Check out This Day in History for Oct. 7, MainStream’s daily look at significant progressive, intersectional historical events.
1520: Writings by the theologian Martin Luther are burned by Catholic clergy at Leuven, Flanders (now in Belgium), after he published “Ninety-Five Theses” calling for church reform. The burning started one of the first book-burning campaigns in early history.
1944: Prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camps revolt against Nazi guards, blowing up the crematorium in which they were being systematically executed. More than 450 prisoners were executed beause of the uprising, but the buried diaries of several helped serve as evidence during the Nuremberg Trials of the Hitler regime’s effort to exterminate Jews.
Above, American Bandstand, the Luna 3 satellite, Elton John, and Toni Morrison.
1950: Mother Teresa founds the Catholic organization Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata to help the “the poorest of the poor.” which continues to operate care homes, schools for street children, and soup kitchens in over 130 countries.
1952: “American Bandstand” debuts. The music program ran for 37 years and featured teenagers dancing to popular music, usually involving lip-syncing. Originally segregated, after moving from Philadelphia to Los Angeles the show included people of color such as Chuck Berry, the Impressions, Prince and the Jackson 5.
1959: Luna 3, a Soviet spacecraft, takes the first pictures of the far side of the moon. The pictures showed mountains and craters very different from the flatter side visible from Earth and inspired more lunar study.
1963: Hundreds of Black Americans in line for voter registration faced police violence and repression in what is now known as Freedom Day in Selma, Alabama. A product of months of organizing that included door-to-door canvassing, community meetings and celebrity speeches, Freedom Day would help advance the civil rights movement in Selma and inspire future activists.
1976: Elton John comes out as bisexual in an interview with Rolling Stone, resulting in a temporary lull in his career. “… when I stopped fooling myself, my life turned around,” John later told Hollywood Reporter. He now identifies as gay, and has been with his husband, who he married in 2014, since 1993.
1993: Toni Morrison becomes the first Black American woman to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. Morrison’s novels focus on the lives of Black Americans, especially Black women facing hardship from oppression and persevering through community.
1996: Fox News begins broadcasting, created as media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s fourth network with Republican strategist Roger Ailes as CEO. It quickly became a prominent part of conservative media as it is today, but lost several prominent figures in the 2010s, including Ailes, due to sexual misconduct allegations.
2001: A coalition led by the United States invades Afghanistan in the first major move of the War on Terror after the 9/11 attacks, resulting in the longest war in American history that will cost over 6,000 American lives and $2 trillion dollars.
2016: The Washington Post publishes video of then-presidential candidate Donald Trump discussing kissing and groping women, and attempting to sleep with married women. While widely condemned in the media, Trump initially called his statements “locker room banter,” and several Republicans, including House Speaker Paul Ryan disinvited him from events or pulled their endorsements.
2019: In what’s considered the most organized effort in history to combat HIV among indigenous communities, the Indian Health Service (IHS) gives $2.4 million to nine Tribal Epidemiology Centers in indigenous and Alaskan Native communities. The funding was part of the first Trump administration’s “Ending the HIV Epidemic”
2023: More than 1,200 Israelis are murdered in their homes or while attending events, and another 251 are taken hostage, in the October 7 Attacks, a surprise raid on Israel by the Hamas militant organization that triggered a massive ongoing bombing campaing by Israel. Israel now faces accusations of genocide and intentional starvation of Palestinians,
References for today’s history nuggets include history.com, On This Day and blackfacts.org. Photos courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
