3 Dates From History Are Etched in My Brain. What Are Yours?

What dates are ingrained in your brain?

For me, at this age, and stage, there are 3 dates — and by dates I mean, month, day, year, that are stuck in my head forever — from lived history and from history books. 

• One is September, 11, 2001. Forever known as 9/11.

• Another is November 22, 1963, the date JFK was assassinated. I was not alive, but I know it’s day of mourning for the country.

• And the last one is December 7, 1941. Pearl Harbor. (It will be 84 years this weekend)

  
  

There are others of course, like July 4, 1776, but I don’t count that. That’s a holiday. And October 29, 1929, Black Tuesday, start of the Great Depression. But for me, those three I listed stand out. The Space Shuttle Challenger explosion I know happened in 1986, but the exact date (January 28) has never stuck with me.

On December 6, 1941, a war was raging in Europe mostly between Great Britain and Germany. But the United States was observing from the sidelines. We were not officially at war. But we were preparing for war. We had begun furiously building President Roosevelt’s Arsenal of Democracy. And, lesser known, we were also building giant 441-foot long steel cargo ships to carry FDR’s tanks, jeeps, munitions, medical supplies, dry goods, and more, to our troops around the world. Those ships were being called America’s Liberty Fleet, individually the Liberty ships. 

The first ship was called the SS Patrick Henry, and it launched on September 27, 1941, as part of Liberty Fleet Day, when America launched 14 ships around the country. When Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, America had only built two — 2!!!! — Liberty ships. In 1942, America built 542! It was a remarkable achievement and the beginning of the greatest shipbuilding effort in history. The United States built 2,710 Liberty ships in three years.

The story of the men and women who built these ships is an under-appreciated story of American history that I aimed to uncover in Launching Liberty: The Epic Race to Build the Ships That Took America to War. It published in late August 2025 and is available on Amazon and local bookstores can get it for you, and I will send you a personalized book plate and bookmark if you buy it. (A great gift for the holidays for history buffs!)

Email me at dougsmost@gmail.com. And tell me what dates are stuck in your head.