Today in History

Today in History Today is Sunday, May 30, the 150th day of 2021. There are 215 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On May 30, 1431, Joan of Arc, condemned as a heretic, was burned at the stake in Rouen (roo-AHN’), France. On this date: In 1883, 12 people were trampled to death in a stampede sparked by a rumor that the recently opened Brooklyn Bridge was in danger of collapsing. In 1922, the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., was dedicated in a ceremony attended by President Warren G. Harding, Chief Justice William Howard Taft and Robert Todd Lincoln. In 1937, ten people were killed when police fired on steelworkers demonstrating near the Republic Steel plant in South Chicago. In 1943, during World War II, American troops secured the Aleutian island of Attu from Japanese forces. In 1971, the American space probe Mariner 9 blasted off from Cape Kennedy on a journey to Mars. In 1972, three members of the Japanese Red Army opened fire at Lod Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing 26 people. Two attackers died; the third was captured. In 1989, student protesters in Beijing erected a ‘œGoddess of Democracy’� statue in Tiananmen Square (the statue was destroyed in the Chinese government’s crackdown). In 1994, Mormon Church president Ezra Taft Benson died in Salt Lake City at age 94. In 1996, Britain’s Prince Andrew and the former Sarah Ferguson were granted an uncontested decree ending their 10-year marriage. In 2002, a solemn, wordless ceremony marked the end of the agonizing cleanup at ground zero in New York, 8 1/2 months after 9/11. In 2006, the FBI said it had found no trace of Jimmy Hoffa after digging up a suburban Detroit horse farm. In 2015, Vice President Joe Biden’s son, former Delaware attorney general Beau Biden, died at age 46 of brain cancer. Ten years ago: President Barack Obama selected Army Gen. Martin Dempsey to be the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman. Germany announced plans to abandon nuclear power over the next 11 years, outlining an ambitious strategy in the wake of Japan’s Fukushima disaster to replace atomic power with renewable energy sources. Five years ago: President Barack Obama challenged Americans on Memorial Day to fill the silence from those who died serving their country with love and support for families of the fallen, ‘œnot just with words but with our actions.’� One year ago: Tense protests over the death of George Floyd and other police killings of Black people grew across the country; racially diverse crowds held mostly peaceful demonstrations in dozens of cities, though many later descended into violence, with police cars set ablaze. The National Guard was deployed outside the White House, where crowds taunted law enforcement officers, who fired pepper spray. A fourth day of violence in Los Angeles prompted the mayor to impose a citywide curfew and call in the National Guard. Street protests in New York City over police killings spiraled into the city’s worst day of unrest in decades, as fires burned, windows were smashed and confrontations between demonstrators and officers flared. A rocket ship built by Elon Musk’s SpaceX took off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral to carry two Americans to the International Space Station; it ushered in a new era of commercial space travel.