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Almanac

By The Associated Press

Today in History

Today is Thursday, March 29, the 88th day of 2018. There are 277 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On March 29, 1943, World War II rationing of meat, fats and cheese began, limiting consumers to store purchases of an average of about two pounds a week for beef, pork, lamb and mutton using a coupon system. (The Associated Press noted, “From the customer viewpoint, the unrationed oasis of food will be the restaurant or other public eating place.”)

On this date:

In 1638, Swedish colonists settled in present-day Delaware.

In 1790, the tenth president of the United States, John Tyler, was born in Charles City County, Virginia.

In 1792, Sweden’s King Gustav III died, nearly two weeks after he had been shot and mortally wounded by an assassin during a masquerade party.

In 1867, Britain’s Parliament passed, and Queen Victoria signed, the British North America Act creating the Dominion of Canada, which came into being the following July.

In 1912, British explorer Robert Falcon Scott, his doomed expedition stranded in an Antarctic blizzard after failing to be the first to reach the South Pole, wrote the last words of his journal: “For Gods sake look after our people.”

In 1936, German Chancellor Adolf Hitler claimed overwhelming victory in a plebiscite on his policies.

In 1951, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted in New York of conspiracy to commit espionage for the Soviet Union. (They were executed in June 1953.) The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “The King and I” opened on Broadway.

In 1962, Jack Paar hosted NBC’s “Tonight” show for the final time. (Johnny Carson debuted as host the following October.)

In 1971, Army Lt. William L. Calley Jr. was convicted of murdering 22 Vietnamese civilians in the 1968 My Lai (mee ly) massacre. (Calley ended up serving three years under house arrest.) A jury in Los Angeles recommended the death penalty for Charles Manson and three female followers for the 1969 Tate-La Bianca murders. (The sentences were later commuted.)

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