On This Day: March 13

On This Day March 13

Click each item below to learn more!

Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1939 – Singer-songwriter and pianist Neil Sedaka (“Breaking Up Is Hard to Do,” “Laughter in the Rain,” “Bad Blood”)

1941 – Singer-dancer-comedian Charo, born María del Rosario Mercedes Pilar Martínez Molina Baez, remembered for her catch phrase “cuchi-cuchi”

1950 – Emmy-winning actor William H. Macy (“ER,” “Fargo,” “Pleasantville,” “Boogie Nights,” “Shameless”)

1956 – Emmy-winning actress Dana Delany (“China Beach,” “Desperate Housewives”) 

1960 – Grammy-winning U2 bassist Adam Clayton 

1971 – Actress Annabeth Gish (“Mystic Pizza,” “Double Jeopardy,” “The West Wing,” “The X-Files”)

1972 – Oscar, Grammy and Golden Globe-winning rapper-actor Common, born Lonnie Rashid Lynn, Jr. (“Love of My Life (An Ode to Hip-Hop),” “Just Wright,” “The Odd Life of Timothy Green,” “Selma”)

History Highlights
History Highlights

1781 – Astronomer Sir William Herschel discovers the seventh planet from the sun, Uranus, named after the Greek god of the sky.

1933 – With the Great Depression raging, U.S. banks begin to re-open on this day after President Franklin D. Roosevelt had mandated a “bank holiday.”

1942 – The federal government authorizes the use of dogs in America’s war effort. Originally known as “Dogs for Defense” (DFD), the War Dog Program, or “K-9 (Canine) Corps,” initially allows the U.S. Army to work with 30 breeds of dogs, but later narrows it to seven. Dogs are also trained to serve the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard.

1969 – Walt Disney Productions releases “The Love Bug,” a comedy starring Dean Jones, Michele Lee, Buddy Hackett and Herbie — a Volkswagen Beetle with a mind of its own.

2005 –  Walt Disney Company announces that Robert Iger, Disney’s president and chief operating officer, will succeed Michael Eisner as the company’s chief executive officer. The move ends Eisner’s storied and tumultuous two-decade reign at Disney.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1965 – “Eight Days a Week,” by The Beatles, begins two weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100. It’s the final of seven songs by the Fab Four to be No. 1 in the U.S. in a one-year period, an all-time record.

1976 – The Four Seasons are Billboard Hot 100 chart-toppers with “December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night).” 

1982 – The J. Geils Band kicks off its sixth and final week on top of the pop chart with “Centerfold.”

1999 – “Believe” is Cher’s first No. 1 hit since 1974’s “Dark Lady.” The song tops the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks and becomes the biggest-selling single in the U.S. for 1999. The recording is one of the first to use an Auto-Tune processor to alter vocal pitch, a technique now commonplace in pop music.

2004 – “Yeah!,” by Usher featuring Lil Jon and Ludacris, is in the middle of a 12-week domination of the singles chart.

2010 – “Imma Bee,” by The Black Eyed Peas, enters its second and final week as a No. 1 single.

READ MORE
On This Day: January 25

On This Day January 25

Click each item below to learn more!

Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1882 – British novelist and journalist Virginia Woolf (d. 1941)

1931 – Actor Dean Jones (“The Love Bug,” “That Darn Cat”) (d. 2015)

1938 – Singer Etta James, best known for her Grammy-winning hit, “At Last” (d. 2012)

1943 – Director-screenwriter Tobe Hooper, best known for the horror classics, “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” and “Poltergeist” (d. 2017)

1957 – Singer-turned-actress Jenifer Lewis (“Dreamgirls,” “Beaches,” “Sister Act,” Cars,” “The Princess and the Frog”)

1981 – Grammy-winning R&B singer-songwriter Alicia Keys (“Fallin’,” “You Don’t Know My Name,” “If I Ain’t Got You,” “Diary,” “No One,” “Empire State of Mind”)

History Highlights
History Highlights

1924 – The first Winter Olympic Games open in Chamonix, France with athletes representing 16 nations. The event was originally called “Winter Sports Week.”

1949 – The first Emmy Awards ceremony, honoring excellence in television, is held at the Hollywood Athletic Club in Los Angeles. Ventriloquist Shirley Dinsdale becomes the first recipient of an Emmy for her show, “Judy Splinters.” Television was still a new medium at the time, with only about 50,000 American households owning a TV set.

1959 – American Airlines ushers in the Jet Age with the first scheduled transcontinental flight of a Boeing 707 from Los Angeles (LAX) to New York (Idlewild Airport, later known as Kennedy Airport/JFK).

1961 – Beginning a tradition that continues today, John F. Kennedy holds the first live televised presidential news conference, just five days after his inauguration as 35th U.S. president. An estimated 65 million viewers tune in.

1971 – Charles Manson and three of his cult followers are convicted of the brutal 1969 murders of actress Sharon Tate and six others.

1995 – The world comes dangerously close to nuclear war when Russia activates its nuclear missile arsenal for the first time in history after its early-warning defense system detects a missile launch near Norway. Russian leaders suspect it might be a U.S. attack, but it turns out to be a harmless scientific rocket that Norway launched to study the aurora borealis, or northern lights.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1964 – “There! I’ve Said It Again,” by Bobby Vinton, begins its fourth and final week as a No. 1 single. It’s the last song to occupy the top spot on the pop chart before The Beatles have their first No. 1 — “I Want to Hold Your Hand.”

1969 – Marvin Gaye’s “I Heard It Through The Grapevine” enjoys a seventh and final week on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

1975 – Carpenters deliver a No. 1 single with their cover of The Marvelettes’ “Please Mr. Postman.” It becomes the brother-sister duo’s 12th million-selling single gold record.

1986 – Barbra Streisand kicks off a three-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart with “The Broadway Album.”

1992 – “All 4 Love,” by Color Me Badd, replaces Michael Jackson’s “Black or White” as the No. 1 single and holds the top spot for a week

1997 – Toni Braxton is in the midst of an 11-week reign over the pop chart with “Un-Break My Heart.”

2014 – “Timber,” by Pitbull featuring Ke$ha, is in the midst of a three-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

READ MORE