Johann Benjamin Frey (1882 - 1942)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during Johann's lifetime.

In 1882, in the year that Johann Benjamin Frey was born, on March 22nd, the Edmunds Act - passed by Congress - made polygamy a felony. The Act also banned "bigamous" relationships and "unlawful cohabitation", making it illegal for polygamists and those who simply lived together without marrying to vote, be on a jury, or hold a public office.

In 1892, he was just 10 years old when on August 4th, the father and stepmother of Lizzie Borden were found murdered. Lizzie was accused of the crime and on June 20th of the next year, she was acquitted of murder by a jury. But she was never acquitted in the public mind.

In 1904, at the age of 22 years old, Johann was alive when the "Teddy's Bear" was first produced. After seeing a political cartoon of President Teddy Roosevelt refusing to kill a clubbed and tied up bear, Jewish Russian immigrant Morris Michtom - who owned a candy shop and sold stuffed animals that he and his wife made at night at the store - made a "Teddy's Bear" and put it in his shop's window. The stuffed bears were an immediate success and Michtom and his wife went on to found the Ideal Novelty and Toy Co.

In 1934, at the age of 52 years old, Johann was alive when on July 22nd, gangster John Dillinger was killed in Chicago. His gang had robbed banks and police stations, among other charges, and he was being hunted by J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI - although many in the public saw him as a "Robin Hood". A madam from a brothel in which he was hiding became an informer for the FBI and, after a shootout with FBI agents, Dillinger was shot and died.

In 1942, in the year of Johann Benjamin Frey's passing, on June 17th, Roosevelt approved the Manhattan Project, which lead to the development of the first atomic bomb. With the support of Canada and the United Kingdom, the Project came to employ more than 130,000 people and cost nearly $2 billion. Julius Robert Oppenheimer, a nuclear physicist born in New York, led the Los Alamos Laboratory that developed the actual bomb. The first artificial nuclear explosion took place near Alamogordo New Mexico on July 16, 1945.