History Today

Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 11th. In a typical year, more than 5.5 million people visit the Grand Canyon. The canyon, which is a mile deep and is the only North American site considered one of the seven natural wonders of the world, was made a national monument on this day in 1908 by President Theodore Roosevelt.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 10th. Texas is the largest producer of oil in the United States, and it all started on this day in 1901, when a drilling derrick at Beaumont, Texas, produced an enormous gusher of crude oil. The gusher coated everything within hundreds of feet and signaled the advent of the American oil industry. Following the discovery, petroleum, which until that time had been used in the U.S.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 9th. When Steve Jobs announced the debut of the iPhone on this day in 2007, few could have predicted the effect it would have on modern life--except maybe Jobs, who called it a “revolutionary and magical product.” When it went on sale in the United States six months later, amid huge hype, thousands of customers lined up at Apple stores across the country to be among the first to purchase an iPhone.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 8th. With the U.S. national debt currently at more than $27 trillion and climbing, we look back to this day in 1835, when America's debt was completely paid off, a long-held goal of then-President Andrew Jackson. Jackson called the debt “a moral failing” and vetoed a number of spending bills throughout his tenure, putting an end to projects that would have expanded nationwide infrastructure.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 7th. Crowds flock to the Leaning Tower of Pisa precisely because of its famous lean, but on this day in 1990, the Leaning Tower of Pisa was closed to the public amidst fears it might topple over completely. Experts then spent 11 years and $27 million fortifying the tower without completely eliminating the tilt that made it famous.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 6th. These days telegrams are basically obsolete, but when inventor Samuel Morse demonstrated the technology for the first time on this day in 1838, they were revolutionary. The telegraph, which used electric impulses to transmit encoded messages over a wire, completely changed long-distance communication, reaching the height of its popularity in the 1920s and 30s.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 5th. Late last year, news broke that the U.S. divorce rate had hit a 50-year low, with only 14.9 marriages out of every 1,000 ending in divorce. But even with this record decline, divorce was a lot more rare way back on this day 1643. That’s when Anne Clarke of the Massachusetts Bay Colony divorced her absent--and adulterous--husband in the very first recorded divorce in the American colonies.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 4th. On this day in 1853, Solomon Northup finally legally obtained his freedom after being enslaved for 12 years. Northup was born a free man in 1807 in upstate New York. A talented fiddler, Northup was convinced by two circus performers to join their troupe, but then was drugged and sold into slavery in New Orleans.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 3rd. There have been more than 40 women inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame since this day in 1987, when Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul, became the very first. Franklin is one of the best-selling musical artists of all time, having sold more than 75 million albums while winning 18 Grammy Awards. Franklin’s Hall of Fame class also included Ricky Nelson, Roy Orbison and Smokey Robinson.

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Hello, and welcome to This Day in History. Here’s what happened on January 2nd. With President-elect Joe Biden promising to hire a diverse staff that, as he says, “looks like America,” we look back to this day in 1890, when President Benjamin Harrison hired Alice Sanger as the White House’s first-ever paid female staffer. Sanger, a skilled stenographer, served as presidential secretary to Harrison and also did work for his wife Caroline.

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