Today In The Past
Events
955 – Alberich II, (bastard?) son of Octavianus elected pope
1165 – Ramjbam & his family reach Acre Palestine
1204 – Baldwin IX, Count of Flanders is crowned as the first Emperor of the Latin Empire.
1527 – Florence becomes a republic
1532 – Sir Thomas More resigns as English Lord Chancellor
1568 – Mary Queen of Scotland flees to England
1571 – Johannes Kepler, by his own calculations, is conceived at 4:37 AM
1606 – 2,000 foreigners murdered in Russia
1648 – Battle at Zolty Wody: Bohdan Chmielricki’s cosacks beat John Casimir
1763 – Samuel Johnson 1st meets his future biographer James Boswell in London
1771 – The Battle of Alamance, a pre-American Revolutionary War battle between local militia and a group of rebels called “The Regulators“, occurs in present-day Alamance County, North Carolina.
1792 – Denmark abolishes slave trade
1815 – The Governor of New South Wales, Lachlan Macquarie, officially names the town of Blackheath in the upper Blue Mountains.
1817 – Mississippi River steamboat service begins
1860 – -18] Chicago: Republican convention selects Abraham Lincoln candidate
1861 – Kentucky proclaims its neutrality
1862 – Jean Joseph Etienne Lenoir builds 1st automobile
1863 – Battle of Champion’s Hill, MS , bloodiest action of Vicksburg Campaign
1864 – Atlanta Campaign: Battle of Resaca, ends (since May 13)
1864 – Battle of Bermuda Hundred, VA
1864 – Last battles at Drewry’s Bluff, Virginia (6,666 casualties)
1866 – Charles Elmer Hires invents root beer
1866 – Congress authorizes the nickel 5 cent piece (replaces silver half-dime)
1868 – By one vote, Senate fails to impeach President Andrew Johnson
1869 – Cincinnati Reds play their 1st baseball game, win 41-7
1872 – Metropolitan Gas Company lamps lit for 1st time
1874 – 1st recorded dam disaster in US (Williamsburg Mass)
1875 – Quake in Venezuela & Colombia kills 16,000
1881 – World’s 1st elec tram goes into service in Lichterfelder (near Berlin)
1882 – 8th Kentucky Derby: Babe Hurd aboard Apollo wins in 2:40.00
1884 – 10th Kentucky Derby: Isaac Murphy aboard Buchanan wins in 2:40.25
1891 – George A Hormel & Co introduce Spam
1894 – Fire in Boston destroys baseball stadium & 170 other buildings
1903 – 1st transcontinental motorcycle trip begins at SF (George Wymann)
1903 – George Wyman makes 1st motorcycle trip across the US
1910 – US Bureau of Mines forms
1911 – Remains of a neanderthal man found in Jersey UK
1911 – Zeppelin “Deutscheland” wrecked at Dusseldorf
1914 – American Horseshoe Pitchers Association organizes in Kansas City
1916 – 41st Preakness: Linus McAtee aboard Damrosch wins in 1:54.8
1918 – The Sedition Act of 1918 is passed by the U.S. Congress, making criticism of the government an imprisonable offense.
1920 – Joan of Arc (Jean D’arc) canonized a saint
1920 – Spanish bullfighter Joselito is fatally gored fighting his last bull
1921 – 47th Preakness: F Coltiletti aboard Broomspun wins in 1:54.2
1922 – White Star Line Majestic completes 5½ day maiden voyage
1925 – 51st Kentucky Derby: Earl Sande aboard Flying Ebony wins in 2:07.6
1927 – Supreme Court ruled bootleggers must pay income tax
1929 – 1st Academy Awards – “Wings,” Emil Jennings & Janet Gaynor wins
1931 – 57th Kentucky Derby: Charley Kurtsinger on Twenty Grand wins 2:01.8
1933 – Cecil Travis becomes 1st player to get 5 hits in his 1st game
1936 – 1st British air hostess (Daphne Kearley) flight to France
1936 – 62nd Preakness: George Woolf aboard Bold Venture wins in 1:59
1938 – 1st animal breeding society forms (NJ)
1939 – Food stamps are 1st issued
1941 – Last great German air attack on Great Britain (Birmingham)
1943 – -17th] RAF bombs Möhne & Eder (Battle of Ruhr)
1943 – Jewish resistance in the Warsaw ghetto ends after 30 days of fighting
1944 – 1st of 180,000+ Hungarian Jews reach Auschwitz
1945 – Violent battles around Sugar Loaf/Half Moon Okinawa
1948 – CBS news correspondent George Polk’s body is found in Greece
1951 – The first regularly scheduled transatlantic flights begin between John F Kennedy International Airport in New York City and Heathrow Airport in London, operated by El Al Israel Airlines.
1954 – Ted Williams gets 8 hits in 1st game (DH) since breaking collarbone
1955 – Rocky Marciano TKOs Don Cockell in 9 for heavyweight boxing title
1957 – Maj Irwin, USAAF flies a Lockheed Starfight to a record 1,404.18 MPH
1957 – US launches its 3rd atomic submarine, USS Skate, at Groton Conn
1958 – Eli Beeding experiences 83 g deceleration on a rocket sled, New Mex
1958 – Walter Irwin flies 2,259 KPH in F-104A Starfighter
1959 – 85th Preakness: William Harmatz aboard Royal Orbit wins in 1:57
1963 – Gordon Cooper completes 22 orbits in Faith 7, ends US Proj Mercury
1964 – 90th Preakness: Bill Hartack aboard Northern Dancer wins in 1:56.8
1964 – Verne Gagne beats Mad Dog Vachon in Omaha, to become NWA champ
1965 – Bomb destroys USAF base Bien Hoa South Vietnam
1965 – The Campbell Soup Company introduces SpaghettiOs under its Franco-American brand.
1966 – National Welfare Rights Organization organizes
1967 – Phila voters approve a $13 million bond issue to build a new stadium
1969 – US nuclear sub Guitarro sinks off SF
1969 – Venera 5 lands on Venus, returns data on atmosphere
1970 – 96th Preakness: Eddie Belmonte aboard Personality wins in 1:56.2
1971 – 1st class postage now costs 8 cents (was 6 cents)
1972 – Greg Luzinski’s 500′ HR hits Liberty Bell monument in Phila Vet
1975 – Japanese Junko Tabei became 1st woman to reach Mt Everest’s summit
1975 – Muhammad Ali TKOs Ron Lyle in 11 for heavyweight boxing title
1977 – 5 die as NY Airway helicopter topples on Pan Am bldg in NYC
1980 – Brian May of rock group Queen collapses on stage with hepatitis
1980 – Former Buggles members Geoff Downes & Trevor Horn replace Jon Anderson & Rick Wakeman in Yes
1981 – “Bette Davis Eyes” by Kim Carnes hits #1 for next 9 weeks
1981 – 107th Preakness: Jorge Velasquez aboard Pleasant Colony wins in 1:54.6
1984 – Phillie pitcher Steve Carlton hits a grand slam homer
1984 – Mackay pays $218,718 for 44,166 tickets to keep Twins in Minnesota Twins sell 51,863 tickets but only 6,346 fans show up for the game
1985 – Michael Jordan named NBA Rookie of Year
1986 – “Top Gun,” premieres
1987 – 113th Preakness: Chris McCarron aboard Alysheba wins in 1:55.8
1987 – “Bobro 400,” a barge carrying 3,200 tons of garbage, set sail from NY, beginning an unsuccesful 8-week search for a dumping site
1991 – Queen Elizabeth becomes 1st British monarch to address US congress
1992 – “Smells Like Nirvana,” by Weird Al Yankovic hits #35
1992 – 118th Preakness: Chris McCarron aboard Pine Bluff wins in 1:55.6
1992 – Polls show Perot, Bush & Clinton could be in a deadlock
1994 – Jacqueline Onassis admitted to the hospital for cancer treatment
1995 – Japanese police arrest cult leader Shoko Asahara & charged him with Nerve-gas attack on Tokyo’s subways two months earlier
1996 – Sammy Sosa is 1st Chic Cub to hit 2 HRS in 1 inning
1997 – St Louis Cards Gary Gaetti records his 2,000th hits
1998 – 124th Preakness
2003 – In Casablanca, Morocco, 33 civilians are killed and more than 100 people are injured in the Casablanca terrorist attacks.
2004 – The Day of Mourning at Bykivnia forest, just outside of Kiev, Ukraine. Here during 1930s and early 1940s communist bolsheviks executed over 100,000 Ukrainian civilians.
2005 – Kuwait permits women’s suffrage in a 35-23 National Assembly vote.
Births
1558 – Andreas of Austria, Bohemia cardinal/gov of Netherlands (1598-1600)
1578 – Everard Digby, English conspirator (d. 1606)
1609 – Ferdinand, Austria, cardinal of Spain/governor of Netherlands
1641 – Dudley North, financier/economist
1718 – Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Italian mathematician (d. 1799)
1763 – Louis-Nicolas Vauquelin, chemist (discovered chromium, beryllium)
1801 – William H. Seward, United States Secretary of State, bought Alaska at 2 ¢/acre (d. 1872)
1804 – Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, educator/founder (US kindergarten)
1806 – George C Cadwalader, Major General (Union volunteers), died in 1879
1816 – Henry Hopkins Sibley, Brigadier General (Confederate Army), died in 1886
1819 – Daniel Ammen, Capt (Union Navy), died in 1898
1821 – Pafnuty Chebyshev, Russian mathematician (d. 1894)
1824 – Edmund Kirby Smith, Fla, General (Confederate Army), died in 1893
1831 – David Edward Hughes, inventor (microphone, teleprinter)
1832 – Philip Danforth Armour, founder (Armour Foods)
1845 – Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov, Russian microbiologist, Nobel laureate (d. 1916)
1860 – Herman Webster Mudgett, American Serial Killer (d. 1896)
1866 – Ernest Watson Burgess, US sociologist (ecological school)
1904 – Hugh Plaxton, Canada, ice hockey player (Olympic-gold-1928)
1905 – Henry Fonda, Grand Is Nebraska, actor (Mr Roberts, On Golden Pond)
1906 – Margret Rey, author and illustrator (d. 1996)
1907 – Robert Tisdall, Ireland, 400m hurdler (Olympic-gold-1932)
1911 – Margaret Sullivan, Norfolk Va, actress (Back Street)
1912 – Studs Terkel, NYC, author/host (Stud’s Place, Working)
1913 – Woody Herman, jazz clarinetist/bandleader/composer (Thundering Herds)
1914 – Edward T. Hall, American anthropologist and author
1916 – Ephraim Katzir, biophysicist/president (Israel)
1919 – Liberace, West Allis WI, pianist (Liberace Show, Evil Chandell-Batman)
1921 – Harry Carey Jr, Saugus California, actor (She Wore a Yellow Ribbon), (d. 2012)
1923 – Merton Miller, American economist, Nobel laureate (d. 2000)
1929 – Adrienne Cecile Rich, Balt Md, feminist writer (Diamond Cutters), (d. 2012)
1931 – Jack Dodson, Pitts Pa, actor (Howard Sprage-Andy Griffith Show)
1931 – Hana Brady, Killed during Holocaust
1934 – Anthony Walker, commandant (Royal College of Defense Studies)
1937 – Yvonne Craig, Taylorville Ill, actress (Batgirl-Batman, Kissin Cousin)
1938 – Anthony Walker, commandant (Royal College of Defense Studies)
1940 – Bernardo Bertolucci, Parma Italy, director (1900, Last Emperor)
1944 – Billy Cobham, Panama, jazz drummer (Same Ole Love)
1944 – Danny Trejo, American actor
1945 – Brewster H Shaw Jr, Mich, Col USAF/astro (STS-9, STS 61B, STS-28)
1946 – Robert Fripp, guitarist (King Crimson)
1946 – Jessi B Wilson, Mississippi, murderer (FBI Most Wanted List)
1946 – Roger Earl, rocker (Foghat)
1947 – Barbara Lee, US singer (Chiffons, He’s So Fine)
1949 – William Sputnik Spooner, rock guitarist (Grateful Dead, Tubes)
1950 – Johannes Bednorz, German superconductivity physicist (Nobel 1987)
1953 – Pierce Brosnan, County Meath Ireland, actor (Remington Steele, Golden Eye)
1955 – Debra Winger, Columbus Oh, actress (Officer & Gentleman)
1955 – Olga Korbut, Grodno Belorussia, gymnist (Olympic-2 golds-1972)
1957 – Joan Benoit Samuelson, Cape Elizabeth ME, marathoner (Oly-gold-1984)
1959 – Mare Winningham, Phoenix Az, actress (St Elmo’s Fire, Turner & Hooch)
1960 – Anne Parillaud, Paris France, actress (Subway, Nikita, Innocent Blood)
1961 – Charles Wright, American professional wrestler known as “The Godfather”
1964 – Boyd Tinsley, American violinist (Dave Matthews Band)
1965 – Krist Novoselic, American bassist (Nirvana)
1966 – Janet Jackson, Gary Indiana, singer, Michael’s sister (Control)
1969 – Steven Earl Lewis, LA California, 4X100/400m runner (Olympic-gold-1988)
1969 – Tracey Gold, NYC, actress (Carol-Growing Pains, Incredible Sunday)
1969 – Tucker Carlson, American television commentator
1970 – Gabriela Sabatini, Argentina, tennis player (Olympic-silver-1988)
1972 – Matthew Hart, cricketer (NZ lefty spinner 1994- )
1979 – McKenzie Lee, English pornographic actress
1981 – Jessica Ponzo, Miss New Jersey Teen USA (1996)
1983 – Kyle Wellwood, Canadian ice hockey player
1986 – Megan Fox, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, American actress (Transformers) and model
Deaths
583 – Saint Brendan, Irish navigator (b. 484)
942 – Saadiah Gaon, head of Talmudic Academy of Sura, dies
1265 – Saint Simon Stock, English saint (b. 1165)
1434 – Pieter Appelmans, Flemish architect/master builder, dies at about 60
1569 – Dirk Willems, Anabaptist Martyr
1620 – William Adams, English navigator (b. 1564)
1667 – Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton, English statesman (b. 1607)
1669 – Pietro da Cortona, [Berrettini], painter/architect, dies
1691 – Jacob Leisler, becomes 1st American colonist hanged for treason
1777 – Button Gwinnet, US revolutionary leader, signer of Dec of Ind , dies from wounds
1805 – Christian Brunings, hydraulic engineer, dies at 68
1819 – Alexander van Bylandt, military, dies at 75
1829 – William Congreve, English officer, dies at 56
1830 – Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier, mathematician, dies
1863 – Lloyd Tilghman, Confederate brig-general, dies in battle at 47
1864 – Lean Bear, Cheyenne chief, murdered
1892 – John Banvard, painted worlds largest painting (3 mile canvas), dies
1920 – Levi P. Morton, United States Vice President under Benjamin Harrision (b. 1824)
1942 – Bronislaw Kasper Malinowski, anthropologist, dies
1944 – Max Brand, [Frederick Schiller Faust], western author, dies
1947 – Frederick Hopkins, English biochemist, Nobel laureate (b. 1861)
1953 – Django Reinhardt, Belgian musician (b. 1910)
1954 – Werner Bischof, Swiss photographer, dies accidentally at 38
1955 – James Agee, US critic/writer (Death in Family), dies in NY
1956 – H. B. Reese, American founder of Reese’s (b. 1876)
1957 – Eliot Ness, American federal agent (b. 1903)
1959 – Joe Cook, Stage comedian, dies at 69
1975 – Michael X, (Abdul Malik), hanged in Trinidad, for murder
1984 – Andy Kaufman, comedian (Latka-Taxi), dies of cancer at 35
1984 – Irwin Shaw, US writer (Rich Man, Poor Man), dies at 71
1985 – Margaret Hamilton, actress (Wicked Witch-Wizard of Oz), dies at 82
1988 – Kay Baxter, best bodybuilder in the world (1983-85), dies in car crash at 42
1989 – Hassan Khaled, sheik of Lebanon, murdered
1990 – Dag Drollet, Cheyenne Brando’s boyfriend killed by brother Christian
1990 – Jim Henson, puppeteer (Sesame Street, Muppet Show), dies at 53
1990 – Sammy Davis Jr, singer/actor (Golden Boy), dies at 64
1993 – Marv Johnson, US soul singer (You Got What it Takes), dies at 54
1996 – Mike Jeremy Boorda, Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) commits suicide at 57
1996 – Pierre Debizet, resistance fighter/special agent, dies at 72
2000 – Bodacious the Bull Famous rodeo bull (b. 1988)
2001 – Brian Pendleton, English musician (The Pretty Things) (b. 1944)
2002 – Alec Campbell, the last surviving ANZAC (b. 1899)
2010 – Ronnie James Dio, American heavy metal vocalist (b. 1942)
2010 – Hank Jones, American jazz pianist (b. 1918)
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