Today in History, August 17th
On August 17, 1807, Robert Fulton's Clermont steamed up the Hudson. Plus Indonesia's independence and the first Atlantic balloon flight.
Published · Last updated
August 17 is best known for 1807, when Robert Fulton’s steamboat, later known as the Clermont, set off on its first trip up the Hudson River. The date also marks Indonesia’s declaration of independence in 1945 and the first balloon crossing of the Atlantic in 1978.
The big story: Fulton’s steamboat churns up the Hudson (1807)
On August 17, 1807, a long, narrow boat with two big paddle wheels pulled away from New York City and headed north against the Hudson River’s current. Its official name was the North River Steamboat of Clermont, though history remembers it simply as the Clermont. Robert Fulton designed it, Charles Brown built it, and Robert Livingston paid for it. Power came from an English Boulton and Watt engine turning paddle wheels 15 feet across. The trip to Albany covered about 150 miles at an average of close to 5 miles per hour. That is a brisk walk, not a race. Fulton did not invent the idea of a steamboat. What he built was the first one practical enough to make money. The Clermont soon carried paying passengers between New York and Albany in the first profitable steam navigation venture.
More events on August 17
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1862 | Facing hunger after crop failures and late government provisions, Dakota warriors attacked settlements along the Minnesota River, starting the six-week U.S.-Dakota War. |
| 1943 | George S. Patton’s U.S. 7th Army reached Messina hours ahead of Bernard Montgomery’s British 8th Army, effectively ending the Allied campaign for Sicily. |
| 1945 | Sukarno proclaimed Indonesia’s independence from the Netherlands. He later became the country’s first president. |
| 1945 | George Orwell’s Animal Farm, a satire of revolution gone sour, was published. |
| 1947 | The Radcliffe Line, the final border between India and Pakistan, was made public, two days after independence. |
| 1978 | Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman landed near Paris in Double Eagle II, completing the first balloon crossing of the Atlantic. |
| 1998 | Bill Clinton became the first sitting president to testify as the subject of a grand jury investigation. That evening he told the nation he had had an inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky. |
| 1999 | A magnitude 7.4 earthquake struck near İzmit in northwestern Turkey, killing more than 17,000 people. |
| 2008 | Michael Phelps won the 4×100-meter medley relay in Beijing, his eighth gold of the Games, topping Mark Spitz’s 1972 record of seven. |
Born on August 17
- 1887: Marcus Garvey, Black nationalist leader and founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, born in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica.
- 1893: Mae West, stage and screen star, born in Brooklyn, New York.
- 1932: V.S. Naipaul, Trinidad-born novelist and 2001 Nobel Prize in Literature winner.
Sources
- Clermont, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- On This Day: August 17, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- This Day in History: August 17, History.com
- U.S.-Dakota War begins in Minnesota, History.com
- General George S. Patton wins race to Messina, History.com
- Sukarno, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- President Clinton testifies before grand jury, History.com
- Izmit earthquake of 1999, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Michael Phelps, Biography.com
- Marcus Garvey, Encyclopaedia Britannica
