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Today In History
- Thread starter The Captain
- Start date
1777 - France recognized American independence.
1791 - A traffic regulation in New York City established the first street to go "One Way."
1830 - South American patriot Simon Bolivar died in Colombia.
1895 - George L. Brownell received a patent for his paper-twine machine.
1903 - The first successful gasoline-powered airplane flight took place near Kitty Hawk, NC. Orville and Wilbur Wright made the flight.
1925 - Col. William "Billy" Mitchell was convicted of insubordination at his court-martial.
1936 - The "The Rudy Vallee Show" debuted on NBC.
1939 - The German pocket battleship Graf Spee was scuttled by its crew, bringing the World War II Battle of the Rio de la Plata off Uruguay to an end.
1944 - The U.S. Army announced the end of its policy of excluding Japanese-Americans from the West Coast which ensured that Japanese-Americans were released from detention camps.
1953 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decided to approve RCA’s color television specifications.
1957 - The United States successfully test-fired the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile for the first time.
1959 - The film "On the Beach" premiered in New York City and in 17 other cities. It was the first motion picture to debut simultaneously in major cities around the world.
1969 - The U.S. Air Force closed its Project "Blue Book" by concluding that there was no evidence of extraterrestrial spaceships behind thousands of UFO sightings.
1969 - Television history was made when Tiny Tim and Miss Vicki Budinger were married on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson.
1973 - Thirty-one people were killed at Rome airport when Arab guerillas hijacked a German airliner.
1975 - Lynette Fromme was sentenced to life in prison for her attempt on the life of U.S. President Ford.
1976 - WTCG-TV, Atlanta, GA, changed its call letters to WTBS, and was uplinked via satellite. The station became the first commercial TV station to cover the entire U.S.
1978 - OPEC decided to raise oil prices by 14.5% by the end of 1979.
1979 - Arthur McDuffie, a black insurance executive, was fatally beaten after a police chase in Miami, FL. Four white police officers were later acquitted of charges stemming from McDuffie's death.
1986 - Wayne "Danke Schoen" Newton won a $19.2 million suit against NBC News. NBC had aired reports claiming a link between Newton and mob figures. The reports were proven to be false.
1986 - Davina Thompson became the world's first recipient of a heart, lungs, and liver transplant.
1986 - Eugene Hasefus was pardoned and then released by Nicaragua. He had been convicted of running guns to the Contras.
1992 - U.S. President Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari signed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
1992 - Israel deported over 400 Palestinians to Lebanese territory in an unprecedented mass expulsion of suspected militants.
1996 - Peruvian guerrillas took hundreds of people hostage at the Japanese embassy in Lima. The siege ended on April 22, 1997, with a commando raid that resulted in the deaths of all the rebels, two commandos and one hostage.
1996 - The Red Cross pulled all but a few of its western staff out of Chechnya after six foreign aid workers were killed by masked gunmen.
1997 - U.S. President Clinton signed the No Electronic Theft Act. The act removed protection from individuals who claimed that they took no direct financial gains from stealing copyrighted works and downloading them from the Internet.
1998 - U.S. House Speaker-designate Bob Livingston admitted he'd had extramarital affairs.
2000 - Terrell Owens (San Francisco 49ers) caught an NFL-record 20 passes for 283 yards and a touchdown against the Chicago Bears. The previous record was held by Tom Fears (Los Angeles Rams) with 18 catches on December 3, 1950, against the Green Bay Packers. Owens also broke Jerry Rice's franchise record of 16 receptions set in 1994 against the Los Angeles Rams.
2002 - U.S. President George W. Bush ordered the Pentagon to have ready for use within two years a system for protecting American territory, troops and allies from ballistic missile attacks.
2002 - McDonald's Corp. warned that they would report its first quarterly loss in its 47-year history.
2002 - The insurance and finance company Conseco Inc. filed for Chapter 11 protection. It was the third-largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.
2002 - Congo's government, opposition parties and rebels signed a peace agreement that ended four years of civil war.
2004 - U.S. President George W. Bush signed into law the largest overhaul of U.S. intelligence gathering in 50 years. The bill aimed to tighten borders and aviation security. It also created a federal counterterrorism center and a new intelligence director.
Current Birthdays
Chase Utley turns 30 years old today.
79 William Safire
Newspaper columnist
78 Bob Guccione
Magazine publisher ("Penthouse")
78 Armin Mueller-Stahl
Actor
73 George Lindsey
Actor
72 Tommy Steele
Singer, actor
71 Art Neville
Rock musician, singer (The Neville Brothers)
64 Bernard Hill
Actor
63 Christopher Cazenove
Actor
63 Ernie Hudson
Actor
62 Eugene Levy
Actor ("American Pie" movies, "SCTV")
61 Wes Studi
Actor
60 Jim Bonfanti
Rock musician (The Raspberries)
59 Paul Rodgers
Rock singer (Bad Company)
57 Wanda Hutchinson
R&B singer (The Emotions)
55 Barry Livingston
Actor ("My Three Sons")
55 Bill Pullman
Actor
55 Sharon White
Country singer
52 Peter Farrelly
Director, producer
50 Mike Mills
Rock musician (R.E.M.)
47 Sarah Dallin
Singer (Bananarama)
46 Tim Chewning
Country musician
42 Tracy Byrd
Country singer
42 Duane Propes
Country musician
38 DJ Homicide
DJ (Sugar Ray)
38 Sean Patrick Thomas
Actor
35 Eddie Fisher
Rock musician (OneRepublic)
34 Sarah Paulson
Actress
34 Giovanni Ribisi
Actor
34 Marissa Ribisi
Actress
33 Milla Jovovich
Actress
33 Bree Sharp
Rock singer
29 Jennifer Carpenter
Actress
22 Vanessa Zima
Actress
Historic Birthdays
Arthur Fiedler
12/17/1894 - 7/10/1979
American conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra
87 Sir Roger L'Estrange
12/17/1616 - 12/11/1704
English journalist and pamphleteer
51 Domenico Cimarosa
12/17/1749 - 1/11/1801
Italian composer
80 Joseph Henry
12/17/1797 - 5/13/1878
American scientist
84 John Greenleaf Whittier
12/17/1807 - 9/7/1892
American poet and abolitionist
65 Ford Madox Ford
12/17/1873 - 6/26/1939
English novelist and editor
75 Mackenzie King
12/17/1874 - 7/22/1950
Canadian prime minister (1921-26, 1926-30, 1935-48)
60 Edwin Cohn
12/17/1892 - 10/1/1953
American biochemist
83 Erskine Caldwell
12/17/1903 - 4/11/1987
American author
1791 - A traffic regulation in New York City established the first street to go "One Way."
1830 - South American patriot Simon Bolivar died in Colombia.
1895 - George L. Brownell received a patent for his paper-twine machine.
1903 - The first successful gasoline-powered airplane flight took place near Kitty Hawk, NC. Orville and Wilbur Wright made the flight.
1925 - Col. William "Billy" Mitchell was convicted of insubordination at his court-martial.
1936 - The "The Rudy Vallee Show" debuted on NBC.
1939 - The German pocket battleship Graf Spee was scuttled by its crew, bringing the World War II Battle of the Rio de la Plata off Uruguay to an end.
1944 - The U.S. Army announced the end of its policy of excluding Japanese-Americans from the West Coast which ensured that Japanese-Americans were released from detention camps.
1953 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decided to approve RCA’s color television specifications.
1957 - The United States successfully test-fired the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile for the first time.
1959 - The film "On the Beach" premiered in New York City and in 17 other cities. It was the first motion picture to debut simultaneously in major cities around the world.
1969 - The U.S. Air Force closed its Project "Blue Book" by concluding that there was no evidence of extraterrestrial spaceships behind thousands of UFO sightings.
1969 - Television history was made when Tiny Tim and Miss Vicki Budinger were married on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson.
1973 - Thirty-one people were killed at Rome airport when Arab guerillas hijacked a German airliner.
1975 - Lynette Fromme was sentenced to life in prison for her attempt on the life of U.S. President Ford.
1976 - WTCG-TV, Atlanta, GA, changed its call letters to WTBS, and was uplinked via satellite. The station became the first commercial TV station to cover the entire U.S.
1978 - OPEC decided to raise oil prices by 14.5% by the end of 1979.
1979 - Arthur McDuffie, a black insurance executive, was fatally beaten after a police chase in Miami, FL. Four white police officers were later acquitted of charges stemming from McDuffie's death.
1986 - Wayne "Danke Schoen" Newton won a $19.2 million suit against NBC News. NBC had aired reports claiming a link between Newton and mob figures. The reports were proven to be false.
1986 - Davina Thompson became the world's first recipient of a heart, lungs, and liver transplant.
1986 - Eugene Hasefus was pardoned and then released by Nicaragua. He had been convicted of running guns to the Contras.
1992 - U.S. President Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari signed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
1992 - Israel deported over 400 Palestinians to Lebanese territory in an unprecedented mass expulsion of suspected militants.
1996 - Peruvian guerrillas took hundreds of people hostage at the Japanese embassy in Lima. The siege ended on April 22, 1997, with a commando raid that resulted in the deaths of all the rebels, two commandos and one hostage.
1996 - The Red Cross pulled all but a few of its western staff out of Chechnya after six foreign aid workers were killed by masked gunmen.
1997 - U.S. President Clinton signed the No Electronic Theft Act. The act removed protection from individuals who claimed that they took no direct financial gains from stealing copyrighted works and downloading them from the Internet.
1998 - U.S. House Speaker-designate Bob Livingston admitted he'd had extramarital affairs.
2000 - Terrell Owens (San Francisco 49ers) caught an NFL-record 20 passes for 283 yards and a touchdown against the Chicago Bears. The previous record was held by Tom Fears (Los Angeles Rams) with 18 catches on December 3, 1950, against the Green Bay Packers. Owens also broke Jerry Rice's franchise record of 16 receptions set in 1994 against the Los Angeles Rams.
2002 - U.S. President George W. Bush ordered the Pentagon to have ready for use within two years a system for protecting American territory, troops and allies from ballistic missile attacks.
2002 - McDonald's Corp. warned that they would report its first quarterly loss in its 47-year history.
2002 - The insurance and finance company Conseco Inc. filed for Chapter 11 protection. It was the third-largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.
2002 - Congo's government, opposition parties and rebels signed a peace agreement that ended four years of civil war.
2004 - U.S. President George W. Bush signed into law the largest overhaul of U.S. intelligence gathering in 50 years. The bill aimed to tighten borders and aviation security. It also created a federal counterterrorism center and a new intelligence director.
Current Birthdays
Chase Utley turns 30 years old today.
79 William Safire
Newspaper columnist
78 Bob Guccione
Magazine publisher ("Penthouse")
78 Armin Mueller-Stahl
Actor
73 George Lindsey
Actor
72 Tommy Steele
Singer, actor
71 Art Neville
Rock musician, singer (The Neville Brothers)
64 Bernard Hill
Actor
63 Christopher Cazenove
Actor
63 Ernie Hudson
Actor
62 Eugene Levy
Actor ("American Pie" movies, "SCTV")
61 Wes Studi
Actor
60 Jim Bonfanti
Rock musician (The Raspberries)
59 Paul Rodgers
Rock singer (Bad Company)
57 Wanda Hutchinson
R&B singer (The Emotions)
55 Barry Livingston
Actor ("My Three Sons")
55 Bill Pullman
Actor
55 Sharon White
Country singer
52 Peter Farrelly
Director, producer
50 Mike Mills
Rock musician (R.E.M.)
47 Sarah Dallin
Singer (Bananarama)
46 Tim Chewning
Country musician
42 Tracy Byrd
Country singer
42 Duane Propes
Country musician
38 DJ Homicide
DJ (Sugar Ray)
38 Sean Patrick Thomas
Actor
35 Eddie Fisher
Rock musician (OneRepublic)
34 Sarah Paulson
Actress
34 Giovanni Ribisi
Actor
34 Marissa Ribisi
Actress
33 Milla Jovovich
Actress
33 Bree Sharp
Rock singer
29 Jennifer Carpenter
Actress
22 Vanessa Zima
Actress
Historic Birthdays
Arthur Fiedler
12/17/1894 - 7/10/1979
American conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra
87 Sir Roger L'Estrange
12/17/1616 - 12/11/1704
English journalist and pamphleteer
51 Domenico Cimarosa
12/17/1749 - 1/11/1801
Italian composer
80 Joseph Henry
12/17/1797 - 5/13/1878
American scientist
84 John Greenleaf Whittier
12/17/1807 - 9/7/1892
American poet and abolitionist
65 Ford Madox Ford
12/17/1873 - 6/26/1939
English novelist and editor
75 Mackenzie King
12/17/1874 - 7/22/1950
Canadian prime minister (1921-26, 1926-30, 1935-48)
60 Edwin Cohn
12/17/1892 - 10/1/1953
American biochemist
83 Erskine Caldwell
12/17/1903 - 4/11/1987
American author
1787 - New Jersey became the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
1796 - The "Monitor," of Baltimore, MD, was published as the first Sunday newspaper.
1862 - The first orthopedic hospital was organized in New York City. It was called the Hospital for Ruptured and Crippled.
1865 - Slavery was abolished in the United States with the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution being ratified.
1898 - A new automobile speed record was set at 39 mph (63 kph).
1903 - The Panama Canal Zone was acquired 'in perpetuity' by the U.S. for an annual rent.
1912 - The U.S. Congress prohibited the immigration of illiterate persons.
1912 - The discovery of the Piltdown Man in East Sussex was announced. It was proved to be a hoax in 1953.
1915 - U.S. President Wilson, widowed the year before, married Edith Bolling Galt at her Washington home.
1916 - During World War I, after 10 months of fighting the French defeated the Germans in the Battle of Verdun.
1917 - The Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed by the U.S. Congress.
1935 - A $1 silver certificate was issued for the first time in the U.S.
1936 - Su-Lin, the first giant panda to come to the U.S. from China, arrived in San Francisco, CA. The bear was sold to the Brookfield Zoo for $8,750.
1940 - Adolf Hitler signed a secret directive ordering preparations for a Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. Operation "Barbarossa" was launched in June 1941.
1944 - The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the wartime relocation of Japanese-Americans, but also stated that undeniably loyal Americans of Japanese ancestry could not be detained.
1950 - NATO foreign ministers approved plans to defend Western Europe, including the use of nuclear weapons, if necessary.
1953 - WPTZ, in Philadelphia, PA, presented a Felso commercial, it was the first color telecast seen on a local station.
1956 - "To Tell the Truth" debuted on CBS-TV.
1956 - Japan was admitted to the United Nations.
1957 - The Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania went online. It was the first nuclear facility to generate electricity in the United States. It was taken out of service in 1982.
1963 - Ron Clarke set a world record when he ran six miles in 28 minutes and 15.6 seconds.
1965 - Kenneth LeBel jumped 17 barrels on ice skates.
1969 - Britain's Parliament abolished the death penalty for murder.
1970 - Divorce became legal in Italy.
1972 - The United States began the heaviest bombing of North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The attack ended 12 days later.
1973 - The IRA launched its Christmas bombing campaign in London.
1979 - The sound barrier was broken on land for the first time by Stanley Barrett when he drove at 739.6 mph.
1983 - Wayne Gretzky (Edmonton Oilers) scored his 100th point in the 34th game of the season.
1984 - Christopher Guest and Jamie Lee Curtis were married.
1987 - Ivan F. Boesky was sentenced to three years in prison for plotting Wall Street's biggest insider-trading scandal. He only served about two years of the sentence.
1996 - Despite a U.N. truce, factional fighting in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, broke out in which at least 300 fighters and civilians were killed.
1998 - The U.S. House of Representatives began the debate on the four articles of impeachment concerning U.S. President Bill Clinton. It was only the second time in U.S. history that process had begun.
1998 - Russia recalled its U.S. ambassador in protest of the U.S. attacks on Iraq.
1998 - South Carolina proceeded with the U.S.' 500th execution since capital punishment was restored.
1999 - After living atop an ancient redwood in Humboldt County, CA, for two years, environmental activist Julia "Butterfly" Hill came down, ending her anti-logging protest.
2001 - Mark Oliver Gebel, a Ringling Bros. Circus star, went on trial for animal abuse. The charges stemmed from an incident with an elephant that was marching too slowly into a circus performance on August 25, 2001. He was acquitted on December 21, 2001.
2001 - A fire damaged New York City's St. John Cathedral. The cathedral is the largest in the United States.
2001 - In Seattle, WA, Gary Leon Ridgeway pled innocent to the charge of murder for four of the Green River serial killings. He had been arrested on November 30, 2001.
2002 - Nine competing designs for the World Trade Center site were unveiled. The Lower Manhattan Development Corp. expected to choose a design by January 31, 2003.
2003 - Adam Rich was arrested for driving onto a closed section of Interstate 10 and nearly struck a California Highway Patrol car.
Current Birthdays
Keith Richards turns 65 years old today.
90 Hal Kanter
TV writer, producer
81 Ramsey Clark
Former U.S. attorney general
76 Roger Smith
Actor
75 Lonnie Brooks
Blues musician
65 Alan Rudolph
Writer, director
62 Steven Spielberg
Director, producer
61 Rod Piazza
Blues musician
58 Gillian Armstrong
Director
58 Leonard Maltin
Movie critic
55 Elliot Easton
Rock musician (The Cars)
53 Ray Liotta
Actor
52 Ron White
Comedian
45 Brad Pitt
Actor
40 Rachel Griffiths
Actress
40 Alejandro Sanz
Singer
38 Cowboy Troy
Country singer, rapper ("Nashville Star")
38 DMX
Rapper
37 Arantxa Sanchez Vicario
Tennis Hall of Famer
36 DJ Lethal
DJ (Limp Bizkit)
30 Katie Holmes
Actress
Historic Birthdays
Robert Moses
12/18/1888 - 7/29/1981
American public works planner; supervised construction of Lincoln Center and Shea Stadium
83 Sir J. J. Thompson
12/18/1856 - 8/30/1940
English physicist
50 Francis Ferdinand
12/18/1863 - 6/28/1914
Austrian archduke
60 Paul Klee
12/18/1879 - 6/29/1940
Swiss painter
74 Ty Cobb
12/18/1886 - 7/17/1961
American baseball player
82 Dame Gladys Cooper
12/18/1888 - 11/17/1971
English actress
70 George Stevens
12/18/1904 - 3/8/1975
American film director
78 Willy Brandt
12/18/1913 - 10/8,9/1992
German statesman
56 Betty Grable
12/18/1916 - 7/2/1973
American actress
1796 - The "Monitor," of Baltimore, MD, was published as the first Sunday newspaper.
1862 - The first orthopedic hospital was organized in New York City. It was called the Hospital for Ruptured and Crippled.
1865 - Slavery was abolished in the United States with the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution being ratified.
1898 - A new automobile speed record was set at 39 mph (63 kph).
1903 - The Panama Canal Zone was acquired 'in perpetuity' by the U.S. for an annual rent.
1912 - The U.S. Congress prohibited the immigration of illiterate persons.
1912 - The discovery of the Piltdown Man in East Sussex was announced. It was proved to be a hoax in 1953.
1915 - U.S. President Wilson, widowed the year before, married Edith Bolling Galt at her Washington home.
1916 - During World War I, after 10 months of fighting the French defeated the Germans in the Battle of Verdun.
1917 - The Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed by the U.S. Congress.
1935 - A $1 silver certificate was issued for the first time in the U.S.
1936 - Su-Lin, the first giant panda to come to the U.S. from China, arrived in San Francisco, CA. The bear was sold to the Brookfield Zoo for $8,750.
1940 - Adolf Hitler signed a secret directive ordering preparations for a Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. Operation "Barbarossa" was launched in June 1941.
1944 - The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the wartime relocation of Japanese-Americans, but also stated that undeniably loyal Americans of Japanese ancestry could not be detained.
1950 - NATO foreign ministers approved plans to defend Western Europe, including the use of nuclear weapons, if necessary.
1953 - WPTZ, in Philadelphia, PA, presented a Felso commercial, it was the first color telecast seen on a local station.
1956 - "To Tell the Truth" debuted on CBS-TV.
1956 - Japan was admitted to the United Nations.
1957 - The Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania went online. It was the first nuclear facility to generate electricity in the United States. It was taken out of service in 1982.
1963 - Ron Clarke set a world record when he ran six miles in 28 minutes and 15.6 seconds.
1965 - Kenneth LeBel jumped 17 barrels on ice skates.
1969 - Britain's Parliament abolished the death penalty for murder.
1970 - Divorce became legal in Italy.
1972 - The United States began the heaviest bombing of North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. The attack ended 12 days later.
1973 - The IRA launched its Christmas bombing campaign in London.
1979 - The sound barrier was broken on land for the first time by Stanley Barrett when he drove at 739.6 mph.
1983 - Wayne Gretzky (Edmonton Oilers) scored his 100th point in the 34th game of the season.
1984 - Christopher Guest and Jamie Lee Curtis were married.
1987 - Ivan F. Boesky was sentenced to three years in prison for plotting Wall Street's biggest insider-trading scandal. He only served about two years of the sentence.
1996 - Despite a U.N. truce, factional fighting in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, broke out in which at least 300 fighters and civilians were killed.
1998 - The U.S. House of Representatives began the debate on the four articles of impeachment concerning U.S. President Bill Clinton. It was only the second time in U.S. history that process had begun.
1998 - Russia recalled its U.S. ambassador in protest of the U.S. attacks on Iraq.
1998 - South Carolina proceeded with the U.S.' 500th execution since capital punishment was restored.
1999 - After living atop an ancient redwood in Humboldt County, CA, for two years, environmental activist Julia "Butterfly" Hill came down, ending her anti-logging protest.
2001 - Mark Oliver Gebel, a Ringling Bros. Circus star, went on trial for animal abuse. The charges stemmed from an incident with an elephant that was marching too slowly into a circus performance on August 25, 2001. He was acquitted on December 21, 2001.
2001 - A fire damaged New York City's St. John Cathedral. The cathedral is the largest in the United States.
2001 - In Seattle, WA, Gary Leon Ridgeway pled innocent to the charge of murder for four of the Green River serial killings. He had been arrested on November 30, 2001.
2002 - Nine competing designs for the World Trade Center site were unveiled. The Lower Manhattan Development Corp. expected to choose a design by January 31, 2003.
2003 - Adam Rich was arrested for driving onto a closed section of Interstate 10 and nearly struck a California Highway Patrol car.
Current Birthdays
Keith Richards turns 65 years old today.
90 Hal Kanter
TV writer, producer
81 Ramsey Clark
Former U.S. attorney general
76 Roger Smith
Actor
75 Lonnie Brooks
Blues musician
65 Alan Rudolph
Writer, director
62 Steven Spielberg
Director, producer
61 Rod Piazza
Blues musician
58 Gillian Armstrong
Director
58 Leonard Maltin
Movie critic
55 Elliot Easton
Rock musician (The Cars)
53 Ray Liotta
Actor
52 Ron White
Comedian
45 Brad Pitt
Actor
40 Rachel Griffiths
Actress
40 Alejandro Sanz
Singer
38 Cowboy Troy
Country singer, rapper ("Nashville Star")
38 DMX
Rapper
37 Arantxa Sanchez Vicario
Tennis Hall of Famer
36 DJ Lethal
DJ (Limp Bizkit)
30 Katie Holmes
Actress
Historic Birthdays
Robert Moses
12/18/1888 - 7/29/1981
American public works planner; supervised construction of Lincoln Center and Shea Stadium
83 Sir J. J. Thompson
12/18/1856 - 8/30/1940
English physicist
50 Francis Ferdinand
12/18/1863 - 6/28/1914
Austrian archduke
60 Paul Klee
12/18/1879 - 6/29/1940
Swiss painter
74 Ty Cobb
12/18/1886 - 7/17/1961
American baseball player
82 Dame Gladys Cooper
12/18/1888 - 11/17/1971
English actress
70 George Stevens
12/18/1904 - 3/8/1975
American film director
78 Willy Brandt
12/18/1913 - 10/8,9/1992
German statesman
56 Betty Grable
12/18/1916 - 7/2/1973
American actress
1979 - The sound barrier was broken on land for the first time by Stanley Barrett when he drove at 739.6 mph.
I thought Andy Green was the first supersonic pass on October 15, 1997 in Thrust SSC at Black Rock Desert recorded at 760.34 MPH.
The USAF who timed Barrett would not give official ratification to the time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budweiser_Rocket
I thought Andy Green was the first supersonic pass on October 15, 1997 in Thrust SSC at Black Rock Desert recorded at 760.34 MPH.
The USAF who timed Barrett would not give official ratification to the time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budweiser_Rocket
1154 - Henry II became King of England.
1562 - The Battle of Dreux was fought between the Huguenots and the Catholics, beginning the French Wars of Religion.
1732 - Benjamin Franklin began publishing "Poor Richard's Almanac."
1776 - Thomas Paine published his first "American Crisis" essay.
1777 - General George Washington led his army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, PA, to camp for the winter.
1842 - Hawaii's independence was recognized by the U.S.
1843 - Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" was first published in England.
1871 - Corrugated paper was patented by Albert L. Jones.
1887 - Jake Kilrain and Jim Smith fought in a bare knuckles fight which lasted 106 rounds and 2 hours and 30 minutes. The fight was ruled a draw and was halted due to darkness.
1903 - The Williamsburg Bridge opened in New York City. It opened as the largest suspension bridge on Earth and remained the largest until 1924. It was also the first major suspension bridge to use steel towers to support the main cable.
1907 - A coalmine explosion in Jacobs Creek, PA, killed 239 workers.
1917 - The first games of the new National Hockey League (NHL) were played. Five teams made up the league: Toronto Arenas, Ottawa Senators, Quebec Bulldogs, the Montreal Canadiens and the Montreal Wanderers.
1918 - Robert Ripley began his "Believe It or Not" column in "The New York Globe".
1932 - The British Broadcasting Corp. began transmitting overseas with its "Empire Service" to Australia.
1957 - Meredith Wilson’s "The Music Man" opened at the Majestic Theatre in New York City. It ran for 1,375 shows.
1957 - Air service between London and Moscow was inaugurated.
1959 - Penn State’s Nittany Lions beat Alabama, 7-0, in the first Liberty Bowl football game.
1959 - Walter Williams died in Houston, TX, at the age of 117. He was said to be the last surviving veteran of the U.S. Civil War.
1961 - "Judgment At Nuremberg" opened in New York City.
1972 - Apollo 17 splashed down in the Pacific, ending the Apollo program of manned lunar landings.
1973 - Johnny Carson started a fake toilet-paper scare on the "Tonight Show."
1978 - Indira Gandhi was expelled from the Lok Sabha for contempt and imprisoned.
1979 - ESPN televised its first NHL game. The teams were the Washington Capitals and the Hartford Whales.
1984 - Wayne Gretsky, 23, of the Edmonton Oilers, became only the 18th player in the National Hockey League (NHL) to score more than 1,000 points.
1984 - Ted Hughes was appointed England's poet laureate.
1984 - Britain and China signed an accord returning Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997.
1985 - Jan Stenerud announced his retirement from the NFL. The football kicker held the record for the most career field goals with 373.
1985 - ABC Sports announced that it was severing ties with Howard Cosell and released ‘The Mouth’ from all TV commitments. Cosell continued on ABC Radio for another five years.
1986 - The Soviet Union announced it had freed dissident Andrei Sakharov from internal exile, and pardoned his wife, Yelena Bonner.
1989 - U.S. troops invaded Panama to overthrow the regime of General Noriega.
1990 - Bo Jackson (Los Angeles Raiders) became the first athlete to be chosen for All Star Games in two sports.
1996 - The school board of Oakland, CA, voted to recognize Black English, also known as "ebonics." The board later reversed its stance.
1997 - "Titanic" opened in American movie theaters.
1998 - U.S. President Bill Clinton was impeached on two charges of perjury and obstruction of justice by the U.S. House of Representatives.
1998 - A four-day bombing of Iraq by British and American forces ended.
2000 - The U.N. Security Council voted to impose sanctions on Afghanistan's Taliban rulers unless they closed all terrorist training camps and surrender U.S. embassy bombing suspect Osama bin Laden.
2003 - Images for the new design for the Freedom Tower at the World Trade Center site were released. The building slopes into a spire that reaches 1,776 feet.
Current Birthdays
Cicely Tyson turns 75 years old today
88 Little Jimmy Dickens
Country singer
83 Robert Sherman
Composer
67 Maurice White
R&B musician (Earth, Wind and Fire)
64 Richard E. Leakey
Palaeontologist
64 Alvin Lee
Rock singer (Ten Years After)
64 Tim Reid
Actor ("WKRP in Cincinnati")
63 Elaine Joyce
Actress
63 John McEuen
Country musician (The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
61 Janie Fricke
Country singer
53 Rob Portman
Former White House budget director
51 Kevin McHale
Basketball Hall of Famer
48 Mike Lookinland
Actor ("The Brady Bunch")
45 Jennifer Beals
Actress
44 Scott Cohen
Actor
42 Robert MacNaughton
Actor
41 Criss Angel
Magician
40 Kevin Shepard
Rock musician
39 Kristy Swanson
Actress
37 Amy Locane
Actress
36 Rosa Blasi
Actress
36 Alyssa Milano
Actress ("Charmed," "Who's the Boss?")
36 Warren Sapp
Football player
34 Jake Plummer
Football player
28 Jake Gyllenhaal
Actor
28 Marla Sokoloff
Actress
23 Lady Sovereign
Rapper
Historic Birthdays
Leonid Brezhnev
12/19/1906 - 11/10/1982
Russian statesman
80 Charles-Julien Brianchon
12/19/1783 - 4/29/1864
French mathematician
55 Edwin Stanton
12/19/1814 - 12/24/1869
American Secretary of War under President Lincoln
78 A.A. Michelson
12/19/1852 - 5/9/1931
German-born American physicist
83 Barry Byrne
12/19/1883 - 12/17/1967
American architect
74 Fritz Reiner
12/19/1888 - 11/15/1963
Hungarian-born American conductor
80 Sir Ralph Richardson
12/19/1902 - 10/10/1983
English actor
92 George Davis Snell
12/19/1903 - 6/6/1996
American geneticist and Nobel Prize winner
75 Jean Genet
12/19/1910 - 4/15/1986
French novelist
47 Edith Piaf
12/19/1915 - 10/11/1963
French singer and actress
1562 - The Battle of Dreux was fought between the Huguenots and the Catholics, beginning the French Wars of Religion.
1732 - Benjamin Franklin began publishing "Poor Richard's Almanac."
1776 - Thomas Paine published his first "American Crisis" essay.
1777 - General George Washington led his army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, PA, to camp for the winter.
1842 - Hawaii's independence was recognized by the U.S.
1843 - Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" was first published in England.
1871 - Corrugated paper was patented by Albert L. Jones.
1887 - Jake Kilrain and Jim Smith fought in a bare knuckles fight which lasted 106 rounds and 2 hours and 30 minutes. The fight was ruled a draw and was halted due to darkness.
1903 - The Williamsburg Bridge opened in New York City. It opened as the largest suspension bridge on Earth and remained the largest until 1924. It was also the first major suspension bridge to use steel towers to support the main cable.
1907 - A coalmine explosion in Jacobs Creek, PA, killed 239 workers.
1917 - The first games of the new National Hockey League (NHL) were played. Five teams made up the league: Toronto Arenas, Ottawa Senators, Quebec Bulldogs, the Montreal Canadiens and the Montreal Wanderers.
1918 - Robert Ripley began his "Believe It or Not" column in "The New York Globe".
1932 - The British Broadcasting Corp. began transmitting overseas with its "Empire Service" to Australia.
1957 - Meredith Wilson’s "The Music Man" opened at the Majestic Theatre in New York City. It ran for 1,375 shows.
1957 - Air service between London and Moscow was inaugurated.
1959 - Penn State’s Nittany Lions beat Alabama, 7-0, in the first Liberty Bowl football game.
1959 - Walter Williams died in Houston, TX, at the age of 117. He was said to be the last surviving veteran of the U.S. Civil War.
1961 - "Judgment At Nuremberg" opened in New York City.
1972 - Apollo 17 splashed down in the Pacific, ending the Apollo program of manned lunar landings.
1973 - Johnny Carson started a fake toilet-paper scare on the "Tonight Show."
1978 - Indira Gandhi was expelled from the Lok Sabha for contempt and imprisoned.
1979 - ESPN televised its first NHL game. The teams were the Washington Capitals and the Hartford Whales.
1984 - Wayne Gretsky, 23, of the Edmonton Oilers, became only the 18th player in the National Hockey League (NHL) to score more than 1,000 points.
1984 - Ted Hughes was appointed England's poet laureate.
1984 - Britain and China signed an accord returning Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997.
1985 - Jan Stenerud announced his retirement from the NFL. The football kicker held the record for the most career field goals with 373.
1985 - ABC Sports announced that it was severing ties with Howard Cosell and released ‘The Mouth’ from all TV commitments. Cosell continued on ABC Radio for another five years.
1986 - The Soviet Union announced it had freed dissident Andrei Sakharov from internal exile, and pardoned his wife, Yelena Bonner.
1989 - U.S. troops invaded Panama to overthrow the regime of General Noriega.
1990 - Bo Jackson (Los Angeles Raiders) became the first athlete to be chosen for All Star Games in two sports.
1996 - The school board of Oakland, CA, voted to recognize Black English, also known as "ebonics." The board later reversed its stance.
1997 - "Titanic" opened in American movie theaters.
1998 - U.S. President Bill Clinton was impeached on two charges of perjury and obstruction of justice by the U.S. House of Representatives.
1998 - A four-day bombing of Iraq by British and American forces ended.
2000 - The U.N. Security Council voted to impose sanctions on Afghanistan's Taliban rulers unless they closed all terrorist training camps and surrender U.S. embassy bombing suspect Osama bin Laden.
2003 - Images for the new design for the Freedom Tower at the World Trade Center site were released. The building slopes into a spire that reaches 1,776 feet.
Current Birthdays
Cicely Tyson turns 75 years old today
88 Little Jimmy Dickens
Country singer
83 Robert Sherman
Composer
67 Maurice White
R&B musician (Earth, Wind and Fire)
64 Richard E. Leakey
Palaeontologist
64 Alvin Lee
Rock singer (Ten Years After)
64 Tim Reid
Actor ("WKRP in Cincinnati")
63 Elaine Joyce
Actress
63 John McEuen
Country musician (The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
61 Janie Fricke
Country singer
53 Rob Portman
Former White House budget director
51 Kevin McHale
Basketball Hall of Famer
48 Mike Lookinland
Actor ("The Brady Bunch")
45 Jennifer Beals
Actress
44 Scott Cohen
Actor
42 Robert MacNaughton
Actor
41 Criss Angel
Magician
40 Kevin Shepard
Rock musician
39 Kristy Swanson
Actress
37 Amy Locane
Actress
36 Rosa Blasi
Actress
36 Alyssa Milano
Actress ("Charmed," "Who's the Boss?")
36 Warren Sapp
Football player
34 Jake Plummer
Football player
28 Jake Gyllenhaal
Actor
28 Marla Sokoloff
Actress
23 Lady Sovereign
Rapper
Historic Birthdays
Leonid Brezhnev
12/19/1906 - 11/10/1982
Russian statesman
80 Charles-Julien Brianchon
12/19/1783 - 4/29/1864
French mathematician
55 Edwin Stanton
12/19/1814 - 12/24/1869
American Secretary of War under President Lincoln
78 A.A. Michelson
12/19/1852 - 5/9/1931
German-born American physicist
83 Barry Byrne
12/19/1883 - 12/17/1967
American architect
74 Fritz Reiner
12/19/1888 - 11/15/1963
Hungarian-born American conductor
80 Sir Ralph Richardson
12/19/1902 - 10/10/1983
English actor
92 George Davis Snell
12/19/1903 - 6/6/1996
American geneticist and Nobel Prize winner
75 Jean Genet
12/19/1910 - 4/15/1986
French novelist
47 Edith Piaf
12/19/1915 - 10/11/1963
French singer and actress
1606 - The "Susan Constant," "Godspeed" and "Discovery" set sail from London. Their landing at Jamestown, VA, was the start of the first permanent English settlement in America.
1699 - Peter the Great ordered that the Russian New Year be changed from September 1 to January 1.
1790 - The first successful cotton mill in the United States began operating at Pawtucket, RI.
1803 - The United States Senate ratified a treaty that included the Louisiana Territories from France for $15 million. The transfer was completed with formal ceremonies in New Orleans.
1820 - The state of Missouri enacted legislation to tax bachelors between the ages of 21-50 for being unmarried. The tax was $1 a year.
1860 - South Carolina became the first state to secede from the American Union.
1864 - Confederate forces evacuated Savannah, GA as Union Gen. William T. Sherman continued his "March to the Sea."
1879 - Thomas A. Edison privately demonstrated his incandescent light at Menlo Park, NJ.
1880 - New York's Broadway became known as the "Great White Way" when it was lighted by electricity.
1892 - Alexander T. Brown and George Stillman patented the pneumatic tire.
1928 - Mail delivery by dog sled began in Lewiston, ME.
1933 - The film "Flying Down to Rio" was first shown in New York.
1938 - Vladimir Kosma Zworykin patented the iconoscope television system.
1946 - The Frank Capra film "It's A Wonderful Life" had a preview showing for charity at New York City's Globe Theatre, a day before its "official" world premiere. James Stewart and Donna Reed star in the film.
1946 - In Indochina (Vietnam), full-scale guerrilla warfare between Vietnam partisans and French troops began.
1954 - Buick Motor Company signed Jackie Gleason to one of the largest contracts ever entered into with an entertainer. Gleason agreed to produce 78 half-hour shows over a two-year period for $6,142,500.
1962 - A world indoor pole-vault record was set by Don Meyers when he cleared 16 feet, 11/4 inches.
1963 - The Berlin Wall was opened for the first time to West Berliners. It was only for the holiday season. It closed again on January 6, 1964.
1968 - Author John Steinbeck died at the age of 66.
1973 - The Spanish premier Carrero Blanco was assassinated in Madrid.
1987 - More than 3,000 people were killed when the Dona Paz, a Philippine passenger ship, collided with the tanker Vector off Mindoro island, setting off a double explosion.
1989 - General Noriega, Panama's former dictator, was overthrown by a United States invasion force invited by the new civilian government. The project was known as Operation Just Cause.
1991 - Ante Markovic resigned as federal Prime Minister of Yugoslavia.
1991 - Oliver Stone's "JFK" opened in the U.S.
1994 - Marcelino Corniel, a homeless man, was shot and mortally wounded by White House security officers. He had brandished a knife near the executive mansion.
1994 - Ivan Lendl retired after a 17-year tennis career.
1995 - An American Airlines Boeing 757 en route to Cali, Colombia, crashed into a mountain, killing all but four of the 163 people aboard.
1996 - Doctors reported that a Cypriot woman who had taken fertility drugs was carrying about 11 embryos.
1998 - In Houston, TX, a 27-year-old woman gave birth to the only known living set of octuplets.
1999 - The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that homosexual couples were entitled to the same benefits and protections as wedded couples of the opposite sex.
1999 - Sovereignty over the colony of Macao was transferred from Portugal to China.
2001 - The U.S. Congress passed a $20 billion package to finance the war against terrorism taking place in Afghanistan.
2001 - Argentina's President Fernando De la Rua resigned after two years in power.
2001 - The first British peacekeepers arrived in Afghanistan to help the nation heal after decades of war
Current Birthdays
David Cook turns 26 years old today.
91 Audrey Totter
Actress
81 Charlie Callas
Comedian, actor
77 Ike Skelton
House Armed Services Committee chairman, D-Mo.
76 John Hillerman
Actor ("Magnum P.I.")
75 Jean Carnahan
Former U.S. senator, D-Mo.
69 Kathryn Joosten
Actress
64 Bobby Colomby
Rock musician (Blood, Sweat and Tears)
63 Peter Criss
Rock musician (Kiss)
62 Uri Geller
Illusionist
62 Sonny Perdue
Governor of Georgia
62 Dick Wolf
TV producer ("Law and Order" shows)
60 Alan Parsons
Rock musician
56 Jenny Agutter
Actress
54 Michael Badalucco
Actor
52 Blanche Baker
Actress
51 Billy Bragg
Rock singer
51 Mike Watt
Rock musician
44 Kris Tyler
Country singer
42 Chris Robinson
Rock singer (The Black Crowes)
38 Nicole deBoer
Actress
27 Roy Williams
Football player
26 David Wright
Baseball player
18 JoJo
Singer
Historic Birthdays
Branch Rickey
12/20/1881 - 12/9/1965
American baseball executive
43 Dan Leno
12/20/1860 - 10/31/1904
English entertainer
69 Harvey Firestone
12/20/1868 - 2/7/1938
American industrialist
87 Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman
12/20/1886 - 12/5/1974
American tennis champion
83 Sir Robert Menzies
12/20/1894 - 5/16/1978
Australian prime minister (1939-41, 1949-66)
91 Irene Dunne
12/20/1898 - 9/4/1990
American actress
65 Robert Van de Graaff
12/20/1901 - 1/16/1967
American physicist and inventor
89 Max Lerner
12/20/1902 - 6/5/1992
American educator and columnist
86 Sidney Hook
12/20/1902 - 7/12/1989
American social philosopher
69 Jean Marchand
12/20/1918 - 8/28/1988
Canadian politician
1699 - Peter the Great ordered that the Russian New Year be changed from September 1 to January 1.
1790 - The first successful cotton mill in the United States began operating at Pawtucket, RI.
1803 - The United States Senate ratified a treaty that included the Louisiana Territories from France for $15 million. The transfer was completed with formal ceremonies in New Orleans.
1820 - The state of Missouri enacted legislation to tax bachelors between the ages of 21-50 for being unmarried. The tax was $1 a year.
1860 - South Carolina became the first state to secede from the American Union.
1864 - Confederate forces evacuated Savannah, GA as Union Gen. William T. Sherman continued his "March to the Sea."
1879 - Thomas A. Edison privately demonstrated his incandescent light at Menlo Park, NJ.
1880 - New York's Broadway became known as the "Great White Way" when it was lighted by electricity.
1892 - Alexander T. Brown and George Stillman patented the pneumatic tire.
1928 - Mail delivery by dog sled began in Lewiston, ME.
1933 - The film "Flying Down to Rio" was first shown in New York.
1938 - Vladimir Kosma Zworykin patented the iconoscope television system.
1946 - The Frank Capra film "It's A Wonderful Life" had a preview showing for charity at New York City's Globe Theatre, a day before its "official" world premiere. James Stewart and Donna Reed star in the film.
1946 - In Indochina (Vietnam), full-scale guerrilla warfare between Vietnam partisans and French troops began.
1954 - Buick Motor Company signed Jackie Gleason to one of the largest contracts ever entered into with an entertainer. Gleason agreed to produce 78 half-hour shows over a two-year period for $6,142,500.
1962 - A world indoor pole-vault record was set by Don Meyers when he cleared 16 feet, 11/4 inches.
1963 - The Berlin Wall was opened for the first time to West Berliners. It was only for the holiday season. It closed again on January 6, 1964.
1968 - Author John Steinbeck died at the age of 66.
1973 - The Spanish premier Carrero Blanco was assassinated in Madrid.
1987 - More than 3,000 people were killed when the Dona Paz, a Philippine passenger ship, collided with the tanker Vector off Mindoro island, setting off a double explosion.
1989 - General Noriega, Panama's former dictator, was overthrown by a United States invasion force invited by the new civilian government. The project was known as Operation Just Cause.
1991 - Ante Markovic resigned as federal Prime Minister of Yugoslavia.
1991 - Oliver Stone's "JFK" opened in the U.S.
1994 - Marcelino Corniel, a homeless man, was shot and mortally wounded by White House security officers. He had brandished a knife near the executive mansion.
1994 - Ivan Lendl retired after a 17-year tennis career.
1995 - An American Airlines Boeing 757 en route to Cali, Colombia, crashed into a mountain, killing all but four of the 163 people aboard.
1996 - Doctors reported that a Cypriot woman who had taken fertility drugs was carrying about 11 embryos.
1998 - In Houston, TX, a 27-year-old woman gave birth to the only known living set of octuplets.
1999 - The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that homosexual couples were entitled to the same benefits and protections as wedded couples of the opposite sex.
1999 - Sovereignty over the colony of Macao was transferred from Portugal to China.
2001 - The U.S. Congress passed a $20 billion package to finance the war against terrorism taking place in Afghanistan.
2001 - Argentina's President Fernando De la Rua resigned after two years in power.
2001 - The first British peacekeepers arrived in Afghanistan to help the nation heal after decades of war
Current Birthdays
David Cook turns 26 years old today.
91 Audrey Totter
Actress
81 Charlie Callas
Comedian, actor
77 Ike Skelton
House Armed Services Committee chairman, D-Mo.
76 John Hillerman
Actor ("Magnum P.I.")
75 Jean Carnahan
Former U.S. senator, D-Mo.
69 Kathryn Joosten
Actress
64 Bobby Colomby
Rock musician (Blood, Sweat and Tears)
63 Peter Criss
Rock musician (Kiss)
62 Uri Geller
Illusionist
62 Sonny Perdue
Governor of Georgia
62 Dick Wolf
TV producer ("Law and Order" shows)
60 Alan Parsons
Rock musician
56 Jenny Agutter
Actress
54 Michael Badalucco
Actor
52 Blanche Baker
Actress
51 Billy Bragg
Rock singer
51 Mike Watt
Rock musician
44 Kris Tyler
Country singer
42 Chris Robinson
Rock singer (The Black Crowes)
38 Nicole deBoer
Actress
27 Roy Williams
Football player
26 David Wright
Baseball player
18 JoJo
Singer
Historic Birthdays
Branch Rickey
12/20/1881 - 12/9/1965
American baseball executive
43 Dan Leno
12/20/1860 - 10/31/1904
English entertainer
69 Harvey Firestone
12/20/1868 - 2/7/1938
American industrialist
87 Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman
12/20/1886 - 12/5/1974
American tennis champion
83 Sir Robert Menzies
12/20/1894 - 5/16/1978
Australian prime minister (1939-41, 1949-66)
91 Irene Dunne
12/20/1898 - 9/4/1990
American actress
65 Robert Van de Graaff
12/20/1901 - 1/16/1967
American physicist and inventor
89 Max Lerner
12/20/1902 - 6/5/1992
American educator and columnist
86 Sidney Hook
12/20/1902 - 7/12/1989
American social philosopher
69 Jean Marchand
12/20/1918 - 8/28/1988
Canadian politician
artysml:1620 - The "Mayflower", and its passengers, pilgrims from England, landed at Plymouth Rock, MA.
1849 - The first ice-skating club in America was formed in Philadelphia, PA.
1879 - Ibsen's "A Doll's House" was first performed in Copenhagen, Denmark, with a revised happy ending.
1898 - Scientists Pierre and Marie Curie discovered the radioactive element radium.
1909 - McKinley and Washington schools of Berkeley, CA, became the first authorized, junior-high schools in the U.S.
1913 - The "New York World" Sunday edition included a crossword puzzle as an added feature of the "Fun" supplement. It was the first crossword puzzle to be published.
1914 - Marie Dressler, Charlie Chaplin, Mabel Normand and Mack Swain appeared in the first six-reel, feature-length comedy. The film was entitled "Tillie’s Punctured Romance".
1925 - Eisenstein's film "Battleship Potemkin" was first shown in Moscow.
1937 - Walt Disney debuted the first, full-length, animated feature in Hollywood, CA. The movie was "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."
1944 - Horse racing was banned in the United States until after the end of World War II.
1945 - U.S. Gen. George S. Patton died in Heidelberg, Germany, of injuries from a car accident.
1948 - The state of Eire (formerly the Irish Free State) declared its independence.
1951 - Joe DiMaggio announced his retirement from major league baseball.
1958 - Charles de Gaulle was elected to a seven-year term as the first president of the Fifth Republic of France.
1968 - Apollo 8 was launched on a mission to orbit the moon. The craft landed safely in the Pacific Ocean on December 27.
1971 - The U.N. Security Council chose Kurt Waldheim to succeed U Thant as secretary-general.
1978 - Police in Des Plaines, IL, arrested John W. Gacy Jr. and began unearthing the remains of 33 men and boys that Gacy was later convicted of killing.
1981 - Cincinnati defeated Bradley 75-73 in seven overtimes. The game was the longest collegiate basketball game in the history of NCAA Division I competition.
1988 - 270 people were killed when Pan Am Boeing 747 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, due to a terrorist attack.
1990 - In a German television interview, Saddam Hussein declared that he would not withdraw from Kuwait by the UN deadline.
1991 - Eleven of the 12 former Soviet republics proclaimed the birth of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
1995 - The city of Bethlehem passed from Israeli to Palestinian control.
1996 - After two years of denials, U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich admitted violating House ethics rules.
1998 - Israel's parliament voted overwhelmingly for early elections. It was the signal to the demise of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government.
1998 - A Chinese court sentenced two dissidents to long prison terms for attempting to organize an opposition party. A third man was sentenced to 12 years in prison on December 22, 1998.
1998 - The first vaccine for Lyme disease was approved.
2001 - The Islamic militant group Hamas released a statement that said it was suspending suicide bombings and mortar attacks in Israel.
2002 - Larry Mayes was released after spending 21 years in prison for a rape that maintained that he never committed. He was the 100th person in the U.S. to be released after DNA tests were performed.
1849 - The first ice-skating club in America was formed in Philadelphia, PA.
1879 - Ibsen's "A Doll's House" was first performed in Copenhagen, Denmark, with a revised happy ending.
1898 - Scientists Pierre and Marie Curie discovered the radioactive element radium.
1909 - McKinley and Washington schools of Berkeley, CA, became the first authorized, junior-high schools in the U.S.
1913 - The "New York World" Sunday edition included a crossword puzzle as an added feature of the "Fun" supplement. It was the first crossword puzzle to be published.
1914 - Marie Dressler, Charlie Chaplin, Mabel Normand and Mack Swain appeared in the first six-reel, feature-length comedy. The film was entitled "Tillie’s Punctured Romance".
1925 - Eisenstein's film "Battleship Potemkin" was first shown in Moscow.
1937 - Walt Disney debuted the first, full-length, animated feature in Hollywood, CA. The movie was "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."
1944 - Horse racing was banned in the United States until after the end of World War II.
1945 - U.S. Gen. George S. Patton died in Heidelberg, Germany, of injuries from a car accident.
1948 - The state of Eire (formerly the Irish Free State) declared its independence.
1951 - Joe DiMaggio announced his retirement from major league baseball.
1958 - Charles de Gaulle was elected to a seven-year term as the first president of the Fifth Republic of France.
1968 - Apollo 8 was launched on a mission to orbit the moon. The craft landed safely in the Pacific Ocean on December 27.
1971 - The U.N. Security Council chose Kurt Waldheim to succeed U Thant as secretary-general.
1978 - Police in Des Plaines, IL, arrested John W. Gacy Jr. and began unearthing the remains of 33 men and boys that Gacy was later convicted of killing.
1981 - Cincinnati defeated Bradley 75-73 in seven overtimes. The game was the longest collegiate basketball game in the history of NCAA Division I competition.
1988 - 270 people were killed when Pan Am Boeing 747 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, due to a terrorist attack.
1990 - In a German television interview, Saddam Hussein declared that he would not withdraw from Kuwait by the UN deadline.
1991 - Eleven of the 12 former Soviet republics proclaimed the birth of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
1995 - The city of Bethlehem passed from Israeli to Palestinian control.
1996 - After two years of denials, U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich admitted violating House ethics rules.
1998 - Israel's parliament voted overwhelmingly for early elections. It was the signal to the demise of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government.
1998 - A Chinese court sentenced two dissidents to long prison terms for attempting to organize an opposition party. A third man was sentenced to 12 years in prison on December 22, 1998.
1998 - The first vaccine for Lyme disease was approved.
2001 - The Islamic militant group Hamas released a statement that said it was suspending suicide bombings and mortar attacks in Israel.
2002 - Larry Mayes was released after spending 21 years in prison for a rape that maintained that he never committed. He was the 100th person in the U.S. to be released after DNA tests were performed.
1783 - George Washington returned home to Mount Vernon, after the disbanding of his army following the Revolutionary War.
1788 - Maryland voted to cede a 100-square-mile area for the seat of the national government. About two-thirds of the area became the District of Columbia.
1823 - The poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas" by Clement C. Moore (" 'Twas the night before Christmas...") was published.
1834 - English architect Joseph Hansom patented his 'safety cab', better known as the Hansom cab.
1852 - The Theatre of Celestial John opened on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco, CA. It was the first Chinese theatre in the U.S.
1880 - Thomas Edison incorporated the Edison Electric Light Company of Europe.
1888 - Following a quarrel with Paul Gauguin, Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh cut off part of his own earlobe.
1893 - The Engelbert Humperdinck opera "Hansel und Gretel" was first performed, in Weimar, Germany.
1913 - The Federal Reserve Bill was signed into law by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. The act established 12 Federal Reserve Banks.
1919 - The first ship designed to be used as an ambulance for the transport patients was launched. The hospital ship was named USS Relief and had 515 beds.
1922 - The British Broadcasting Corporation began daily news broadcasts.
1930 - Ruth Elizabeth Davis, an unknown actress, arrived in Hollywood, under contract to Universal Studios. Universal changed her name to Bette Davis for the movies.
1938 - "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch" was heard for the final time on the radio.
1941 - During World War II, American forces on Wake Island surrendered to the Japanese.
1942 - Bob Hope agreed to entertain U.S. airmen in Alaska. It was the first of the traditional Christmas shows.
1943 - "Hansel and Gretel," the opera, was televised on New York's WRBG. It was the first complete opera to be televised.
1947 - John Bardeen, Walter H. Brattain and William Shockley invented the transistor.
1948 - Former Japanese premier Hideki Tojo and six other Japanese war leaders were executed in Tokyo. They had been found guilty of crimes against humanity.
1951 - A National Football League (NFL) championship game was televised nationally for the first time. The Los Angeles Rams beat the Cleveland Browns 24-17. The DuMont Network had paid $75,000 for the rights to the game.
1953 - Soviet secret police chief Lavrenti Beria and six of his associates were shot for treason following a secret trial.
1954 - The Walt Disney movie "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" was released.
1957 - Dan Blocker made his acting debut on television in the "Restless Gun."
1965 - A 70-mph speed limit was introduced in Britain.
1968 - Eighty-two crewmembers of the U.S. intelligence ship Pueblo were released by North Korea, 11 months after they had been captured.
1972 - The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Oakland Raiders 13-7 in an NFL playoff game on a last-second play that was dubbed the "Immaculate Reception." Pittsburgh's Franco Harris caught a deflected pass and ran it in for the winning touchdown.
1986 - The experimental airplane Voyager, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, completed the first non-stop, around-the-world flight without refueling as it landed safely at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
1987 - Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, serving a life sentence for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ford in 1975, escaped from the Alderson Federal Prison for Women in West Virginia. She was recaptured two days later.
1989 - Ousted Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, were captured as they were attempting to flee their country.
1990 - Elections in Yugoslavia ended, leaving four of its six republics with non-Communist governments.
1995 - A fire in Dabwali, India, killed 540 people, including 170 children, during a year-end party being held near the children's school.
1995 - The bodies of 16 members of the Solar Temple religious sect were found in a clearing near Grenoble, France. 14 were presumed shot by two people who then committed suicide.
1997 - Terry Nichols was convicted by a Denver jury on charges of conspiracy and involuntary manslaughter in the 1995 federal building bombing in Oklahoma City. The bomb killed 168 people.
1998 - Guerrillas in south Lebanon fired dozens of rockets at northern Israel.
Current Birthdays
Eddie Vedder turns 44 years old today
87 Gerald S. O'Loughlin
Actor
84 Bob Kurland
Basketball Hall of Famer
77 Ronnie Schell
Actor
75 Akihito
Emperor of Japan
73 Paul Hornung
Football Hall of Famer
72 Frederic Forrest
Actor
72 James Stacy
Actor
68 Jorma Kaukonen
Rock musician (Jefferson Airplane, Hot Tuna)
67 Ron Bushy
Rock musician (Iron Butterfly)
65 Harry Shearer
Actor, comedian ("The Simpsons")
62 Susan Lucci
Actress ("All My Children")
60 Jack Ham
Football Hall of Famer
59 Adrian Belew
Rock musician, producer
50 Dave Murray
Rock musician (Iron Maiden)
50 Joan Severance
Actress
37 Corey Haim
Actor
33 Jamie Murphy
Rock musician
31 Alge Crumpler
Football player
31 Irvin Mayfield
Jazz trumpeter
30 Estella Warren
Actress
25 Hanley Ramirez
Baseball player
18 Anna Maria Perez de Tagle
Actress ("Hannah Montana," "Camp Rock")
Historic Birthdays
Sarah Breedlove Walker
12/23/1867 - 5/25/1919
American philanthropist
41 Robert Barclay
12/23/1648 - 10/3/1690
English-born American Quaker leader
71 James Gibbs
12/23/1682 - 8/5/1754
Scottish architect
41 Jean-Francois Champollion
12/23/1790 - 3/4/1832
French historian and linguist
38 Joseph Smith
12/23/1805 - 6/27/1844
American founder of the Mormon Church
75 Oscar Solomon Straus
12/23/1850 - 5/3/1926
American member of President Wilson's cabinet
68 James Buchanan Duke
12/23/1856 - 10/10/1925
American tobacco magnate
84 Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko
12/23/1858 - 4/25/1943
Russian playwright
76 Emil Brunner
12/23/1889 - 4/6/1966
Swiss theologian
1788 - Maryland voted to cede a 100-square-mile area for the seat of the national government. About two-thirds of the area became the District of Columbia.
1823 - The poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas" by Clement C. Moore (" 'Twas the night before Christmas...") was published.
1834 - English architect Joseph Hansom patented his 'safety cab', better known as the Hansom cab.
1852 - The Theatre of Celestial John opened on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco, CA. It was the first Chinese theatre in the U.S.
1880 - Thomas Edison incorporated the Edison Electric Light Company of Europe.
1888 - Following a quarrel with Paul Gauguin, Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh cut off part of his own earlobe.
1893 - The Engelbert Humperdinck opera "Hansel und Gretel" was first performed, in Weimar, Germany.
1913 - The Federal Reserve Bill was signed into law by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. The act established 12 Federal Reserve Banks.
1919 - The first ship designed to be used as an ambulance for the transport patients was launched. The hospital ship was named USS Relief and had 515 beds.
1922 - The British Broadcasting Corporation began daily news broadcasts.
1930 - Ruth Elizabeth Davis, an unknown actress, arrived in Hollywood, under contract to Universal Studios. Universal changed her name to Bette Davis for the movies.
1938 - "Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch" was heard for the final time on the radio.
1941 - During World War II, American forces on Wake Island surrendered to the Japanese.
1942 - Bob Hope agreed to entertain U.S. airmen in Alaska. It was the first of the traditional Christmas shows.
1943 - "Hansel and Gretel," the opera, was televised on New York's WRBG. It was the first complete opera to be televised.
1947 - John Bardeen, Walter H. Brattain and William Shockley invented the transistor.
1948 - Former Japanese premier Hideki Tojo and six other Japanese war leaders were executed in Tokyo. They had been found guilty of crimes against humanity.
1951 - A National Football League (NFL) championship game was televised nationally for the first time. The Los Angeles Rams beat the Cleveland Browns 24-17. The DuMont Network had paid $75,000 for the rights to the game.
1953 - Soviet secret police chief Lavrenti Beria and six of his associates were shot for treason following a secret trial.
1954 - The Walt Disney movie "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" was released.
1957 - Dan Blocker made his acting debut on television in the "Restless Gun."
1965 - A 70-mph speed limit was introduced in Britain.
1968 - Eighty-two crewmembers of the U.S. intelligence ship Pueblo were released by North Korea, 11 months after they had been captured.
1972 - The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Oakland Raiders 13-7 in an NFL playoff game on a last-second play that was dubbed the "Immaculate Reception." Pittsburgh's Franco Harris caught a deflected pass and ran it in for the winning touchdown.
1986 - The experimental airplane Voyager, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, completed the first non-stop, around-the-world flight without refueling as it landed safely at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
1987 - Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, serving a life sentence for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ford in 1975, escaped from the Alderson Federal Prison for Women in West Virginia. She was recaptured two days later.
1989 - Ousted Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, were captured as they were attempting to flee their country.
1990 - Elections in Yugoslavia ended, leaving four of its six republics with non-Communist governments.
1995 - A fire in Dabwali, India, killed 540 people, including 170 children, during a year-end party being held near the children's school.
1995 - The bodies of 16 members of the Solar Temple religious sect were found in a clearing near Grenoble, France. 14 were presumed shot by two people who then committed suicide.
1997 - Terry Nichols was convicted by a Denver jury on charges of conspiracy and involuntary manslaughter in the 1995 federal building bombing in Oklahoma City. The bomb killed 168 people.
1998 - Guerrillas in south Lebanon fired dozens of rockets at northern Israel.
Current Birthdays
Eddie Vedder turns 44 years old today
87 Gerald S. O'Loughlin
Actor
84 Bob Kurland
Basketball Hall of Famer
77 Ronnie Schell
Actor
75 Akihito
Emperor of Japan
73 Paul Hornung
Football Hall of Famer
72 Frederic Forrest
Actor
72 James Stacy
Actor
68 Jorma Kaukonen
Rock musician (Jefferson Airplane, Hot Tuna)
67 Ron Bushy
Rock musician (Iron Butterfly)
65 Harry Shearer
Actor, comedian ("The Simpsons")
62 Susan Lucci
Actress ("All My Children")
60 Jack Ham
Football Hall of Famer
59 Adrian Belew
Rock musician, producer
50 Dave Murray
Rock musician (Iron Maiden)
50 Joan Severance
Actress
37 Corey Haim
Actor
33 Jamie Murphy
Rock musician
31 Alge Crumpler
Football player
31 Irvin Mayfield
Jazz trumpeter
30 Estella Warren
Actress
25 Hanley Ramirez
Baseball player
18 Anna Maria Perez de Tagle
Actress ("Hannah Montana," "Camp Rock")
Historic Birthdays
Sarah Breedlove Walker
12/23/1867 - 5/25/1919
American philanthropist
41 Robert Barclay
12/23/1648 - 10/3/1690
English-born American Quaker leader
71 James Gibbs
12/23/1682 - 8/5/1754
Scottish architect
41 Jean-Francois Champollion
12/23/1790 - 3/4/1832
French historian and linguist
38 Joseph Smith
12/23/1805 - 6/27/1844
American founder of the Mormon Church
75 Oscar Solomon Straus
12/23/1850 - 5/3/1926
American member of President Wilson's cabinet
68 James Buchanan Duke
12/23/1856 - 10/10/1925
American tobacco magnate
84 Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko
12/23/1858 - 4/25/1943
Russian playwright
76 Emil Brunner
12/23/1889 - 4/6/1966
Swiss theologian
1814 - The War of 1812 between the U.S. and Britain was ended with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent in Belgium.
1818 - Franz Gruber of Oberndorf, Germany composed the music for "Silent Night" to words written by Josef Mohr.
1828 - William Burke who, with his partner William Hare, dug up the dead and murdered to sell the corpses for dissection, went on trial in Edinburgh.
1851 - A fire devastated the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, destroying about 35,000 volumes.
1865 - Several veterans of the Confederate Army formed a private social club in Pulaski, TN, called the Ku Klux Klan.
1906 - Reginald A. Fessenden became the first person to broadcast a music program over radio, from Brant Rock, MA.
1914 - In World War I, the first air raid on Britain was made when a German airplane dropped a bomb on the grounds of a rectory in Dover.
1928 - The first broadcast of "The Voice of Firestone" was heard.
1943 - U.S. President Roosevelt appointed Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower supreme commander of Allied forces as part of Operation Overlord.
1944 - The Andrews Sisters starred in the debut of "The Andrews Sisters’ Eight-To-The-Bar-Ranch" on ABC Radio.
1944 - A German submarine torpedoed the Belgian transport ship S.S. Leopoldville with 2,235 soldiers aboard. About 800 American soldiers died. The soldiers were crossing the English Channel to be reinforcements at the battle that become known as the Battle of the Bulge.
1948 - For the first time ever, a midnight Mass was broadcast on television. It was held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.
1948 - The first completely solar-heated house became occupied in Dover, MA.
1951 - NBC-TV presented, "Amal and the Night Visitors," the first opera written for television.
1951 - Libya achieved independence as the United Kingdom of Libya, under King Idris.
1965 - A meteorite landed on Leicestershire. It weighed about 100lbs.
1966 - Luna 13 landed on the moon.
1967 - Joe Namath (New York Jets) became the first NFL quarterback to pass for 4,000 yards.
1968 - The crew of the U.S. Navy ship, Pueblo, was released by North Korea. The Captain of the Pueblo, Commander Lloyd M. Bucher, and 82 of his crew were held for 11 months after the ship was seized by North Korea because of suspected spying by the Americans.
1968 - Three astronauts, James A. Lovell, William Anders and Frank Borman, reached the moon. They orbited the moon 10 times before coming back to Earth. Seven months later man first landed on the moon.
1979 - Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan in support of the country's Marxist government.
1981 - Reggie Jackson announced that he would join Gene Autry’s California Angels for the 1982 season.
1985 - Fidel Castro, the Cuban president, announced that he was a non-smoker.
1989 - Ousted Panamanian ruler Manuel Noriega took refuge at the Vatican's diplomatic mission in Panama City.
1990 - Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were married.
1992 - U.S. President Bush pardoned former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and five others in the Iran-Contra scandal.
1997 - Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, known as "Carlos the Jackal," was sentenced by a French court to life in prison for the 1975 murders of two French investigators and a Lebanese national.
1998 - At Disneyland in Anaheim, CA, a tourist was hit by a piece of flying metal while waiting to board a ride. The man's wife and a Disneyland employee were also injured. Luan Phi Dawson died December 26th from his injuries.
1999 - Ivory Coast President Henri Konan Bédié was overthrown in a coup.
1999 - An Indian Airplines plane was seized during a flight from Katmandu, Nepal, to New Delhi. In Afghanistan, the 150 hostages were freed on December 31 after India released three Kashmir militants from prison.
2000 - 36 minutes after the end of a game, both the New England Patriots and the Miami Dolphins were called back to the playing field. The teams had to play the final 3 seconds of the game which the Dolphins had won 27-24. The end result did not change.
2000 - The "Texas 7," seven convicts that had escaped a Texas prison, robbed a sports store in Irving, TX. The suspects killed Officer Aubrey Hawkins, stole $70,000, 25 weapons and clothing. The men had escaped on December 13.
Current Birthdays
Ryan Seacrest turns 34 years old today
88 Dave Bartholomew
Bandleader
81 Mary Higgins Clark
Mystery writer
68 Anthony Fauci
Public health official
64 Mike Curb
Recording company executive
63 Lemmy
Rock musician (Motorhead)
62 Jeff Sessions
U.S. senator, R-Ala.
53 Grand L. Bush
Actor
53 Clarence Gilyard
Actor
52 Stephanie Hodge
Actress
51 Ian Burden
Rock musician (The Human League)
46 Kate Spade
Designer
45 Mary Ramsey
Rock singer (10,000 Maniacs)
44 Mark Valley
Actor
42 Diedrich Bader
Actor ("The Drew Carey Show")
38 Amaury Nolasco
Actor ("Prison Break")
37 Ricky Martin
Singer
Eric Lindros celebrates today
Historic Birthdays
I. F. Stone
12/24/1907 - 6/18/1989
American journalist
(Go to obit.)
60 William Paterson
12/24/1745 - 9/9/1806
Irish-born American governor of New Jersey
58 Kit Carson
12/24/1809 - 5/23/1868
American frontiersman and folk hero
65 Matthew Arnold
12/24/1822 - 4/15/1888
English poet and social critic
73 Michael Curtiz
12/24/1886 - 4/10/1962
Hungarian-born American film director
22 Georges-Marie Guynemer
12/24/1894 - 9/11/1917
French World War I combat pilot
60 Baby Dodds
12/24/1898 - 2/14/1959
American jazz musician
70 Howard Hughes
12/24/1905 - 4/5/1976
American manufacturer and aviator
67 Ava Gardner
12/24/1922 - 1/25/1990
American actress
1818 - Franz Gruber of Oberndorf, Germany composed the music for "Silent Night" to words written by Josef Mohr.
1828 - William Burke who, with his partner William Hare, dug up the dead and murdered to sell the corpses for dissection, went on trial in Edinburgh.
1851 - A fire devastated the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, destroying about 35,000 volumes.
1865 - Several veterans of the Confederate Army formed a private social club in Pulaski, TN, called the Ku Klux Klan.
1906 - Reginald A. Fessenden became the first person to broadcast a music program over radio, from Brant Rock, MA.
1914 - In World War I, the first air raid on Britain was made when a German airplane dropped a bomb on the grounds of a rectory in Dover.
1928 - The first broadcast of "The Voice of Firestone" was heard.
1943 - U.S. President Roosevelt appointed Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower supreme commander of Allied forces as part of Operation Overlord.
1944 - The Andrews Sisters starred in the debut of "The Andrews Sisters’ Eight-To-The-Bar-Ranch" on ABC Radio.
1944 - A German submarine torpedoed the Belgian transport ship S.S. Leopoldville with 2,235 soldiers aboard. About 800 American soldiers died. The soldiers were crossing the English Channel to be reinforcements at the battle that become known as the Battle of the Bulge.
1948 - For the first time ever, a midnight Mass was broadcast on television. It was held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.
1948 - The first completely solar-heated house became occupied in Dover, MA.
1951 - NBC-TV presented, "Amal and the Night Visitors," the first opera written for television.
1951 - Libya achieved independence as the United Kingdom of Libya, under King Idris.
1965 - A meteorite landed on Leicestershire. It weighed about 100lbs.
1966 - Luna 13 landed on the moon.
1967 - Joe Namath (New York Jets) became the first NFL quarterback to pass for 4,000 yards.
1968 - The crew of the U.S. Navy ship, Pueblo, was released by North Korea. The Captain of the Pueblo, Commander Lloyd M. Bucher, and 82 of his crew were held for 11 months after the ship was seized by North Korea because of suspected spying by the Americans.
1968 - Three astronauts, James A. Lovell, William Anders and Frank Borman, reached the moon. They orbited the moon 10 times before coming back to Earth. Seven months later man first landed on the moon.
1979 - Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan in support of the country's Marxist government.
1981 - Reggie Jackson announced that he would join Gene Autry’s California Angels for the 1982 season.
1985 - Fidel Castro, the Cuban president, announced that he was a non-smoker.
1989 - Ousted Panamanian ruler Manuel Noriega took refuge at the Vatican's diplomatic mission in Panama City.
1990 - Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were married.
1992 - U.S. President Bush pardoned former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and five others in the Iran-Contra scandal.
1997 - Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, known as "Carlos the Jackal," was sentenced by a French court to life in prison for the 1975 murders of two French investigators and a Lebanese national.
1998 - At Disneyland in Anaheim, CA, a tourist was hit by a piece of flying metal while waiting to board a ride. The man's wife and a Disneyland employee were also injured. Luan Phi Dawson died December 26th from his injuries.
1999 - Ivory Coast President Henri Konan Bédié was overthrown in a coup.
1999 - An Indian Airplines plane was seized during a flight from Katmandu, Nepal, to New Delhi. In Afghanistan, the 150 hostages were freed on December 31 after India released three Kashmir militants from prison.
2000 - 36 minutes after the end of a game, both the New England Patriots and the Miami Dolphins were called back to the playing field. The teams had to play the final 3 seconds of the game which the Dolphins had won 27-24. The end result did not change.
2000 - The "Texas 7," seven convicts that had escaped a Texas prison, robbed a sports store in Irving, TX. The suspects killed Officer Aubrey Hawkins, stole $70,000, 25 weapons and clothing. The men had escaped on December 13.
Current Birthdays
Ryan Seacrest turns 34 years old today
88 Dave Bartholomew
Bandleader
81 Mary Higgins Clark
Mystery writer
68 Anthony Fauci
Public health official
64 Mike Curb
Recording company executive
63 Lemmy
Rock musician (Motorhead)
62 Jeff Sessions
U.S. senator, R-Ala.
53 Grand L. Bush
Actor
53 Clarence Gilyard
Actor
52 Stephanie Hodge
Actress
51 Ian Burden
Rock musician (The Human League)
46 Kate Spade
Designer
45 Mary Ramsey
Rock singer (10,000 Maniacs)
44 Mark Valley
Actor
42 Diedrich Bader
Actor ("The Drew Carey Show")
38 Amaury Nolasco
Actor ("Prison Break")
37 Ricky Martin
Singer
Eric Lindros celebrates today
Historic Birthdays
I. F. Stone
12/24/1907 - 6/18/1989
American journalist
(Go to obit.)
60 William Paterson
12/24/1745 - 9/9/1806
Irish-born American governor of New Jersey
58 Kit Carson
12/24/1809 - 5/23/1868
American frontiersman and folk hero
65 Matthew Arnold
12/24/1822 - 4/15/1888
English poet and social critic
73 Michael Curtiz
12/24/1886 - 4/10/1962
Hungarian-born American film director
22 Georges-Marie Guynemer
12/24/1894 - 9/11/1917
French World War I combat pilot
60 Baby Dodds
12/24/1898 - 2/14/1959
American jazz musician
70 Howard Hughes
12/24/1905 - 4/5/1976
American manufacturer and aviator
67 Ava Gardner
12/24/1922 - 1/25/1990
American actress
1620 - The Pilgrim Fathers landed at New Plymouth, MA, to found Plymouth Colony, with John Carver as Governor.
1776 - The British suffered a major defeat in the Battle of Trenton during the American Revolutionary War.
1865 - The coffee percolator was patented by James H. Mason.
1871 - The "Gods Grown Old" was performed for the first time. It ran for 64 shows.
1898 - Marie and Pierre Curie discovered radium.
1908 - Texan boxer "Galveston Jack" Johnson knocked out Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia, to become the first black boxer to win the world heavyweight title.
1917 - During World War I, the U.S. government took over operation of the nation's railroads.
1921 - The Catholic Irish Free State became a self-governing dominion of Great Britain.
1927 - The East-West Shrine football game featured numbers on both the front and back of players’ jerseys.
1941 - Winston Churchill became the first British prime minister to address a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress.
1943 - The German battlecruiser Scharnhorst was sunk in the North Sea, during the Battle of North Cape.
1944 - Tennessee Williams' play "The Glass Menagerie" was first performed publicly, at the Civic Theatre in Chicago, IL.
1947 - Heavy snow blanketed the Northeast United States, burying New York City under 25.8 inches of snow in 16 hours. The severe weather was blamed for about 80 deaths.
1953 - "Big Sister" was heard for the last time on CBS Radio. The show ran for 17 years.
1954 - "The Shadow" aired on radio for the last time.
1956 - Fidel Castro attempted a secret landing in Cuba to overthrow the Batista regime. All but 11 of his supporters were killed.
1959 - The first charity walk took place, along Icknield Way, in aid of the World Refugee Fund.
1974 - Comedian Jack Benny died at age 80.
1982 - The Man of the Year in "TIME" magazine was a computer. It was the first time a non-human received the honors.
1986 - Doug Jarvis, age 31, set a National Hockey League (NHL) record as he skated in his 916th consecutive game. Jarvis eventually set the individual record for most consecutive games played with 964.
1986 - "Search for Tomorrow" was seen for the last time on CBS-TV. The show had been on the air for 35-years.
1990 - Garry Kasparov beat Anatoly Karpov to retain the chess championship.
1991 - The Soviet Union's parliament formally voted the country out of existence.
1995 - Israel turned dozens of West Bank villages over to the Palestinian Authority.
1996 - Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, CO.
1998 - Iraq announced that it would fire on U.S. and British warplanes that patrol the skies over northern and southern Iraq.
1999 - Alfonso Portillo, a populist lawyer, won Guatemala's first peacetime presidential elections in 40 years.
2000 - Michael McDermott, age 42, opened fire at his place of employment killing seven people. McDermott had no criminal history.
2002 - The first cloned human baby was born. The announcement was made the December 27 by Clonaid.
2004 - Under the Indian Ocean, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake sent 500-mph waves across the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal. The tsunami killed at least 283,000 people in a dozen countries, including Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Sumatra, Thailand and India
Current Birthdays
Chris Daughtry turns 29 years old today.
78 Donald Moffat
Actor
73 Abdul "Duke" Fakir
R&B singer (The Four Tops)
75 Caroll Spinney
Actor (Big Bird on "Sesame Street")
68 Phil Spector
Record producer
63 John Walsh
TV host ("America's Most Wanted")
62 Bob Carpenter
Country musician (The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
61 Carlton Fisk
Baseball Hall of Famer
54 Ozzie Smith
Baseball Hall of Famer
53 Evan Bayh
U.S. senator, D-Ind.
52 David Sedaris
Humorist
46 James Kottak
Rock musician (The Scorpions)
46 Brian Westrum
Country musician (Sons of the Desert)
45 Lars Ulrich
Rock musician (Metallica)
43 Nadia Dajani
Actress
41 J
Rock musician
41 Audrey Wiggins
Country singer
39 Peter Klett
Rock musician (Candlebox)
38 James Mercer
Rock singer (The Shins)
28 Ryan Shaw
R&B singer
13 Zach Mills
Actor ("Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium")
Historic Birthdays
Mao Tse-tung
12/26/1893 - 9/9/1976
Chinese statesman and leader of his nation's communist revolution
64 Leopold Mannes
12/26/1899 - 8/11/1964
American co-developer of Kodachrome film
88 Henry Miller
12/26/1891 - 6/7/1980
American novelist
93 Sir Norman Angell
12/26/1872 - 10/7/1967
English economist and Nobel Peace Prize winner
79 George Dewey
12/26/1837 - 1/16/1917
American naval commander
69 Dion Boucicault
12/26/1820 - 9/18/1890
Irish-born American playwright and actor
79 Charles Babbage
12/26/1791 - 10/18/1871
English mathematician and inventor
54 Thomas Gray
12/26/1716 - 7/30/1771
English poet
1776 - The British suffered a major defeat in the Battle of Trenton during the American Revolutionary War.
1865 - The coffee percolator was patented by James H. Mason.
1871 - The "Gods Grown Old" was performed for the first time. It ran for 64 shows.
1898 - Marie and Pierre Curie discovered radium.
1908 - Texan boxer "Galveston Jack" Johnson knocked out Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia, to become the first black boxer to win the world heavyweight title.
1917 - During World War I, the U.S. government took over operation of the nation's railroads.
1921 - The Catholic Irish Free State became a self-governing dominion of Great Britain.
1927 - The East-West Shrine football game featured numbers on both the front and back of players’ jerseys.
1941 - Winston Churchill became the first British prime minister to address a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress.
1943 - The German battlecruiser Scharnhorst was sunk in the North Sea, during the Battle of North Cape.
1944 - Tennessee Williams' play "The Glass Menagerie" was first performed publicly, at the Civic Theatre in Chicago, IL.
1947 - Heavy snow blanketed the Northeast United States, burying New York City under 25.8 inches of snow in 16 hours. The severe weather was blamed for about 80 deaths.
1953 - "Big Sister" was heard for the last time on CBS Radio. The show ran for 17 years.
1954 - "The Shadow" aired on radio for the last time.
1956 - Fidel Castro attempted a secret landing in Cuba to overthrow the Batista regime. All but 11 of his supporters were killed.
1959 - The first charity walk took place, along Icknield Way, in aid of the World Refugee Fund.
1974 - Comedian Jack Benny died at age 80.
1982 - The Man of the Year in "TIME" magazine was a computer. It was the first time a non-human received the honors.
1986 - Doug Jarvis, age 31, set a National Hockey League (NHL) record as he skated in his 916th consecutive game. Jarvis eventually set the individual record for most consecutive games played with 964.
1986 - "Search for Tomorrow" was seen for the last time on CBS-TV. The show had been on the air for 35-years.
1990 - Garry Kasparov beat Anatoly Karpov to retain the chess championship.
1991 - The Soviet Union's parliament formally voted the country out of existence.
1995 - Israel turned dozens of West Bank villages over to the Palestinian Authority.
1996 - Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, CO.
1998 - Iraq announced that it would fire on U.S. and British warplanes that patrol the skies over northern and southern Iraq.
1999 - Alfonso Portillo, a populist lawyer, won Guatemala's first peacetime presidential elections in 40 years.
2000 - Michael McDermott, age 42, opened fire at his place of employment killing seven people. McDermott had no criminal history.
2002 - The first cloned human baby was born. The announcement was made the December 27 by Clonaid.
2004 - Under the Indian Ocean, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake sent 500-mph waves across the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal. The tsunami killed at least 283,000 people in a dozen countries, including Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Sumatra, Thailand and India
Current Birthdays
Chris Daughtry turns 29 years old today.
78 Donald Moffat
Actor
73 Abdul "Duke" Fakir
R&B singer (The Four Tops)
75 Caroll Spinney
Actor (Big Bird on "Sesame Street")
68 Phil Spector
Record producer
63 John Walsh
TV host ("America's Most Wanted")
62 Bob Carpenter
Country musician (The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
61 Carlton Fisk
Baseball Hall of Famer
54 Ozzie Smith
Baseball Hall of Famer
53 Evan Bayh
U.S. senator, D-Ind.
52 David Sedaris
Humorist
46 James Kottak
Rock musician (The Scorpions)
46 Brian Westrum
Country musician (Sons of the Desert)
45 Lars Ulrich
Rock musician (Metallica)
43 Nadia Dajani
Actress
41 J
Rock musician
41 Audrey Wiggins
Country singer
39 Peter Klett
Rock musician (Candlebox)
38 James Mercer
Rock singer (The Shins)
28 Ryan Shaw
R&B singer
13 Zach Mills
Actor ("Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium")
Historic Birthdays
Mao Tse-tung
12/26/1893 - 9/9/1976
Chinese statesman and leader of his nation's communist revolution
64 Leopold Mannes
12/26/1899 - 8/11/1964
American co-developer of Kodachrome film
88 Henry Miller
12/26/1891 - 6/7/1980
American novelist
93 Sir Norman Angell
12/26/1872 - 10/7/1967
English economist and Nobel Peace Prize winner
79 George Dewey
12/26/1837 - 1/16/1917
American naval commander
69 Dion Boucicault
12/26/1820 - 9/18/1890
Irish-born American playwright and actor
79 Charles Babbage
12/26/1791 - 10/18/1871
English mathematician and inventor
54 Thomas Gray
12/26/1716 - 7/30/1771
English poet
And, thus began our Digital Age. Roughly two years later, Apple unleashed their infamous commercial advertising the Macintosh.
Coincidentally the date coincides with the birth of Charles Babbage who is credited as being one of the fathers of the computer.Although mechanical his designs incorporated many modern computer features including a printer.
http://www.computerhistory.org/babbage/?gclid=CKv5saai35cCFQoi3godZXdrDQ
1703 - The Methuen Treaty was signed between Portugal and England, giving preference to the import of Portuguese wines into England.
1831 - Charles Darwin set out on a voyage to the Pacific aboard the HMS Beagle. Darwin's discoveries during the voyage helped him form the basis of his theories on evolution.
1845 - Dr. Crawford Williamson Long used anesthesia for childbirth for the first time. The event was the delivery of his own child in Jefferson, GA.
1900 - Carrie Nation staged her first raid on a saloon at the Carey Hotel in Wichita, KS. She broke each and every one of the liquor bottles that could be seen.
1904 - James Barrie's play "Peter Pan" premiered in London.
1927 - Leon Trotsky was expelled from the Communist Party.
1938 - The first skimobile course in America opened in North Conway, NH.
1945 - The World Bank was created with an agreement signed by 28 nations.
1947 - The children's television program "Howdy Doody," hosted by Bob Smith, made its debut on NBC.
1949 - Queen Juliana of the Netherlands granted sovereignty to Indonesia after more than 300 years of Dutch rule.
1951 - In Cincinnati, OH, a Crosley automobile, with a steering wheel on the right side, became the first vehicle of its kind to be placed in service for mail delivery.
1965 - The BP oil rig Sea Gem capsized in the North Sea, with the loss of 13 lives.
1968 - "The Breakfast Club" signed off for the last time on ABC radio, after 35 years on the air.
1971 - Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy and Woodstock of Charles Schulz’ "Peanuts" comic strip were on the cover of "Newsweek" magazine.
1978 - Spain adopted a new constitution and became a democracy after 40 years of dictatorship.
1979 - Soviet forces seized control of Afghanistan. Babrak Karmal succeeded President Hafizullah Amin, who was overthrown and executed.
1985 - Palestinian guerrillas opened fire inside the Rome and Vienna airports. A total of twenty people were killed, including five of the attackers, who were slain by police and security personnel.
1985 - Dian Fossey, an American naturalist, was found murdered at a research station in Rawanda.
1992 - The U.S. shot down an Iraqi fighter jet during what the Pentagon described as a confrontation between a pair of Iraqi warplanes and U.S. F-16 jets in U.N.-restricted airspace over southern Iraq.
1996 - Muslim fundamentalist Taliban forces retook the strategic air base of Bagram, solidifying their buffer zone around Kabul, the Afghanistan capital.
1997 - In Northern Ireland, Billy Wright was assassinated. He was imprisoned as a Protestant paramilitary leader.
2000 - Mario Lemeiux (Pittsburgh Penguins) returned to the National Hockey League (NHL) as a player after over 3 years of retirement. He was the first owner-player in the modern era of pro sports. Lemieux had purchased the Pittsburgh Penguins during his retirement from playing.
2001 - U.S. President George W. Bush granted China permanent normal trade status with the United States.
2002 - North Korea ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said that it would restart a laboratory capable of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons.
2002 - Clonaid announced the birth of the first cloned human baby. The baby had been born December 26.
2002 - In Chechnya, at least 40 people were killed when suicide bombers attacked the administartion of Grozny.
Current Birthdays
Emilie de Ravin turns 27 years old today
84 James A. McClure
Former U.S. senator, R-Idaho
77 Scotty Moore
Rock musician
69 John Amos
Actor
65 Cokie Roberts
Broadcast journalist
64 Mick Jones
Rock musician (Foreigner)
64 Tracy Nelson
Blues singer
60 Gerard Depardieu
Actor
59 T.S. Monk
Jazz drummer, vocalist
56 Tovah Feldshuh
Actress ("Law and Order")
56 David Knopfler
Rock musician (Dire Straits)
52 Karen Hughes
Former White House aide
49 Andre Tippett
Football Hall of Famer
48 Maryam D'Abo
Actress
46 Jeff Bryant
Country musician
44 Ian Gomez
Actor
44 Theresa Randle
Actress
42 Eva La Rue
Actress ("All My Children")
39 Darrin Vincent
Bluegrass musician
39 Sarah Vowell
Author
36 Matt Slocum
Rock musician (Sixpence None the Richer)
35 Wilson Cruz
Actor
35 Olu
R&B singer
34 Masi Oka
Actor ("Heroes")
30 Deuce McAllister
Football player
29 Carson Palmer
Football player
25 Cole Hamels
Baseball player
Historic Birthdays
Marlene Dietrich
12/27/1901 - 5/6/1992
German-born American actress
59 Louis Bromfield
12/27/1896 - 3/18/1956
American novelist and essayist
95 Cyrus Eaton
12/27/1883 - 5/9/1979
Canadian-born American industrialist and philanthropist
93 Sir Mackenzie Bowell
12/27/1823 - 12/10/1917
Canadian prime minister
72 Louis Pasteur
12/27/1822 - 9/28/1895
French biologist and chemist; invented pasteurization process
84 Sir George Cayley
12/27/1773 - 12/15/1857
English aerial navigator
62 William Johnson
12/27/1771 - 8/4/1834
American Supreme Court justice
58 Johannes Kepler
12/27/1571 - 11/15/1630
German astronomer
1831 - Charles Darwin set out on a voyage to the Pacific aboard the HMS Beagle. Darwin's discoveries during the voyage helped him form the basis of his theories on evolution.
1845 - Dr. Crawford Williamson Long used anesthesia for childbirth for the first time. The event was the delivery of his own child in Jefferson, GA.
1900 - Carrie Nation staged her first raid on a saloon at the Carey Hotel in Wichita, KS. She broke each and every one of the liquor bottles that could be seen.
1904 - James Barrie's play "Peter Pan" premiered in London.
1927 - Leon Trotsky was expelled from the Communist Party.
1938 - The first skimobile course in America opened in North Conway, NH.
1945 - The World Bank was created with an agreement signed by 28 nations.
1947 - The children's television program "Howdy Doody," hosted by Bob Smith, made its debut on NBC.
1949 - Queen Juliana of the Netherlands granted sovereignty to Indonesia after more than 300 years of Dutch rule.
1951 - In Cincinnati, OH, a Crosley automobile, with a steering wheel on the right side, became the first vehicle of its kind to be placed in service for mail delivery.
1965 - The BP oil rig Sea Gem capsized in the North Sea, with the loss of 13 lives.
1968 - "The Breakfast Club" signed off for the last time on ABC radio, after 35 years on the air.
1971 - Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy and Woodstock of Charles Schulz’ "Peanuts" comic strip were on the cover of "Newsweek" magazine.
1978 - Spain adopted a new constitution and became a democracy after 40 years of dictatorship.
1979 - Soviet forces seized control of Afghanistan. Babrak Karmal succeeded President Hafizullah Amin, who was overthrown and executed.
1985 - Palestinian guerrillas opened fire inside the Rome and Vienna airports. A total of twenty people were killed, including five of the attackers, who were slain by police and security personnel.
1985 - Dian Fossey, an American naturalist, was found murdered at a research station in Rawanda.
1992 - The U.S. shot down an Iraqi fighter jet during what the Pentagon described as a confrontation between a pair of Iraqi warplanes and U.S. F-16 jets in U.N.-restricted airspace over southern Iraq.
1996 - Muslim fundamentalist Taliban forces retook the strategic air base of Bagram, solidifying their buffer zone around Kabul, the Afghanistan capital.
1997 - In Northern Ireland, Billy Wright was assassinated. He was imprisoned as a Protestant paramilitary leader.
2000 - Mario Lemeiux (Pittsburgh Penguins) returned to the National Hockey League (NHL) as a player after over 3 years of retirement. He was the first owner-player in the modern era of pro sports. Lemieux had purchased the Pittsburgh Penguins during his retirement from playing.
2001 - U.S. President George W. Bush granted China permanent normal trade status with the United States.
2002 - North Korea ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said that it would restart a laboratory capable of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons.
2002 - Clonaid announced the birth of the first cloned human baby. The baby had been born December 26.
2002 - In Chechnya, at least 40 people were killed when suicide bombers attacked the administartion of Grozny.
Current Birthdays
Emilie de Ravin turns 27 years old today
84 James A. McClure
Former U.S. senator, R-Idaho
77 Scotty Moore
Rock musician
69 John Amos
Actor
65 Cokie Roberts
Broadcast journalist
64 Mick Jones
Rock musician (Foreigner)
64 Tracy Nelson
Blues singer
60 Gerard Depardieu
Actor
59 T.S. Monk
Jazz drummer, vocalist
56 Tovah Feldshuh
Actress ("Law and Order")
56 David Knopfler
Rock musician (Dire Straits)
52 Karen Hughes
Former White House aide
49 Andre Tippett
Football Hall of Famer
48 Maryam D'Abo
Actress
46 Jeff Bryant
Country musician
44 Ian Gomez
Actor
44 Theresa Randle
Actress
42 Eva La Rue
Actress ("All My Children")
39 Darrin Vincent
Bluegrass musician
39 Sarah Vowell
Author
36 Matt Slocum
Rock musician (Sixpence None the Richer)
35 Wilson Cruz
Actor
35 Olu
R&B singer
34 Masi Oka
Actor ("Heroes")
30 Deuce McAllister
Football player
29 Carson Palmer
Football player
25 Cole Hamels
Baseball player
Historic Birthdays
Marlene Dietrich
12/27/1901 - 5/6/1992
German-born American actress
59 Louis Bromfield
12/27/1896 - 3/18/1956
American novelist and essayist
95 Cyrus Eaton
12/27/1883 - 5/9/1979
Canadian-born American industrialist and philanthropist
93 Sir Mackenzie Bowell
12/27/1823 - 12/10/1917
Canadian prime minister
72 Louis Pasteur
12/27/1822 - 9/28/1895
French biologist and chemist; invented pasteurization process
84 Sir George Cayley
12/27/1773 - 12/15/1857
English aerial navigator
62 William Johnson
12/27/1771 - 8/4/1834
American Supreme Court justice
58 Johannes Kepler
12/27/1571 - 11/15/1630
German astronomer
1170 - St Thomas à Becket, the 40th archbishop of Canterbury, was murdered in his own cathedral by four knights acting on Henry II's orders.
1812 - The USS Constitution won a battle with the British ship HMS Java about 30 miles off the coast of Brazil. Before Commodore William Bainbridge ordered the sinking of the Java he had her wheel removed to replace the one the Constitution had lost during the battle.
1813 - The British burned Buffalo, NY, during the War of 1812.
1837 - Canadian militiamen destroyed the Caroline, a U.S. steamboat docked at Buffalo, NY.
1845 - U.S. President James Polk and signed legislation making Texas the 28th state of the United States.
1848 - U.S. President James Polk turned on the first gas light at the White House.
1851 - The first American Young Men's Christian Association was organized, in Boston, MA.
1860 - The HMS Warrior, Britain's first seagoing first iron-hulled warship, was launched.
1888 - The first Performance of Macbeth took place at the Lyceum Theatre.
1890 - The U.S. Seventh Cavalry massacred over 400 men, women and children at Wounded Knee Creek, SD. This was the last major conflict between Indians and U.S. troops.
1895 - The Jameson Raid from Mafikeng into Transvaal, which attempted to overthrow Kruger's Boer government, started.
1911 - Sun Yat-sen became the first president of a republican China, following the Revolution.
1913 - "The Unwelcome Throne" was released by Selig’s Polyscope Company. This was a moving picture and the first serial motion picture.
1934 - The first regular-season, college basketball game was played at Madison Square Garden in New York City. New York University defeated Notre Dame 25-18.
1934 - Japan renounced the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.
1937 - Babe Ruth returned to baseball as the new manager of the Class D, De Land Reds of the Florida State League. Ruth had retired from baseball in 1935.
1940 - During World War II, Germany began dropping incendiary bombs on London.
1945 - The mystery voice of Mr. Hush was heard for the first time on the radio show, "Truth or Consequences", hosted by Ralph Edwards.
1945 - Sheb Wooley recorded the first commercial record made in Nashville, TN.
1949 - KC2XAK of Bridgeport, Connecticut became the first ultrahigh frequency (UHF) television station to begin operating on a regular daily schedule.
1952 - The first transistorized hearing aid was offered for sale by Sonotone Corporation.
1953 - Jean Stapleton debuted in her first Broadway play, "In the Summer House", which closed after only 55 performances.
1972 - Following 36 years of publication, the last weekly issue of "LIFE" magazine hit the newsstands. The magazine later became a monthly publication.
1975 - A bomb exploded in the main terminal of New York's LaGuardia Airport. 11 people were killed.
1985 - Phil Donahue and a Soviet radio commentator hosted the "Citizens’ Summit" via satellite TV.
1986 - The Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, FL, reopened for business after eighteen years and $47 million expended on restoration.
1989 - Following Hong Kong's decision to forcibly repatriate some Vietnamese refugees, thousands of Vietnamese 'boat people' battled with riot police.
1996 - The Guatemalan government and leaders of the leftist Guatemalan National Revolutionary Union signed a peace accord in Guatemala City, ending a civil war that had lasted 36 years.
1997 - Hong Kong began killing 1.25 million chickens, the entire population, for fear of the spread of 'bird flu'.
1998 - Khmer Rouge leaders apologized for the 1970s genocide in Cambodia that claimed 1 million lives.
Current Birthdays
Jon Voight turns 70 years old today
91 Clarence Swensen
Actor ("The Wizard of Oz")
76 Inga Swenson
Actress ("Benson")
74 Tom Jarriel
Broadcast journalist
71 Mary Tyler Moore
Actress
68 Ed Bruce
Country singer, actor
67 Ray Thomas
Flutist (The Moody Blues)
62 Marianne Faithfull
Rock singer
61 Ted Danson
Actor ("Cheers," "Becker")
58 Jon Polito
Actor
57 Yvonne Elliman
Singer, actress
49 Paula Poundstone
Comedian
47 Jim Reid
Rock singer, musician (The Jesus and Mary Chain)
45 Sean Payton
Football coach
43 Dexter Holland
Rock singer (The Offspring)
42 Mystro Clark
Actor, comedian
42 Jason Gould
Actor
41 Andy Wachowski
Director ("Matrix" films)
39 Jennifer Ehle
Actress
38 Glen Phillips
Rock musician
38 Kevin Weisman
Actor ("Alias")
36 Jude Law
Actor
34 Mekhi Phifer
Actor ("ER")
33 Shawn Hatosy
Actor
31 Laveranues Coles
Football player
29 Diego Luna
Actor
25 Jessica Andrews
Country singer
Historic Birthdays
Andrew Johnson
12/29/1808 - 7/31/1875
17th President of the United States (1865-69)
75 William Gaddis
12/29/1922 - 12/16/1998
American novelist
76 Klaus Fuchs
12/29/1911 - 1/28/1988
German-born American physicist and spy
86 Jess Willard
12/29/1881 - 12/15/1968
American prizefighter
56 William Mitchell
12/29/1879 - 2/19/1936
U.S. Army officer and early advocate of a separate air force
96 Pablo Casals
12/29/1876 - 10/22/1973
Spanish cellist and conductor
88 William Gladstone
12/29/1809 - 5/19/1898
English statesman and four-time prime minister (1868-74, 1880-85, 1886, 1892-94)
59 Charles Goodyear
12/29/1800 - 7/1/1860
American inventor; pioneered commercial use of rubber
76 Charles Macintosh
12/29/1766 - 7/25/1843
Scottish chemist and inventor
42 Jeanne-Antoinette Pompadour
12/29/1721 - 4/15/1764
French mistress of Louis XV
1812 - The USS Constitution won a battle with the British ship HMS Java about 30 miles off the coast of Brazil. Before Commodore William Bainbridge ordered the sinking of the Java he had her wheel removed to replace the one the Constitution had lost during the battle.
1813 - The British burned Buffalo, NY, during the War of 1812.
1837 - Canadian militiamen destroyed the Caroline, a U.S. steamboat docked at Buffalo, NY.
1845 - U.S. President James Polk and signed legislation making Texas the 28th state of the United States.
1848 - U.S. President James Polk turned on the first gas light at the White House.
1851 - The first American Young Men's Christian Association was organized, in Boston, MA.
1860 - The HMS Warrior, Britain's first seagoing first iron-hulled warship, was launched.
1888 - The first Performance of Macbeth took place at the Lyceum Theatre.
1890 - The U.S. Seventh Cavalry massacred over 400 men, women and children at Wounded Knee Creek, SD. This was the last major conflict between Indians and U.S. troops.
1895 - The Jameson Raid from Mafikeng into Transvaal, which attempted to overthrow Kruger's Boer government, started.
1911 - Sun Yat-sen became the first president of a republican China, following the Revolution.
1913 - "The Unwelcome Throne" was released by Selig’s Polyscope Company. This was a moving picture and the first serial motion picture.
1934 - The first regular-season, college basketball game was played at Madison Square Garden in New York City. New York University defeated Notre Dame 25-18.
1934 - Japan renounced the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.
1937 - Babe Ruth returned to baseball as the new manager of the Class D, De Land Reds of the Florida State League. Ruth had retired from baseball in 1935.
1940 - During World War II, Germany began dropping incendiary bombs on London.
1945 - The mystery voice of Mr. Hush was heard for the first time on the radio show, "Truth or Consequences", hosted by Ralph Edwards.
1945 - Sheb Wooley recorded the first commercial record made in Nashville, TN.
1949 - KC2XAK of Bridgeport, Connecticut became the first ultrahigh frequency (UHF) television station to begin operating on a regular daily schedule.
1952 - The first transistorized hearing aid was offered for sale by Sonotone Corporation.
1953 - Jean Stapleton debuted in her first Broadway play, "In the Summer House", which closed after only 55 performances.
1972 - Following 36 years of publication, the last weekly issue of "LIFE" magazine hit the newsstands. The magazine later became a monthly publication.
1975 - A bomb exploded in the main terminal of New York's LaGuardia Airport. 11 people were killed.
1985 - Phil Donahue and a Soviet radio commentator hosted the "Citizens’ Summit" via satellite TV.
1986 - The Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, FL, reopened for business after eighteen years and $47 million expended on restoration.
1989 - Following Hong Kong's decision to forcibly repatriate some Vietnamese refugees, thousands of Vietnamese 'boat people' battled with riot police.
1996 - The Guatemalan government and leaders of the leftist Guatemalan National Revolutionary Union signed a peace accord in Guatemala City, ending a civil war that had lasted 36 years.
1997 - Hong Kong began killing 1.25 million chickens, the entire population, for fear of the spread of 'bird flu'.
1998 - Khmer Rouge leaders apologized for the 1970s genocide in Cambodia that claimed 1 million lives.
Current Birthdays
Jon Voight turns 70 years old today
91 Clarence Swensen
Actor ("The Wizard of Oz")
76 Inga Swenson
Actress ("Benson")
74 Tom Jarriel
Broadcast journalist
71 Mary Tyler Moore
Actress
68 Ed Bruce
Country singer, actor
67 Ray Thomas
Flutist (The Moody Blues)
62 Marianne Faithfull
Rock singer
61 Ted Danson
Actor ("Cheers," "Becker")
58 Jon Polito
Actor
57 Yvonne Elliman
Singer, actress
49 Paula Poundstone
Comedian
47 Jim Reid
Rock singer, musician (The Jesus and Mary Chain)
45 Sean Payton
Football coach
43 Dexter Holland
Rock singer (The Offspring)
42 Mystro Clark
Actor, comedian
42 Jason Gould
Actor
41 Andy Wachowski
Director ("Matrix" films)
39 Jennifer Ehle
Actress
38 Glen Phillips
Rock musician
38 Kevin Weisman
Actor ("Alias")
36 Jude Law
Actor
34 Mekhi Phifer
Actor ("ER")
33 Shawn Hatosy
Actor
31 Laveranues Coles
Football player
29 Diego Luna
Actor
25 Jessica Andrews
Country singer
Historic Birthdays
Andrew Johnson
12/29/1808 - 7/31/1875
17th President of the United States (1865-69)
75 William Gaddis
12/29/1922 - 12/16/1998
American novelist
76 Klaus Fuchs
12/29/1911 - 1/28/1988
German-born American physicist and spy
86 Jess Willard
12/29/1881 - 12/15/1968
American prizefighter
56 William Mitchell
12/29/1879 - 2/19/1936
U.S. Army officer and early advocate of a separate air force
96 Pablo Casals
12/29/1876 - 10/22/1973
Spanish cellist and conductor
88 William Gladstone
12/29/1809 - 5/19/1898
English statesman and four-time prime minister (1868-74, 1880-85, 1886, 1892-94)
59 Charles Goodyear
12/29/1800 - 7/1/1860
American inventor; pioneered commercial use of rubber
76 Charles Macintosh
12/29/1766 - 7/25/1843
Scottish chemist and inventor
42 Jeanne-Antoinette Pompadour
12/29/1721 - 4/15/1764
French mistress of Louis XV
1460 - At the Battle of Wakefield, in England's Wars of the Roses, the Duke of York was defeated and killed by the Lancastrians.
1853 - The United States bought about 45,000 square miles of land from Mexico in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase.
1879 - Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Pirates of Penzance" was first performed, at Paignton, Devon, England.
1880 - The Transvaal was declared a republic. Paul Kruger became its first president.
1887 - A petition to Queen Victoria with over one million names of women appealing for public houses to be closed on Sundays was handed to the home secretary.
1903 - About 600 people died when fire broke out at the Iroquois Theater in Chicago, IL.
1911 - Sun Yat-sen was elected the first president of the Republic of China.
1919 - Lincoln's Inn, in London, admitted the first female bar student.
1922 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was formed.
1924 - Edwin Hubble announced the existence of other galactic systems.
1927 - The first subway in the Orient was dedicated in Tokyo, Japan.
1935 - Italian bombers destroyed a Sweedish Red Cross unit in Ethiopia.
1936 - The United Auto Workers union staged its first sit-down strike, at the Fisher Body Plant in Flint, MI.
1940 - California's first freeway was officially opened. It was the Arroyo Seco Parkway connecting Los Angeles and Pasadena.
1942 - "Mr. and Mrs. North" debuted on NBC radio.
1944 - King George II of Greece proclaimed a regency to rule his country, virtually renouncing the throne.
1947 - King Michael of Romania abdicated in favor of a Communist Republic. He claimed he was forced from his throne.
1948 - "Kiss Me Kate" opened at the New Century Theatre in New York City. Cole Porter composed the music for the classic play that ran for 1,077 performances.
1953 - The first color TV sets went on sale for about $1,175.
1954 - Pearl Bailey opened on Broadway in the play, "House of Flowers."
1954 - James Arness made his dramatic TV debut in "The Chase". The "Gunsmoke" series didn’t begin for Arness until the fall of 1955.
1961 - Jack Nicklaus lost his first attempt at pro golf to Gary Player in an exhibition match in Miami, FL.
1972 - The United States halted its heavy bombing of North Vietnam.
1976 - The Smothers Brothers, Tom and Dick, played their last show at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas and retired as a team from show business. Both continued as solo artists and they reunited several years later.
1978 - Ohio State University fired Woody Hayes as its football coach, one day after Hayes punched Clemson University player Charlie Bauman during the Gator Bowl. Bauman had intercepted an Ohio pass.
1980 - "The Wonderful World of Disney" was cancelled by NBC after more than 25 years on the TV. It was the longest-running series in prime-time television history.
1993 - Israel and the Vatican established diplomatic relations.
1996 - A passenger train was bombed by Bodo separatists in India's eastern state of Assam. At least 26 people were killed and dozens were seriously injured.
1996 - About 250,000 striking workers shut down vital services across Israel in protests against budget cuts proposed by Prime Minister Netanyahu.
1997 - More than 400 people were massacred in four villages in the single worst incident during Algeria's insurgency.
1999 Former Beatle George Harrison fought off a knife-wielding intruder who broke into his mansion west of London and stabbed him in the chest.
2003 The federal government announced it would ban the sale of ephedra, an herbal stimulant linked to 155 deaths and dozens of heart attacks and strokes.
2006 Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was hanged.
2007 Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of an election that opponents and observers alleged was rigged; violence flared in Nairobi slums and coastal resort towns, killing scores in the following days.
Current Birthdays
LeBron James turns 24 years old today.
74 Joseph Bologna
Actor
74 Russ Tamblyn
Actor
73 Jack Riley
Actor ("The Bob Newhart Show")
73 Sandy Koufax
Baseball Hall of Famer
71 Paul Stookey
Folk singer (Peter, Paul and Mary)
68 James Burrows
TV director ("Taxi," "Cheers," "Will and Grace")
66 Michael Nesmith
Rock singer, musician (The Monkees)
66 Fred Ward
Actor
63 Davy Jones
Rock singer (The Monkees)
62 Patti Smith
Rock musician
61 Jeff Lynne
Rock singer, musician (ELO)
55 Meredith Viera
TV host ("Today")
53 Sheryl Lee Ralph
Actress
52 Suzy Bogguss
Country singer
52 Patricia Kalember
Actress
51 Matt Lauer
TV host ("Today")
49 Tracey Ullman
Actress, comedian
48 Rob Hotchkiss
Rock musician
47 Sean Hannity
TV host ("Hannity & Colmes")
39 Jay Kay
Singer (Jamiroquai)
39 Byron McMackin
Rock musician (Pennywise)
39 Meredith Monroe
Actress ("Dawson's Creek")
37 Daniel Sunjata
Actor ("Rescue Me")
36 Maureen Flanniga
Actress
35 Jason Behr
Actor
33 Tiger Woods
Golfer
32 A.J. Pierzynski
Baseball player
31 Laila Ali
Boxer, TV personality
30 Tyrese
R&B singer, actor
28 Tim Lopez
Rock musician (Plain White T's))
26 Kristin Kreuk
Actress ("Smallville")
Historic Birthdays
Alfred Smith
12/30/1873 - 10/4/1944
American politician and four-time governor of New York State
77 Bert Parks
12/30/1914 - 2/2/1992
American game show host
69 Sir Carol Reed
12/30/1906 - 4/25/1976
English film director
71 Alfred Einstein
12/30/1880 - 2/13/1952
German-born American musicologist and critic
70 Ramana Maharshi
12/30/1879 - 4/14/1950
Hindu philosopher and yogi
70 Rudyard Kipling
12/30/1865 - 1/18/1936
English writer
77 Asa Griggs Candler
12/30/1851 - 3/12/1929
American developer of Coca-Cola
62 John Milne
12/30/1850 - 7/30/1913
English seismologist and geologist; inventor of the seismograph
1853 - The United States bought about 45,000 square miles of land from Mexico in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase.
1879 - Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Pirates of Penzance" was first performed, at Paignton, Devon, England.
1880 - The Transvaal was declared a republic. Paul Kruger became its first president.
1887 - A petition to Queen Victoria with over one million names of women appealing for public houses to be closed on Sundays was handed to the home secretary.
1903 - About 600 people died when fire broke out at the Iroquois Theater in Chicago, IL.
1911 - Sun Yat-sen was elected the first president of the Republic of China.
1919 - Lincoln's Inn, in London, admitted the first female bar student.
1922 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was formed.
1924 - Edwin Hubble announced the existence of other galactic systems.
1927 - The first subway in the Orient was dedicated in Tokyo, Japan.
1935 - Italian bombers destroyed a Sweedish Red Cross unit in Ethiopia.
1936 - The United Auto Workers union staged its first sit-down strike, at the Fisher Body Plant in Flint, MI.
1940 - California's first freeway was officially opened. It was the Arroyo Seco Parkway connecting Los Angeles and Pasadena.
1942 - "Mr. and Mrs. North" debuted on NBC radio.
1944 - King George II of Greece proclaimed a regency to rule his country, virtually renouncing the throne.
1947 - King Michael of Romania abdicated in favor of a Communist Republic. He claimed he was forced from his throne.
1948 - "Kiss Me Kate" opened at the New Century Theatre in New York City. Cole Porter composed the music for the classic play that ran for 1,077 performances.
1953 - The first color TV sets went on sale for about $1,175.
1954 - Pearl Bailey opened on Broadway in the play, "House of Flowers."
1954 - James Arness made his dramatic TV debut in "The Chase". The "Gunsmoke" series didn’t begin for Arness until the fall of 1955.
1961 - Jack Nicklaus lost his first attempt at pro golf to Gary Player in an exhibition match in Miami, FL.
1972 - The United States halted its heavy bombing of North Vietnam.
1976 - The Smothers Brothers, Tom and Dick, played their last show at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas and retired as a team from show business. Both continued as solo artists and they reunited several years later.
1978 - Ohio State University fired Woody Hayes as its football coach, one day after Hayes punched Clemson University player Charlie Bauman during the Gator Bowl. Bauman had intercepted an Ohio pass.
1980 - "The Wonderful World of Disney" was cancelled by NBC after more than 25 years on the TV. It was the longest-running series in prime-time television history.
1993 - Israel and the Vatican established diplomatic relations.
1996 - A passenger train was bombed by Bodo separatists in India's eastern state of Assam. At least 26 people were killed and dozens were seriously injured.
1996 - About 250,000 striking workers shut down vital services across Israel in protests against budget cuts proposed by Prime Minister Netanyahu.
1997 - More than 400 people were massacred in four villages in the single worst incident during Algeria's insurgency.
1999 Former Beatle George Harrison fought off a knife-wielding intruder who broke into his mansion west of London and stabbed him in the chest.
2003 The federal government announced it would ban the sale of ephedra, an herbal stimulant linked to 155 deaths and dozens of heart attacks and strokes.
2006 Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was hanged.
2007 Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of an election that opponents and observers alleged was rigged; violence flared in Nairobi slums and coastal resort towns, killing scores in the following days.
Current Birthdays
LeBron James turns 24 years old today.
74 Joseph Bologna
Actor
74 Russ Tamblyn
Actor
73 Jack Riley
Actor ("The Bob Newhart Show")
73 Sandy Koufax
Baseball Hall of Famer
71 Paul Stookey
Folk singer (Peter, Paul and Mary)
68 James Burrows
TV director ("Taxi," "Cheers," "Will and Grace")
66 Michael Nesmith
Rock singer, musician (The Monkees)
66 Fred Ward
Actor
63 Davy Jones
Rock singer (The Monkees)
62 Patti Smith
Rock musician
61 Jeff Lynne
Rock singer, musician (ELO)
55 Meredith Viera
TV host ("Today")
53 Sheryl Lee Ralph
Actress
52 Suzy Bogguss
Country singer
52 Patricia Kalember
Actress
51 Matt Lauer
TV host ("Today")
49 Tracey Ullman
Actress, comedian
48 Rob Hotchkiss
Rock musician
47 Sean Hannity
TV host ("Hannity & Colmes")
39 Jay Kay
Singer (Jamiroquai)
39 Byron McMackin
Rock musician (Pennywise)
39 Meredith Monroe
Actress ("Dawson's Creek")
37 Daniel Sunjata
Actor ("Rescue Me")
36 Maureen Flanniga
Actress
35 Jason Behr
Actor
33 Tiger Woods
Golfer
32 A.J. Pierzynski
Baseball player
31 Laila Ali
Boxer, TV personality
30 Tyrese
R&B singer, actor
28 Tim Lopez
Rock musician (Plain White T's))
26 Kristin Kreuk
Actress ("Smallville")
Historic Birthdays
Alfred Smith
12/30/1873 - 10/4/1944
American politician and four-time governor of New York State
77 Bert Parks
12/30/1914 - 2/2/1992
American game show host
69 Sir Carol Reed
12/30/1906 - 4/25/1976
English film director
71 Alfred Einstein
12/30/1880 - 2/13/1952
German-born American musicologist and critic
70 Ramana Maharshi
12/30/1879 - 4/14/1950
Hindu philosopher and yogi
70 Rudyard Kipling
12/30/1865 - 1/18/1936
English writer
77 Asa Griggs Candler
12/30/1851 - 3/12/1929
American developer of Coca-Cola
62 John Milne
12/30/1850 - 7/30/1913
English seismologist and geologist; inventor of the seismograph
1492 - The leader of the last Arab stronghold in Spain surrendered to Spanish forces loyal to King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I.
1788 - Georgia became the 4th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
1842 - In Fairmount, PA, the first wire suspension bridge was opened to traffic.
1859 - Erastus Beadle published "The Dime Book of Practical Etiquette."
1872 - Brigham Young, the 71-year-old leader of the Mormon Church, was arrested on a charge of bigamy. He had 25 wives.
1879 - Thomas Edison began construction on his first generator.
1890 - Alice Sanger became the first female White House staffer.
1893 - The first commemorative postage stamps were issued.
1900 - U.S. Secretary of State John Hay announced the Open Door Policy to prompt trade with China.
1900 - The Chicago Canal opened.
1910 - The first junior high school in the United States opened. McKinley School in Berkeley, CA, housed seventh and eighth grade students. In a separate building students were housed who attended grades 9-12.
1917 - Royal Bank of Canada took over the Quebec Bank.
1921 - The first religious broadcast on radio was heard on KDKA Radio in Pittsburgh, PA, as Dr. E.J. Van Etten of Calvary Episcopal Church preached.
1921 - DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park opened.
1929 - The United States and Canada reached an agreement on joint action to preserve Niagara Falls.
1935 - Bruno Richard Hauptmann went on trial for the kidnap-murder of Charles Lindberghs baby. Hauptmann was found guilt and executed.
1942 - The Philippine capital of Manila was captured by Japanese forces during World War II.
1953 - "The Life of Riley" debuted on NBC-TV.
1955 - Panamanian President Jose Antonio Remon was assassinated.
1957 - The San Francisco and Los Angeles stock exchanges merged.
1959 - CBS Radio ended four soap operas. "Our Gal Sunday", "This is Nora Drake", "Backstage Wife" and "Road of Life" all aired for the last time.
1960 - U.S. Sen. John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.
1965 - "Broadway" Joe Namath signed the richest rookie contract ($400,000) in the history of pro football.
1968 - Dr. Christian Barnard performed the first successful heart transplant.
1968 - Fidel Castro announced petroleum and sugar rationing in Cuba.
1971 - In the U.S., a federally imposed ban on television cigarette advertisements went into effect.
1974 - U.S. President Richard M. Nixon signed a bill requiring all states to lower the maximum speed limit to 55 MPH. The law was intended to conserve gasoline supplies during an embargo imposed by Arab oil-producing countries. Federal speed limits were abolished in 1995.
1983 - The final edition of Garry Trudeau’s comic strip, "Doonesbury", appeared in 726 newspapers. "Doonesbury" began running again in September 1984.
1983 - The musical "Annie" closed on Broadway at the Uris Theatre after 2,377 performances.
1985 - The Rebels of UNLV beat Utah State in three overtime periods. The final score of 142-140 set a new NCAA record for total points in a basketball game (282). The game took over three hours to play.
1991 - Sharon Pratt Dixon was sworn in as mayor of Washington, DC. She was the first black woman to head a city of that size and prominence.
1996 - AT&T announced that it would eliminate 40,000 jobs over three years.
1998 - Russia began circulating new rubles in effort to keep inflation in check and promote confidence
Current Birthdays
Kate Bosworth turns 26 years old today
83 Harold Bradley
Country musician
69 Jim Bakker
Former TV evangelist
67 Dennis Hastert
Former House speaker
62 Jack Hanna
TV host
57 Wendy Phillips
Actress
48 Gabrielle Carteris
Actress
48 Todd Haynes
Director
42 Tia Carrere
Actress
41 Cuba Gooding Jr.
Actor
40 Christy Turlington
Model
38 Scott Underwood
Rock musician (Train)
34 Doug Robb
Rock singer (Hoobastank)
34 Dax Shepard
Actor ("Punk'd")
33 Paz Vega
Actress
31 Chris Hartman
Country musician
30 Jerry DePizzo Jr.
Rock musician (O.A.R.)
28 Kelton Kessee
R&B singer (IMX)
Historic Birthdays
Isaac Asimov
1/2/1920 - 4/6/1992
American science fiction author
32 James Wolfe
1/2/1727 - 9/13/1759
English general who captured Quebec
67 Johann Daniel Titius
1/2/1729 - 12/11/1796
Prussian astronomer and physicist
66 Rudolf Clausius
1/2/1822 - 8/24/1888
German mathematical physicist
66 Justin Winsor
1/2/1831 - 10/22/1897
American librarian and historian
68 Ernst Barlach
1/2/1870 - 10/24/1938
German sculpture and playwright
58/59 Tex Rickard
1/2/1870/71 - 1/6/1929
American fight promoter and gambler
79 Albert Coombs Barnes
1/2/1872 - 7/24/1951
American inventor and art collector
24 Saint Theresa of Lisieux
1/2/1873 - 9/30/1897
French Carmelite nun
53 Count Folke Bernadotte
1/2/1895 - 9/17/1948
Swedish diplomat, humanitarian
75 Sally Rand
1/2/1904 - 8/31/1979
American actress and fan dancer
1788 - Georgia became the 4th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
1842 - In Fairmount, PA, the first wire suspension bridge was opened to traffic.
1859 - Erastus Beadle published "The Dime Book of Practical Etiquette."
1872 - Brigham Young, the 71-year-old leader of the Mormon Church, was arrested on a charge of bigamy. He had 25 wives.
1879 - Thomas Edison began construction on his first generator.
1890 - Alice Sanger became the first female White House staffer.
1893 - The first commemorative postage stamps were issued.
1900 - U.S. Secretary of State John Hay announced the Open Door Policy to prompt trade with China.
1900 - The Chicago Canal opened.
1910 - The first junior high school in the United States opened. McKinley School in Berkeley, CA, housed seventh and eighth grade students. In a separate building students were housed who attended grades 9-12.
1917 - Royal Bank of Canada took over the Quebec Bank.
1921 - The first religious broadcast on radio was heard on KDKA Radio in Pittsburgh, PA, as Dr. E.J. Van Etten of Calvary Episcopal Church preached.
1921 - DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park opened.
1929 - The United States and Canada reached an agreement on joint action to preserve Niagara Falls.
1935 - Bruno Richard Hauptmann went on trial for the kidnap-murder of Charles Lindberghs baby. Hauptmann was found guilt and executed.
1942 - The Philippine capital of Manila was captured by Japanese forces during World War II.
1953 - "The Life of Riley" debuted on NBC-TV.
1955 - Panamanian President Jose Antonio Remon was assassinated.
1957 - The San Francisco and Los Angeles stock exchanges merged.
1959 - CBS Radio ended four soap operas. "Our Gal Sunday", "This is Nora Drake", "Backstage Wife" and "Road of Life" all aired for the last time.
1960 - U.S. Sen. John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.
1965 - "Broadway" Joe Namath signed the richest rookie contract ($400,000) in the history of pro football.
1968 - Dr. Christian Barnard performed the first successful heart transplant.
1968 - Fidel Castro announced petroleum and sugar rationing in Cuba.
1971 - In the U.S., a federally imposed ban on television cigarette advertisements went into effect.
1974 - U.S. President Richard M. Nixon signed a bill requiring all states to lower the maximum speed limit to 55 MPH. The law was intended to conserve gasoline supplies during an embargo imposed by Arab oil-producing countries. Federal speed limits were abolished in 1995.
1983 - The final edition of Garry Trudeau’s comic strip, "Doonesbury", appeared in 726 newspapers. "Doonesbury" began running again in September 1984.
1983 - The musical "Annie" closed on Broadway at the Uris Theatre after 2,377 performances.
1985 - The Rebels of UNLV beat Utah State in three overtime periods. The final score of 142-140 set a new NCAA record for total points in a basketball game (282). The game took over three hours to play.
1991 - Sharon Pratt Dixon was sworn in as mayor of Washington, DC. She was the first black woman to head a city of that size and prominence.
1996 - AT&T announced that it would eliminate 40,000 jobs over three years.
1998 - Russia began circulating new rubles in effort to keep inflation in check and promote confidence
Current Birthdays
Kate Bosworth turns 26 years old today
83 Harold Bradley
Country musician
69 Jim Bakker
Former TV evangelist
67 Dennis Hastert
Former House speaker
62 Jack Hanna
TV host
57 Wendy Phillips
Actress
48 Gabrielle Carteris
Actress
48 Todd Haynes
Director
42 Tia Carrere
Actress
41 Cuba Gooding Jr.
Actor
40 Christy Turlington
Model
38 Scott Underwood
Rock musician (Train)
34 Doug Robb
Rock singer (Hoobastank)
34 Dax Shepard
Actor ("Punk'd")
33 Paz Vega
Actress
31 Chris Hartman
Country musician
30 Jerry DePizzo Jr.
Rock musician (O.A.R.)
28 Kelton Kessee
R&B singer (IMX)
Historic Birthdays
Isaac Asimov
1/2/1920 - 4/6/1992
American science fiction author
32 James Wolfe
1/2/1727 - 9/13/1759
English general who captured Quebec
67 Johann Daniel Titius
1/2/1729 - 12/11/1796
Prussian astronomer and physicist
66 Rudolf Clausius
1/2/1822 - 8/24/1888
German mathematical physicist
66 Justin Winsor
1/2/1831 - 10/22/1897
American librarian and historian
68 Ernst Barlach
1/2/1870 - 10/24/1938
German sculpture and playwright
58/59 Tex Rickard
1/2/1870/71 - 1/6/1929
American fight promoter and gambler
79 Albert Coombs Barnes
1/2/1872 - 7/24/1951
American inventor and art collector
24 Saint Theresa of Lisieux
1/2/1873 - 9/30/1897
French Carmelite nun
53 Count Folke Bernadotte
1/2/1895 - 9/17/1948
Swedish diplomat, humanitarian
75 Sally Rand
1/2/1904 - 8/31/1979
American actress and fan dancer
1781 - Richmond, VA, was burned by a British naval expedition led by Benedict Arnold.
1885 - The Long Island Railroad Company became the first to offer piggy-back rail service which was the transportation of farm wagons on trains.
1896 - It was reported by The Austrian newspaper that Wilhelm Roentgen had discovered the type of radiation that became known as X-rays.
1900 - In Ireland, Nationalist leader John Edward Redmond called for a revolt against British rule.
1903 - The general public could use the Pacific cable for the very first time.
1914 - Ford Motor Company announced that there would be a new daily minimum wage of $5 and an eight-hour workday.
1925 - Mrs. Nellie Taylor Ross was sworn in as the governor of Wyoming She was the first female governor in the U.S.
1933 - Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge began.
1934 - Both the National and American baseball leagues decided to use a uniform-size baseball. It was the first time in 33 years that both leagues used the same size ball. (MLB)
1935 - Phil Spitalny’s All-Girl Orchestra was featured on CBS radio on the program, "The Hour of Charm."
1940 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) got its very first demonstration of FM radio.
1944 - The London "Daily Mail" was the first transoceanic newspaper to be published.
1948 - Warner Brothers-Pathe showed the very first color newsreel. The footage was of the Tournament of Roses Parade and the Rose Bowl football classic.
1956 - In the Peanuts comic strip, Snoop walked on two legs for the first time.
1961 - "Mr. Ed" debuted. The show would run for six years.
1970 - "All My Children" premiered on ABC.
1972 - U.S. President Richard M. Nixon ordered the development of the space shuttle.
1987 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan underwend prostate surgery.
1993 - The state of Washington executed Westley Allan Dodd. It was America's first legal hanging since 1965. Dodd was an admitted child sex killer.
1996 - Yahya Ayyash, a member of the Hamas in Israel, is killed by a booby-trapped cellular phone.
1998 - U.S. Representative Sonny Bono died in skiing accident.
2002 - A 15 year-old student pilot, Charles Bishop, crashed a small plane into a building in Tampa, FL. Bishop was about to begin a flying lesson when he took off without permission and without an instructor.
Current Birthdays
Robert Duvall turns 78 years old today.
84 Lou Carnesecca
Hall of Fame basketball coach
81 Walter F. Mondale
Former vice president
77 Chuck Noll
Hall of Fame football coach
71 King Juan Carlos
King of Spain
67 Charlie Rose
Broadcast journalist
65 Ed Rendell
Governor of Pennsylvania
63 Diane Keaton
Actress
61 Ted Lange
Actor ("The Love Boat")
60 George "Funky" Brown
R&B musician (Kool and the Gang)
59 Chris Stein
Rock musician (Blondie)
56 Pamela Sue Martin
Actress ("Dynasty")
56 George Tenet
Former CIA director
55 Alex English
Basketball Hall of Famer
50 Clancy Brown
Actor
48 Iris Dement
Country singer
44 Ricky Paull Goldin
Actor ("All My Children")
44 Vinnie Jones
Actor
43 Kate Schellenbach
Rock musician (Luscious Jackson)
40 Heather Paige Kent
Actress
40 Marilyn Manson
Rock singer
34 Warrick Dunn
Football player
31 January Jones
Actress ("Mad Men")
28 Brooklyn Sudano
Actress ("Mad Men")
Historic Birthdays
Constantin Sergeyevich Stanislavsky
1/5/1863 (1/17/1863 N.S.) - 8/7/1938
Russian actor, producer, teacher and philosopher of theater
69 Francisco Suárez
1/5/1548 - 9/25/1617
Spanish theologian
74 Shah Jahan
1/5/1592 - 1/22/1666
Mughal emperor of India and builder of the Taj Mahal
34 Zebulon Montgomery Pike
1/5/1779 - 4/27/1813
American army officer and explorer
41 Stephen Decatur
1/5/1779 - 3/22/1820
American naval officer
77 King Camp Gillette
1/5/1855 - 7/9/1932
American inventor and manufacturer
91 Konrad Adenauer
1/5/1876 - 4/19/1967
First chancellor of West Germany (1949-63)
77 Henry Sloane Coffin
1/5/1877 - 11/25/1954
American clergyman
76 Herbert Bayard Swope
1/5/1882 - 6/20/1958
American journalist and editor
55 Yves Tanguy
1/5/1900 - 1/15/1955
French Surrealist painter
87 Stella Gibbons
1/5/1902 - 12/19/1989
English novelist and poet
87 Hubert Beuve-Méry
1/5/1902 - 8/6/1989
French publisher and editor of "Le Monde"
72 Dame Kathleen Kenyon
1/5/1906 - 8/24/1978
English archaeologist
58 Alvin Ailey Jr.
1/5/1931 - 12/1/1989
American choreographer and dancer; founded Ailey American Dance Theater
1885 - The Long Island Railroad Company became the first to offer piggy-back rail service which was the transportation of farm wagons on trains.
1896 - It was reported by The Austrian newspaper that Wilhelm Roentgen had discovered the type of radiation that became known as X-rays.
1900 - In Ireland, Nationalist leader John Edward Redmond called for a revolt against British rule.
1903 - The general public could use the Pacific cable for the very first time.
1914 - Ford Motor Company announced that there would be a new daily minimum wage of $5 and an eight-hour workday.
1925 - Mrs. Nellie Taylor Ross was sworn in as the governor of Wyoming She was the first female governor in the U.S.
1933 - Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge began.
1934 - Both the National and American baseball leagues decided to use a uniform-size baseball. It was the first time in 33 years that both leagues used the same size ball. (MLB)
1935 - Phil Spitalny’s All-Girl Orchestra was featured on CBS radio on the program, "The Hour of Charm."
1940 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) got its very first demonstration of FM radio.
1944 - The London "Daily Mail" was the first transoceanic newspaper to be published.
1948 - Warner Brothers-Pathe showed the very first color newsreel. The footage was of the Tournament of Roses Parade and the Rose Bowl football classic.
1956 - In the Peanuts comic strip, Snoop walked on two legs for the first time.
1961 - "Mr. Ed" debuted. The show would run for six years.
1970 - "All My Children" premiered on ABC.
1972 - U.S. President Richard M. Nixon ordered the development of the space shuttle.
1987 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan underwend prostate surgery.
1993 - The state of Washington executed Westley Allan Dodd. It was America's first legal hanging since 1965. Dodd was an admitted child sex killer.
1996 - Yahya Ayyash, a member of the Hamas in Israel, is killed by a booby-trapped cellular phone.
1998 - U.S. Representative Sonny Bono died in skiing accident.
2002 - A 15 year-old student pilot, Charles Bishop, crashed a small plane into a building in Tampa, FL. Bishop was about to begin a flying lesson when he took off without permission and without an instructor.
Current Birthdays
Robert Duvall turns 78 years old today.
84 Lou Carnesecca
Hall of Fame basketball coach
81 Walter F. Mondale
Former vice president
77 Chuck Noll
Hall of Fame football coach
71 King Juan Carlos
King of Spain
67 Charlie Rose
Broadcast journalist
65 Ed Rendell
Governor of Pennsylvania
63 Diane Keaton
Actress
61 Ted Lange
Actor ("The Love Boat")
60 George "Funky" Brown
R&B musician (Kool and the Gang)
59 Chris Stein
Rock musician (Blondie)
56 Pamela Sue Martin
Actress ("Dynasty")
56 George Tenet
Former CIA director
55 Alex English
Basketball Hall of Famer
50 Clancy Brown
Actor
48 Iris Dement
Country singer
44 Ricky Paull Goldin
Actor ("All My Children")
44 Vinnie Jones
Actor
43 Kate Schellenbach
Rock musician (Luscious Jackson)
40 Heather Paige Kent
Actress
40 Marilyn Manson
Rock singer
34 Warrick Dunn
Football player
31 January Jones
Actress ("Mad Men")
28 Brooklyn Sudano
Actress ("Mad Men")
Historic Birthdays
Constantin Sergeyevich Stanislavsky
1/5/1863 (1/17/1863 N.S.) - 8/7/1938
Russian actor, producer, teacher and philosopher of theater
69 Francisco Suárez
1/5/1548 - 9/25/1617
Spanish theologian
74 Shah Jahan
1/5/1592 - 1/22/1666
Mughal emperor of India and builder of the Taj Mahal
34 Zebulon Montgomery Pike
1/5/1779 - 4/27/1813
American army officer and explorer
41 Stephen Decatur
1/5/1779 - 3/22/1820
American naval officer
77 King Camp Gillette
1/5/1855 - 7/9/1932
American inventor and manufacturer
91 Konrad Adenauer
1/5/1876 - 4/19/1967
First chancellor of West Germany (1949-63)
77 Henry Sloane Coffin
1/5/1877 - 11/25/1954
American clergyman
76 Herbert Bayard Swope
1/5/1882 - 6/20/1958
American journalist and editor
55 Yves Tanguy
1/5/1900 - 1/15/1955
French Surrealist painter
87 Stella Gibbons
1/5/1902 - 12/19/1989
English novelist and poet
87 Hubert Beuve-Méry
1/5/1902 - 8/6/1989
French publisher and editor of "Le Monde"
72 Dame Kathleen Kenyon
1/5/1906 - 8/24/1978
English archaeologist
58 Alvin Ailey Jr.
1/5/1931 - 12/1/1989
American choreographer and dancer; founded Ailey American Dance Theater
0871 - England's King Alfred defeated the Danes at the Battle of Ashdown.
1205 - Philip of Swabia was crowned as King of the Romans.
1453 - Frederick III erected Austria into an Archduchy.
1540 - King Henry VIII of England was married to Anne of Cleves, his fourth wife.
1720 - The Committee of Inquiry on the South Sea Bubble published its findings.
1759 - George Washington and Martha Dandridge Custis were married.
1838 - Samuel Morse publicly demonstrated the telegraph for the first time.
1896 - The first American women’s six-day bicycle race was held at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1900 - In India, it was reported that millions of people were dying from starvation.
1900 - Off of South Africa, the British seized the German steamer Herzog. The boat was released on January 22, 1900.
1912 - New Mexico became the 47th U.S. state.
1930 - The first diesel-engine automobile trip was completed after a run of 792 miles from Indianapolis, IN, to New York City, NY.
1931 - Thomas Edison executed his last patent application.
1941 - Richard Widmark made his debut on radio in "The Home of the Brave."
1941 - Alice Marble made her professional tennis debut when she defeated Ruth Hardwick of Great Britain at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1942 - The first commercial around-the-world airline flight took place. Pan American Airlines was the company that made history with the feat.
1942 - The National Collegiate Football Rules Committee abolished the Y formation.
1945 - The Battle of the Bulge ended with 130,000 German and 77,000 Allied casualties.
1950 - Britain recognized the Communist government of China.
1952 - "Peanuts" debuted in Sunday papers across the United States.
1963 - "Wild Kingdom" premiered on NBC.
1967 - U.S. and South Vietnamese forces launched a major offensive, known as Operation "Deckhouse V", in the Mekong River delta.
1974 - CBS radio debuted "Radio Mystery Theatre."
1975 - The Broadway show "The Wiz" opened.
1975 - ABC-TV debuted "A.M. America."
1982 - William G. Bonin was convicted in Los Angeles, CA, of being the "freeway killer" who had murdered 14 young men and boys.
1987 - After a 29-year lapse, the Ford Thunderbird was presented with the Motor Trend Car of the Year Award. It was the first occurrence of a repeat winner of the award.
1994 - Figure skater Nancy Kerrigan was clubbed on the right leg by an assailant at Cobo Arena in Detroit, MI. Four men were later sentenced to prison for the attack, including Tonya Harding's ex-husband.
1998 - The spacecraft Lunar Prospect was launched into orbit around the moon. The craft was crashed into the moon, in an effort to find water under the lunar surface, on July 31, 1999.
1999 - The 106th U.S. Congress opened. The first item on the agenda was the impeachment proceedings of U.S. President Bill Clinton. The trial was set to begin January 7, 1999.
1999 - Bob Newhart received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Current Birthdays
John Singleton turns 41 years old today
88 Louis Harris
Pollster
85 Earl Scruggs
Bluegrass musician
78 E.L. Doctorow
Author
65 Bonnie Franklin
Actress ("One Day At A Time")
58 Kim Wilson
Rock musician (The Fabulous Thunderbirds
56 Jett Williams
Singer
56 Malcolm Young
Rock musician (AC-DC)
54 Rowan Atkinson
Actor, comedian ("Mr Bean" films)
52 Nancy Lopez
Golfer
50 Kathy Sledge
R&B singer (Sister Sledge)
49 Nigella Lawson
TV chef
49 Howie Long
Football Hall of Famer, sportscaster
49 Eric Williams
R&B singer (BLACKstreet)
39 Julie Chen
TV host ("The Early Show," "Big Brother")
33 Danny Pintauro
Actor
28 Rinko Kikuchi
Actress ("Babel")
28 Asante Samuel
Football player
23 Alex Turner
Rock singer (Arctic Monkeys)
Historic Birthdays
Sam Rayburn
1/6/1882 - 11/16/1961
American Speaker of the House
70 Martin Agricola
1/6/1486 - 6/10/1556
German composer and teacher
50 Jakob Bernoulli
1/6/1655 - 8/16/1705
Swiss mathematician
63 Charles Sumner
1/6/1811 - 3/11/1874
American Civil War statesman
68 Heinrich Schliemann
1/6/1822 - 12/26/1890
German-born Greek excavator
86 Victor Horta
1/6/1861 - 9/8/1947
Belgian architect
89 Carl Sandburg
1/6/1878 - 7/22/1967
American poet and novelist
67 Joseph Medill Patterson
1/6/1879 - 5/26/1946
American journalist and publisher
60 Tom Mix
1/6/1880 - 10/12/1940
American silent screen actor
48 Khalil Gibran
1/6/1883 - 4/10/1931
Lebanese-born American novelist and poet
88 Morris Wright
1/6/1910 - April/25/1998
American author
1205 - Philip of Swabia was crowned as King of the Romans.
1453 - Frederick III erected Austria into an Archduchy.
1540 - King Henry VIII of England was married to Anne of Cleves, his fourth wife.
1720 - The Committee of Inquiry on the South Sea Bubble published its findings.
1759 - George Washington and Martha Dandridge Custis were married.
1838 - Samuel Morse publicly demonstrated the telegraph for the first time.
1896 - The first American women’s six-day bicycle race was held at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1900 - In India, it was reported that millions of people were dying from starvation.
1900 - Off of South Africa, the British seized the German steamer Herzog. The boat was released on January 22, 1900.
1912 - New Mexico became the 47th U.S. state.
1930 - The first diesel-engine automobile trip was completed after a run of 792 miles from Indianapolis, IN, to New York City, NY.
1931 - Thomas Edison executed his last patent application.
1941 - Richard Widmark made his debut on radio in "The Home of the Brave."
1941 - Alice Marble made her professional tennis debut when she defeated Ruth Hardwick of Great Britain at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1942 - The first commercial around-the-world airline flight took place. Pan American Airlines was the company that made history with the feat.
1942 - The National Collegiate Football Rules Committee abolished the Y formation.
1945 - The Battle of the Bulge ended with 130,000 German and 77,000 Allied casualties.
1950 - Britain recognized the Communist government of China.
1952 - "Peanuts" debuted in Sunday papers across the United States.
1963 - "Wild Kingdom" premiered on NBC.
1967 - U.S. and South Vietnamese forces launched a major offensive, known as Operation "Deckhouse V", in the Mekong River delta.
1974 - CBS radio debuted "Radio Mystery Theatre."
1975 - The Broadway show "The Wiz" opened.
1975 - ABC-TV debuted "A.M. America."
1982 - William G. Bonin was convicted in Los Angeles, CA, of being the "freeway killer" who had murdered 14 young men and boys.
1987 - After a 29-year lapse, the Ford Thunderbird was presented with the Motor Trend Car of the Year Award. It was the first occurrence of a repeat winner of the award.
1994 - Figure skater Nancy Kerrigan was clubbed on the right leg by an assailant at Cobo Arena in Detroit, MI. Four men were later sentenced to prison for the attack, including Tonya Harding's ex-husband.
1998 - The spacecraft Lunar Prospect was launched into orbit around the moon. The craft was crashed into the moon, in an effort to find water under the lunar surface, on July 31, 1999.
1999 - The 106th U.S. Congress opened. The first item on the agenda was the impeachment proceedings of U.S. President Bill Clinton. The trial was set to begin January 7, 1999.
1999 - Bob Newhart received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Current Birthdays
John Singleton turns 41 years old today
88 Louis Harris
Pollster
85 Earl Scruggs
Bluegrass musician
78 E.L. Doctorow
Author
65 Bonnie Franklin
Actress ("One Day At A Time")
58 Kim Wilson
Rock musician (The Fabulous Thunderbirds
56 Jett Williams
Singer
56 Malcolm Young
Rock musician (AC-DC)
54 Rowan Atkinson
Actor, comedian ("Mr Bean" films)
52 Nancy Lopez
Golfer
50 Kathy Sledge
R&B singer (Sister Sledge)
49 Nigella Lawson
TV chef
49 Howie Long
Football Hall of Famer, sportscaster
49 Eric Williams
R&B singer (BLACKstreet)
39 Julie Chen
TV host ("The Early Show," "Big Brother")
33 Danny Pintauro
Actor
28 Rinko Kikuchi
Actress ("Babel")
28 Asante Samuel
Football player
23 Alex Turner
Rock singer (Arctic Monkeys)
Historic Birthdays
Sam Rayburn
1/6/1882 - 11/16/1961
American Speaker of the House
70 Martin Agricola
1/6/1486 - 6/10/1556
German composer and teacher
50 Jakob Bernoulli
1/6/1655 - 8/16/1705
Swiss mathematician
63 Charles Sumner
1/6/1811 - 3/11/1874
American Civil War statesman
68 Heinrich Schliemann
1/6/1822 - 12/26/1890
German-born Greek excavator
86 Victor Horta
1/6/1861 - 9/8/1947
Belgian architect
89 Carl Sandburg
1/6/1878 - 7/22/1967
American poet and novelist
67 Joseph Medill Patterson
1/6/1879 - 5/26/1946
American journalist and publisher
60 Tom Mix
1/6/1880 - 10/12/1940
American silent screen actor
48 Khalil Gibran
1/6/1883 - 4/10/1931
Lebanese-born American novelist and poet
88 Morris Wright
1/6/1910 - April/25/1998
American author
1558 - Calais, the last English possession on mainland France, was recaptured by the French.
1610 - Galileo Galilei sighted four of Jupiter's moons. He named them Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
1782 - The Bank of North America opened in Philadelphia. It was the first commercial bank in the United States.
1785 - French aeronaut/balloonist Jean-Pierre Blanchard successfully made the first air-crossing of the English Channel from the English coast to France.
1789 - Americans voted for the electors that would choose George Washington to be the first U.S. president.
1887 - Thomas Stevens completed the first worldwide bicycle trip. He started his trip in April 1884. Stevens and his bike traveled 13,500 miles in almost three years time.
1894 - W.K. Dickson received a patent for motion picture film.
1896 - "Fannie Farmer Cookbook" cookbook was published.
1904 - The distress signal "CQD" was established. Two years later "SOS" became the radio distress signal because it was quicker to send by wireless radio.
1926 - George Burns and Gracie Allen were married.
1927 - Transatlantic telephone service Service began between New York and London. 31 calls were made on this first day.
1927 - In Hinckley IL, the Harlem Globetrotters played their first game.
1929 - The debut of "Buck Rogers 2429 A.D." occurred in newspapers around the U.S. The title of the comic strip was later changed to "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."
1932 - Chancellor Heinrich Brüning declared that Germany cannot, and will not, resume reparations payments.
1935 - French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval and Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini signed the Italo-French agreements.
1940 - "Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch" debuted on CBS Radio. The show aired for 16 years.
1941 - The NBC Blue radio network presented "The Squeaky Door" for the first time. The show was later known as "Inner Sanctum."
1942 - The World War II siege of Bataan began.
1949 - The announcement of the first photograph of genes was shown at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
1953 - U.S. President Harry Truman announced the development of the hydrogen bomb.
1954 - The Duoscopic TV receiver was unveiled this day. The TV set allowed the watching of two different shows at the same time.
1959 - The United States recognized Fidel Castro's new government in Cuba.
1968 - The cost of a U.S. first class stamp was raised to 6 cents.
1975 - OPEC agreed to raise crude oil prices by 10%, which began a time of world economic inflation.
1979 - Vietnamese forces captured the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, overthrowing the Khmer Rouge government.
1980 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that authorized $1.5 billion in loans for the bail out of Chrysler Corp.
1989 - Crown Prince Akihito became the emperor of Japan following the death of his father, Emperor Hirohito.
1990 - The Leaning Tower of Pisa was closed to the public. The accelerated rate of "leaning" raised fears for the safety of its visitors.
1996 - Alvaro Arzu was elected president of Guatemala.
1996 - One of the biggest blizzards in U.S. history hit the eastern states. More than 100 deaths were later blamed on the severe weather.
1998 - Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky signed an affidavit denying that she had an affair with U.S. President Clinton.
1999 - U.S. President Clinton went on trial before the Senate. It was only the second time in U.S. history that an impeached president had gone to trial. Clinton was later acquitted of perjury and obstruction of justice charges.
2002 - Microsoft Corp. chairman Bill Gates introduced a new device code named Mira. The device was tablet-like and was a cross between a handheld computer and a TV remote control.
Katie Couric turns 52 years old today
81 William Peter Blatty
Author ("The Exorcist")
79 Jack Greene
Country singer
71 Paul Revere
Rock musician
63 Jann Wenner
Magazine publisher (Rolling Stone)
61 Kenny Loggins
Rock singer
60 Marshall Chapman
Rock singer, songwriter
59 Juan Gabriel
Singer
59 Erin Gray
Actress
57 Sammo Hung
Actor
53 David Caruso
Actor ("CSI: Miami")
50 David Lee Murphy
Country singer
50 Kathy Valentine
Rock musician (The Go-Gos)
49 David Marciano
Actor
48 John Thune
U.S. senator, R-S.D.
47 Hallie Todd
Actress ("Lizzie McGuire")
45 Nicolas Cage
Actor
44 John Ondrasik
Rock siger, songwriter (Five for Fighting)
39 Doug E. Doug
Actor
38 Kevin Rahm
Actor
36 Bobby Engram
Football player
35 John Rich
Country musician (Big and Rich)
33 Eric Gagne
Baseball player
33 Alfonso Soriano
Baseball player
32 Dustin Diamond
Actor
27 Francisco Rodriguez
Baseball player
26 Robert Ri'chard
Actor
19 Liam Aiken
Actor
19 Camryn Grimes
Actress
18 Max Morrow
Actor
Historic Birthdays
Adolph Zukor
1/7/1873 - 6/10/1976
American entrepreneur
66 James Harrington
1/7/1611 - 9/11/1677
English political philosopher
63 Johann Christian Fabricius
1/7/1745 - 3/3/1808
Dutch entomologist
74 Millard Fillmore
1/7/1800 - 3/8/1874
13th president of the United States (1850-53)
35 Saint Bernadette of Lourdes
1/7/1844 - 4/16/1879
French nun
76 Herbert John Gladstone
1/7/1854 - 3/6/1930
English statesman
85 Émile Borel
1/7/1871 - 2/3/1956
French mathematician
64 Francis Poulenc
1/7/1899 - 1/30/1963
French composer
69 Aristotle Onassis
1/7/1906 (O.S.) - 3/15/1975
Greek shipping magnate
59 Henry Allen
1/7/1908 - 4/17/1967
American jazz musician
76 Charles Addams
1/7/1912 - 9/29/1988
American cartoonist
1610 - Galileo Galilei sighted four of Jupiter's moons. He named them Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
1782 - The Bank of North America opened in Philadelphia. It was the first commercial bank in the United States.
1785 - French aeronaut/balloonist Jean-Pierre Blanchard successfully made the first air-crossing of the English Channel from the English coast to France.
1789 - Americans voted for the electors that would choose George Washington to be the first U.S. president.
1887 - Thomas Stevens completed the first worldwide bicycle trip. He started his trip in April 1884. Stevens and his bike traveled 13,500 miles in almost three years time.
1894 - W.K. Dickson received a patent for motion picture film.
1896 - "Fannie Farmer Cookbook" cookbook was published.
1904 - The distress signal "CQD" was established. Two years later "SOS" became the radio distress signal because it was quicker to send by wireless radio.
1926 - George Burns and Gracie Allen were married.
1927 - Transatlantic telephone service Service began between New York and London. 31 calls were made on this first day.
1927 - In Hinckley IL, the Harlem Globetrotters played their first game.
1929 - The debut of "Buck Rogers 2429 A.D." occurred in newspapers around the U.S. The title of the comic strip was later changed to "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."
1932 - Chancellor Heinrich Brüning declared that Germany cannot, and will not, resume reparations payments.
1935 - French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval and Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini signed the Italo-French agreements.
1940 - "Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch" debuted on CBS Radio. The show aired for 16 years.
1941 - The NBC Blue radio network presented "The Squeaky Door" for the first time. The show was later known as "Inner Sanctum."
1942 - The World War II siege of Bataan began.
1949 - The announcement of the first photograph of genes was shown at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
1953 - U.S. President Harry Truman announced the development of the hydrogen bomb.
1954 - The Duoscopic TV receiver was unveiled this day. The TV set allowed the watching of two different shows at the same time.
1959 - The United States recognized Fidel Castro's new government in Cuba.
1968 - The cost of a U.S. first class stamp was raised to 6 cents.
1975 - OPEC agreed to raise crude oil prices by 10%, which began a time of world economic inflation.
1979 - Vietnamese forces captured the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, overthrowing the Khmer Rouge government.
1980 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that authorized $1.5 billion in loans for the bail out of Chrysler Corp.
1989 - Crown Prince Akihito became the emperor of Japan following the death of his father, Emperor Hirohito.
1990 - The Leaning Tower of Pisa was closed to the public. The accelerated rate of "leaning" raised fears for the safety of its visitors.
1996 - Alvaro Arzu was elected president of Guatemala.
1996 - One of the biggest blizzards in U.S. history hit the eastern states. More than 100 deaths were later blamed on the severe weather.
1998 - Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky signed an affidavit denying that she had an affair with U.S. President Clinton.
1999 - U.S. President Clinton went on trial before the Senate. It was only the second time in U.S. history that an impeached president had gone to trial. Clinton was later acquitted of perjury and obstruction of justice charges.
2002 - Microsoft Corp. chairman Bill Gates introduced a new device code named Mira. The device was tablet-like and was a cross between a handheld computer and a TV remote control.
Katie Couric turns 52 years old today
81 William Peter Blatty
Author ("The Exorcist")
79 Jack Greene
Country singer
71 Paul Revere
Rock musician
63 Jann Wenner
Magazine publisher (Rolling Stone)
61 Kenny Loggins
Rock singer
60 Marshall Chapman
Rock singer, songwriter
59 Juan Gabriel
Singer
59 Erin Gray
Actress
57 Sammo Hung
Actor
53 David Caruso
Actor ("CSI: Miami")
50 David Lee Murphy
Country singer
50 Kathy Valentine
Rock musician (The Go-Gos)
49 David Marciano
Actor
48 John Thune
U.S. senator, R-S.D.
47 Hallie Todd
Actress ("Lizzie McGuire")
45 Nicolas Cage
Actor
44 John Ondrasik
Rock siger, songwriter (Five for Fighting)
39 Doug E. Doug
Actor
38 Kevin Rahm
Actor
36 Bobby Engram
Football player
35 John Rich
Country musician (Big and Rich)
33 Eric Gagne
Baseball player
33 Alfonso Soriano
Baseball player
32 Dustin Diamond
Actor
27 Francisco Rodriguez
Baseball player
26 Robert Ri'chard
Actor
19 Liam Aiken
Actor
19 Camryn Grimes
Actress
18 Max Morrow
Actor
Historic Birthdays
Adolph Zukor
1/7/1873 - 6/10/1976
American entrepreneur
66 James Harrington
1/7/1611 - 9/11/1677
English political philosopher
63 Johann Christian Fabricius
1/7/1745 - 3/3/1808
Dutch entomologist
74 Millard Fillmore
1/7/1800 - 3/8/1874
13th president of the United States (1850-53)
35 Saint Bernadette of Lourdes
1/7/1844 - 4/16/1879
French nun
76 Herbert John Gladstone
1/7/1854 - 3/6/1930
English statesman
85 Émile Borel
1/7/1871 - 2/3/1956
French mathematician
64 Francis Poulenc
1/7/1899 - 1/30/1963
French composer
69 Aristotle Onassis
1/7/1906 (O.S.) - 3/15/1975
Greek shipping magnate
59 Henry Allen
1/7/1908 - 4/17/1967
American jazz musician
76 Charles Addams
1/7/1912 - 9/29/1988
American cartoonist
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