APRIL 20 — 1898 McKinley gets authorization from Congress for war on Spain; 1841 Edgar Allen Poe publishes first book; 1999 Columbine shooting; 1957 All Shook Up goes #1
APRIL 20
1970-Happy birthday,me. Me like beer, so please send it.
1898-President William McKinley had asked Congress for war
…on April 11, and on the 20, Wobbly Willie got it. Cuban revolutionaries were trying to overthrow the Spanish government in their country for a few years.
Forming an alliance with the Cubans, as it was generally believed, would help the United States economically. It would also be a great chance to get rid of European colonization of the western hemisphere once and for all. Not to mention the Americans were disgusted by the brutality that was being inflicted on the Cubans by the Spanish. For instance, 100,000 Cuban prisoners died in horrible conditions in Spanish concentration camps between 1895 and 1898.
Randolph Hearst, who owned America’s largest newspaper chain, called out President McKinley for being weak on the Spanish position. On February 17, 1898, US battleship USS Maine that was moored in the Havana harbor was sunk and 252 Americans died. The Ohio Napoleon McKinley felt he had no choice, and America was at War with Spain.
It lasted four months. Future President Teddy Roosevilt and his band of Rough Riders quickly captured Santiago and Puerto Rico, and Commodore George Dewey’s Asiatic Squadron defeated Spanish in the Philippines, and on July 26 a cease-fire was formed. The US and Spanish government signed the Treaty of Paris in December, and aside from guaranteeing the independence of Cuba, the treaty also forced Spain to cede Guam and Puerto Rico to the US, and to sell the Philippines to the US for $20 million.
This also helped America to acquire Hawaii, but that wasn’t until a little bit later.
1841-Edgar Allen Poe publishes The Murders in the Rue Morgue
…in Graham’s Ladies and Gentlemen magazine. This is credited as being the world’s first detective story. It’s about C. Auguste Dupin, a man in Paris who solves the mystery of the brutal murder of two women. Poe was born in Boston in 1809, his father left when he was young and his mom died a year later, leaving Poe orphaned. He was unofficially adopted by John and Frances Allen of Richmond, Virginia, later dropped out of the University of Virginia due to lack of funds and started writing.
Since he wrote for a living, he didn’t have much money and had to move around from Philadelphia, Baltimore and New York City. He married his 13 year old cousin in 1835, because that’s not weird or anything.
He wrote great classics like the Pit and the Pendulum, The Tell-TaleHeart and many others. He sadly died at the age of 40 due to either brain congestion, alcohol poisoning, cholera, drugs, heart disease, rabies, suicide, tuberculosis, or something else. We’re not sure.
1999-Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims and their loved ones who perished in the Columbine school shooting.
1957 Elvis Presley’s All Shook Up goes to the top of the charts.
APRIL 20 — 1898 McKinley gets authorization from Congress for war on Spain; 1841 Edgar Allen Poe publishes first book; 1999 Columbine shooting; 1957 All Shook Up goes #1