On October 8, 1869 14th President of The United States and U.S. Army Brigadier General (Mexican-American War) Franklin Pierce died in Concord, New Hampshire. President Grant at the time declared a day of national mourning. Image: General Franklin Pierce by Waterman Lilly Ormsby in 1852 via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Game 5 of the 1956 World Series was played on October 8. It’s remembered for the perfect game pitched by Don Larsen of the New York Yankees for a 2 – 0 win over the Brooklyn Dodgers. Larsen’s feat has never been repeated in the World Series. He’s shown here on a 1955 trading card. Image via Wikimedia Commons, copyright not renewed public domain in the US

Vietnam Veteran Tom Ridge was sworn in as the first U.S. Homeland Security Advisor on October 8, 2001. He resigned as Governor of Pennsylvania three days earlier. Image of Tom Ridge at The White House on October 8, 2001 via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Jesse Jackson, then-president of the Student Government in 1964 at North Carolina A&T Jesse Jackson was born on October 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina. via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

A beautiful photograph of American actress Edythe Chapman who was born on October 8, 1863 in Rochester, New York. Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

WWI American flying ace Eddie Rickenbacker was born on October 8, 1890 in Columbus, Ohio. In addition to flying planes and even before WWI, Rickenbacker was an avid race car driver and was considered one of the best in the nation. Image of Eddie Rickenbacker from 1918, public domain

Cooling off a safe among the ruins of Fifth National Bank after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 that began on October 8th. 300 lives were lost in the tragedy. Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Civil War era musician Walter Kittredge was born on October 8, 1834 in Merrimack, New Hampshire His song, “Tenting on the Old Campground” was played and sung by both North & South during the war. Image via Wikimedia Commons, public domain

A group of debutantes October 8, 1923 via Library of Congress, no known restrictions

Spine-Tingling History Hallowe’en in a Suburb The steeples are white in the wild moonlight, And the trees have a silver glare; Past the chimneys high see the vampires fly, And the harpies of upper air, That flutter and laugh and stare. For the village dead to the moon outspread Never shone in the sunset’s gleam, But grew out of the deep that the dead years keep Where the rivers of madness stream Down the gulfs to a pit of dream. A chill wind weaves through the rows of sheaves In the meadows that shimmer pale, And comes to twine where the headstones shine And the ghouls of the churchyard wail For harvests that fly and fail. Not a breath of the strange grey gods of change That tore from the past its own Can quicken this hour, when a spectral power Spreads sleep o’er the cosmic throne, And looses the vast unknown. So here again stretch the vale and plain That moons long-forgotten saw, And the dead leap gay in the pallid ray, Sprung out of the tomb’s black maw To shake all the world with awe. And all that the morn shall greet forlorn, The ugliness and the pest Of rows where thick rise the stones and brick, Shall some day be with the rest, And brood with the shades unblest. Then wild in the dark let the lemurs bark, And the leprous spires ascend; For new and old alike in the fold Of horror and death are penned, For the hounds of Time to rend. by H.P. Lovecraft