Washington tells the story of how a fatherless young soldier full of personal ambition becomes a leader of men willing to sacrifice all for the common cause.
How a once-loyal British subject rises to battle an empire in a liberty-or-death campaign to forge a new nation. And then how, at the zenith of his power, the victorious general voluntarily steps down, becoming what King George III would call "the greatest man in the world.
Believing his public duty complete, he heads into retirement ready to be a farmer. But with the young country on the verge of collapse, he is once again called to lead, creating the most powerful and successful democracy in history.
You may think you know George Washington, but there’s more to our preeminent founding father than you’ve been told. Washington chips away the marble to reveal the man at the heart of our nation’s story. You’ll never look at George Washington, or the founding of our country, the same way again.
Aug 31, 1985, Richard Ramirez, the notorious “Night Stalker,” was captured and nearly killed by a mob in East Los Angeles, California, after being recognized from a photograph shown both on television and in newspapers. Recently identified as the terrifying serial killer, Ramirez was saved from the enraged mob by police officers.
After leaving an East LA bus stop he noticed a group of elderly Mexican women fearfully identifying him as "El Matador" (or "The Killer"), Ramirez saw his face on the front pages on the newspaper rack and fled in a panic.
After running across the Santa Ana Freeway, he attempted to carjack a woman but was chased away by bystanders, who pursued him. After hopping over several fences and attempting two more carjackings, he was eventually subdued by a group of residents, one of whom had struck him over the head with a metal bar in the pursuit. The group held Ramirez down, relentlessly beating him until the police arrived and took him into custody.
During the summer of 1985, the city of Los Angeles was panic-stricken by a killer who crept into his victims’ homes at night. The Night Stalker, as the press dubbed the murderer, first turned his attention on the men in the house, usually shot any men in the house with a .22 caliber handgun before raping, stabbing, and mutilating his female victims. He cut out one of his victim’s eyes and sometimes carved satanic pentagrams on the bodies before he left. Read More History
By August, the Night Stalker has murdered at least a dozen people, and law enforcement officials were desperate to stop him. One witness, who managed to note the license plate of the car in which Ramirez fled, led police to a single, partial fingerprint left in the vehicle.
Ramirez died on death row of complications secondary to B-cell lymphoma at Marin General Hospital in Greenbrae, California on June 7, 2013. He had also been affected by "chronic substance abuse and chronic hepatitis C viral infection". At 53 years old, he had been on death row for more than 23 years.
On this day in 1961, amusement park lovers “head for the thrills” as Six Flags Over Texas, the first park in the Six Flags chain, opens. Located on 212 acres in Arlington, Texas, the park was the first to feature log flume and mine train rides and later, the first 360-degree looping roller coaster, modern parachute drop and man-made river rapids ride.
The park also pioneered the concept of all-inclusive admission price; until then, separate entrance fees and individual ride tickets were the standard.
During its opening year, a day at Six Flags cost $2.75 for an adult and $2.25 for a child. A hamburger sold for 50 cents and a soda set the buyer back a dime.
The park, which took a year and $10 million to build, was the brainchild of Texas real estate developer and oilman Angus Wynne Jr., who viewed it as a short-term way to make a buck from some vacant land before turning it into an industrial complex.
Wynne reportedly recouped his personal investment of $3.5 million within 18 months and changed his mind about the park’s temporary status. With 17.5 million visitors in its first 10 years, the park became the Lone Star State’s top for-profit tourist attraction. Today, average annual attendance at the park is over 3 million.
One of Six Flags’ unique aspects was that it wasn’t just a random collection of rides; it was developed around a theme: the history of Texas. The park’s name was a nod to the six flags that had flown over the state at various times–France, Spain, Mexico, the Confederacy, Texas, and the United States.
The park’s rides and attractions were grouped into six themed sections that represented the cultures of these governments and enabled visitors to experience everything from cowboy culture to Southern belles and pirates. Originally, the park was to be called Texas Under Six Flags, before it was decided that Texas should never be under anything.
Angus Wynne sold Six Flags in 1969 and in the coming years, the company expanded and was resold. Today, Six Flags, Inc. is the world’s largest regional theme park company and owns and operates 25 theme, water and zoological parks in North America.
From the producers of Ancient Aliens and The Curse of Oak Island, hosted and executive produced by Golden Globe and Emmy Award-winning actor William Shatner (Star Trek, Boston Legal), comes The UnXplained, a one-hour, non-fiction series that explores the world's most fascinating, strange and inexplicable mysteries.
Each episode will feature compelling contributions from scientists, historians, witnesses, and experiencers—each seeking to shed light on how the seemingly impossible actually can happen.
At about 1:01 PM on March 18, 1925, trees began to snap north-northwest of Ellington, Missouri, and for the next three and a half hours more people would die, more schools would be destroyed, more students and farm owners would be killed, and more deaths would occur in a single city than from any other tornado in U.S. history.
It began when a small tornado touched down near Ellington, Missouri gained momentum over the course of the afternoon. In the three-and-a-half hours that followed, it ballooned to record widths and speed. At one point, observers calculated that it was a full mile wide, and it maintained an average speed of 62 miles per hour and a top speed of 73 miles per hour.
In 2013, a group of weather experts reevaluated the tornado in search of reasons why it was so huge and so destructive. Though they did find an unusual combination of a warm front, the tornado’s supercell and a favorable storm environment, they concluded that there wasn’t a single reason why the storm was so huge.
For people on the ground, the reasons didn’t matter. This tornado was the biggest one they’d ever seen, and people scrambled for shelter as it attacked town after town. From the start, the storm was a killer. Within minutes of materializing, it killed a farmer.
Then it headed to Annapolis, Missouri, a mining town. Tragically, the mountains in the town kept people from spotting it. Ninety percent of the town’s buildings were destroyed, four people were killed, and 1,000 people became homeless. Miraculously, a group of children who had huddled around their teacher’s desk after coming in from recess survived.
That was just the beginning. Soon the tornado had marched through Murphysboro, Illinois, where 243 people were killed, 623 injured and the city’s industries decimated. In nearby De Soto, 7-year-old Betty Moroni was in her classroom when the storm hit. Thirty-three students died at the school, including Moroni’s sister and 19 of the children in the classroom where she cowered during the storm. She lost three sisters and her father eventually died of head injuries he sustained during the tornado.
“After the tornado was over, nobody knew where anybody was,” she told The Southern Illinoisian in 2015. “You could be blown forever.” The tornado killed 33 schoolchildren, and 36 others, in De Soto. The death toll was even higher in West Frankfort, and only three buildings were left standing in nearby Parrish.
Then the tornado jumped state lines again. This time, its target was Indiana. Owensville was first. “The body of an unidentified infant was found in a creek, where it had been hurled by the fury,” wrote a local reporter. After laying waste to much of Princeton, the storm finally petered out.
Today, those spotters—and a weather prediction network that is unafraid of the word tornado—have contributed to a massive decline in tornado deaths. Massive tornadoes still strike the Midwest, but forecasters and residents hope they’ll never see the likes of the 1925 tornado again.
On this day in 1957, machines at the Wham-O toy company roll out the first batch of their aerodynamic plastic discs–now known to millions of fans all over the world as Frisbees.
The story of the Frisbee began in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where William Frisbie opened the Frisbie Pie Company in 1871. Students from nearby universities would throw the empty pie tins to each other, yelling “Frisbie!” as they let go.
In 1948, Walter Frederick Morrison and his partner Warren Franscioni invented a plastic version of the disc called the “Flying Saucer” that could fly further and more accurately than the tin pie plates.
After splitting with Franscioni, Morrison made an improved model in 1955 and sold it to the new toy company Wham-O as the “Pluto Platter”–an attempt to cash in on the public craze over space and Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs).
In 1958, a year after the toy’s first release, Wham-O–the company behind such top-sellers as the Hula-Hoop, the Super Ball and the Water Wiggle–changed its name to the Frisbee disc, misspelling the name of the historic pie company.
A company designer, Ed Headrick, patented the design for the modern Frisbee in December 1967, adding a band of raised ridges on the disc’s surface–called the Rings–to stabilize flight.
By aggressively marketing Frisbee-playing as a new sport, Wham-O sold over 100 million units of its famous toy by 1977.
Today, at least 60 manufacturers produce the flying discs–generally made out of plastic and measuring roughly 20-25 centimeters (8-10 inches) in diameter with a curved lip. The official Frisbee is owned by Mattel Toy Manufacturers, who bought the toy from Wham-O in 1994. Read More
On this day in 1969, “Sesame Street,” a pioneering TV show that would teach generations of young children the alphabet and how to count, makes its broadcast debut. “Sesame Street,” with its memorable theme song (“Can you tell me how to get/How to get to Sesame Street”), went on to become the most widely viewed children’s program in the world. It has aired in more than 120 countries.
The show was the brainchild of Joan Ganz Cooney, a former documentary producer for public television. Cooney’s goal was to create programming for preschoolers that was both entertaining and educational.
She also wanted to use TV as a way to help underprivileged 3- to 5- year-olds prepare for kindergarten. “Sesame Street” was set in a fictional New York neighborhood and included ethnically diverse characters and positive social messages.
Taking a cue from “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In,” a popular 1960s variety show, “Sesame Street” was built around short, often funny segments featuring puppets, animation and live actors.
This format was hugely successful, although over the years some critics have blamed the show and its use of brief segments for shrinking children’s attention spans.
From the show’s inception, one of its most-loved aspects has been a family of puppets known as Muppets. Joan Ganz Cooney hired puppeteer Jim Henson (1936-1990) to create a cast of characters that became Sesame Street institutions, including Bert and Ernie, Cookie Monster, Oscar the Grouch, Grover and Big Bird.
Since its inception, over 74 million Americans have watched “Sesame Street.” Today, an estimated 8 million people tune in to the show each week in the U.S. alone.
On this day in 1931, gangster Al Capone is sentenced to 11 years in prison for tax evasion and fined $80,000, signaling the downfall of one of the most notorious criminals of the 1920s and 1930s.
Alphonse Gabriel Capone was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1899 to Italian immigrants. He was expelled from school at 14, joined a gang and earned his nickname “Scarface” after being sliced across the cheek during a fight. By 1920, Capone had moved to Chicago, where he was soon helping to run crime boss Johnny Torrio’s illegal enterprises.
Torrio's enterprises included alcohol-smuggling, gambling, and prostitution. Torrio retired in 1925 after an attempt on his life and Capone, known for his cunning and brutality, was put in charge of the organization.
Capone and Torrio
Prohibition, which outlawed the brewing and distribution of alcohol and lasted from 1920 to 1933, proved extremely lucrative for bootleggers and gangsters like Capone, who raked in millions from his underworld activities.
Capone was at the top of the F.B.I.’s “Most Wanted” list by 1930, but he avoided long stints in jail until 1931 by bribing city officials, intimidating witnesses and maintaining various hideouts.
He became Chicago’s crime kingpin by wiping out his competitors through a series of gangland battles and slayings, including the infamous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in 1929 when Capone’s men gunned down seven rivals. This event helped raise Capone’s notoriety to a national level.
federal agent Eliot Ness
Among Capone’s enemies was federal agent Eliot Ness, who led a team of officers known as “The Untouchables” because they couldn’t be corrupted. Ness and his men routinely broke up Capone’s bootlegging businesses, but it was tax-evasion charges that finally stuck and landed Capone in prison in 1931.
Capone began serving his time at the U.S. Penitentiary in Atlanta, but amid accusations that he was manipulating the system and receiving cushy treatment, he was transferred to the maximum-security lockup at Alcatraz Island, in California’s San Francisco Bay.
Palm Bay Miami
He got out early in 1939 for good behavior, after spending his final year in prison in a hospital, suffering from syphilis.
Capone in Miami
Plagued by health problems for the rest of his life, Capone died in 1947 at age 48 at his home in Palm Island, Florida.
Al Capone's headquarters of operation was in Cicero, and the folklore is that he was a driving force in getting Route 66 developed as a paved highway so he could distribute illegal alcohol as part of his business activities. The gravesite is located at Mount Carmel Cemetery in Hillside, which is located 15 minutes northwest of Berwyn. Read More on Capone
