This picture, taken on August 19, 1896 by Baldwin Coolidge, shows a spectacular waterspout twisting over Vineyard Sound, Massachusetts. The historic scene reveals the power and beauty of this natural phenomenon, in late 19th-century New England, as people go about their lives.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

With the disastrous encounter next to Fort Laramie – later characterized as the “Grattan Massacre” – the First Sioux War started on August 19, 1854. Lieutenant John Grattan led a detachment of US soldiers to arrest a Lakota man, who had allegedly killed a settler’s cow, not only breaking treaty stipulations, but furthermore completely ignoring the diplomatic processes that should have existed to prove this man’s innocence. During the conflict Chief Conquering Bear was shot, and Lakota warriors sought revenge killing Grattan and his men. The incident was a product of arrogance, misunderstandings and violations of previous agreements, igniting a state of war that would shape the next several decades of the US-Lakota relationship.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Samuel Prescott, one of the trio of riders who participated in Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride, was born in Concord, Massachusetts on August 19, 1751.

Prescott, who was a young doctor, was the only rider to reach the town of Concord (the town of his birth) during the night of the famous ride.

Image: Home of Samuel Prescott of Revolutionary War fame from 1928 via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

On August 19, 1940 the B-25 Mitchell bomber made its first flight.

Image of a B-25 Mitchell bombing a Nazi supply center over Tivoli near Rome in the 1940s via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Born August 19, 1899 silent film star Colleen Moore helped popularize the short bobbed hairstyle favored by flappers of the 1920s. She starred in a film that typified the Jazz Age, 1923’s “Flaming Youth.”

Image via Wikipedia Commons, public domain in the US. {PD-US}

On August 19, 1909, the first auto race began at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The track basically consisted of packed dirt and crushed stone that flew into the faces of drivers as they competed in their early open air vehicles.

Image: 1909 poster promoting the Indianapolis Motor Speedway via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

August 19, 1934 saw the first All-American Soap Box Derby race, ran in Dayton, Ohio. The next year the Soap Box Derby moved to Akron and has taken place every year since except for four years during WW2 and one year due to Covid-19. Racers are typically sponsored, as was North Dakota’s John Yunker in 1953.

Image by Chris Yunker, CCA 2.0 Generic via Wikimedia Commons.

American businessman and Presidential adviser Bernard Baruch was born on August 19, 1870 in Camden, South Carolina.

Quote: “America has never forgotten — and never will forget — the nobler things that brought her into being and that light her path.”

Image: Bernard Baruch via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

A photo of Robert F. Kennedy appearing before Platform Committee

August 19, 1964

During his speech that day RFK said that “violence is not the way…”

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

On August 19, 1692 five residents of Salem, in the colony of Massachusetts, were executed after being found guilty of witchcraft. In all 20 were put to death and five more of those accused died in jail before the hysteria subsided in the following year.

Image via Shutterstock

American aviation trailblazer Orville Wright was born on August 19, 1871 in Dayton, Ohio.

Image: Young Orville Wright in 1876 via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

The USS Constitution met and soundly defeated the HMS Guerriere on August 19, 1812. It was during this engagement that the Constitution was dubbed “Old Ironsides.”

Image via NHC via Wikimedia Commons, public domain in the US

On August 19, 1919, the United States Armed Forces reintroduced the roundel of a white star inside a blue circle with a red disc in the center as its official national military insignia.

A very similar earlier design with slightly different proportions was discontinued during WWI to avoid confusion with German insignia.

It was removed again in 1942 so that it wasn’t mistaken with Japanese insignia during WWII.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

On August 19, 1856, Texas Revolution Veteran Gail Borden received a patent for his process of making condensed milk.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Gene Roddenberry with some of the cast of the original Star Trek TV series and others in front of the Space Shuttle “Enterprise” in 1976.

Gene Roddenberry was born on August 19, 1921
in El Paso, Texas.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Johnny Nash, the artist who wrote, sang and produced the 1972 hit song “I Can See Clearly Now” was born on August 19, 1940 in Houston, Texas.

Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Dorothy Burr Thompson was born in Philadelphia on August 19, 1900—into a world she would later explore with both pen and trowel. Raised in a household steeped in law and literature, she became one of classical archaeology’s most lyrical and rigorous voices.

Coming from a family of lawyers and writers, she would excavate gardens from antiquity, interpret Hellenistic terracottas, and be the first woman appointed to the Athenian Agora.

The Athenian Agora was the civic heart of ancient Athens—a bustling plaza where democracy was practiced, goods were traded, and ideas were debated in the open air. It was where Athens thought, argued, and imagined itself into being.

In this photo from the 1930s, Dorothy is shown with her excavation crew at the Athenian Agora, not merely documenting history, but remolding it. The image offers a glimpse of a scholar at work, but one who insisted that beauty, intelligence, and rigor stood together in the archaeological record.


Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain