Today in History

Published 9:52 pm Monday, August 16, 2010

Today is Monday, Aug. 17, the 229th day of 2009. There are 136 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

On Aug. 17, 1969, Hurricane Camille slammed into the Mississippi coast as a Category 5 storm with top sustained winds estimated at nearly 200 mph. The hurricane and resulting flash floods were blamed for 256 U.S. deaths.

ON THIS DATE

In 1863, federal batteries and ships began bombarding Fort Sumter in South Carolina during the Civil War, but the Confederates managed to hold on.

In 1915, a mob in Cobb County, Ga., lynched Jewish businessman Leo Frank, whose death sentence for the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan had been commuted to life imprisonment. (Frank, who had maintained his innocence, was pardoned by the state of Georgia in 1986.)

In 1943, the Allied conquest of Sicily was completed as U.S. and British forces entered Messina.

In 1987, Rudolf Hess, the last member of Adolf Hitler’s inner circle, died at Spandau Prison at age 93, an apparent suicide.

In 2008, at the Summer Olympics, Michael Phelps and three teammates won the 400-meter medley relay for Phelps’ eighth gold medal. Matamoros, Mexico, pitcher Jesus Sauceda had the fifth perfect game in Little League World Series history.

Associated Press