On August 24, 1891 – Thomas Edison patents the motion picture camera.

1894 – Congress passed the first graduated income tax law, which was declared unconstitutional the next year. It imposed a 2% tax on incomes over $4000.

1909 – Workers started pouring concrete for Panama Canal.

1945 – The last Cadillac- built M-24 tank was produced on this day, ending the company’s World War II effort. Civilian auto production virtually ceased after the attack on Pearl Harbor, as the U.S. automotive industry turned to war production. Between 1940 and 1945, automotive firms made almost $29 billion worth of military materials, including jeeps, trucks, machine guns, carbines, tanks, helmets, and aerial bombs.

1949 – The North Atlantic Treaty went into effect.

1950 – The U.S. 2nd Infantry Division relieved the 24th Infantry Division on line along the Pusan Perimeter after weeks of continuous combat.

1969 – Company A of the Third Battalion, 196th Light Infantry Brigade refuses the order of its commander, Lieutenant Eugene Schurtz, Jr., to continue an attack that had been launched to reach a downed helicopter shot down in the Que Son valley, 30 miles south of Da Nang.

1970 – U.S. B52s carry out heavy bombing raids along the DMZ.

1987 – A military jury in Quantico, Va., sentenced Marine Sgt. Clayton Lonetree to 30 years in prison for disclosing U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union.

2002 – In the Canary Islands over a dozen beaked whales beached themselves following NATO exercises that involved a cluster of warships and submarines. 9 of the whales washed ashore dead and showed lesions in the brain and hearing system, consistent with acoustic impact.