On This Day: April 10

On This Day April 10

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1921 – Professional baseball and basketball player-turned-actor Chuck Connors (“The Rifleman”)  (d. 1992)

1929 – Actor Max von Sydow (“The Seventh Seal,” “The Exorcist,” “Three Days of the Condor,” “Pelle The Conqueror,” “Minority Report,” “Game of Thrones”) (d. 2020)

1932 – Golden Globe Award-winning actor Omar Sharif (“Lawrence of Arabia,” “Doctor Zhivago,” “Funny Girl”)  (d. 2015)

1936 – Pro Football Hall of Famer, retired NFL coach and sportscaster John Madden

1952 – Actor, producer and martial artist Steven Seagal (“Above the Law,” “Under Siege,” “Executive Decision,” “The Patriot”)  

1959 – Grammy-winning R&B singer-songwriter and music producer Babyface, born Kenneth Edmonds

1984 – Singer-songwriter and actress Mandy Moore (“Candy,” “A Walk to Remember,” “Tangled,” “This Is Us”)

1988 – Actor Haley Joel Osment (“Forrest Gump,” “The Sixth Sense,” “Pay It Forward,” “A.I. Artificial Intelligence,” “Entourage”)

History Highlights
History Highlights

1790 – President George Washington signs a bill establishing the U.S. Patent system as a means of protecting the rights of inventors for their creations.

1849 – New York mason Walter Hunt is granted U.S. Patent #6,281 for his safety pin invention, which he fashioned from a single piece of wire.

1866 – A major step toward protecting the welfare of animals is taken on this day when philanthropist and diplomat Henry Bergh establishes the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). 

1912 – The luxury liner Titanic sets sail from Southampton, England on its fateful voyage to New York.

1953 – The first color 3-D movie opens in New York. It’s “House of Wax,” starring Vincent Price and directed by André De Toth. In addition to sparking the 3-D movie craze of the 1950s, this motion picture also launches Price’s long and successful career as a star of the horror genre.

1963 – All 129 crewmen die when the nuclear submarine USS Thresher sinks some 300 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, while conducting drills.

1971 – The U.S. table tennis team begins a week-long visit to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) at the invitation of China’s communist government. The well-publicized trip is part of the PRC’s efforts to build closer diplomatic relations with the United States.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1954 – “Wanted,” by Perry Como, begins an eight-week run on top of the pop chart. 

1965 – Freddie and the Dreamers, known for their unique dance gyrations while performing, hold the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 with “I’m Telling You Now.”

1970 – Paul McCartney issues a press statement — more of a self-interview — announcing the breakup of The Beatles. McCartney wrote, “I have no future plans to record or appear with The Beatles again, or to write any music with John (Lennon).”

1971 – Motown sensation The Temptations have the No. 1 single with “Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me).”

1976 – The biggest-selling live album in rock history hits the top of the U.S. album chart and remains there for 10 weeks. It’s “Frampton Comes Alive!” by British singer-songwriter Peter Frampton. An estimated 11 million copies have been sold worldwide.

1993 – One-hit-wonder Snow is in the middle of seven weeks atop the pop chart with “Informer.”

1999 – The female trio TLC kicks off four weeks as chart-toppers with “No Scrubs.”

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On This Day: November 25

On This Day November 25

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1835 – Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (d. 1919)

1914 – New York Yankees Hall of Fame outfielder Joe DiMaggio (d. 1999)

1920 – Emmy-winning actor Ricardo Montalban, best known for playing Mr. Rourke on ABC’s “Fantasy Island” and Captain Kirk’s nemesis in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan”) (d. 2009)

1944 – Economist-turned-presidential speechwriter-turned actor, comedian and Emmy-winning game show host Ben Stein (“Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Win Ben Stein’s Money”)

1947 – Emmy-winning actor John Larroquette (“Night Court,” “The John Larroquette Show,” “The West Wing,” “Boston Legal”)

1960 – Publisher and presidential son John F. Kennedy, Jr. (d. 1999)

1960 – Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Amy Grant (“Next Time I Fall,” “Baby, Baby”)

1971 – Emmy-winning actress Christina Applegate (“Married… with Children,” “Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead,” “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” and its sequel, “Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues”)

History Highlights
History Highlights

1947 – Film industry executives announce that 10 directors, producers and actors — the so-called “Hollywood Ten” — who refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee, will be fired or suspended.

1950 – A killer blizzard that comes to be known as “The Storm of the Century” paralyzes the eastern U.S. from western Pennsylvania and Ohio to New England and the Appalachians with heavy snow, 100-mile-per-hour winds and sub-zero temperatures. Coburn Creek, West Virginia receives the greatest snowfall: 62 inches. The storm claims more than 350 lives and becomes one of the costliest on record.

1973 – In response to the oil crisis, President Richard Nixon calls for a Sunday ban on the sale of gasoline to consumers. The proposal is part of a larger plan announced earlier in the month to achieve energy self-sufficiency in the U.S. by 1980.

1986 – The Iran-Contra scandal comes to light, as U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese announces that profits from covert weapons sales to Iran were illegally diverted to the anti-communist Contra rebels in Nicaragua. An investigation determines that the diversion of those funds had no direct link to then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1965 – Harrods department store in London closes to the public for two hours so The Beatles can go Christmas shopping. Sadly, with Christmas still four weeks away, the Fab Four end up giving away all the gifts they bought during their spree.

1967 – “Incense and Peppermints,” by Strawberry Alarm Clock. is on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

1976 – The Band give their final performance at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. The show also features Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Eric Clapton and other rock legends. Director Martin Scorsese films the event and releases it as a documentary called “The Last Waltz.”

1989 – Milli Vanilli start a two-week run at No. 1 on the singles chart with “Blame It On The Rain,” the duo’s third No. 1 of the year.

1992 – “The Bodyguard” opens in theaters, starring Whitney Houston in her first acting role, and Kevin Costner. The soundtrack becomes the best-selling soundtrack of all time, with many of the songs dominating the pop chart.

1995 – Whitney Houston scores her 11th No. 1 single with “Exhale (Shoop Shoop),” off the “Waiting To Exhale” movie soundtrack. The song was written and produced by Babyface.

2003 – Pop music legend Michael Jackson is arrested on suspicion of child molestation. He posts a $3 million bond and is released less than an hour later.

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