On This Day: April 27

Musical Milestones

1963 – High school freshman Little Peggy March (born Margaret Annemarie Battavio) marches to the top of the singles chart with “I Will Follow Him.” The song remains there for three weeks. 

1967 – Motown Records releases the Marvin Gaye-Tammi Terrell duet, “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” which becomes a Top 20 hit. Diana Ross’ 1970 version rockets to the top of the pop chart, becoming her first No. 1 since leaving The Supremes. 

1974 – “TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia),” by MFSB and The Three Degrees, is the No. 1 single. 

1981 – Singer-songwriter and legendary Beatles drummer Ringo Starr weds actress Barbara Bach, best known for her roles in the James Bond movie “The Spy Who Loved Me” and “Force 10 from Navarone.”

1985 – “We Are The World,” the musical collaboration produced under the baton of Quincy Jones as a fundraiser for African famine relief, is in the middle of a four-week reign over the Billboard Hot 100.

1991 – Amy Grant’s “Baby Baby begins two weeks as the most popular single in the U.S.

1999 – British rockers The Verve, best known for their Grammy-nominated hit “Bitter Sweet Symphony” and the chart-topping singles “The Drugs Don’t Work” and “Lucky Man,” announce their second breakup. The band re-forms in 2007, but by 2009, the musicians truly go their separate ways.

2002 – “Foolish,” off Ashanti’s self-titled debut album, tops the Billboard Hot 100 and remains at No. 1 for 10 weeks. The accompanying music video features actor Terrence Howard.

History Highlights

1865 – After surviving the horrors of the Civil War, some Union soldiers — many former prisoners of war — are crammed aboard the steamboat Sultana, heading home along the Mississippi River, when the ship’s boilers explode. More than 1,800 passengers die as the ship burns and sinks, resulting in the worst maritime disaster in American history — with more lives lost than in the 1912 Titanic sinking. 

1936 – The United Auto Workers (UAW) gains autonomy from the American Federation of Labor (AFL). 

1956 – Rocky Marciano retires from boxing at age 31, ending his career as the only undefeated world heavyweight champion: 49 wins in 49 professional bouts, with 43 knockouts. 

1974 – Some 10,000 demonstrators march in Washington, D.C. calling for the impeachment of President Richard Nixon. 

1982 – Jury selection begins in the trial of John Hinckley, Jr., charged with the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan. 

1993 – Authorities in North Carolina determine that film crew negligence is to blame for the death of actor Brandon Lee, who was accidentally shot and killed a month earlier on the set of the action-adventure movie “The Crow.” Brandon was the son of legendary martial arts star Bruce Lee.

2009 – General Motors (GM) announces plans to discontinue production of its 80-year-old Pontiac line of cars in 2010.

Celebrity Birthdays

1791 – Inventor and painter Samuel Morse, most famous for creating the telegraph  (d. 1872)

1822 – 18th U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant, who helped lead the Union forces to victory during the Civil War (d. 1885)

1922 – Actor Jack Klugman (“The Odd Couple,” “Quincy, M.E.”) (d. 2012)

1927 – Civil rights leader Coretta Scott King, wife of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  (d. 2006)

1932 – Radio personality Casey Kasem, co-founder and former host of “American Top 40” and the voice of Shaggy from “Scooby-Doo” (d. 2014)

1951 – Guitarist and Kiss co-founder Ace Frehley 

1959 – Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Sheena Easton (“Morning Train,” “For Your Eyes Only,” “Sugar Walls”)  

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The Complete Duets

Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell

Greatest Hits

Amy Grant

Remember the Sultana

Narrated by Sean Astin, and directed and produced by Mike Marshall and Mark Marshall

Rocky Marciano: A LIfe Story

Narrated by Robert Loggia and directed by Marino Amoruso

The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant

Coretta: My Life, My Love, My Legacy

Coretta Scott King

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On This Day: April 9

Musical Milestones

1966 – “(You’re My) Soul and Inspiration,” by The Righteous Brothers, launches a three-week run at No. 1 on the singles chart. 

1969 – Columbia Records releases Bob Dylan’s “Nashville Skyline” album, showcasing Dylan’s foray into country music. It spawns the hit “Lay Lady Lay,” which climbs as high as No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100.

1977 – “Dancing Queen,” by ABBA, becomes the Swedish band’s first and only No. 1 single in the U.S. The song holds the top spot for a week.

1978 – Donna Summer’s “Last Dance,” from the “Thank God It’s Friday” soundtrack, captures an Oscar for Best Original Song at the 51st annual Academy Awards.

1988 – Billy Ocean kicks off two weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car.”

1994 – “Bump n’ Grind,” by R. Kelly, begins four weeks as a Billboard singles chart-topper.

History Highlights

1865 – Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox, Virginia, ending the American Civil War.

1959 – Six months after its creation, NASA holds a news conference to introduce the U.S. Air Force pilots that were to become America’s first astronauts – the Mercury Seven: Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard and Deke Slayton.

1962 – “West Side Story” sweeps the Academy Awards, winning 10 Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor and Actress and Best Director. 

1965 – The Houston Astrodome, the world’s first domed stadium and so-called “Eighth Wonder of the World,” opens to the public with a sold-out exhibition game between the Houston Astros and the New York Yankees. President Lyndon B. Johnson is in attendance as the Astros prevail 2-1. 

1972 – Jane Fonda wins the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as a call girl who witnesses a crime in “Klute,” co-starring Donald Sutherland.

Celebrity Birthdays

1898 – Stage actor, singer and civil rights crusader Paul Robeson (d. 1976)

1926 – Playboy magazine founder and publisher Hugh Hefner (d. 2017)

1928 – Singer-songwriter, satirist, pianist, and mathematician Tom Lehrer 

1954 – Actor Dennis Quaid (“Breaking Away,” “The Right Stuff,” “Enemy Mine,” “Innerspace,” “Postcards From the Edge,” “The Parent Trap,” “Frequency,” “The Day After Tomorrow,” “In Good Company,” “A Dog’s Purpose”)

1966 – Emmy, Tony and Grammy-winning actress Cynthia Nixon, best known as Miranda Hobbes in “Sex and the City” 

1990 – Actress Kristen Stewart (“Panic Room,” “Zathura,” “The Twilight Saga,” “Snow White and the Huntsman”) 

1998 – Actress Elle Fanning (“I Am Sam,” “Phoebe in Wonderland,” “Super 8,” “We Bought a Zoo,” “Low Down,” “Maleficent,” “Trumbo”)

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Nashville Skyline

Bob Dylan

GOLD: Greatest Hits

ABBA

Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control From Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond

Gene Kranz

West Side Story

Starring Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer and Russ Tamblyn, and directed by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise

Paul Robeson: A Biography

Martin Duberman

Panic Room

Starring Jodie Foster, Jared Leto, Forest Whitaker and Kristen Stewart, and directed by David Fincher

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On This Day: January 29

Musical Milestones

1964 – The Beatles spend the day at the Pathe Marconi Studios in Paris in their only studio recording session for EMI held outside the U.K. They record “She Loves You” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand” in German.

1972 – Don McLean’s “American Pie” is in the midst of a four-week ride atop the Billboard Hot 100.

1977 – “Car Wash,” by Rose Royce, is the No. 1 single. It comes from the movie of the same name that features Richard Pryor, George Carlin and The Pointer Sisters, and is considered a staple of the disco genre.

1983 – Men at Work wrap up three weeks on top of the Hot 100 with “Down Under,” off the Aussie band’s “Business as Usual” album.

1994 – “All for Love,” by Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart and Sting, is in the middle of a three-week run on top of the pop chart. The single comes from the soundtrack to “The Three Musketeers,” a movie starring Charlie Sheen, Kiefer Sutherland and Chris O’Donnell.

2000 – The No. 1 spot on the pop chart belongs to Australian pop duo Savage Garden with “I Knew I Loved You.”

History Highlights

1845 – The Evening Mirror publishes Edgar Allan Poe’s now-classic poem, “The Raven.”

1936 – The first inductees into the Baseball Hall of Fame are announced In Cooperstown, New York. They include Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson.

1963 – Robert Frost, considered the dean of American poets, dies in Boston at the age of 88.

1964 – Stanley Kubrick’s black comic masterpiece, “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb,” opens in movie theaters to critical acclaim. Actor Peter Sellers plays three roles in the Cold War parody.

1979 – Teenager Brenda Spencer shoots and kills two men and wounds nine children as they enter the Grover Cleveland Elementary School in San Diego. Asked by authorities upon her arrest why she did it, the 16-year-old replies, “I don’t like Mondays. This livens up the day.” The incident inspires The Boomtown Rats to write their hit song, “I Don’t Like Mondays.”

Celebrity Birthdays

1820 – Civil rights crusader Harriet Tubman, known for freeing slaves via the Underground Railroad, and who served as a Union spy during the Civil War (d. 1913)

1843 – 25th U.S. President William McKinley, who was assassinated six months into his second term after leading the nation to victory in the Spanish-American War (d. 1901)

1940 – Actress Katharine Ross (“Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “The Stepford Wives”) 

1945 – Emmy and Golden Globe-winning actor Tom Selleck (“Magnum, P.I.,” “Lassiter,” “Three Men and a Baby,” “Friends,” “Blue Bloods”) 

1954 – Media executive, talk show host, actress, producer and philanthropist Oprah Winfrey 

1970 – Actress Heather Graham (“Twin Peaks,” “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me,” “Boogie Nights,” “Bowfinger,” Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me,” “The Hangover”) 

1975 – Actress and TV talk show host Sara Gilbert (“Roseanne,” “The Talk’)

1982 – Singer-songwriter Adam Lambert, whose career was launched during the eighth season of “American Idol” and now tours with Queen members Brian May and Roger Taylor as Queen + Adam Lambert

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American Pie

Don McLean

Car Wash

Rose Royce

Cooperstown Confidential: Heroes, Rogues, and the Inside Story of the Baseball Hall of Fame

Zev Chafets

Dr. Strangelove Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb

Starring Peter Sellers, Peter Bull and George C. Scott, and directed by Stanley Kubrick

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford, and directed by Thurl Ravenscroft and Jorge Russek

Magnum P.I.: The Complete First Season

Starring Tom Selleck and John Hillerman

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On This Day: January 19

Musical Milestones

1959 – The Platters serve up the hottest single on this day with “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes,” which holds the top spot for three weeks.

1967 – The Beatles begin recording “A Day In The Life” at Abbey Road Studios in London. According to John Lennon, the inspiration for the song came largely from Tara Browne, the heir to the Guinness fortune, who was killed in a London car crash a year earlier.

1971 – Tracks from The Beatles’ “The White Album,” including “Helter Skelter,” are played in a California courtroom to determine if any songs could have influenced Charles Manson and his followers to murder actress Sharon Tate and four others in a 1969 killing spree.

1974 – Al Wilson’s “Show And Tell” is No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

1980 – Pink Floyd’s concept album, “The Wall,” begins a 15-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart and goes on to sell more than 8 million copies. 

1993 – Members of Fleetwood Mac reunite to perform at U.S. President Bill Clinton’s Inaugural Ball. The band’s hit, “Don’t Stop,” had been the theme of his presidential campaign.

1994 – Elton John, John Lennon, The Band, The Grateful Dead, Duane Eddy, Willie Dixon, Bob Marley, Johnny Otis, and Rod Stewart are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York. Stewart is stranded in Los Angeles and unable to attend because of the massive earthquake that had struck two days earlier.

History Highlights

1825 – Ezra Daggett and Thomas Kensett secure a patent for the tin can as a means of preserving food. Consequently, this is known as National Tin Can Day.

1937 – Millionaire Howard Hughes sets a transcontinental air record, flying from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey in just under 7.5 hours. Hughes breaks the record he set a year earlier by about two hours. He averaged 332 miles an hour during the 2,490-mile flight in his H-1 Racer.

1955 – Dwight Eisenhower becomes the first U.S. president to allow a filmed news conference to be used on television and in movie newsreels. The 33-minute conference was cut to 28-1/2 minutes to fit TV formats. 

1983 – Klaus Barbie, the Nazi Gestapo chief of Lyons, France during the German occupation, is arrested in Bolivia for his crimes against humanity. As chief of Nazi Germany’s secret police in occupied France, Barbie (a.k.a. “The Butcher of Lyons”) sent thousands of French Jews and Resistance members to their deaths in concentration camps, while torturing, abusing, or executing many others.

Celebrity Birthdays

1807 – U.S. Civil War Confederate General Robert E. Lee (d. 1870)

1809 – Poet Edgar Allen Poe (“The Tell-Tale Heart,” “The Raven”) (d. 1849)

1923 – Emmy and Golden Globe-winning actress Jean Stapleton, best known for her role as Edith Bunker in TV’s “All in the Family” (d. 2013)

1930 – Golden Globe-winning actress Tippi Hedren (“The Birds,” “Marnie”)

1939 – Rock and Roll and Country Music Hall of Famer Phil Everly of The Everly Brothers (d. 2014)

1942 – Tony Award-winning actor and singer Michael Crawford (“Phantom of the Opera”)

1943 – Rock legend Janis Joplin (d. 1970)

1946 – Grammy-winning singer, actress and Country Music Hall of Famer Dolly Parton

1947 – Emmy-winning TV chef Paula Deen

 

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The Platters: All-Time Greatest Hits

The Platters

The Wall

Pink Floyd

Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness

Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele

The Best of I Love Lucy

Starring Lucille Ball

All in the Family: Complete First Season

Starring Jean Stapleton and Carroll O’Connor

The Birds

Starring Tippi Hedren, Suzanne Pleshette and Rod Taylor, and directed by Alfred Hitchcock

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On This Day: December 25

Musical Milestones

1941 – Bing Crosby performs the Irving Berlin holiday classic “White Christmas” for the first time on his weekly NBC Radio show “The Kraft Music Hall.” Crosby later performs it in the 1942 movie “Holiday Inn.” It remains the largest-selling single in music history until surpassed by Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind 1997.”

1961 – The Brooklyn-based doo-wop group The Tokens rule the singles chart with “The Lion Sleeps Tonight (Wimoweh)” — originally written and recorded as “Mbube” in 1939 by Zulu artist Solomon Linda. 

1965 – The Dave Clark Five have the No. 1 single with “Over and Over.”

1976 – Rod Stewart claims the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 for a seventh straight week with “Tonight’s The Night (Gonna Be Alright).”

1982 – “Maneater,” by Hall & Oates, is mid-way through a four week domination of the singles chart.

1995 – Entertainer Dean Martin, a beloved member of the so-called “Rat Pack,” dies at the age of 78.

2004 – Ludacris has the No. 1 album with “The Red Light District,” which spawns the hit singles “Get Back” and “Number One Spot.”

History Highlights

1776 – General George Washington and 2,400 of his Continental Army troops cross the icy waters of the Delaware River for a surprise attack against Hessian forces at Trenton, New Jersey.

1973 – “The Sting,” starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford as a pair of 1930s grifters, premieres.

1977 – British director, producer and comedic actor Charlie Chaplin, an icon of the silent film era, dies at the age of 88.

1989 – Ousted Romanian President Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife, Elena, are executed following a popular uprising.

1989 – Former New York Yankees manager Billy Martin dies in a traffic accident at the age of 61.

1991 – Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the Soviet Union just days after 11 of the former Soviet republics establish the Commonwealth of Independent States.

Celebrity Birthdays

1821 – Clara Barton, Civil War volunteer nurse who founded the American Red Cross (d. 1912)

1899 – Legendary Oscar-winning actor Humphrey Bogart (“Casablanca,” “Maltese Falcon,” “The African Queen,” “Key Largo”) (d. 1957)

1924 – Emmy-winning “The Twilight Zone” creator-writer Rod Serling (d. 1975)

1946 – Singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett (“Margaritaville,” “Cheeseburger in Paradise”)

1948 – Grammy-winning country music singer Barbara Mandrell (“Sleeping Single in a Double Bed,” “Years”)

1949 – Oscar-winning actress Sissy Spacek (“Carrie,” “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” “In the Bedroom,” “The Help”)

1952 – Actress CCH Pounder (“Hill Street Blues,” “ER,” “The Practice,” “Law & Order: SVU,”, “Millennium,” “The West Wing,” “The Shield”)

1954 – Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Annie Lennox, formerly of the 80s new wave band Eurythmics

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White Christmas

Bing Crosby

Dino The Essential Dean Martin

Dean Martin

Charlie Chaplin: A Brief Life

Peter Ackroyd

Billy Martin: Baseball's Flawed Genius

Bill Pennington

The Twilight Zone (Season 1)

Created by Rod Serling

Coal Miner's Daughter

Starring Sissy Spacek, Tommy Lee Jones and Levon Helm, and directed by Michael Apted

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On This Day: September 22

Musical Milestones

1956 – Elvis Presley is king of the singles chart with “Don’t Be Cruel.” The song remains at No. 1 for 11 weeks. In 2002, it is inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

1962 – “Sherry,” by The Four Seasons, is in the midst of a five-week domination of the pop chart.

1973 – “Let’s Get it On,” by Marvin Gaye, returns to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 for a second week and becomes his most successful Motown single.

1984 – “Missing You,” by John Waite, is on top of the singles chart.

1990 – Wilson Phillips has the No. 1 single with “Release Me.”

2001 – “I’m Real,” by Jennifer Lopez featuring Ja Rule, begins its third week as a No. 1 single.

History Highlights

1862 – President Abraham Lincoln issues a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, which sets a date for the freedom of more than three million black slaves in the U.S. and recasts the Civil War as a fight against slavery. 

1976 – “Charlie’s Angels” premieres on ABC with Kate Jackson, Jaclyn Smith and the late Farrah Fawcett as a trio of detectives working for their unseen boss, Charlie, who telephoned in their assignments. 

1982 – “Family Ties” debuts on NBC, starring Michael J. Fox as Alex, the smart, conservative and financially driven teenage son of parents played by Meredith Baxter and Michael Gross. 

1994 – NBC introduces “Friends,” starring Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Jennifer Aniston, Matthew Perry, David Schwimmer and Matt Le Blanc. The sitcom becomes one of primetime TV’s most popular shows during a 10-season run.

Celebrity Birthdays

1927 – Retired Los Angeles Dodgers manager and National Baseball Hall of Famer Tommy Lasorda 

1954 – Actress-model-singer Shari Belafonte (“Hotel,” “Beyond Reality,” “Babylon 5: Thirdspace”)

1956 – Singer Debby Boone, best known for her Grammy-winning 70s smash “You Light Up My Life”

1958 – Rock guitarist-singer and 2015 Rock And Roll Hall of Fame inductee Joan Jett 

1958 – Golden Globe-winning Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli

1960 – Actor Scott Baio (“Happy Days,” “Joanie Loves Chachi,” “Charles in Charge”)

1987 – Actor Tom Felton, best known for playing the villainous Draco Malfoy in the “Harry Potter” movie series

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The Essential Elvis Presley

Elvis Presley

Let's Get It On

Marvin Gaye

A. Lincoln: A Biography

Ronald C. White

Charlie's Angels, Season 1

Starring Farrah Fawcett, Kate Jackson and Jaclyn Smith

Tommy Lasorda: My Way

Colin Gunderson

Greatest Hits: Joan Jett & The Blackhearts

Joan Jett & The Blackhearts

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On This Day: September 17

Musical Milestones

1967 – The Doors are banned from “The Ed Sullivan Show” after front man Jim Morrison breaks his agreement with the producers. Morrison promised he wouldn’t sing the words, “Girl, we couldn’t get much higher,” from “Light My Fire,” but did anyway.

1969 – Media on both sides of the Atlantic report that Paul McCartney of The Beatles is dead — supposedly killed in a car accident in Scotland in November 1966 and that a double had been standing in for him during public appearances. In fact, Paul and his girlfriend, Jane Asher, were vacationing in Kenya at the time.

1977 – Andy Gibb owns the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 with “I Just Want to Be Your Everything.”

1988 – Guns N’ Roses begins the second and final week at No. 1 on the singles chart with “Sweet Child o’ Mine,” off the band’s debut album, “Appetite for Destruction.”

1994 – “I’ll Make Love to You,” by Boyz II Men, is in the midst of a 14-week domination of the singles chart.

2016 – Barbra Streisand extends her record as the artist with the most No. 1 albums in chart history (11) when “Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway” reaches the top of the Billboard album chart.

History Highlights

1862 – At the Battle of Antietam, Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia and Union General George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac fight to a standstill along a Maryland creek. The bloodiest day in American military history results in nearly 23,000 soldiers killed, wounded or missing.

1937 – The stone likeness of President Abraham Lincoln’s face is officially dedicated at Mount Rushmore.

1963 – New programming premieres on ABC: “The Greatest Show on Earth” and “The Fugitive,” the latter of which is made into a movie 30 years later, starring Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones. 

1966 – The spy series “Mission: Impossible” debuts on CBS. Thirty years later, in 1996, the first in a series of “Mission: Impossible” movies is produced starring, starring Tom Cruise. 

1972 – The Korean War-era series “M*A*S*H,” starring Alan Alda, begins an 11-year run on CBS

1976 – NASA unveils the first space shuttle, Enterprise, a $10 billion technological marvel that took a decade to develop. 

1978 – A milestone is achieved on the road to a Middle East peace, with the signing of the Camp David Accords. U.S. President Jimmy Carter presides as Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli President Menachem Begin agree to end three decades of hostilities between their nations. 

Celebrity Birthdays

1923 – Legendary country music star Hank Williams, Sr. (d. 1953)

1928 – Actor Roddy McDowall, born Roderick Andrew Anthony Jude “Roddy” McDowall, who played Cornelius and Caesar in the original “Planet of the Apes” sci-fi movie and TV series (d. 1998)

1931 – Oscar, Golden Globe, Tony and Emmy-winning actress Anne Bancroft, born Anna Maria Louisa Italiano (“The Graduate,” “The Miracle Worker,” “The Elephant Man, “Agnes of God,” “Malice”) (d. 2005)

1948 – Golden Globe and Emmy-winning actor John Ritter, best known as Jack Tripper in the hit comedy series “Three’s Company” (d. 2003)

1951 – Actress Cassandra Peterson, a.k.a. Elvira, Mistress of the Dark

1965 – Actor Kyle Chandler (“Friday Night Lights,”  “Super 8,” “Argo,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” “The Wolf of Wall Street,” “King Kong”)

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Appetite for Destruction

Guns N’ Roses

II

Boyz II Men

M*A*S*H (TV Milestones Series)

David Scott Diffrient

Landscape Turned Red

Stephen W. Sears

The Complete Hank Williams

Hank Williams, Sr.

The Graduate

Starring Anne BancroftDustin Hoffman and Katharine Ross, and directed by Mike Nichols

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On this Day: August 5

Musical Milestones

1957 – “American Bandstand” debuts on national television (ABC) with host Dick Clark, and helps make rock ‘n roll more “acceptable” to skeptical parents by bringing music and dancing kids into their homes. It also provides exposure to up-and-coming bands.

1966 – The Beatles release their seventh studio album, “Revolver,” in the U.K. It’s the first album to feature backwards music — a George Harrison guitar solo played in reverse in “I’m Only Sleeping.”

1967 – The Doors are chart-toppers for a second straight week with “Light My Fire.”

1978 – The Rolling Stones climb to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Miss You,” the group’s eighth No. 1 hit. 

1981 – Singer-songwriter and actress Olivia Newton-John, who starred with John Travolta in the 1978 movie “Grease,” is honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1989 – Prince’s “Batdance,” from the movie “Batman,” starring Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson, soars to No. 1 on the singles chart. 

1995 – “Waterfalls,” by TLC, holds on to the No. 1 slot on the Billboard Hot 100 for a fifth consecutive week.

2000 – NSYNC rules the pop chart for a second and final week with “It’s Gonna Be Me.”

History Highlights

1858 – The first telegraph line across the Atlantic Ocean is completed.

1914 – The world’s first electric traffic signal is installed at the corner of Euclid Avenue and East 105th Street in Cleveland, Ohio.

1962 – Hollywood icon Marilyn Monroe is found dead in her Los Angeles home at the age of 36. An investigation determines the cause to be a drug overdose. 

1963 – Representatives of the U.S., Soviet Union and Great Britain sign the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits the testing of nuclear weapons in outer space, underwater or in the atmosphere. The treaty is hailed as an important first step toward the control of nuclear weapons.

1981 – President Ronald Reagan begins firing more than 11,000 striking air traffic controllers for defying his order to return to work. The move slowed commercial air travel for months.

1983 – “Risky Business” opens in theaters, propelling actor Tom Cruise to stardom. The movie’s most iconic scene features Cruise dancing at home in his underpants to Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll.”

1998 – Seventy-year-old Marie Noe is arrested and charged with the suffocation murders of eight of her 10 children over a 50-year period.

2002 – Divers recover the rusty turret of the ironclad Civil War-era warship U.S.S. Monitor, which sank 140 years earlier in a storm off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. 

Celebrity Birthdays

1906 – Golden Globe-winning director and actor John Huston (“The Maltese Falcon,” “The African Queen,” “Chinatown”) (d. 1987)

1930 – Astronaut Neil Armstrong, who was the first human to set foot on the moon (d. 2012)

1935 – Actor John Saxon, born Carmine Orrico, best known for his work in westerns and horror films, as well as Bruce Lee’s 1973 movie, “Enter the Dragon”

1945 – Actress Loni Anderson (“WKRP in Cincinnati”) 

1956 – Actress Maureen McCormick, best known for playing Marcia Brady in the sitcom “The Brady Bunch”

1962 – Retired basketball Hall of Famer and current Georgetown University head coach Patrick Ewing

1963 – Actor Mark Strong (“Syriana,” “Sherlock Holmes,” “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy,” “Green Lantern,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” “The Imitation Game,” “Kingsman: The Secret Service”)

1964 – Rapper and Beastie Boys founder Adam Yauch (d. 2012)

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Revolver

The Beatles

Some Girls

The Rolling Stones

Fragments: Poems, Intimate Notes, Letters

Marilyn Monroe

Risky Business

Starring Tom Cruise, Rebecca DeMornay and Joe Pantoliano, and directed by Paul Brickman

The Imitation Game

Starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode and Mark Strong, and directed by Morten Tyldem

Solid Gold Hits

Beastie Boys

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On this Day: July 23

Musical Milestones

1966 – Tommy James and the Shondells have the No. 1 single in the U.S. for a second straight week: “Hanky Panky.”

1977 – Barry Manilow’s “Looks Like We Made It” makes it to the No. 1 spot on the singles chart. 

1983 – “Synchronicity,” by The Police, kicks off 17 weeks on top of the Billboard album chart. It’s the band’s fifth and final studio album, and goes on to capture three Grammy Awards.

1988 – The first single from Richard Marx, “Hold On to the Nights,” is the hottest song on the radio. 

1988 – Guns N’ Roses scores a huge popular breakthrough when their first hit single, “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” enters the Billboard Top 40. It climbs to No. 1 that September.

1994 – “I Swear,” by All-4-One, is in the middle of an 11-week domination of the Billboard Hot 100.

2005 – Mariah Carey claims the top spot on the pop chart with “We Belong Together.”

2011 – Grammy-winning British singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse (“Stronger Than Me,” “Rehab”) dies of alcohol poisoning in her London townhouse at the age of 27. 

History Highlights

1885 – Shortly after completing his memoirs, Civil War hero and former president Ulysses S. Grant dies of throat cancer.

1967 – A police raid on an illegal Detroit bar triggers the 12th Street Riot, with days of firebombing, violence and looting, as African Americans lash out over police brutality, housing discrimination and unemployment. 

1982 – Actor Vic Morrow and two child actors are killed in an accident involving a helicopter while filming a Vietnam combat scene for “Twilight Zone: The Movie” — director John Landis’ film adaptation of Rod Serling’s TV series. The deaths lead to tighter on-set safety measures by the film industry. 

1984 – Vanessa Williams gives up her Miss America title — the first resignation in the pageant’s history — after Penthouse magazine announces plans to publish nude photos of her. At 21, Williams was the first African American woman to win the Miss America crown. Despite the scandal, she goes on to enjoy a successful singing and acting career that continues today.

1985 – A revolution in gaming takes place as Commodore releases the Amiga 1000, the home computer that played host to everything from Speedball to Rainbow Islands.

1996 – At the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, the U.S. women’s gymnastics team, nicknamed the “Mag 7” or “Magnificent 7,” captures its first-ever team gold.

Celebrity Birthdays

1918 – Major League Baseball All-Star shortstop Pee Wee Reese, born Harold Henry Reese (d. 1999)

1933 – Emmy-winning actor and game show host Bert Convy (d. 1991)

1940 – Radio talk show host Don Imus

1961 – Emmy-winning actor Woody Harrelson (“Cheers,” “Indecent Proposal,” “Natural Born Killers,” “Kingpin,” “The Thin Red Line,” “True Detective”) 

1965 – Rock and Roll Hall of Fame guitarist and songwriter Slash, born Saul Hudson, formerly with Guns N’ Roses and Velvet Revolver

1967 – Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman (“The Talented Mr. Ripley,” “Capote,” “Scent of a Woman,” “Boogie Nights,” “Mission: Impossible III,” “Doubt,” “The Hunger Games”) (d. 2014)

1973 – Former White House intern-turned-designer Monica Lewinsky

1987 – Actor Daniel Radcliffe, best known for his portrayal of Harry Potter in the movie series

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Barry Manilow

Synchronicity

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The Great Uprising: Race Riots in Urban America During the 1960s

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You Have No Idea

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White Men Can't Jump

Starring Woody HarrelsonWesley Snipes andRosie Perez, and directed by Ron Shelton

Capote

Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Chris Cooper and Bruce Greenwood, and directed by Bennett Miller

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On this Day: July 21

Musical Milestones

1958 – The Coasters are chart-toppers with “Yakety Yak.” While this now-classic single spends just one week at No. 1 on the pop chart, it enjoys a seven-week run on top of the R&B chart.

1962 – “Roses Are Red (My Love),” by Bobby Vinton, is the No. 1 single.

1973 – Jim Croce’s “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” kicks off two weeks as a No. 1 single. It is Croce’s final chart-topper before his death in a plane crash that September.

1984 – Prince is midway through a five-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with “When Doves Cry,” from his “Puple Rain” album.

1987 – Geffen Records releases Guns N’ Roses’ debut album, “Appetite for Destruction,” featuring hard rock anthems “Sweet Child O’Mine” and “Welcome to the Jungle.” The album goes on to top the Billboard 200 and becomes the best-selling debut album ever by a band.

1990 – “She Ain’t Worth It,” by Glenn Medeiros featuring Bobby Brown, kicks off two weeks on top of the pop chart.

2001 – Usher maintains his grip on the top spot of the singles chart with “U Remind Me.”

History Highlights

1861 – In the first major clash of the Civil War, the Battle of Bull Run, a large Union force under General Irvin McDowell is routed by a Confederate army led by General Pierre G.T. Beauregard.

1925 – The so-called “Monkey Trial” ends with Tennessee high school biology teacher John Scopes found guilty of teaching evolution in class. He is fined $100.

1955 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower presents his “Open Skies” plan at the Geneva summit. It calls on the U.S. and Soviet Union to exchange maps showing the location of every military installation in their respective nations.

1961 – Astronaut Virgil “Gus” Grissom, piloting Liberty Bell 7, becomes the second American to go into space in a suborbital mission. 

1970 – After 11 years of construction, the Aswan High Dam across the Nile River in Egypt is completed.

2005 – Terrorists attempt to attack the London transit system with bombs planted on three subways and a bus, however none detonates completely. The plot comes two weeks after terrorists killed 52 people and wounded over 700 others in the largest attack on Great Britain since World War II.

2011 – NASA’s 30-year space shuttle program comes to an end with the early-morning landing of shuttle Atlantis (STS-135) at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The mission was the 33rd for Atlantis and 135th for NASA’s shuttle fleet.

Celebrity Birthdays

1899 – Pulitzer and Nobel Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway (d. 1961)

1920 – Grammy-winning violinist Isaac Stern (d. 2001)

1924 – Comedic actor Don Knotts (“The Andy Griffith Show,” “Three’s Company,” “Pleasantville”) (d. 2006)

1926 – Oscar-winning director-producer Norman Jewison (“In The Heat of The Night,” “Fiddler on the Roof,” “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Moonstruck,” “The Hurricane”)

1948 – Singer-songwriter Yusuf Islam, formerly known as Cat Stevens (“Father and Son,” “Wild World,” “Peace Train,” “Moonshadow,” “Morning Has Broken”)

1951 – Oscar-winning actor-comedian Robin Williams (“Mork and Mindy,” “Dead Poets Society,” “Good Morning, Vietnam,” “Good Will Hunting,” “Mrs. Doubtfire,” “Aladdin, “Night at the Museum”)) (d. 2014)

1957 – Comedian-actor and “SNL” alum Jon Lovitz (“A League of Their Own,” “The Wedding Singer”)

1978 – Actor-producer Josh Hartnett (“Pearl Harbor,” “Black Hawk Down,” “Sin City”)  

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20 Greatest Hits

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Appetite for Destruction

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The Scopes Monkey Trial

Randy Moore and William McComas

Liberty Bell 7: The Suborbital Mercury Flight of Virgil I. Grissom

Colin Burgess

The Old Man and the Sea

Ernest Hemingway

Good Will Hunting

Starring Robin Williams, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Minnie Driver, and directed by Gus Van Sant

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