A series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693, caused by mass hysteria. The trials resulted in the executions of twenty people, while five others (including two infant children) died in prison.
Salem Witch Trials
Fact of the Day
Henry I kept lions, leopards and camels at Woodstock in the 12th century.
Quote of the Day
"The English piously believe themselves to be a peaceful people; nobody else is of the same belief.
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~ Gladstone
On This Day
1537 Henry VIII's third wife, Jane Seymour, died of a fever following the birth of her son.
1648 The Treaty of Westphalia marked the end of the Thirty Years War. The first six months of the peace conference was spent arguing about protocol.
1901 Annie Edson Taylor, a 63 year old schoolteacher was the first person to plunge over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
1945 The United Nations was founded.
2003 Concorde completed its final commercial passenger flight.