Wednesday’s History: October 14

Today is October 14, and on this date the sound barrier was broken, miners were rescued and the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded, according to history.com.

A coal mine near Wales consisted of two pits holding nearly 1,000 miners. In 1913 at 8:12AM, a explosion sent dust, debris and flames hundreds of feet in the air. After an hour, the flames were under control and rescuers were sent down.

They saw many dismembered bodies at first. Then throughout the day nearly 500 miners, many seriously injured, were rescued and more than 300 unaccounted for. The rescuers found 100 more bodies as they dug into the next day.

Mine officials sealed the mine, deeming it unsafe and left the remaining bodies.

Born in 1923, U.S. Air Force Capt. Chuck Yeager flew more than 60 missions over Europe during World War II.

Bell Aircraft Co., exploring supersonic flight, built the x-1 - "Glamorous Glennis" - rocket plane. After the war, Yeager was among many chosen volunteers to test fly it.

In 1947 over Rogers Dry Lake, Calif., Yeager in the pilot seat of the x-1, being lifted to 250,000 feet by a B-29 rocketed to 40,000 feet exceeding 662 mph, the sound barrier at that speed. It was not made public until 1948. In 1953, Yeager flew x-1A at 1,650 mph.

He retired with the rank of brigadier general in 1975.

In 2012 at the Roswell International Air Center, 43-year-old Austrian "Fearless Felix" Baumgartner was in a capsule that was lifted by a 550-foot-high helium balloon, which was made of 40 acres of ultra-thin plastic. He reached an altitude of nearly 128,000 feet -- 24-miles high -- and plunged to Earth in 9 minutes and 18 seconds. Of that, 4 minutes and 20 seconds was free falling about 120,000 feet. His top speed: 843 mph, or mach 1.25, breaking the sound barrier without protection or propulsion of a vehicle. At 8,400 feet above sea level, deploying the parachute, Baumgartner landed 2 hours and 47 minutes later.

Baumgartner also set a new record for highest altitude jump. Former Air Force Col. Joseph, the previous record holder, helped prepare Baumgartner for the jump coinciding with the Chuck Yeager's sound barrier flight 65th anniversary.

Martin Luther King Jr., born in 1929, received his doctorate degree of theology. King was influenced by Mohandas Gandhi to have nonviolent protest and his first organized protest was the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955. In 1963, King led the March on Washington where he delivered the "I Have a Dream" speech.

In 1964 at age 35, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He donated the $54,600 prize to the civil rights movement.

On April 4, 1968, King was assassinated in Memphis by escaped convict James Earl Ray weeks before the planned interracial "Poor People's March" on Washington.