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19481776 Club

SP&S railway berm collapses; ten-foot wall of water erases Vanport in an afternoon

This morning, Portland's Housing Authority told 18,500 residents the dikes were safe. Tonight, Oregon's second-largest city is under the Columbia.

At 4:17 p.m. on Memorial Day, May 30, 1948, the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway berm gave way, sending a ten-foot wall of water into Vanport, Oregon — a city of 18,500 people built on reclaimed Columbia River lowlands. That morning, the Housing Authority of Portland had issued a statement reassuring residents the dikes were safe. By nightfall, Oregon's second-largest city was underwater…

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More from May 30
1854

Pierce signs the Kansas-Nebraska Act; the Missouri Compromise's thirty-four-year line is gone

Douglas's "popular sovereignty" doctrine now lets settlers in both territories vote on slavery themselves, erasing the 36°30' ban that has held since 1820.
1868

Logan names May 30 a national day to decorate soldiers' graves; the order goes to every post in the Union

General Order No. 11 puts the commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic behind a practice Southern women began two years ago.
1958

Eisenhower buries two unknowns at Arlington; each man receives the Medal of Honor

Charette, the Navy's only active enlisted Medal of Honor holder, chose the World War II unknown; Lyle picked the Korean War soldier from four disinterred candidates.
18061776 Club
Near Adairville, Dickinson's shot broke two ribs and stopped inches from Jackson's heart; bleeding inside a loose coat, Jackson drew the hammer a second time and fired.
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More from Cold War America
1950

Pyongyang falls to UN troops; by nightfall, China's army is already crossing the border

Church bells rang over the North Korean capital hours before Beijing's soldiers began wading the Yalu.
1973

Two Justice Department chiefs quit in one night rather than fire the Watergate prosecutor

Nixon finally finds a third official willing to do it: Solicitor General Robert Bork.
1959

Eisenhower signs over the Army's rocket men; von Braun now works for NASA

The order strips most of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and hands its hardware and people to the year-old civilian space agency.
1959

Wright's spiral museum opens its doors on Fifth Avenue

The architect died in April; the building he fought sixteen years to see built opened without him in October.
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