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This Day In History

1310 In a conspiracy to overthrow the Venetian government, a horde of people had almost made it to St Mark's Square, preparing to attack the government building when Giustina Rossi leant out of her house window and dropped a heavy mortar that she was holding, immediately killing the rioters' flag holder, causing havoc amongst the insurgents who were subsequently easily defeated by the regular army.

1648 Margaret Jones is hanged in Boston for witchcraft in the first such execution for the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Arts

1939 In Oakland, California, folk music collector Sidney Robertson Cowell recorded Mary MacPhee performing Gaelic songs from the Hebrides, Scotland. The collection California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties Collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell contains these a cappella performances, still photographs, drawings, and written documents from various European ethnic and English- and Spanish-speaking communities in Northern California. On the dust jacket of MacPhee’s recording of “Hi Oro ‘s Na Horo Eile” Cowell noted, “This she sang to her husband when they were courting.”

Aviation and Aeronautics

1921 Bessie Coleman earns her pilot's license, becoming the first female pilot of African-American descent.