There is always much to learn from quotes and their historical significance. Read on for a collection of quotes and general history from May 23rd – 29th.
May 23, 1934
Some day they’ll go down together;
– Bonnie Parker, “The Trail’s End” now more commonly known as “The Story of Bonnie and Clyde”
They’ll bury them side by side;
To few it’ll be grief–
To the law a relief–
But it’s death for Bonnie and Clyde.
The infamous gangsters Bonnie and Clyde were killed in a police ambush on May 23, 1934. Together with the Barrow Gang, they are believed to have murdered at least 9 police officers and 4 civilians. Although known for their bank robberies, they preferred to rob rural stores or gas stations. The press covered their exploits extensively, depicting them in perhaps a more ruthless light than was true. Eventually, public opinion, especially in Texas, turned on them and Texas Ranger Frank Hamer was brought out of retirement to hunt them down. Ignoring state lines, Hamer tracked the pair to Bienville Parish, Louisiana where an ambush was set up and around 130 rounds were fired into the couple’s Ford V8.
May 24, 1844
“What hath God wrought.”
– Samuel Morse, First U.S. Telegraph, quoted from the Bible (Numbers 23:23)
Samuel Morse sent the first official telegraph in the United States on May 24, 1844. After a small demonstration between two committee rooms in the Capitol, Congress had granted $30,000 to build an experimental telegraph line between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore in 1943. It was this 38-mile line that made the chosen words, “What hath God wrought”, famous. The technology quickly took off with 12,000 miles of telegraphic lines laid by 1850! Although most known as a co-inventor of Morse code and telegraphy, Samuel Morse was also an accomplished portrait painter.
May 25, 1935
“For a time, at least, I was the most famous person in the entire world.”
– Jesse Owens
On May 25, 1935, Jesse Owens established 4 world records in a span of 45 minutes at the Big Ten track meet in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He set new world records in the long jump (26 feet 8 ¼ inches), 220-yard sprint (20.3 seconds), and the 220-yard low hurdles (22.6 seconds), and equaled the 100-yard dash record of 9.4 seconds. This incredible feat has often been called “the greatest 45 minutes ever in sport”! Owens went on to achieve international fame by winning four gold medals at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany.
May 26, 1857
“We think the Dred Scott decision is erroneous. We know the court that made it has often overruled its own decisions, and we shall do what we can to have it overrule this.”
– Abraham Lincoln
Dred Scott and his family were freed by owner Henry Taylor Blow on May 26, 1857. Their freedom came despite the US Supreme Court’s landmark decision in the Dred Scott v. Sandford case that had held that the US Constitution was not meant to include American citizenship for black people. Several of the justices hoped this decision would permanently settle the slavery controversy but it instead helped deepen the divide that eventually led to the Civil War. The Dred Scott decision was voided by the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments and is now widely agreed as the Supreme Court’s worst ever decision.
May 27, 1940
“We must be very careful not to assign to this deliverance the attributes of a victory. Wars are not won by evacuations.”
– Winston Churchill, June 4, 1940
May 27, 1940, marked the first full day of the Dunkirk evacuation during World War II. Between May 26th and June 4th, 338,226 soldiers were rescued from the beaches and harbors of Dunkirk, France across the English Channel. Codenamed Operation Dynamo, the Allied retreat is sometimes referred to as the Miracle of Dunkirk for the soldiers who lived to fight another day. However, it also signaled a major defeat to the Allies in the Battle of France, ending land operations on the Western Front until D-Day in 1944. Of the 800-some vessels used in the evacuation, many were civilian volunteers that came to be known as the Little Ships of Dunkirk. For more, check out the 2017 film Dunkirk!
May 28, 1830
“The Trail of Tears has a great deal of meaning for every person of American Indian ancestry, whether they are Cherokee or not. For me, it has always stood for what is best and worst about the history of the United States.”
– Joseph Bruchac
The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by U.S. President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830. This paved the way for the forced removal of thousands of American Indians from their ancestral homelands in the Southeastern United States to areas west of the Mississippi. During relocation, many members of the Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek), Seminole, Chickasaw, and Choctaw nations died from exposure, disease, and starvation. Sadly, these events were largely ignored by the American people at the time but eventually became known as the Trail of Tears.
May 29, 1953
“If it is a shame to be the second man on Mount Everest, then I will have to live with this shame.”
– Tenzing Norgay
Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first confirmed people to reach the summit of Mount Everest on May 29, 1953. Hillary, a New Zealand mountaineer, reached the peak just before his partner Norgay, a Nepali Sherpa, as part of the ninth British expedition to Everest. However, it’s possible that George Mallory and/or Andrew Irvine reached the summit much earlier on June 8, 1924. Unfortunately, their fate will forever remain a mystery since neither returned after being seen entering the clouds near the peak that day. As Earth’s tallest mountain, Mount Everest continues to attract many climbers despite the dangers of altitude sickness, inclement weather, and avalanches. To date, over 4,000 people have reached the summit but more than 300 have also died in the attempt.
In case you missed last week’s quotes, see History May 16th – 22nd.
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