Today in History: May 19, West Virginia’s Matewan Massacre

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Today is Monday, May 19, the 139th day of 2025. There are 226 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On May 19, 1920, ten people were killed in a gun battle between coal miners, who were led by a local police chief, and a group of private security guards hired to evict them for joining a union in Matewan, West Virginia.

Also on this date:

In 1536, Anne Boleyn, the second wife of England’s King Henry VIII, was beheaded at the Tower of London after being convicted of adultery.

In 1883, William Cody held the first of his “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West” shows in Omaha, Nebraska.

In 1921, President Warren G. Harding signed the Emergency Quota Act, which established national quotas for immigrants.

In 1943, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met with President Franklin D. Roosevelt at the White House, where the two leaders agreed on May 1, 1944, as the date for the D-Day invasion of France (expansion plans for the invasion caused the date of the landing to be delayed by a month).

In 1962, film star Marilyn Monroe sang “Happy Birthday to You” to President John F. Kennedy during a Democratic fundraiser at New York’s Madison Square Garden.

In 2018, Britain’s Prince Harry wed American actor Meghan Markle in St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.

Today’s Birthdays: TV personality David Hartman is 90. Musician-composer Pete Townshend (The Who) is 80. Singer-actor Grace Jones is 77. Former racing driver Dario Franchitti is 52. Basketball Hall of Famer Kevin Garnett is 49. Country musician-producer Shooter Jennings is 46. Comedian-actor Michael Che is 42. Singer Sam Smith is 33. Media personality-singer JoJo Siwa is 22.