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Today in History: October 24

79
Mt. Vesuvius erupts, burying the cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Oplontis and Stabiae and killing thousands. New research in 2018 suggests the eruption occurred at about this date, not the previously used 24 August.

0439
Carthage, the leading Roman city in North Africa, falls to Genseric and the Vandals.

1836
The match is patented.

1861
Western Union completes the first transcontinental telegraph line, putting the Pony Express out of business.

1863
General Ulysses S. Grant arrives in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to find the Union Army there starving.

1901
Anna Edson Taylor, 43, is the first woman to go safely over Niagara Falls in a barrel. She made the attempt for the cash award offered, which she put toward the loan on her Texas ranch.

1916
Henry Ford awards equal pay to women.

1929
Black Thursday--the first day of the stock market crash which began the Great Depression.

1930
John Wayne debuts in his first starring role in The Big Trail .

1931
Al (Alphonse) Capone, the prohibition-era Chicago gangster, is sent to prison for tax evasion.

1938
The Fair Labor Standards Act becomes law, establishing the 40-hour work week.

1944
The aircraft carrier USS Princeton is sunk by a single Japanese plane during the Battle of Leyte Gulf.

1945
Vidkun Quisling, Norway's wartime minister president, is executed by firing squad for collaboration with the Nazis.

1945
The United Nations comes into existence with the ratification of its charter by the first 29 nations.

1952
Presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that if elected, he will go to Korea.

1973
Yom Kippur War ends.

2003
The supersonic Concorde jet made its last commercial passenger flight from New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport to London's Heathrow Airport, traveling at twice the speed of sound.

2020
Colombia records more than 1 million cases of COVID-19, the 8th globally and 3rd in Latin America

2021
COVID-19 cases in Eastern Europe pass 20 million with Russia, Ukraine and Romania in top five countries reporting deaths globally



Today in History: Born on October 24
1788
Sarah Josepha Hale, magazine editor and poet whose book Poems for Our Children included "Mary Had a Little Lamb" (the first words to be recorded in sound)

1930
The Big Bopper (Jiles Perry Richardson, Jr.), singer, songwriter, musician; an early star of rock 'n' roll ("Chantilly Lace"), he died in the same plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the pilot, Roger Peterson.

JOTD
Family had no money left, so the husband sent his wife to work the streets.
She came home in the morning, and her husband asked:”How much did you make?”

“$804” she said

“Which idiot gave you $4 ???” he asked

“Well... everyone...”