July 17th: what occurred?

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Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California. (1955) The live television broadcast of the dedication occurred on this day, and the park opened to the public on July 18. Walt Disney himself oversaw the design of the theme park, which sees more than 15 million visitors each year. This is a higher cumulative attendance than any other theme park in the world, with over 600 million total visitors.
TWA Flight 800 exploded after taking off from John F. Kennedy Airport. (1996) Flight, bound for Paris and then Rome, exploded 12 minutes after takeoff, killing all 230 people on board. While there has been speculation, no evidence of a terrorist attack has ever been found.
Woolworth Corp. closed its 400 remaining dime stores after 117 years of operation. (1997) Frank Winfield Woolworth opened the first five-cent Woolworth store in Utica, New York in 1878, but it failed. He opened a second store the following year in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and one of the largest retail chains in the United States was born. 9,200 people were laid off when the chain closed 117 years later.
Two ships carrying weapons for World War II collided in Port Chicago, California: 320 people were killed. (1944) In unsafe conditions, munitions exploded while being loaded onto a ship: 320 people died and 390 were injured. The event led to the “Port Chicago Mutiny,” in which the military refused to continue loading cargo.
A US spacecraft docked with a Russian spacecraft, the first docking of a superpower of its kind. (1975) The Apollo 18 mission was the last of the Apollo missions, although some consider the Apollo 17 mission to be the last and do not number it as part of the series. Its connection with the Russian Soyuz craft was the first spaceflight collaboration between the two countries.
The Great Train Wreck of 1856 occurred in Pennsylvania: up to that point it was the deadliest train wreck in the world. (1856) Two trains collided going in opposite directions on the same track: one train was late and failed to communicate this fact with the shipment. More than 60 people were killed and more than 100 injured.
Pilot Douglas Corrigan earned the nickname “Wrong Way” by flying from New York to Ireland instead of his scheduled destination of Long Beach, California. (1938) Although he never publicly admitted that he made the “mistake” intentionally, there is some evidence that the erroneous flight may have been a planned “mistake”. Corrigan was a highly trained aviator and had previously been denied permission to fly to Ireland from New York nonstop, and had recently made modifications to his aircraft that would have prepared it for a transatlantic crossing.
The worst plane crash in Brazil’s history occurred, killing about 200 people. (2007) TAM Linhas Aereas Flight 3054 landed at São Paulo airport. The plane overshot the runway, crossed a major highway during rush hour, and struck a warehouse next to a gas station, causing an explosion. The crash is the deadliest in Latin America, and is the deadliest in the world for an Airbus A320.
He opened the first dental school in the United States. (1867) Harvard School of Dental Medicine opened in Boston, Massachusetts. It remains open today and is considered a small dental school: it has approximately 280 total students each year. It is also Harvard’s smallest school.
The cartoon character Spongebob Squarepants premiered on Nickelodeon. (1999) Created by a marine biologist and animator named Stephen Hillenburg, the cartoon gained popularity in its second season and continues that popularity to this day. It is the highest-rated show on the Nickelodeon television network.
12 people were killed in Scillium, North Africa, because they were Christians. (180) The execution marks the first recorded existence of Christianity in that region.

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