On This Day: March 7

On This Day March 7

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1934 – Longtime NBC weatherman and “Today” show personality Willard Scott 

1945 – Actor John Heard (“Awakenings,” “Home Alone,” “The Pelican Brief”) (d. 2017)

1956 – Emmy, Tony and Golden Globe-winning actor Bryan Cranston (“Saving Private Ryan,” “Malcolm in the Middle,” “Little Miss Sunshine,” “Breaking Bad,” “Argo,” “Trumbo,” “The Infiltrator,” “Isle of Dogs,” “The Upside”)

1964 – Emmy-winning comedian Wanda Sykes (“The Chris Rock Show,” “The New Adventures of Old Christine,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm”)

1970 – Oscar and Golden Globe-winning actress Rachel Weisz (“Stealing Beauty,” “The Mummy,” “The Constant Gardener,” “The Bourne Legacy,” “Oz the Great and Powerful,” “The Favourite”)

1974 – Actress-producer Jenna Fischer (“The Office,” “Blades of Glory,” “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story,” “The Promotion,” “Hall Pass”)

1980 – Actress Laura Prepon (“That ‘70s Show,” “Slackers,” “Lightning Bug,” “The Pornographer: A Love Story,” “The Killing Game,” “Orange is the New Black”) 

History Highlights
History Highlights

1876 – Alexander Graham Bell receives a patent for his revolutionary invention, the telephone, which remains a vital communications tool around the world today.

1924 – “The New Republic” publishes Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.” The work, beginning with the famous line “Whose woods these are, I think I know. His house is in the village though,” introduces millions of American students to poetry.

1933 – Unemployed during the Great Depression, Charles Darrow creates the board game Monopoly, which he personally sells for two years until Parker Brothers begins mass-marketing it in 1935. Darrow dies a millionaire in 1967.

1965 – A peaceful civil rights demonstration ends in violence in Selma, Alabama when many of the protesters are tear-gassed and beaten by white state troopers and sheriff’s deputies. The day’s events become known as “Bloody Sunday” and mark a tragic but important milestone in America’s civil rights movement. The clash was reported on national television and other media, spurring demonstrations in 80 cities across the country over the next few days.

1999 – Acclaimed screenwriter-director-producer Stanley Kubrick (“Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb,” “2001: A Space Odyssey,” “A Clockwork Orange,” “The Shining,” “Full Metal Jacket,” “Eyes Wide Shut”) dies in England at the age of 70.

2010 – Kathryn Bigelow becomes the first woman to win an Academy Award for Best Director, for the movie “The Hurt Locker,” about an American bomb squad that disables explosives in Iraq in 2004. Bigelow beats out directing heavyweights James Cameron (coincidentally, her ex-husband),  Lee Daniels, Jason Reitman and Quentin Tarantino.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1964 – “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” by The Beatles, is in the middle of a seven-week domination of the Billboard Hot 100. It is the band’s first No. 1 hit in the U.S. and marks the rising tide of the British Invasion and Beatlemania.

1966 – Tina Turner records her vocals for the legendary Phil Spector-produced “River Deep Mountain High.”

1970 – Just as Simon & Garfunkel split, the acclaimed pop duo’s final collaboration, “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” starts a 10-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart.

1987 – The Beastie Boys become the first rap act to have a No. 1 album with their debut work, “Licensed To Ill.” The album contains fan favorites including “(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party)” and “No Sleep till Brooklyn.”

1992 – Mr. Big is in the middle of three weeks as Billboard Hot 100 chart-toppers with “To Be With You.”

1998 – Céline Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On,” the theme from the blockbuster movie “Titanic,” begins its second and final week on top of the pop chart.

2009 – Flo Rida is in the middle of a six-week domination of the singles chart with “Right Round,” which was inspired by Dead or Alive’s 1985 hit, “You Spin Me Round (Like a Record).”

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On This Day: November 4

On This Day November 4

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1879 – American cowboy-vaudeville performer-actor Will Rogers (d. 1935)

1916 – Legendary broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite, longtime anchor of the “CBS Evening News,” who was dubbed “the most trusted man in America” (d. 2009)

1918 – Oscar-winning actor-comedian Art Carney, best known as Ed Norton in the 1950s sitcom “The Honeymooners” (d. 2003)

1925 – Emmy-winning actress Doris Roberts (“Everybody Loves Raymond”) (d. 2016)

1937 – Actress Loretta Swit, best remembered for her role as “Hot Lips” Houlihan in the popular TV series “M*A*S*H”

1946 – Former First Lady Laura Bush

1960 – Emmy and Grammy-winning comedian Kathy Griffin

1961 – Actor Ralph Macchio (“Eight is Enough,” “The Karate Kid,” “My Cousin Vinny”)

1969 – Oscar-winning actor Matthew McConaughey (“Dazed and Confused,” “Lone Star,” “Contact,” “Dallas Buyers Club,” “Interstellar,” “True Detective”)

1969 – Grammy-winning rapper-songwriter-producer Sean Combs, previously known as Puff Daddy, P. Diddy and, later, Diddy

History Highlights
History Highlights

1922 – British archaeologist Howard Carter and his crew discover the entrance to King Tutankhamen’s tomb in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings.

1924 – Nellie Tayloe Ross of Wyoming is elected as the first female governor in the United States, winning a special election to succeed her husband, who died just a year and 10 months into his term. Ross remains the only woman ever to have served as a Wyoming governor.

1939 – America’s first air-conditioned car goes on display at the 40th National Automobile Show in Chicago. The mechanical refrigeration unit of the 1940 Packard 180 prototype automatically switched to heating in winter and therefore was not called an air conditioner, but rather a “Weather Conditioner.” It was a $279 option that Packard stopped offering after 1942.

1948 – The Nobel Prize in Literature is awarded to T.S. Eliot “for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry.”

1952 – The National Security Agency (NSA) is established by order of President Harry Truman to coordinate communications intelligence work across the entire federal government.

1979 – An angry mob of young Islamic revolutionaries storms the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran and takes 90 Americans hostage. Two weeks later, about half are released. The remaining hostages are held captive for the next 14 months in what is known as the Iran Hostage Crisis.

1990 – “Dances With Wolves,” starring Kevin Costner as an American Civil War-era soldier who forms a bond with a tribe of Sioux Indians, premieres in Los Angeles. The movie, which also marks Costner’s directorial debut, goes on to capture seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director, and proves the Western genre is not dead.

1995 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated. The 73-year-old leader was walking to his car following a peace rally in Tel Aviv when he was shot by a 27-year-old Israeli extremist who is arrested at the scene of the shooting, and later confesses to the crime.

2008 – Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois) defeats Senator John McCain (R- Arizona) to become the 44th U.S. president and the first African American elected to the White House. 

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1967 – Lulu is in the middle of a five-week domination of the pop chart with the theme song from the movie “To Sir, With Love,” starring Sidney Poitier.

1972 – “I Can See Clearly Now” puts Johnny Nash on top of the Billboard singles chart and keeps him there for four weeks.

1978 – Anne Murray’s “You Needed Me” becomes her first and only No. 1 single.

1989 – With “Sacrifice,” Elton John becomes only the third artist to score 50 chart singles in the U.K. The others were Elvis Presley and Cliff Richard. “Sacrifice” reaches No. 1 in the U.K. and France, but only climbs to No. 18 on the Billboard Hot 100.

1989 – “Listen to Your Heart,” by the Swedish duo Roxette, grabs the top spot on the Billboard singles chart.

1995 – Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy” holds at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Carey makes her directorial debut with the accompanying music video.

2000 – Christina Aguilera wraps up four weeks as a chart-topper with “Come on Over Baby (All I Want Is You).”

2006 – “Money Maker,” by Ludacris featuring Pharrell, begins its second and final week as a No. 1 single.

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