TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – MARCH 31
1146 Bernard of Clairvaux preaches his famous sermon in a field at Vézelay, urging the necessity of a Second Crusade. Louis VII is present, and joins the Crusade.
1282 The great massacre of the French in Sicily The Sicilian Vespers comes to an end.
1492 Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Aragon issue the Alhambra Decree which expels Jews from their Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon
1657 English Parliament makes the Humble Petition to Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell offering him the crown: he declines
1776 Abigail Adams writes to husband John that women are “determined to foment a rebellion” if the new Declaration of Independence fails to guarantee their rights.
1836 The first monthly installment of The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens is published in London.
1854 The U.S. government signed the Treaty of Kanagawa with Japan. The act opened the ports of Shimoda and Hakotade to American trade.
1870 -In Perth Amboy, NJ, Thomas Munday Peterson became the first black to vote in the U.S.
1880 The first electric street lights ever installed by a municipality are turned on in Wabash, Indiana.
1889 The Eiffel Tower in Paris officially opens on the Left Bank as part of the Exhibition of 1889.
1906 The Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States was founded to set rules in amateur sports. The organization became the National Collegiate Athletic Association in 1910.
1917 The United States purchases the Virgin Islands from Denmark for $25 million.
1933 To relieve rampant unemployment, Congress authorizes the Civilian Conservation Corps .
1944 Hungary orders all Jews to wear yellow stars
1953 Department of Health, Education & Welfare established
1967 President Lyndon Johnson signs the Consular Treaty, the first bi-lateral pact with the Soviet Union since the Bolshevik Revolution.
1976 The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that Karen Anne Quinlan could be disconnected from a respirator. Quinlan remained comatose until 1985 when she died.
1980 President Jimmy Carter deregulates the banking industry.
1985 Wrestlemania I at Madison Square Garden New York, Hogan & Mr T beat Piper & Orndorf
1989 Donald Trump purchases Eastern’s Northeast Shuttle
1990 Riots began in London over the new poll tax laws
1993 Brandon Lee was killed accidentally while filming a movie.
1998 For the first time in U.S. history the federal government’s detailed financial statement was released. This occurred under the Clinton administration.
2000 In Uganda, officials set the number of deaths linked to a doomsday religious cult, the Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments, at more than 900. In Kanungu, a March 17 fire at the cult’s church killed more than 530 and authorities subsequently found mass graves at various sites linked to the cult.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
