The Grand Isle Hurricane of 1909 destroyed much of New Orleans, killing 350 people.
Parliament passed the South Africa Act 1909, effective May 31, 1910, uniting the Cape of Good Hope and Natal with the Transvaal and the Orange River Colony, to create the Union of South Africa. The latter two colonies were conquests of the Boer War.
Many of the residents of the latter two entities weren't thrilled above developments.
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One Adolf Hitler, an Austrian, age 20, was evicted from his lodgings at Sechshauserstrasse 58 in Vienna.
He had no money, no income, and no forwarding address. He was homeless.
Life magazine came out.
William Howard Taft announced his support for a national bank. It would become the Federal Reserve.
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Career U.S. Navy sailor John King won his second Medal of Honor.
The citation read:
Watertender, serving on board the U.S.S. Salem, for extraordinary heroism in the line of his profession on the occasion of the accident to one of the boilers of that vessel, 13 September 1909.
The citation for his first one read:
On board the U.S.S. Vicksburg, for heroism in the line of his profession at the time of the accident to the boilers, 29 May 1901.
He was an Irish immigrant, retired in 1916, reentered the Navy during World War One, and retired again in 1919. He died in 1938 at age 73.
A destroyer was named after him, and coincidentally I served in the National Guard with a fellow who had served on that ship.
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The city leaders of San Miguel Anenecuilco elected Emiliano Zapata to recover lands owned by the village, his initiation in what would become a career as a Mexican agrarian rebel.
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He was thirty years old.
Moroccan rebel Jilali ben Driss al-Youssefi al-Zerhouni (الجيلالي بن إدريس اليوسفي الزرهوني), commonly known as El Roghi (الرُقي ar-ruqī) meaning "the pretender" and Bou Hmara (بو حمارة) meaning the man on a female donkey was put to death after being hideously tortured.
The U.S. Post Office excused letter carriers from delivering mail to residences with vicious dogs.
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Slow ambulance -- "Broke Her Arm.
"Mrs. Frank Jameson of Ervay was kicked on the left arm by a horse Sunday and sustained a fractured bone, and she passed through this city Monday on her way to the Douglas hospital, where she will have the fracture reduced. She was accompanied by her son Lawrence.
The National Library of China was created, which is truly remarkable given the turmoil China was in, and would be, clean through the 40s.
The 1,600 foot long Santa Monica Pier opened opened to the public in Santa Monica, California.
E.H. Harriman, 61, railroad magnate, died at age 61. He's probably best remembered to the public due to the reference to his name in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
So read the headlines.
Eugene Lefebvre crashed an airplane at Juvisy-sur-Orge in France and was killed, the first pilot to die flying an airplane.
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Robert Pesry telegraphed his claim to the North Pole to the New York Times.
I have the pole, April sixth. Expect arrive Chateau Bay September seventh. Secure control wire for me there and arrange expedite transmission big story. PEARY.
He claimed an April 6, 1909 date. Cook had claimed an April 21, 1908 date. It's clear that Cook didn't make it to the pole, and that Peary believed he had, but it's not clear that he actually did.
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A group of girls approached the Scout's founder, Sir Robert Baden-Powell, and asked for him to create an organization for girls, which was then entrusted to his sister, Agnes Baden-Powell. They would become the Girl Guides.
I'm tempted to comment on declined standards, and contemporary events, but I'll forgo it.
Japan and China agreed to the positioning of the north east Chinese-Korean border at the Gando Convention. The boundary that was established was a natural one, being a watercourse.
Today, due to 19th and 20th Century migration, a large ethnically Korean population lives north of North Korea in the People's Republic of China, in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture which rivals the combined North and South Korea in size.
Orville Wright made the first airplane flight in Germany.
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The Leconte Observatory in Brussels received a message cabled from Lerwick in the Shetland Islands as follows:
Reached north pole April 21, 1908. Discovered land far north. Return to Copenhagen by steamer Hans Eged. (Signed) FREDERICK COOK
Not everyone was convinced, and not without good reason, but he no doubt believed it, and it was hard to establish, then and now.
Does it really matter? It's almost impossible to see how, but then in future years reaching the Moon might seem similarly irrelevant.
Or significant.
Cook died in 1940 at age 75, his reputation never recovered from the attacks that would soon occur on it.
Baguio, Philippines, elevation 5,100 ft, was incorporated.
The American Governor General would make it his summer residence due to its cool summer temperatures.
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Banking was unknown as a flying technique to retain speed until that time.
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Honestly, I don't know when these started, or ended (1970s?) but yet another military coup in Greece occurred on this day.
Henry Farman became the first person to fly an airplane 100 miles. He accordingly won the Grand Prix de la Champagne endurance test.
Farman would live to age 84 and die in 1958.
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Catcher Bill Bergen of the Brooklyn Dodgers threw out six batters on the base paths in a game against St. Louis.
The record still stands.
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A major downtown fire broke out in Victor, Colorado. The fire was caused by a prostitute in the city's red light district catching a gown she was washing in kerosene with a cigarette. The fire rapidly spread from the red light district to the downtown.
The burnt area was rapidly rebuilt.
A set of great grandparents lived in Victor at the time.
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The first automobile race occurred at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. William Bourque and his mechanic, Harry Holcomb, were killed when their car left the track, struck a fence, and turned over. Louis H. Schwitzer won the race, averaging 57.4 mph.
Schwitzer as an engineer who would go on to be responsible for numerous important automotive inventions.
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St. Pope Pius X became the first Pope to ride in an automobile.
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The location of Rainbow Bridge, the world's largest natural ridge, was disclosed by Jim Mike (1872–1977), a Paiute Indian, to William B. Douglas of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.
The first motor race took place at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway took place. It was a motorcycle race sanctioned by the Federation of American Motorcyclists.
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