Today in history: May 21

Today in history for May 21 – humanitarian Clara Barton and Adolphus Solomons founded the American Red Cross, an organization established to provide aid to victims of wars and natural disasters.

1539 — Black Spanish explorer Estevan is reported killed.

1542 — Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto dies in the American wilderness.

1683 — The world’s first university museum opens in Oxford, England.

1758 — The Lenape tribe abducts Mary Campbell from western Pennsylvania.

1881 — Clara Barton and Adolphus Solomons found the American Red Cross to provide humanitarian aid to victims of wars and natural disasters.

1901 — Connecticut enacts the first speed-limit law in the United States.

1911 — French troops occupy Fez, sparking the second Moroccan Crisis.

1924 — Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb murder 14-year-old Bobby Franks in Chicago in what becomes one of the most sensational criminal cases of the 20th century.

1927 — Charles Lindbergh completes the first solo, nonstop transatlantic flight, landing in Paris after departing from New York.

1932 — Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to complete a solo, nonstop transatlantic flight.

1940 — Nazis begin killing people deemed “unfit” in East Prussia.

1942 — Thousands of Jewish residents are deported from Chelm, Poland.

1956 — The United States drops a hydrogen bomb over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific.

1960 — A massive earthquake strikes Chile in one of the most powerful seismic events ever recorded.

1992 — Amy Fisher, known as the “Long Island Lolita,” is arrested in connection with the shooting of Mary Jo Buttafuoco.

1997 — A young boy in Hong Kong dies of avian flu in one of the first known human cases of the H5N1 virus.

1999 — Soap opera star Susan Lucci wins her first Daytime Emmy Award after 19 previous nominations.

2000 — Former President James Garfield’s spine goes on public display for its final day at the National Museum of Health and Medicine.

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