January 7 · This Day in America
The Constitution is barely a year old and the country has never done this before. On this day, the states reach the deadline to choose their presidential electors — the first time in human history a large republic will pick a head of state by ballot under a written constitution. Only ten of the thirteen states take part; North Carolina and Rhode Island have not yet ratified, and New York's legislature has deadlocked. There are no parties, no campaign, no doubt about the man. When the electors meet weeks later, every single one of them writes the same name: George Washington. He does not want the job. He will take it anyway, ride north to a borrowed capital, and place his hand on a Bible on a Wall Street balcony. A people has just hired a government, on purpose, with paper. The experiment begins.
Source: www.britannica.com
Also on this day · 1927
For the first time, a person in America can pick up a telephone and speak with someone across the Atlantic. The head of AT&T calls a British official over a brand-new commercial circuit — voice carried by wire to Long Island, hurled across three thousand miles of ocean as radio waves, and turned back into a human voice in London. The price: seventy-five dollars for three minutes. Thirty-one calls go through that first day. The world had just gotten audibly, suddenly smaller.
Source: www.loc.gov