian, died by suicide at 63. Along with acting, Williams was dedicated to various charitable causes that helped homeless people and those suffering through metal illness. He was a regular on USO tours, entertaining American troops around the world. In his stand-up routines, Williams spoke openly about his experiences with substance abuse and sobriety. After Williams died, tributes poured in from the Hollywood community and beyond. Then-president Barack Obama said: “[He] was an airman, a doctor, a genie, a nanny, a president, a professor, a bangarang Peter Pan and everything in-between. But he was one of a kind. He arrived in our lives as an alien—but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit.”

August 12

1939

The Wizard of Oz, starring Judy Garland and featuring words and music by E.Y. “Yip” Harburg and Harold Arlen, premiered in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. First published in 1900, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was adapted numerous times for the stage and screen prior to 1939. However, that year’s film adaptation earned Baum’s work a permanent place in cinema and music history. Not only did Judy Garland’s signature song, “Over The Rainbow,” earn Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg the Oscar for Best Song at the 1940 Academy Awards, but it quickly became an indispensable standard in the American Songbook, later being acknowledged as the #1 song on the “Songs of the Century” list compiled in 2001 by the Recording Industry Association of America and the National Endowment for the Arts.

1973

American golfer Jack Nicklaus won the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) championship for his 14th major title, surpassing Bobby Jones’ record of 13 major championships. The “Golden Bear” went on to win 18 major tournaments, a record that still stands today. A member of the World Golf Hall of Fame since 1974, the PGA named him Golfer of the Century in 1988. He joined the Senior tour in 1990, winning the U.S. Senior Open in 1991 and 1993. Throughout his career, Nicklaus also designed many noted golf courses, including Muirfield Village Golf Course in Ohio, site of the Nicklaus-sponsored Memorial Tournament. In 2005, Nicklaus announced he was retiring from professional tournament play after that year’s British Open.

1990

Fossil hunter Susan Hendrickson discovered three huge bones jutting out of a cliff near Faith, South Dakota. They turned out to be part of the largest-ever Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ever discovered, a 65 million-year-old specimen dubbed Sue, after its discoverer. Amazingly, Sue’s skeleton was over 90% complete. Sue’s extraordinarily well-preserved bones have allowed scientists to determine many things about the life of T.rex. They have determined that the carnivorous dinosaur had an incredible sense of smell, as the olfactory bulbs were each bigger than the cerebrum, the thinking part of the brain. In addition, Sue was the first T.rex skeleton to be discovered with a wishbone, a crucial discovery that provided support for scientists’ theory that birds are a type of living dinosaur.

 

August 13

1981

At his home in CA, Ronald Reagan signed the Economic Recovery Tax Act, a historic package of tax and budget reductions that set the tone for his administration’s overall economic policy. During his campaign for the White House in 1980, Reagan argued on behalf of “supply-side economics,” the theory of using tax cuts as incentives for individuals and businesses to work and produce goods (supply) rather than as an incentive for consumers to buy goods (demand). His tax program undoubtedly set in motion powerful forces of change that would result in both short- and long-term economic gainsCritics of so-called “Reaganomics” point out that his tax cuts and the effects of steady economic growth disproportionately benefitted the wealthy, and vastly increased the gap between the nation’s rich and poor.

1982

The teenage coming-of-age comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High opened in theaters around the United States. Written by Cameron Crowe and directed by Amy Heckerling, the film follows a year in the life of high school students and their teachers. The ensemble cast featured the (then relatively unknown) future A-list actors Sean Penn, Nicolas Cage and Forest Whitaker. Fast Times at Ridgemont High marked Cameron Crowe’s feature-film debut as a writer and was based on a 1981 book of the same name that he penned after going undercover to research it at a San Diego high school. His other films include Jerry Maguire, Almost Famous, Vanilla Sky, Elizabethtown, Aloha and more.

1995

Former New York Yankees star Mickey Mantle dies of liver cancer at the age of 63. While “The Mick” patrolled center field and batted clean-up between 1951 and 1968, the Yankees won 12 American League pennants and seven World Series championships. Mantle made his debut for the Yankees in 1951 at age 19, playing right field alongside aging center fielder Joe DiMaggio. After years of brilliance, Mantle’s career began to decline by 1967, and he was forced to move to first base. The next season would be his last. Mantle was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974 in his first year of eligibility. At the time of his death Mantle held many of the records for World Series play, including most home runs (18), most RBIs (40) and most runs

August 14

1935

President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into law the Social Security Act, which guaranteed an income for the unemployed and retirees. FDR commended Congress for what he considered to be a “patriotic” act. n his public statement that day, FDR expressed concern for “young people [who] have come to wonder what would be their lot when they came to old age” as well as those who had employment but no job security. Although he acknowledged that “we can never insure one hundred percent of the population against one hundred percent of the hazards and vicissitudes of life,” he hoped the act would prevent senior citizens from ending up impoverished.

  

1995

Shannon Faulkner became the first female cadet in the 156 year history of South Carolina’s state military college, The Citadel. Her battle to attend the all-male school lasted two years, but her presence was met with intense resistance, reportedly including death threats. She only lasted about a week and many thought women could not handle the physical pressures of a military academy. The following year, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered all-male, state-supported Virginia Military Institute to admit women and The Citadel bowed to the rule of law. Today about 10 percent of the Citadel's cadets are female, and the school annually celebrates Women’s History Month.

2003

A major outage knocked out power across the eastern US and parts of Canada. Beginning at 4:10 p.m. ET, 21 power plants shut down in just three minutes. 50 million people were affected, including residents of New York, Cleveland and Detroit. Although power companies were able to resume some service in as little as two hours, power remained off in other places for more than a day. The outage stopped trains and elevators, and disrupted everything from cellular telephone service to operations at hospitals to traffic at airports. an investigation by a joint U.S.-Canada task force traced the problem back to an Ohio company, FirstEnergy Corporation. When the company’s EastLake plant shut down unexpectedly after overgrown trees came into contact with a power line, it triggered a series of problems that led to a chain reaction of outages.

August 15

1780

American Lieutenant Colonel Francis Marion, the “Swamp Fox,” and his irregular cavalry force of 250 routed a party of Loyalists at Port’s Ferry, South Carolina. Marion, a mere 5ft tall, won fame and the “Swamp Fox” moniker for his ability to strike and then quickly retreat without a trace into the South Carolina swamps. Famed as the only senior Continental officer to escape the British following the fall of Charleston on May 12, 1780, his military strategy is considered an 18th-century example of guerilla warfare and served as partial inspiration for Mel Gibson’s character in the film The Patriot (2000).

The Woodstock music festival opened in the upstate New York town of Bethel. Promoters John Roberts, Joel Rosenman, Artie Kornfield and Michael Lang, despite their relative inexperience, managed to sign a roster of top acts, including Jefferson Airplane, The Who, Grateful Dead, Sly and the Family Stone, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Creedence Clearwater Revival and many more. Though Woodstock had left its promoters nearly bankrupt, their ownership of the film and recording rights more than compensated for the losses after the release of a hit documentary film in 1970. Later music festivals inspired by Woodstock’s success failed to live up to its standard, and the festival still stands for many as an example of America’s 1960s youth counterculture at its best.

1914

The American-built waterway across the Isthmus of Panama, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, was inaugurated with the passage of the U.S. vessel Ancon. The rush of settlers to California and Oregon in the mid 19th century was the initial impetus of the U.S. desire to build an artificial waterway across Central America. By the turn of the century, sole possession of the isthmian canal became imperative to the United States, which had acquired an overseas empire at the end of the Spanish-American War and sought the ability to move warships and commerce quickly between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. In 1977 U.S. President Jimmy Carter and Panamanian dictator Omar Torrijos signed a treaty to turn over the canal to Panama by the end of the century. A peaceful transfer occurred at noon on December 31, 1999.

August 16

1904

New York City and the Vanderbilts began building Grand Central Station. The building was the largest construction project in New York’s history up to that time. It’s 70-acre compound had 32 miles of track, which fed into 46 tracks and 30 passenger platforms. A technological marvel, it was one of the world’s first all-electric buildings.

1954

"Sports Illustrated," a new magazine dedicated to covering sports, appeared on American newsstands. The new magazine was the brainchild of Henry, Luce, creator of Time magazine. It was considered a joke by some and would not make money for most of its first decade. The magazine eventually became the undisputed leader in American sports media, the sporting magazine of record and one of the most recognizable media brands in the world. Sports Illustrated started making a profit in the 1960s and by the 1970s it became a go-to source for American sports news, retaining its strong brand and reputation for sterling journalism well into the age of ESPN and digital media.

1977

Elvis Presley, "The King of Rock and Roll," died of a heart attack in Memphis, Tennessee at 42. His death brought legions of mourning fans to Graceland, his mansion in Memphis. Doctors said he died of a heart attack, likely brought on by his addiction to prescription barbiturates. By the mid 1970s, Elvis was in declining physical and mental health. In the last two years of his life, he made erratic stage appearances and lived nearly as a recluse. He was buried on the grounds of Graceland, which continues to attract fans and has been turned into a highly successful tourist attraction.

 August 17

1978

The Double Eagle II completed the first transatlantic balloon flight when it lands in a barley field near Paris, 137 hours after lifting off from Presque Isle, Maine. The helium-filed balloon was piloted by Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman and flew 3,233 miles in the six-day odyssey. Human flight first became a reality in the early 1780s with the successful development of the hot-air balloon by French paper-making brothers Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier. Soon balloons were being filled with lighter-than-air gas, such as helium or hydrogen, to provide buoyancy. In 2002, American adventurer Steve Fossett became the first man in history to fly around the world solo in a hot-air balloon.

1998

President Bill Clinton became the first sitting president to testify before the Office of Independent Counsel as the subject of a grand-jury investigation. The testimony came after a four-year investigation into Clinton and his wife Hillary's alleged involvement in several scandals, including accusations of sexual harassment, potentially illegal real-estate deals and suspected “cronyism” involved in the firing of White House travel-agency personnel. The independent prosecutor, Kenneth Starr, then uncovered an affair between Clinton and a White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. When questioned about the affair, Clinton denied it, which led Starr to charge the president with perjury and obstruction of justice, which in turn prompted his testimony on August 17.

2008

The US team of Michael Phelps, Aaron Peirsol, Brendan Hansen & Jason Lezak won the 4 x 100m men's medley relay at the Beijing Olympics. They set a new world record time of 3:29.34. This was Phelps' 8th gold medal of the Games, breaking Mark Spitz's 1972 record of seven. He would compete in five Summer Olympics, retiring after the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Summer Olympics. Michael Phelp's 23 Olympic gold medals is the most won by a single person. He is considered the greatest swimmer of all time and arguably the greatest athlete of all time.