Week of November 14 – Events from 100 years ago: November 1910

Indiana University held its first Homecoming game. Credit for inventing the idea of an alumni “homecoming” has also been claimed for earlier games by Baylor University and University of Illinois.  (11/5/1910)

The first commercial airplane flight in history was carried out by Wright Company pilot Philip Parmalee who transported two bolts of silk (worth $1,000) from Dayton, Ohio to Columbus for delivery to the Morehouse-Martens Department Store in Columbus. (11/7/1910)

In what was described as “the first conviction on finger print evidence In the history of this country”, a jury in Chicago found Thomas Jennings guilty of the murder of Clarence A. Hiller. (11/10/1910)

The governments of the United States, Germany, Russia, Sweden and Norway gave diplomatic recognition to the newly created Republic of Portugal which had overthrown the Kingdom of Portugal one month earlier.  (11/11/1910)

President Taft, in Panama City for an inspection of the building of the canal, reassured Panamanians that the U.S. had no intention of annexing the Republic of Panama.  “We have guaranteed your integrity as a republic, and for us to annex territory would be to violate that guarantee, and nothing would justify it in our part”, said Taft, adding “so long as Panama performed her part under the treaty.” (11/16/1910)