June 8, 1959 – Just before noon on this day the U.S. Navy submarine USS Barbero surfaced off the northern coast of Florida. It took careful aim at the mainland and launched a customized cruise missile in which the nuclear warhead had been replaced with a bunch of postcards. Twenty minutes later, the missile [...]
June 6, 2002 – On this day, a big space rock tumbled into the Earth’s atmosphere and exploded over the eastern Mediterranean (between Libya and Greece). The asteroid was about 30 feet in diameter and was almost completely disintegrated by the time it hit the water. No traces were ever found.
The explosion was detected on [...]
May 25, 1961 – On this day during a joint session of Congress, President John F. Kennedy announced his goal of putting a man on the moon before the end of the decade.
At the time many of his critics mocked the speech as a pipedream, and a desperate attempt to change the subject following the [...]
