🌟 Editor's Note
Good morning — it’s Thursday, March 19. Today, we're checking out the first stone laid for the Sagrada Familia, the first air combat mission in U.S. history, legalized gambling in Nevada, the Iraq War, and plenty more — all quick, to the point, and easy to understand.
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🚀 Time Machine
-1279
Mongolia's victory at the naval Battle of Yamen ended the Song Dynasty in China.
-1644
Two hundred members of the Peking imperial family commit suicide out of loyalty to Chongzhen.
-1863
The Confederate cruiser SS Georgiana is destroyed on her maiden voyage, carrying munitions and medicines worth over $1 million. The wreck is discovered 102 years later by teenager and underwater archaeologist E. Lee Spence.
-1882
The first stone is laid for the Sagrada Familia basilica in Barcelona, Spain, designed by Antoni Gaudí.
-1916
Eight Curtiss "Jenny" planes take off from Columbus, New Mexico, in the first combat air mission in U.S. history.
-1920
The US Senate rejects the Treaty of Versailles again, refusing to ratify the League of Nations and opting for isolation.
-1931
To combat the Great Depression, the Nevada state legislature legalized gambling.
-1932
The Sydney Harbour Bridge opens in Australia.
-2003
Airstrikes by a US-British coalition mark the start of the Iraq invasion, without UN support or global opinion.
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📸 Snapshot
New York opium dens were full of smokers as the drug craze swept the country, 1923
🗨️ Last Words
“I die unable to face my ancestors in the underworld, dejected and ashamed. May the rebels dismember my corpse and slaughter my officials, but let them not despoil the imperial tombs nor harm a single one of our people.”