On This Day

Mohawk Chief Thayendanegea Dies

Mohawk Chief Thayendanegea, also known by his English name Joseph Brant, dies at his home in Burlington, Ontario. Before dying, he reportedly said, "Have pity on the poor Indians. If you have any influence with the great, endeavour to use it for their good."

Thayendanegea ranked among Britain's best commanders during the American Revolutionary War. He led Mohawk and British forces in several key battles and played a crucial role in the defense of Canada.

John Froelich, Inventor of the Gas-Powered Tractor, is Born

John Froelich, the inventor of the first internal-combustion traction motor, or tractor, is born on November 24, 1849, in Iowa.

At the end of the 19th century, Froelich operated a grain elevator and mobile threshing service. Every year at harvest time, he dragged a crew of hired hands and a heavy steam-powered thresher through Iowa and surrounding states.

Battle of Lookout Mountain

Union troops capture Lookout Mountain southwest of Chattanooga, Tennessee, as they begin to break the Confederate siege of the city.

In the "battle above the clouds," the Yankees scaled the slopes of the mountain on the periphery of the Chattanooga lines. For nearly two months following the Battle of Chickamauga, the Confederates had trapped the Union army in Chattanooga.

First Federal Prison for Women Opens

The Federal Industrial Institution for Women, the first women's federal prison, officially opens in Alderson, West Virginia.

All women serving federal sentences of more than a year were to be brought here. Run by Dr. Mary B. Harris, the prison's buildings, each named after social reformers, sat atop 500 acres. One judge described the prison as a "convict's paradise."

FBI Crime Lab Opens

The crime lab that is now referred to as the FBI Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory officially opens in Washington, D.C., on November 24, 1932.

The lab was initially operated out of a single room and had only one full-time employee, Agent Charles Appel. Agent Appel began with a borrowed microscope and a pseudo-scientific device called a helixometer.