Category: Open Lines

One of the most famous department stores in America opened in Philadelphia on this date in 1877. Wanamaker’s, now absorbed into the Macy’s family of department stores, opened in a converted train station and is now a national historic landmark. The store was among the first in the country to make the experience of shopping as much a draw as the merchandise itself, pioneered the use of the price tag, and was the first to install a restaurant on the …

One of the most devastating public health crises in history hit the U.S. on this date 95 years ago — and experts are still studying it, hoping to head off a similar global pandemic. The first cases were reported among soldiers at Fort Riley, Kansas. By October, the worst month, 195,000 Americans perished. By 1920, nearly one-in-four Americans had suffered from this strain of the flu, killing about 575,000. Worldwide, estimates put the death toll between 30 million to 50 …

For many Americans, trying to envision life without our various telephones would be like trying to live without indoor plumbing. The telephone is 138 years old today. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell made the first telephone call in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Over a wire to his assistant in the next room, Bell said, “Mister Watson, come here; I want to see you.” Only when Bell improved his invention to carry a voice for several miles did the public discover a need …

As if to prove there is nothing new under the sun, Massachusetts acted on this date in far-off 1801 to register voters. At that time, the franchise was limited to men — usually those of local repute and owning property. Town assessors drew up publicly posted lists of voters. If any voter was omitted, documents proving eligibility were accepted. The practice caught on very slowly. Only after the Civil War did voter registration become widespread. Today, North Dakota is the …

The Philadelphia Flower Show — the largest such indoor event in the world — winds up this weekend. Some 265,000 visitors are expected to have attended by the time the show closes on Sunday. The Philadelphia show started in 1829 and now covers 33 acres. The show now under way features a symbiosis of fine art and gardening, dubbing the event “articulture.” In the U.S., close to 70 percent of households take part in some form of gardening. To aid …

A severe economic panic, striking in 1893, led the city of Seattle to create the nation’s first municipal unemployment assistance office on this date in 1894. State and federal unemployment assistance wasn’t established until the 1930s. Recently, the national unemployment rate, as determined by the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey, has settled to a little under 7 percent. In 2010, Washington state’s average was at the then national average of 9.6 percent. The most current unemployment rate is over 6 …

The first woman to serve in Congress took her seat on this date in 1917. Jeannette Rankin of Montana shortly became one of the few representatives to vote against entry into World War I, a stand that contributed to her defeat when she ran for the Senate in 1918. She reentered Congress in 1940, and putting her principles ahead of office holding, cast the lone vote against declaring war on Japan after Pearl Harbor in 1941. Her political career, which …

The first issue of Time magazine appeared on newsstands 90 years ago today. The co-creator, Henry Luce, founded other famous magazines, such as Life and Sports Illustrated. In 1935, he married Clare Boothe Luce, whose own life was filled with accomplishment. She edited two magazines — Vogue and Vanity Fair — and was a successful playwright. In the 1940s, she served two terms in the House of Representatives as the first woman sent to Congress by Connecticut. And in 1953, …

Although February is the calendar’s shortest month, it stands tall in America’s history of railroad development. In 1815, the first state charter for a railroad was issued by New Jersey for a never-completed line between Trenton and New Brunswick. On this date in 1827, the famed Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was chartered to carry passengers and freight. February 1830 saw the first charter for an interstate railroad to serve Virginia and North Carolina. The peak year for the number of …

On this date in 1872, America’s third female law student was graduated. But this third was a first. Charlotte Ray was a freeborn African-American. With her degree from historically black Howard University, she shortly began her law practice in Washington, D.C., and was the first woman accredited to argue a case before the Supreme Court. When Charlotte Ray graduated, university degrees were a rarity in all of America. Today, among the 24 million African-Americans over 25 years old, some 2.8 …

Car insurance is both required and a major item in the budget of many households. The idea of insuring cars against accidents began this month in 1898 when the Traveler’s Insurance Company issued a policy to Dr. Truman Martin of Buffalo. His policy cost $12.25 and gave him $5,000 in coverage. Martin was chiefly concerned about accidents between his automobile — one of less than 4,000 in the entire country at the time — and horses, which numbered about 18 …

Paper money has circulated in North America since 1690, when the Massachusetts Bay Colony issued some to paper over — so to speak — the shortage of coins. But these were just promissory notes from governing bodies. That changed on this date in 1862 when Congress passed the Legal Tender Act, fixing paper money as a means of paying the government’s considerable Civil War bills with something other than gold or silver. One result was that greenbacks became a means …

Even with the ongoing difficulties in the housing and mortgage industries, the American dream is still defined by many as owning your own home. Across the U.S., just over 65 percent of households own their homes, a decline of more than 1 percent since the year 2000. Among the states, the highest percentage of home ownership is in West Virginia, at more than 73 percent, while the lowest rate is in New York, at just over 53 percent. And New …

In the early days of the telephone, knowing who had one and what the number was quickly became a problem. The first telephone directory in the U.S. was published on this date in 1878 in New Haven, Connecticut. It wasn’t a big list — there were only 50 subscribers. A little later, a directory also came out in San Francisco, with about 170 names. Now, there are over 22,000 retail establishments in the U.S. selling landline and cellular phones, with …

Editors note:  Sorry, I switched the Open Line text from today and yesterday.  Here is the one that should have been shown yesterday: Wednesday, February 19th. On this date in 1942, some two and a half months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt issued an executive order requiring Japanese-Americans living along the Pacific Coast to be relocated inland. This order affected some 77,000 citizens and 43,000 resident aliens. The internment lasted throughout the Second World War, and …

Black History Month highlights not only past achievements but continued progress in the African-American community. There are just under 2 million black-owned businesses, representing a gain of more than 60 percent in just five recent years. These businesses employed more than 920,000 people — a growth of more than one-fifth in the same period. Retail trade, health care and social assistance sectors account for 27 percent of black-owned business revenue, which totals more than $137 billion. Among cities, New York …

Every time we use a phone, drive a car, watch TV, turn on our computers, or do any myriad of everyday activities, we are benefitting from the accumulated work of a most important, broad profession — engineering. To note its contribution to our way of life, this is National Engineers Week. During this time, engineering societies and corporations will reach out to schoolchildren and stage events across the country to call attention to the achievements of the profession. From iPods …

This month — and some sources cite this date — is the anniversary of the 1766 birth of Thomas Malthus in Dorking, England. Given that birthplace, he perhaps naturally became an economist, demographer and statistician. He’s remembered for “The Principle of Population,” a 1798 essay foretelling widespread famine caused by population growth far outstripping the food supply. While the forecast remains unrealized, his theory of demand-supply mismatches was a precursor to later theories about the Great Depression. When Malthus wrote …

While today may not be an official holiday, Valentine’s Day is one of the most popular in the year’s calendar. Its origins are a mix of legends involving two Christian martyrs, a Roman fertility rite, and the old notion that this is the time of year when the birds choose their mates. What is sure is that Esther Howland of Massachusetts began selling the first mass-produced valentines in the 1840s. Today’s occasion falls in the heart of February, which is …

This date marks the anniversary in 1635 of the idea of America’s first public school — the Boston Latin School — long before there was a United States. Established in April that year, among its later students were Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Adams. And this month in 1897, Phoebe Hearst and Alice Birney founded what is today known as the Parent Teacher Association, or PTA. Originally called the National Congress of Mothers, the organization now encourages both mothers and fathers …