On this day in the Sunshine State ...

1821 Pensacola’s First United Methodist Church was established as a Methodist mission in this Panhandle city.


1918 Sidney J. Catts, Florida’s only Prohibition governor, called the Legislature into session to ratify the amendment to the U.S. Constitution that prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages.


1969 Testimony continued today in the murder trial of Miami native, Lieutenant William Calley, who was charged with killing Vietnamese  civilians at Mylai, in Songmy Province, South Vietnam, on March 16, 1968.


1972 Apollo 17 was successfully launched from Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center.  This was the last manned moon shot in the NASA moon series.  Eugene A. Cernan and Harrison H. Schmitt land on the moon’s surface, while Ronald E. Evans remained in the command ship.  The astronauts spent a total of 75 hours on the lunar surface, and, in addition to collecting specimens, left a permanent plaque, signed by President Richard M. Nixon and the astronauts, on the part of their space ship that remained behind.