24 August 1974
On this date in 1974…
Lynyrd Skynyrd’s song “Sweet Home Alabama” hit the music charts. The thoroughly Southern anthem is one of many responses to former CSN&Y singer, Neil Young’s libelous and defamatory cut, “Southern Man.” One Southern businessman is reported to have offered $1,000 for Young’s head. Had Young’s song defamed any other ethnic group in America, he would have been driven out of the music industry.
Other Years:
1635 - The Great Colonial Hurricane struck the Virginia Colony at Jamestown
1814 – British troops burned the White House and the U.S. Capitol when they invaded Washington, DC during the War of 1812.
1818 – The Quapaw tribe signed a treaty at St. Louis ceding land along the Arkansas and Red Rivers. One elderly Quapaw Chief, Saracen, is allowed to remain at his home on Bayou Bartholomew in Arkansas.
1835 – The Choctaw, Comanche, Muscogee Creek, Cherokee, Osage, Quapaw, Seneca and Witchita tribes sign a peace treaty with the U.S. government at Camp Holmes near the Canadian River in Indian Territory.
1877 - American gunman John Wesley Hardin, who was wanted for murder, was arrested by Texas Rangers on a train in Pensacola, Florida
1893 - A tornado killed more than 1,000 people when it devatated the cities of Savannah, Georgia, and Charleston, South Carolina
1912 - A ticker-tape parade was held in NYC for Jim Thorpe and returning US Olympic atheletes
1992 – Hurricane Andrew made landfall near Miami, Florida and left a path of devastation that extended to a second landfall in Louisiana. The Category 5 storm killed 39 and caused $26.5 billion damage. Homeowners in Miami set up armed patrols of their neighborhoods to prevent looting.
2001 – In McAllen, TX, Bridgestone/Firestone agreed to settle out of court and pay a reported $7.5 million to a family in a rollover accident in their Ford Explorer.
2006 - After signing a one-day contract with the San Francisco 49ers, Jerry Rice of Starkville, Mississippi officially retired from the NFL
2023 - Former US President Donald Trump surrendered at Fulton County Jail to be arrested on charges related to the 2020 Georgia election. His mugshot goes viral
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