1. 1965: Soviet Union sends first man on spacewalk
PHOTO: Gizmodo
PHOTO: Wiki
On this day in 1965, the Soviet Union took a huge step ahead of the United States in the “Space Race” when they sent the the Voskhod 2 into orbit carrying 2 astronauts, Pavel Belyayev and Alexey Leonov. The two men were sent up into space for only a short mission and the main objective would be to achieve the first space walk, Alexey was the man for the job. Connected to a 15 foot tether Alexey wearing a specialized space suit that would allow him to exit the space craft Alexy just floated around for 12 minutes and 9 seconds before he was required to get back inside the capsule. Interestingly by the time the spacewalk had ended his suit had inflated due to the vacuum of space and he was not able to fit inside the capsule door so he had to open a valve to release some pressure for him to be able to get back inside to safety.
1852: Wells Fargo start a bank and delivery service.
PHOTO: wiki
PHOTO: Coin-College
In New York City on this day back in 1852, Henry Wells and William G Fargo have a meeting with several other investors to talk about starting a shipping company, Wells Fargo. With the Gold Rush of California in full swing, there was a need for reliable transportation that can being supplies to the miners, and maybe more importantly be able to transport the gold dust and important paper documents back east where they could be sold which ended up being a major contributing factor in California’s growing economy. In 1905, Wells Fargo split from the delivery business and focused strictly on the banking side of things, later merging with Nevada State Bank and is now recognized as one of the largest banks in the United States
3. 1925: The Tri- State Tornado becomes the Worst In US History
PHOTO: StlToday
Back in Ellington, Missouri is where the single deadliest tornado in U.S History took place back in 1925 on this day. From there, it proceeded to wreak havoc on eastern Missouri, southern Illinois and southern Indiana; a full 235 miles away from where it started. This wasn’t your everyday tornado, it was classified as an F5, which is the highest level on the scale and are uncommon. But when they do pop up they are extremely deadly, this particular one killed 695 people that day and injuring up to 13,000 more. An estimated $17 billion in damage. It had an estimated width of over 1,200 yards and moved at around 70mph destroying everything in its path. Keep in mind in order to reach the status of F5 its gotta have wind speeds over 200 mph, according to the “new scale”. If you were to look at an “old scale” the F5 classification is 261-318mph.