Today is Thursday, May 13, the 133rd day of 2010. There are 232 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT
On May 13, 1940, in his first speech as prime minister of Britain, Winston Churchill told Parliament, “I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this government: I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”
ON THIS DATE
In 1607, English colonists arrived by ship at the site of what became the Jamestown settlement in Virginia (the colonists went ashore the next day).
In 1846, the United States declared that a state of war already existed with Mexico.
In 1917, three shepherd children near Fatima, Portugal, reported seeing a vision of the Virgin Mary.
In 1918, the first U.S. airmail stamps, featuring a picture of a Curtiss JN-4 biplane, were issued to the public. (On a few of the stamps, the biplane was inadvertently printed upside-down, making them collector’s items.)
In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed into law the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Act. The musical play “The Pajama Game” opened on Broadway.
In 1958, Vice President Richard Nixon and his wife, Pat, were spat upon and their limousine battered by rocks thrown by anti-U.S. demonstrators in Caracas, Venezuela.
In 1981, Pope John Paul II was shot and seriously wounded in St. Peter’s Square by Turkish assailant Mehmet Ali Agca.
Associated Press
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