1929: The stock market sludges through a day of murky panic, as 2.4 million shares trade in the first half-hour, one of the heaviest openings yet on record. By lunchtime, the market has slumped 6% in disorderly trading. Then J.P. Morgan & Co. steps in publicly and begins to buy stocks for its own account. By day's end, the Dow manages to squeeze out a small gain, but the tickertape runs two hours late, and many sell orders go unfilled when they can't be matched with buy orders.

Barrie A. Wigmore, The Crash and Its Aftermath: A History of Securities Markets in the United States, 1929-1933 (Greenwood Press, Westport, CT and London, 1985), p. 23.

1920: If you think talking on your cellphone and driving at the same time is a modern marvel, on this day in 1920 it's reported that "it is now possible for a businessman to talk with his office?while touring in his automobile."