337 Constantine The Great died at a suburban villa called Achyron on the outskirts of Constantinople on the last day of the fifty-day festival of Pentecost directly following Easter on May 22, 337. Following his death, Constantine's body was transferred to Constantinople and buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles there. He was succeeded by his three sons born of Fausta, Constantine II, Constantius II and Constans. The Roman Empire was divided between the three Augusti.
1808 French writer Gérard de Nerval was born on May 22, 1808. De Nerval had a pet lobster he would take for walks in Paris. He used a blue silk ribbon as a leash. The author called them “peaceful, serious creatures” and that they didn’t “bark” or “gnaw upon one's monadic privacy” like dogs did.
1813 Richard Wagner was born on May 22, 1813 to an ethnic German family at 3, the Brühl in the Jewish quarter of Leipzig. He was the ninth child of Carl Friedrich Wagner, who was the Secretary to the Chief Commissioner of the Police. He died of typhus when he was a baby. Several of his elder sisters became opera singers or actresses. Richard was educated at the Dresden Kreuzschule between 1822-27 where he excelled at creative writing and history.
1819 The SS Savannah left port at Savannah, Georgia, United States, on May 22, 1819 on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ship arrived at Liverpool, England, on June 20. In fact, only a fraction of the distance was covered with the ship under steam power; the rest was sailed by wind power. In spite of her historic voyage, Savannah was not a commercial success as a steamship and was converted back into a sailing ship shortly after returning from Europe.
1826 HMS Beagle set sail from Plymouth on her first voyage, under the command of Captain Stokes on May 22, 1826. The mission was to accompany the larger ship HMS Adventure (380 tons) on a hydrographic survey of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, Its second voyage was Charles Darwin's famous 1831-36 voyage to the Pacific.
1830 The two-storey Mount Clare railway station in Baltimore, Maryland first saw passenger service as the terminus of the horse-drawn Baltimore and Ohio Railroad on May 22, 1830. The Mount Clare station served as the starting point for the B&O's historic inaugural journey to Ellicott's Mills (now Ellicott City), Maryland. This trip marked the beginning of the first regularly scheduled passenger rail service in the United States.
1843 The first major wagon train heading for the Pacific Northwest set out on the Oregon Trail with a thousand pioneers from Elm Grove, Missouri on May 22, 1843. The Oregon Trail, which stretched 2200 miles, was the longest of the land routes used in the Western expansion of the United States.
1849 Abraham Lincoln invented a device for lifting riverboats over obstacles in shallow water. He was awarded on May 22, 1849 a patent for "A Device for Buoying Vessels over Shoals." It never got past the patent stage, but he was the first and only president to hold a patent.
1859 The author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born May 22, 1859 at 11 Picardy Street, Edinburgh. He was the third of ten children of Mary and Charles Doyle. Arthur was his parent's favorite child. Even at school he had the impulse to write and he produced his first story at the age of six. Doyle went to Edinburgh University where he gained a medical degree and qualified as a doctor. At Edinburgh he was taught by Dr Joseph Bell whose mastery of educative logic helped to inspire Sherlock Holmes.
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| Marble head of Emperor Constantine the Great, Roman, 4th century |
1808 French writer Gérard de Nerval was born on May 22, 1808. De Nerval had a pet lobster he would take for walks in Paris. He used a blue silk ribbon as a leash. The author called them “peaceful, serious creatures” and that they didn’t “bark” or “gnaw upon one's monadic privacy” like dogs did.
1813 Richard Wagner was born on May 22, 1813 to an ethnic German family at 3, the Brühl in the Jewish quarter of Leipzig. He was the ninth child of Carl Friedrich Wagner, who was the Secretary to the Chief Commissioner of the Police. He died of typhus when he was a baby. Several of his elder sisters became opera singers or actresses. Richard was educated at the Dresden Kreuzschule between 1822-27 where he excelled at creative writing and history.
1819 The SS Savannah left port at Savannah, Georgia, United States, on May 22, 1819 on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ship arrived at Liverpool, England, on June 20. In fact, only a fraction of the distance was covered with the ship under steam power; the rest was sailed by wind power. In spite of her historic voyage, Savannah was not a commercial success as a steamship and was converted back into a sailing ship shortly after returning from Europe.
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| SS Savannah, the first steam powered ship to cross the Atlantic Ocean—1819 |
1826 HMS Beagle set sail from Plymouth on her first voyage, under the command of Captain Stokes on May 22, 1826. The mission was to accompany the larger ship HMS Adventure (380 tons) on a hydrographic survey of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, Its second voyage was Charles Darwin's famous 1831-36 voyage to the Pacific.
1830 The two-storey Mount Clare railway station in Baltimore, Maryland first saw passenger service as the terminus of the horse-drawn Baltimore and Ohio Railroad on May 22, 1830. The Mount Clare station served as the starting point for the B&O's historic inaugural journey to Ellicott's Mills (now Ellicott City), Maryland. This trip marked the beginning of the first regularly scheduled passenger rail service in the United States.
1843 The first major wagon train heading for the Pacific Northwest set out on the Oregon Trail with a thousand pioneers from Elm Grove, Missouri on May 22, 1843. The Oregon Trail, which stretched 2200 miles, was the longest of the land routes used in the Western expansion of the United States.
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| Pioneers Crossing the Plains of Nebraska |
1849 Abraham Lincoln invented a device for lifting riverboats over obstacles in shallow water. He was awarded on May 22, 1849 a patent for "A Device for Buoying Vessels over Shoals." It never got past the patent stage, but he was the first and only president to hold a patent.
1859 The author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was born May 22, 1859 at 11 Picardy Street, Edinburgh. He was the third of ten children of Mary and Charles Doyle. Arthur was his parent's favorite child. Even at school he had the impulse to write and he produced his first story at the age of six. Doyle went to Edinburgh University where he gained a medical degree and qualified as a doctor. At Edinburgh he was taught by Dr Joseph Bell whose mastery of educative logic helped to inspire Sherlock Holmes.
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| Sherlock Holmes statue in Edinburgh, erected opposite the birthplace of Doyle |
1885 Predominantly of Native Indian descent, all-round sportsman James "Jim" Thorpe was born near Prague, Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), on May 22, 1888. In 1907 Thorpe began his athletic career there when he walked past his school's athletic track and beat all the school's high jumpers with an impromptu 5-ft 9-in leap despite being in street clothes. He won Olympic gold medals in the 1912 pentathlon and decathlon, and played American football, professional baseball, and basketball.
1885 Victor Hugo's death from pneumonia on May 22, 1885, at the age of 83, generated intense national mourning. An honor guard of twelve young poets flanked his coffin and all the street lamps en route were draped in black crepe. More than two million people joined his funeral procession in Paris from the Arc de Triomphe to the Panthéon, where he was buried. Victor Hugo shares a crypt within the Panthéon with Alexandre Dumas and Émile Zola.
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| Hugo on his deathbed |
1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright flew the first successful, albeit brief, "flying machine" in 1903. It flew for 12 seconds at a height of 500 feet and covered 37,120 feet. The flight was witnessed by four men and a boy. In 1905 the Wright Brothers built their Flyer 111. It was the first practical plane capable of flights over half an hour and could do a figure of eight. On May 22, 1906, the Wright brothers were granted a patent for their "Flying-Machine".
1956 NBC is sometimes referred to as the "Peacock Network", in reference to its stylized peacock logo, which was originally created to highlight the network's color programming. The emblem made its first on-air appearance on May 22, 1956 and was retired by September 1975.
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| Original NBC peacock (1956) Wikipedia Commons |
1960 The Valdivia earthquake of May 22, 1960 was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded, rating a magnitude of 9.5. The epicenter was near Lumaco, Chile, south of Santiago, with Valdivia being the most affected city. The resulting tsunami affected southern Chile, Hawaii, Japan, the Philippines, eastern New Zealand and SE Australia. Various estimates of the total number of fatalities from the earthquake and tsunamis have been published, ranging between 1,000 and 6,000 killed.
1962 The first revolving restaurant in the U.S., La Ronde, opened in 1961 in Honolulu, atop the Ala Moana Building. La Ronde was soon followed by the Space Needle, built for the 1962 Worlds Fair in Seattle. The Top of the Needle restaurant, which opened on May 22, 1962, was the world's oldest revolving restaurant until it closed in September 2017 as part of the landmark’s renovation project.
1972 Ceylon changed its name to Sri Lanka, adopted a new constitution, and officially became a republic on May 22, 1972. The name "Ceylon" was derived from the Portuguese name "Ceilão", which was in turn derived from the Sinhalese name "Sinhaloka". The name "Sri Lanka" is a combination of the Sanskrit words "Sri" (meaning "blessed") and "Lanka" (meaning "island"). The name was chosen because it was believed to be more reflective of the country's ancient history and culture.
1980 Pac-Man is an arcade game developed by Namco and created by Japanese video game designer Toru Iwatani. Pac-Man's name was inspired by the Japanese onomatopoeia "pakku-pakku," which sounds like someone opening and closing their mouth. The first ever Pac-Man machine - then called Puck-Man - was installed in a Tokyo movie theater on May 22, 1980.
1981 English serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, also known as the Yorkshire Ripper, was sentenced to life imprisonment on May 22, 1981. He was convicted of murdering 13 women and attempting to murder seven others between 1975 and 1980. His victims were all women, mostly prostitutes, who he attacked with a hammer and a knife.
1990 Modern Yemen was actually divided into two countries – South Yemen and North Yemen – until 1990. On May 22, 1990 North Yemen and South Yemen merged to create the Republic of Yemen. Thousands of people took to the streets, chanting "Unity is power." The Flag of Yemen was adopted the same day. It is essentially the Arab Liberation Flag of 1952, introduced after the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 in which Arab nationalism was a dominant theme.
2010 American mountain climber Jordan Romero became on May 22, 2010, the youngest person to climb Mount Everest. He was 13 years 10 months 10 days old when he reached the summit. Jordan was accompanied by his father Paul Romero, his step-mother Karen Lundgren, and three Sherpas. When he got to the top of Everest, Jordan called his mom, telling her, "Mom, I'm calling you from the top of the world."
2012 The Tokyo Skytree, which opened to the public on May 22, 2012, is the tallest tower in the world standing 634 meters tall (2,080 ft). A broadcasting, restaurant and observation tower in Sumida, it is the third tallest (man-made) structure on Earth, after after the Merdeka 118 (678.9 m or 2,227 ft) and the Burj Khalifa (829.8 m or 2,722 ft).
2010 American mountain climber Jordan Romero became on May 22, 2010, the youngest person to climb Mount Everest. He was 13 years 10 months 10 days old when he reached the summit. Jordan was accompanied by his father Paul Romero, his step-mother Karen Lundgren, and three Sherpas. When he got to the top of Everest, Jordan called his mom, telling her, "Mom, I'm calling you from the top of the world."
2012 The Tokyo Skytree, which opened to the public on May 22, 2012, is the tallest tower in the world standing 634 meters tall (2,080 ft). A broadcasting, restaurant and observation tower in Sumida, it is the third tallest (man-made) structure on Earth, after after the Merdeka 118 (678.9 m or 2,227 ft) and the Burj Khalifa (829.8 m or 2,722 ft).
2015 Ireland became the first country to legalize same-sex marriage by constitutional referendum on May 22, 2015. The referendum asked Irish citizens whether they agreed with amending the country's constitution to allow for same-sex couples to marry. The "Yes" campaign, which advocated for marriage equality, received widespread support from various political parties, civil society organizations, and individuals. 62.1% of voters supported the amendment and 37.9% voting against it.
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