June 17 · This Day in America
Through the night, a thousand New England men dig a redoubt on Breed's Hill above Charlestown while the world's finest army watches from Boston. At dawn the British come on in scarlet ranks, certain that militia will scatter. They do not. The Americans hold their fire down the slope until the lines are close enough to see faces, then loose a volley that staggers an empire. Twice the British are thrown back down the hill. The third charge takes the redoubt only because the defenders run out of powder. The British win the ground and lose more than a thousand men doing it. The legend says someone ordered the men not to fire until they saw the whites of British eyes; historians doubt anyone said it. The truth needs no legend. Untrained farmers had stood, and bled, and made regulars pay. After this day, no one could pretend the colonies would not fight.
Source: www.nps.gov
Also on this day · 1885
The French steamer Isere drops anchor off Bedloe's Island carrying a gift no one had ever attempted: a colossal woman of copper, taken apart into 350 pieces and packed in more than 200 crates. America had not yet raised the money for her pedestal. She waited in boxes while schoolchildren and newsboys sent in pennies. A year later she would lift her torch over the harbor, and every ship of immigrants after would see her first.
Source: www.statueofliberty.org