British inventor Richard Trevithick takes seven of his friends for a test ride on his “Puffing Devil,” or “Puffer,” the first steam-powered passenger vehicle, on December 24, 1801. Unlike the steam engine pioneered by the Scotsman James Watt, Trevithick’s used “strong steam”—that is, steam at a very high pressure (145 pounds per square inch, or […]

A devastating fire at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., destroys about two-thirds of its 55,000 volumes, including most of Thomas Jefferson’s personal library, sold to the institution in 1815. The Library of Congress was established in 1800, when President John Adams approved legislation that appropriated $5,000 to purchase “such books as may be […]

On Christmas Eve 1948, a family of three moves into a home in Dover, Massachusetts with unusually large windows—the world’s first fully solar house, an idea decades ahead of its time. Nobody had ever tried living in a residence heated only by the sun, much less through a frigid New England winter. The 800-square-foot wedge-shaped […]

The McCarran-Walter Act takes effect and revises U.S. immigration laws. The law was hailed by supporters as a necessary step in preventing alleged communist subversion in the United States, while opponents decried the legislation as being xenophobic and discriminatory. The act, named after Senator Pat McCarran (Democrat-Nevada) and Representative Francis Walter (Democratic-Pennsylvania), did relatively little to […]

Comedian Bob Hope gives what he says is his last Christmas show to U.S. servicemen in Saigon. Hope was a comedian and star of stage, radio, television and over 50 feature films. Hope was one of many Hollywood stars who followed the tradition of traveling overseas to entertain American troops stationed abroad. The 1972 show […]