August 29
Things that happened on this day that you never had to memorize in school
30: Beheading of St. John, the Baptist.
1475: England again invades France. Probably to "protect interests."
1533: Atahullpa, 13th and last emporor of the Inca empire in present-day Peru, is put to death by Spanish conquistador Pizarro.
1758: First Indian reservation established.
1830: Swing Riots start; 400 destroy threshing machines that had put them out of work.
1842: At the conclusion of the first Anglo-Chinese War, also known as the First Opium War, the Treaty of Nanking is signed, ceding the island of Hong Kong to the British and winning European merchants more loot in China.
1865: "Battle" of Tongue River; Gen. Connor leads troops in dawn attack on a sleeping Arapaho village in Dakota Territory, killing at least 60. Connor relieved of command for killing woman and children, but practice continues.
1877: Death of Mormon lunatic strongman Brigham Young. Seagulls reportedly disinterested.
1905: Birth of anti-militarist Arndt Pekurinen, Finland.
1921: Newspapers report that Ku Klux Klan members have tarred and feathered 43 Texans in the past seven days. During the fear and government repression following WWI, the Klan makes an astonishing comeback. The group's platform attacks African Americans, Catholics and Jews. By 1924, the Klan has 4.5 million members and enormous political clout in some states. At Indiana's Republican convention in 1923, the state Klan head will walk down the aisle with a pistol strapped to his waist. Georgia's Klan chief, Hiram Wesley Evans, runs for president. In Texas, the Klan controls two-thirds of the state's county conventions.
1949: Soviet Union detonates its first atomic bomb.
1957: U.S. Congress passes the Civil Rights Act, the first since 1875. The bill establishes a Civil Rights Commission and a Civil Rights Division in the Department of Justice. In a futile attempt to block it, Democratic Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina sets the all-time filibuster record: 24 hours, 19 minutes.
1957: 2,300 people watch Nevada Nuclear test on-site, so U.S. Army can test the effects. Some observers later develop cancer.
1961: SNCC voter registration drive begins in South. Bob Moses beaten while trying to register two voters in Liberty, Mississippi.
1970: Three die in East Los Angeles when an anti-war march turns into a riot during Chicano National Moratorium. Thousands of Chicanos gathered at Laguna Park in East L.A. to protest disproportionate number of deaths of Chicano soldiers in Vietnam. LAPD attack and one shot, fired into Silver Dollar Bar, kills Ruben Salazar, LA Times columnist and commentator on KMEX TV (accused by LAPD of inciting the Chicano community.)
1970: Selective Service Systems report: prosecutions for draft evasion have increased 10 times over 1965 level.
1977: First world conference on desertification, Nairobi, Kenya.
1991: Women call on women worldwide for peace. European Peace Caravan, Sarajevo, Bosnia.
1992: Radical analyst and schizo-theorist Felix Guattari dies, Paris.
1997: Seven thousand protest NYPD torture of Abner Louima.
http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?itemid=17393#29