On This Day November 28 Click each item below to learn more! Celebrity Birthdays 1929 – Motown Records founder Berry Gordy, Jr. 1943 – Oscar, Emmy and Grammy-winning singer-songwriter and composer Randy Newman, best known for his 1977 hit “Short People” and movie soundtracks including the animated blockbuster “Toy Story” series and “Monsters, Inc.” 1949 – Singer, actor and multi-instrumentalist Paul Shaffer, best known as the bandleader for David Letterman’s late-night TV shows 1950 – Golden Globe-winning actor Ed Harris (“The Right Stuff,” “The Abyss,” “Pollack,” “Apollo 13,” “The Rock,” “The Truman Show,” “A Beautiful Mind,” “Man on a Ledge,” “Westworld”) 1959 – Actor-producer Judd Nelson (“The Breakfast Club,” “St. Elmo’s Fire,” “New Jack City,” “Suddenly Susan”) 1962 – Comedian, director and former “The Daily Show” host Jon Stewart History Highlights 1520 – Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan leads a fleet of three ships through treacherous waters below South America to become the first European explorer to reach the Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic. 1895 – Driving a gas-powered horseless carriage known as the Duryea Motor Wagon at an average speed of 5 miles per hour in the Chicago snow, J. Frank Duryea wins America’s first auto race. Frank and his brother, Charles, designed and manufactured the vehicle. 1942 – The deadliest nightclub fire in U.S. history strikes the Cocoanut Grove in Boston, killing 492 people and injuring hundreds more. Investigators never determined what sparked the inferno. The disaster led to sweeping changes in fire codes 1964 – The U.S. scores one in the Space Race as NASA launches Mariner 4 on a successful fly-by mission to Mars. 1975 – “As The World Turns” and “The Edge of Night” become the last American soaps to switch from live broadcasts to videotape. 1994 – Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer is beaten to death in a Wisconsin prison while serving 15 consecutive life terms for the rape, murder and dismemberment of 17 men and boys. Musical Milestones 1925 – The Grand Ole Opry, one of the longest-lived and most popular showcases for country music, begins broadcasting live from Nashville, Tennessee. At the time, it is known as the WSM Barn Dance. 1960 – Elvis Presley scores his 15th chart-topping single when “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” reaches No. 1 on the pop chart. It holds the top spot for six weeks. 1970 – Ex-Beatle George Harrison makes his solo Billboard chart debut with “My Sweet Lord,” a song he is later found guilty of having “subconsciously plagiarized” from Ronnie Mack’s “He’s So Fine,” which was a smash for The Chiffons. 1974 – John Lennon joins Elton John on stage at New York’s Madison Square Garden for what becomes Lennon’s last concert appearance. He performs three songs: “Whatever Gets You Thru The Night,” “I Saw Her Standing There,” and “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.” 1987 – The Bill Medley-Jennifer Warnes duet, “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life,” from the movie “Dirty Dancing,” is No. 1 on the singles chart. 1998 – “Lately,” by one-hit-wonder Divine, tops the Billboard Hot 100 for a week. 2001 – Aretha Franklin sues the supermarket tabloid “Star” for $50 million dollars claiming that her reputation was damaged by a December 2000 article that alleged she had alcohol problems. 2007 – Kanye West and stuntman Evel Knievel settle a copyright dispute over West’s use of the name “Evel Kanyevel” in a music video. The 69-year-old daredevil claimed his image was harmed by the video’s “vulgar, sexual nature.” The clip for “Touch The Sky” shows the rap star attempting to cross a canyon on a rocket-powered motorcycle. READ MORE
On This Day November 13 Click each item below to learn more! Celebrity Birthdays 1850 – Novelist Robert Louis Stevenson (“Treasure Island,” “Kidnapped,” “Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”) (d. 1894) 1934 – Actor-director-producer Garry Marshall, who created some of the most popular TV sitcoms of all time, including “The Odd Couple,” “Mork & Mindy,” “Happy Days” and “Laverne & Shirley” and hit movies like “Pretty Woman” and “The Princess Diaries” (d. 2016) 1947 – Tony-winning actor Joe Mantegna (“Three Amigos,” “The Godfather Part III,” “Forget Paris,” “Up Close & Personal,” “Criminal Minds”) 1954 – Actor Chris Noth (“Law & Order,” “Sex and the City”) 1955 – Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and Tony-winning actress, comedian and “The View” host Whoopi Goldberg, born Caryn Elaine Johnson 1967 – Actor Steve Zahn (“Strange Wilderness,” “Suburbia,” “Happy Texas,” “Crimson Tide,” “Stuart Little,” “Hamlet,” “Diary of a Wimpy Kid,” “Dr. Dolittle 2”) 1967 – Late-night TV talk show host-comedian Jimmy Kimmel, born James Christian Kimmel History Highlights 1927 – The Holland Tunnel, linking New York City to New Jersey beneath the Hudson River, opens to traffic with each crossing costing 50 cents. Nearly 52,000 vehicles travel the tunnel on its first day. 1965 – Ninety people die in a fire aboard the cruise ship S.S. Yarmouth Castle between Miami and Nassau, The Bahamas. More than 400 others are rescued before the ship sinks. 1969 – Thousands of Vietnam War protesters stage a symbolic “March Against Death” in Washington, D.C., calling out the names of U.S. servicemen killed in combat as they pass the White House. 1974 – Chemical technician and union activist Karen Silkwood is killed in a mysterious one-car crash in Oklahoma at the age of 28. Silkwood worked at the Kerr-McGee plutonium plant in Crescent, Oklahoma and was critical of plant safety. The night she died, she was driving to meet with a union representative and a reporter for The New York Times, reportedly with documents proving unsafe plant conditions that led to her own exposure to radioactivity. 1982 – A week-long national salute to Americans who served in the Vietnam War culminates with the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. The long-anticipated memorial, designed by Ohio-born architect Maya Lin, is a simple V-shaped black-granite wall inscribed with the names of some 59,000 Americans who died in the Southeast Asia conflict. Musical Milestones 1965 – The Rolling Stones enjoy their second and final week at No. 1 on the pop chart with “Get Off of My Cloud.” 1968 – The Beatles rule the airwaves as “Hey Jude” cruises through its seventh week as a No. 1 single. The band hired a 36-piece orchestra for the recording and offered the musicians twice their usual rate to sing and clap along to the song. 1976 – “Tonight’s the Night (Gonna Be Alright),” by Rod Stewart, begins eight weeks on the top of the Billboard Hot 100. The track, from Sir Rod’s “A Night on the Town” album, becomes his second U.S. No. 1. 1982 – Men At Work kick off a 15-week run at No. 1 on the album chart with their debut album, “Business As Usual,” which goes on to sell more than five million copies in the U.S. It contains the hits “Who Can It Be Now?” and “Down Under.” 1993 – Meat Loaf scores his first No. 1 single with “I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That).” The song later earns him a Grammy Award for Best Rock Vocal Performance, Solo. 1999 – The Grammy-winning single “Smooth,” by Santana featuring Rob Thomas, is in the middle of a 12-week domination of the Billboard Hot 100. 2012 – The original collage by artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth that was reproduced and included in copies of The Beatles’ 1967 classic “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album sells to an unnamed bidder. It goes for around $88,000 during an auction of modern British art at Sotheby’s in London. READ MORE
On This Day November 6 Click each item below to learn more! Celebrity Birthdays 1854 – Composer John Philip Sousa (“The Stars and Stripes Forever”) (d. 1932) 1914 – Actor Jonathan Harris, born Jonathan Charasuchin, who played Dr. Zachary Smith in the 1960s sci-fi TV series “Lost in Space” (d. 2002) 1931 – Emmy, Oscar, Tony and Grammy-winning director Mike Nichols (“Barefoot in the Park,” “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” “The Graduate,” ” Silkwood,” “Working Girl,” “Postcards from the Edge,” “The Birdcage,” “Primary Colors,” “Angels in America,” “Closer,” “Charlie Wilson’s War”) (d. 2014) 1946 – Oscar and Golden Globe-winning actress Sally Field (“Gidget,” “The Flying Nun,” “Smokey and the Bandit,” “Sybil,” “Norma Rae,” “Places in the Heart,” “Mrs. Doubtfire,” “Forrest Gump,” “Lincoln,” “The Amazing Spider-Man,” “My Name Is Doris,” “80 for Brady” ) 1948 – Grammy-winning singer, songwriter and Eagles co-founder Glenn Frey (d. 2016) 1955 – Journalist, author and former First Lady of California, Maria Shriver 1970 – Actor Ethan Hawke (“Dead Poets Society,” “Reality Bites,” “Before Sunrise,” “Gattaca,” “Training Day,” “Before Sunset,” “The Black Phone,” “The Northman”) 1988 – Oscar and Golden Globe-winning actress Emma Stone (“Superbad,” “The Help,” “Crazy, Stupid, Love,” “The Amazing Spider-Man,” “Birdman,” “La La Land,” “Cruella,” “Poor Things”) History Highlights 1860 – Former Illinois congressman Abraham Lincoln is elected 16th U.S. president, handily defeating three other candidates to become the first Republican to win the presidency. 1962 – The United Nations General Assembly adopts a resolution condemning South Africa’s racist apartheid policies and calling on all its members to end economic and military relations with the country. 1977 – Thirty-nine people die when the Kelly Barnes Dam bursts, sending a wall of water through Toccoa Falls College in Georgia. 1987 – “Less Than Zero” opens in theaters. It’s a movie about a group of wealthy, young friends in 1980s L.A., starring Robert Downey, Jr., Andrew McCarthy, James Spader and Jami Gertz. 1990 – Nearly a fifth of the Universal Studios back lot in southern California is destroyed in a massive fire that was deliberately set. The blaze also consumes vintage cars from the 1920s and 30s, causing an estimated $50 million in damage. Musical Milestones 1961 – Jimmy Dean kicks off a five-week run at No. 1 on the singles chart with “Big Bad John.” 1965 – The Rolling Stones are on Cloud 9 when “Get Off Of My Cloud” hits the top spot on the singles chart and floats there for two weeks. 1971 – The soundtrack to the movie “Shaft,” by Isaac Hayes, tops the U.S. album chart. 1971 – “Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves” marks the first of two weeks as a No. 1 hit for Cher. It’s her first chart-topper as a solo act. 1976 – The Steve Miller Band scores its second Billboard chart-topper with “Rock ‘n’ Me,” off the “Fly Like an Eagle” album. 1982 – Movie music propels Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes to the top of the Billboard singles survey as “Up Where We Belong,” from the motion picture “An Officer And A Gentleman,” begins three weeks at No. 1. 1993 – Meat Loaf starts a five-week run at No.1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with “I’d’ Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That).” READ MORE