HISTORY MOMENTS

The Idaho State Historical Society reports that during this week in history:

On May 21, 1927, Charles Lindbergh became the first person to fly across the Atlantic—from New York to Paris—in his monoplane, The Spirit of St. Louis. The next day the following appeared in the Idaho Sunday Statesman:

“BORAH PAYS WARM TRIBUTE TO LINDBERGH by William E. Borah,

U.S. Senator from Idaho and Chairman, Senate Foreign Relations Committee

WASHINGTON: The spirit of American Youth incarnate—the spirit which charms and subdues to its purpose all things. That is what the feat of Charles Lindbergh means to me. Nothing could be more simple, sincere and courageous. It ought to lift every American boy into the atmosphere of the heroic—life is worthwhile.”

“Lady Bluebeard” Lyda Southland was arrested in Hawaii on May 19, 1921, and charged with the murder of her fourth husband. Lyda was convicted, sentenced to ten years, and entered the Idaho State Penitentiary just after her twenty-ninth birthday. She escaped, was captured and returned to prison in August 1932. Lyda was released on probation in 1941, and received a final pardon in 1942. She became known as “America’s First Female Serial Killer” after it was suspected that she had killed her first four husbands, a brother-in-law, and an infant daughter by boiling the arsenic from flypaper and poisoning them.

Mount St. Helens erupted on May 18, 1980 after being dormant for 123 years.

The May 21, 1931, Grace (Idaho) Herald, advertised the new Ford Roadster as “an unusual value at $430.”