This Day in History Class

On this day in 1983, Alfred “Freddy” Heineken, CEO of the Heineken brewery, was abducted at gunpoint outside the company’s headquarters in Amsterdam.

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On this day in 1972, Home Box Office, or HBO, began broadcasting for the first time.

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On this day in 1800, the police chief of Paris issued an order making it illegal for women to wear pants in public.

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On this day in 1528, Spanish explorer Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca became the first European to set foot on land that would later become the state of Texas.

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On this day in 1935, Parker Brothers begins selling Monopoly, a board game based on the real estate of Atlantic City, New Jersey.

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On this day in 1918, at the tail end of the First World War, British poet Wilfred Owen was killed in action during an assault on a German-held canal on the Western Front of France.

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On this day in 1906, at an international conference held in Berlin, SOS was chosen as the officially recognized distress call for ships at sea.

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On this day in 1947, Howard Hughes pilots the H-4 Hercules, also known as the “Spruce Goose”, on its first and only flight.

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On this day in 1945, Ebony magazine, a journal chronicling the lives of African Americans, released its inaugural issue.

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On this day in 1926, in Room 401 of Grace Hospital in Detroit, Harry Houdini dies of complications from a ruptured appendix.

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