1844
First Telegraph Message
From the old Supreme Court chamber in the Capitol, Samuel Morse tapped out "What hath God wrought" to his assistant in Baltimore. The wire ran along the railroad tracks. Within a decade it would reach across the continent, and news - which had always traveled at the speed of a horse - would travel at the speed of light.
Bahai Faith Begins
In the Persian city of Shiraz, a young merchant named the Bab declared himself the gate to a promised one. His movement spread through the Qajar provinces like a rumor; by 1850 he would be executed by firing squad. His follower Baha'u'llah would found, from an Ottoman prison, the Bahai faith.
Dominican Independence
A clandestine group called La Trinitaria raised the flag of a new republic in Santo Domingo and drove out the Haitian occupation that had ruled the eastern half of the island for twenty-two years. It was one of the few countries in the Americas to gain its independence from another American state, not a European one.
Joseph Smith Killed
A mob of armed men with blackened faces stormed the Carthage jail in Illinois and shot the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum. They had been held on charges of inciting a riot against a newspaper critical of plural marriage. Within weeks Brigham Young assumed leadership, and within three years the Mormons would be walking to Utah.