August 8

International Cat Day

Lex Anteinternet:  Eee gads, I almost missed it.

It's International Cat Day.  August 8.

1854   Smith and Wesson patented a pattern of metallic cartridge.

1902  The first Weston County "Old Timers' Day" held. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1916   The Cheyenne State Leader for August 8, 1916. The mysterious disappearance of Private Dilley 

Guardsman Pvt. Dilley mysteriously disappeared.

1919  August 8, 1919. Making Cheyenne.

The 1919 transcontinental Motor Transport Convoy entered Wyoming on this day in 1919.

The convoy east of Cheyenne.

Governor Carey was on the road as well, meeting the convoy at Hillsdale, a small Wyoming town that is now a shadow of its former self.  From there they proceeded on to Cheyenne, where Ft. D. A. Russell somewhat ironically provided a cavalry escort through Cheyenne and onto the post.

They were treated to a rodeo at Frontier Park and the town's businesses closed at 4:00 p.m. for the festivities.

Elsewhere, the Third Afghan War came to an end when the warring parties signed the Ango-Afghan Treaty of 1919. The war had been short and fought for limited purposes. The result was the establishment of the current Afghan border and the end of British subsidies to Afghanistan.

In the wreck of the Austrian Empire, the First Hungarian Republic dissolved.  As confusing as the names may be, it was replaced by the Hungarian Republic, a more conservative government.

1929  Major Doyen P. Wardwell of Casper, a World War One veteran of the Lafayette Escadrille and a pioneer Wyoming aviator, dies in an airplane crash.  The Wardwell Addition to the City of Casper would be named after him, and the Casper Municipal Airport was renamed for him. That airport later formed some of the city streets for Bar Nunn Wyoming.

1936  Ernest Hemingway visited Laramie.  Hemingway visited Wyoming and the Rocky Mountain fairly frequently. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1944 Wyoming has its smallest lamb crop in eight year.  This was likely due to sheep requirements during World War Two, which would have reduced the number of ewes.  Attribution: Wyoming State Historical Society.

1989  Robert Arthur Harris, the first Wyomingite to become a Major League baseball player, died in North Platte Nebraska.  He was born in Gillette in 1915.

1991  The keel was laid down for SSBN 742, the USS Wyoming.