On This Day: March 18

On This Day March 18

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1837 – Twenty-second and twenty-fourth U.S. President Grover Cleveland (d. 1908)

1926 – Actor and TV host Peter Graves, best remembered as Jim Phelps in the CBS spy series “Mission: Impossible” and the pilot in “Airplane!” (d. 2010)

1938 – Country music singer-guitarist Charley Pride

1941 – Soul singer and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Wilson Pickett (“In The Midnight Hour,” “Mustang Sally”) (d. 2006)

1962 – Oscar, Grammy and Golden Globe-winning actress and singer-songwriter Irene Cara (“Fame,” “Flashdance… What a Feeling”)

1963 – Actress, singer and former Miss America, Vanessa Williams

1970 – Golden Globe and Grammy-winning actress-rapper Queen Latifah, born Dana Elaine Owens

1979 – Grammy-winning Maroon 5 frontman and former judge/coach on NBC’s “The Voice,” Adam Levine

History Highlights
History Highlights

1852 – Henry Wells and William G. Fargo sign papers at the Astor House hotel in New York to establish a new banking and express enterprise serving customers across the nation. Their company, Wells Fargo, is currently one of the world’s largest banks.

1931 – The first electric razor goes on sale in the U.S., developed by the Schick corporation. It revolutionizes personal grooming by minimizing the risk of nicks and cuts.

1937 – With just minutes left to the school day, a thunderous natural gas explosion levels the combined junior-senior high school in the small East Texas town of New London, killing 294 students and teachers. It is considered the worst school disaster in U.S. history.

1965 – In another chapter of the Space Race between the United States and Soviet Union, Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov becomes the first person to walk in space when he leaves his spacecraft, Voskhod 2, for 12 minutes and nine seconds. He beats American astronaut Ed White on Gemini 4 by almost three months.

1968 – “The Producers,” starring Gene Wilder and Zero Mostel, opens at movie theaters around the U.S., eventually garnering a Best Original Screenplay Oscar for writer-director Mel Brooks.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1967 – “Penny Lane,” written by Paul McCartney, leads The Beatles to No. 1 on the Billboard singles chart.

1972 – “Heart of Gold” becomes Neil Young’s first, and to date, only No. 1 single. The track appears on his “Harvest” album.

1978 – The Bee Gees begin an eight-week ride on top of the singles chart with “Night Fever,” off the “Saturday Night Fever” soundtrack. It is the band’s third No. 1 single of the year.

1982 – Former Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes lead singer Teddy Pendergrass is paralyzed from the neck down after his car crashes into a tree in Philadelphia.

1989 – Debbie Gibson wraps up three weeks at No. 1 on the pop chart with “Lost in Your Eyes.”

1995 – Madonna is mid-way through a seven-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard pop chart with “Take a Bow,” off her “Bedtime Stories” album.”

2000 – “Say My Name,” by Destiny’s Child,” begins three weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

2006 – Ne-Yo kicks off two weeks on top of the singles chart with “So Sick.”

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On This Day: February 25

On This Day February 25

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1913 – Actor Jim Backus, best known for playing stranded millionaire Thurston Howell III in the comedy “Gilligan’s Island” and providing the voice for the cartoon character “Mr. Magoo” (d. 1989)

1935 – Retired syndicated TV talk show host Sally Jessy Raphael

1937 – Retired Emmy-winning CBS News anchor-commentator and author Bob Schieffer

1943 – Singer-songwriter-guitarist and former Beatle George Harrison (d. 2001)

1965 – Comedian Carrot Top, born Scott Thompson

1966 – Actress Tea Leoni, born Elizabeth Téa Pantaleoni (“Bad Boys,” “Deep Impact,” “The Family Man,” “Tower Heist,” “Madam Secretary”) 

1971 – Actor Sean Aston (“The Goonies,” “Rudy,” the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy) 

1976 – Actress Rashida Jones (“The Office,” “Parks and Recreation,” “The Social Network,” “Our Idiot Brother,” “Angie Tribeca”)

1997 – Actress Isabelle Fuhrman, best known for playing a demonic child in “Orphan” and Clove in “The Hunger Games”

History Highlights
History Highlights

1870 – Hiram Rhodes Revels, a Republican from Natchez, Mississippi, is sworn into the U.S. Senate, becoming the first African American ever to sit in Congress. He is assigned to serve on the Committee on Education and Labor and the Committee on the District of Columbia.

1916 – German troops seize Fort Douaumont, the most formidable of the forts guarding the walled city of Verdun, France, four days after launching their initial attack. The Battle of Verdun becomes the longest and bloodiest conflict of World War I, lasting 10 months and resulting in over 700,000 casualties.

1950 – The TV comedy “Your Show of Shows,” hosted by Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca, premieres, eventually helping launch the successful entertainment careers of Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks, Neil Simon, Woody Allen and others.

1964 – Twenty-two-year-old Cassius Clay (who later changes his name to Muhammad Ali) stuns odds-makers by dethroning world heavyweight boxing champ Sonny Liston in a seventh-round technical knockout in Miami Beach.

1984 – A massive explosion, triggered when gasoline from a ruptured pipeline ignited, levels a shantytown outside Sao Paulo, Brazil, killing at least 500 people — mostly young children. However, investigators speculate that the actual death toll may have been closer to 700 since many bodies were incinerated in the intense blaze.

1986 – President Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines flees the nation after 20 years of rule. Corazon Aquino becomes that nation’s first woman president. 

2004 – “The Passion of the Christ,” Mel Gibson’s controversial film about the final hours of Jesus of Nazareth’s life, opens in U.S. theaters, starring  Jim Caviezel as Jesus. It receives three Oscar nominations.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1956 – Elvis Presley scores his first hit when “I Forgot to Remember to Forget” reaches No. 1 on the Billboard Country & Western chart. The Beatles cover the song in 1964 on the BBC radio show “From Us to You,” with George Harrison on lead vocals.

1956 – “Lisbon Antigua,” by Nelson Riddle, begins a four-week run as a No. 1 single.

1967 – The No. 1 single on the Billboard Hot 100 for a second and final week belongs to The Buckinghams: “Kind of a Drag”

1978 – The Bee Gees are in their fourth and final week at No. 1 on the singles chart with “Stayin’ Alive,” from the “Saturday Night Fever” soundtrack.

1981 – Christopher Cross, then a little-known musician from Texas, cleans up at the Grammy Awards with five statuettes, including Best New Artist, Album of the Year (“Christopher Cross”) and Song of the Year (“Sailing”).

1984 – “Jump,” by Van Halen, kicks off five weeks atop the U.S. singles chart. The track, off the band’s “1984” album, is ranked among the “500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll” by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. 

1995 – Madonna begins seven weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Take a Bow,” off her “Bedtime Stories” album. The single becomes her eleventh chart-topper. With it, Madonna replaces Carole King as the female who had written the most No. 1 songs.

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On this Day: June 28

On this Day June 28

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1926 – Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and Tony-winning comedic director-writer-producer Mel Brooks (“The Producers,” “Blazing Saddles,” “Young Frankenstein,” “Silent Movie,” “High Anxiety,” “History of the World, Part I,” “Spaceballs,” “Robin Hood: Men in Tights”)

1932 – Actor Pat Morita (“Happy Days,” “The Karate Kid”) (d. 2005)

1948 – Oscar and Golden Globe-winning actress Kathy Bates (“Misery,” “Fried Green Tomatoes,” “Delores Claiborne,” “Titanic,” “Primary Colors,” “About Schmidt,” “American Horror Story”)

1966 – Actor John Cusack (“Say Anything,” “The Grifters,” “Grosse Pointe Blank,” “Being John Malkovich,” “High Fidelity,” “2012,” “The Raven”)

1971 – Engineer, inventor and entrepreneur Elon Musk, who established PayPal, Tesla Motors and SpaceX

History Highlights
History Highlights

1836 – Fourth U.S. President James Madison, drafter of the Constitution, recorder of the Constitutional Convention and author of the “Federalist Papers,” dies on his tobacco plantation in Virginia.

1953 – Workers at a Chevrolet plant in Flint, Michigan, begin building the first Corvette, a two-seater sports car that quickly becomes an American automotive icon. It rolls off the assembly line two days later. Only 300 Corvettes were built for the 1953 model year — all Polo white with red upholstery.

1969 – A police raid of the Stonewall Inn — a gay club located on New York City’s Christopher Street — turns violent as patrons and local sympathizers begin rioting against police officers. The clashes become a watershed moment in the struggle for gay rights in the U.S. In 2016, the Stonewall Inn was designated as the first national monument honoring the LGBTQ movement. The monument covers 7.7 acres, including nearby Christopher Park.

1975 – One of television’s most successful writers, “The Twilight Zone” creator Rod Serling dies of a heart attack at the age of 50. During his career, Serling racked up more Emmy Awards for dramatic writing than anyone in history. He also won a Golden Globe and Peabody Award for productions other than “The Twilight Zone.”

1997 – Boxing fans are horrified as Mike Tyson bites both of Evander Holyfield’s ears in the third round of their heavyweight rematch. The attack leads to his disqualification from the match and suspension from boxing.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1969 – The No. 1 single comes from the big screen. It’s “Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet,” by Henry Mancini & His Orchestra.

1975 – Elton John is captain of the Billboard album chart with “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy,” which remains at No. 1 for six weeks. The album contains the hit “Someone Saved My Life Tonight.”

1975 – The Captain & Tennille are Billboard chart-toppers with “Love Will Keep Us Together.” The song, from the husband-and-wife team’s debut album of the same name, was written by Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield.

1980 – “Coming Up (Live at Glasgow)” by Paul McCartney & Wings begins a three-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The track was recorded on December 17, 1979 during the band’s tour of the UK.

1997 – “I’ll Be Missing You,” a tribute to slain rapper The Notorious B.I.G. by Puff Daddy and Faith Evans featuring 112, is in the midst of an 11-week domination of the Billboard singles chart.

2003 – Clay Aiken commandeers the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks with “This Is the Night.” Aiken has “American Idol” to thank for his musical career. He was a second-place finalist in Season 2 of the reality singing competition. 

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