This Day in History
In Alaska
• In 1922, a serious fire broke out in the Evans Jones coal mine in the Matanuska Valley.
• In 1941, work was started on the railroad tunnel to connect Portage and Whittier.
• In 1959, authorization for night take-offs and landings at the Juneau International Airport was given by the FAA.
• In 1961, RCA formally took over operation of the White Alice network, an ultra-modern radio relay communications system of 33 sites along Alaska's coast.
• In 1964, Anchorage's first bank robbery entered the FBI files as a "husky, raunchy-looking man" robbed the National Bank of Alaska's 5th Avenue branch of $6,000.
• In 1969, Bethel voted to close down its only liquor store.
In the nation
• In 1794, the United States and Britain signed Jay's Treaty, which resolved some issues left over from the Revolutionary War.
• In 1831, the 20th president of the United States, James Garfield, was born in Orange, Ohio.
• In 1863, President Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address as he dedicated a national cemetery at the site of the Civil War battlefield in Pennsylvania.
• In 1969, Apollo 12 astronauts Charles Conrad and Alan Bean made man's second landing on the moon.
• In 1997, Iowa seamstress Bobbi McCaughey gave birth to four boys and three girls - only the second set of septuplets known to have been born alive.
• In 2003, a U.S.-Canadian investigation found that the Aug. 14 blackout should have been contained by operators at Ohio's FirstEnergy Corp.; the investigators also faulted Midwest regional monitors.