What happened on this day in history: Evelyn McHale dies in the "Most Beautiful Suicide," Aron Ralston amputates his own arm, and more.
1486: Christopher Columbus Proposes Sailing Westward To India
Wikimedia CommonsMost people know that Italian explorer Christopher Columbus landed in the New World while pursuing a westward sea passage to India in 1492. What many may not know, however, is that this historic endeavor languished in the planning phase for more than a decade.
At least five years after first dreaming up the idea of pursuing a westward sea passage to India, Christopher Columbus makes his first official proposal to the Spanish monarchs Queen Isabella I of Castile and King Ferdinand II of Aragon. But when Isabella took the idea to committee, court scholars immediately laughed it off, arguing that Columbus had wildly underestimated the distance to Asia.
However, Spain nevertheless wanted to make sure that none of Europe’s other great powers would fund Columbus’ proposal. So, Isabella and Ferdinand gave him a generous yearly allowance as well as access to free food and lodging wherever he went within their kingdom, all in an effort to keep him from taking his idea to a rival ruler.
After five years, however, Columbus decided to take his plan to England, but he was captured by pirates en route, after which Isabella and Ferdinand sent him a large sum of money along with orders to return to their court. It was only then that they said yes to his daring plan and set him on the path to his “discovery” of the New World.
1840: The First Adhesive Postage Stamp Is Released
The world’s first adhesive postage stamp, the Penny Black, is introduced in the United Kingdom. Until the introduction of the adhesive stamp, letters were weighed individually and priced accordingly, and the person receiving the mail was the one who paid. However, if the recipient refused, the post office lost money. The one-cent postage stamp ensured that all mail was paid for and made sending letters affordable for the general public.
1852: Calamity Jane Is Born
Wikimedia CommonsKnown for her legendary skills with a gun, Calamity Jane remains among the most fabled figures of the Wild West to this day.
American frontierswoman and sharpshooter Calamity Jane is born Martha Jane Canary in Princeton, Missouri. It’s unclear how factual many of the stories that she later told about her life in the Wild West really were.
However, it is known that she settled in Deadwood, South Dakota in 1876, where she met folk hero Wild Bill Hickok and may have had a relationship with him. Later in life, Calamity Jane appeared in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show and cemented her place as an enduring legend of the American Frontier.
1931: The Empire State Building Is Dedicated
President Herbert Hoover dedicates the Empire State Building in New York City by symbolically pushing a button from the White House to “light up” the structure.
The tallest skyscraper in the world at the time, the Empire State Building took just one year and 45 days to build. Standing at 1,250 feet high, the building held its record as the tallest in the world until the World Trade Center was constructed in 1972.
1947: Evelyn McHale Dies By Suicide
Robert Wiles/Wikimedia CommonsThe “most beautiful suicide” of Evelyn McHale.
A 23-year-old bookkeeper named Evelyn McHale jumps to her death from the 86th floor of the Empire State Building in what is now known as “the most beautiful suicide.” Just four minutes after she died, a photography student named Robert Wiles snapped a photo of her body, which had landed on a car below, crushing it.
1999: Mountaineer George Mallory’s Body Is Found On Everest
Pictorial Press Ltd/Alamy Stock PhotoGeorge Mallory with fellow climber Andrew Irvine in the last photo of them on their fatal Everest climb in 1924.
The body of British mountaineer George Mallory is found on the slopes of Everest — almost exactly 75 years after he vanished while trying to reach its summit. On June 8, 1924, Mallory and climbing partner Andrew Irvine were hiking along Everest’s Northeast Ridge just 800 feet from the summit when they disappeared, never to be seen alive again.
For the next seven decades, experts were left baffled as to what exactly happened to Mallory and whether he may have made it to the top before vanishing. Had he done so, he would have been the first documented climber to ever reach the peak, beating Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary to the punch by 29 years.
2001: Chandra Levy Disappears
Chandra Levy disappears in Washington, D.C., launching a media frenzy over the 24-year-old intern’s fate and her relationship with an older, married congressman named Gary Condit. Levy’s body was discovered about a year later in a local park.
2003: Aron Ralston Amputates His Own Arm
Aron Ralston/YouTubeAron Ralston just before he amputated his own arm.
Mountaineer and adventurer Aron Ralston cuts off his own arm after it becomes stuck between a rock wall and a boulder during a climbing accident in Utah’s Bluejohn Canyon.
Ralston had been trapped for five days and had accepted his inevitable death when he suddenly had a vision of himself in the future with a partially-amputated arm. He then broke his radius and ulna, before using a dull, two-inch knife and pliers from the multi-tool he carried to cut through his own skin and tendons, successfully amputating his forearm and freeing himself. His survival story was later turned into the movie 127 Hours.
