Ridgefield Allies

Today in “Hidden” History is a daily listing of important but little-known events illustrating the range of innovators, contributors, or incidents excluded from formal history lessons or common knowledge. Hidden history is intended not as an exhaustive review, but merely as an illustration of how popular narratives "hide" many matters of fundamental importance. Bookmark this page and check daily to quickly expand your knowledge. Suggest entries for Today in “Hidden” History by clicking the Contact Us link. Entries for April 19:

Date	Type	Event
1775		African American minutemen assemble and fight in an integrated colonial militia (first integrated army in American history) on the front lines at Lexington and Concord (the opening skirmish of the Revolutionary War) to defend Boston against a threatened attack by His Majesty's regiments. Although the Continental Army tried to exclude African Americans at one time during the conflict, and some states raised all-Black units, free African Americans and slave militiamen served alongside of white militiamen in many battles from Bunker Hill to Yorktown. Learn more.
1885		Lucien-Leon Guillaume Lambert‘s 1882 Rossini Concours Prize-winning composition Prométhée enchaîné (Prometheus Bound) is performed for the first time by the Société des Concerts du Conservatoire in Paris. Guillaume Lambert was a child-prodigy pianist, composer, arranger, and music teacher. Born in 1858 in Vernouillet, France, a then-small village near Paris, he was the son of Charles Lucien Lambert, an American, and an unknown French mother. Guillaume Lambert and some other members of his family are part of what has been termed a “Creole Romantic” musical dynasty composed of musicians with ties to New Orleans (Louisiana), France, Portugal, the Antilles Islands in the West Indies, and Latin America. Learn more.
1887		Elijah McCoy patents the Lubricator Attachment for steam engine trains, greatly changing the locomotive industry by allowing trains to be oiled while in motion, saving the train industry the time and money previously expended to completely shut down engines for oil maintenance. McCoy patented 57 inventions, most associated with the locomotive industry, but also including a lawn sprinkler, ironing board, design for a rubber shoe heel, a buggy top support, and tread for tires. McCoy also established his own company (Elijah McCoy Manufacturing Company). Learn more.
1989		A white woman is brutally raped and beaten in New York City's Central Park. Police quickly arrest and over 12+ excruciating hours torturous badgering extract false confessions from and then charge five innocent teenage boys ranging 14-16 years of age with the brutal crime. The subsequent press spectacle and trial popularize the wholly fictional phenomenon of “wilding”, a false narrative of irredeemably feral African American super-predator youth prowling urban hell-scapes reaping destruction and misery in their wake. Law enforcement and use of the death penalty would be modified for the worse nationwide in response to this fiction. Their arrest triggered one of Donald Trump’s first forays into racism on the national stage when he took out full page ads in multiple national newspapers demanding reinstatement of the death penalty. Despite lack of any evidence beyond the duress-induced and subsequently recanted false confessions, the “Central Park Five” are convicted and sentenced to maximum security confinement. Thirteen years later DNA testing and another man’s voluntary confession prove the innocence of the “Central Park Five”, and their convictions are vacated. Learn more.