RMS Titanic – Time Rewind

On This Day April 14

Click each item below to learn more!

On This Day September 1

Click each item below to learn more!

Celebrity Birthdays

1922- Actress Yvonne DeCarlo (“The Ten Commandments,” “The Munsters”) (d. 2007)

1923- Former world heavyweight boxing champion Rocky Marciano, born Rocco Francis Marchegiano (d. 1969)

1933 – Country Music Hall of Famer and Rockabilly Hall of Famer Conway Twitty, born Harold Lloyd Jenkins (d. 1993)

1938 – Attorney and Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz

1939 – Tony, Emmy and Grammy-winning actress-comedian Lily Tomlin (“Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” “9 to 5,” “All of Me,” “The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe,” “Flirting with Disaster,” “Tea with Mussolini,” “I Heart Huckabees,” “A Prairie Home Companion”)

1946 – Singer-songwriter and Bee Gees founder Barry Gibb

1950 – TV psychologist Dr. Phil McGraw

1957 – Grammy-winning musician Gloria Estefan, born Gloria Fajardo, lead singer of the 80s band Miami Sound Machine

History Highlights

1807 – Former U.S. Vice President Aaron Burr is acquitted of plotting to annex parts of Louisiana and Spanish territory in Mexico to be used toward the establishment of an independent republic.

1964 – Pitcher Masanori Murakami becomes the first Japanese man to play in U.S. Major League Baseball. He pitches a scoreless 8th inning for the San Francisco Giants in a 4-1 loss to the New York Mets at Shea Stadium.

1972 – In what is billed as the “Match of the Century,” American chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer defeats Russian Boris Spassky during the World Chess Championship in Reykjavik, Iceland. Fischer, from Brooklyn, NY, became the first American to win the competition since its inception in 1866. The victory also marked the first win for a non-Russian in 24 years.

1983 – A Soviet fighter jet shoots down Korean Air Lines Flight 007 after the New York to Seoul flight enters Soviet airspace. All 269 aboard the 747 jumbo jet are killed, including U.S. Congressman Lawrence McDonald. President Ronald Reagan condemns the incident as a “massacre.”

1985 – An expedition led by oceanographer Dr. Robert Ballard locates the wreck of the RMS Titanic 73 years after the luxury liner sank to the bottom of the North Atlantic.

1989 – The first Lexus is sold, marking the beginning of Toyota’s new luxury line of automobiles.

1998 – A federal law takes effect requiring that all cars and light trucks sold in the United States have air bags installed in the front seats as standard equipment. Seat belts had been required since the 1960s, and some auto manufacturers had begun voluntarily providing air bags before 1998.

Musical Milestones

1962 – Tommy Roe is on top of the singles chart with “Sheila.” It’s the re-recorded version of a track first released in 1960 when Roe was part of a band called The Satins.

1973 – “Brother Louie,” by one-hit-wonder Stories, enters its second and final week as a No. 1 single. The track, about an interracial love affair, was originally recorded by British soul band Hot Chocolate, which just a few months earlier took it to No. 7 on the U.K. singles chart.

1977 – Blondie, featuring former Playboy Bunny Debbie Harry, signs its first major record company contract with Chrysalis Records.

1980 – Fleetwood Mac ends a nine-month world tour with a performance at the Hollywood Bowl. Lindsay Buckingham tells the audience, “This is our last show. For a long time.”

1984 – “What’s Love Got to Do with It,” by Queen of Rock and Roll Tina Turner, begins three weeks on top of the U.S. singles chart. The track, off Turner’s “Private Dancer” album, goes on to capture three Grammy Awards: Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. In 2012, it is inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

1990 – “If Wishes Came True,” by Sweet Sensation, bumps Mariah Carey’s “Vision of Love” to become the No. 1 single on the Billboard Hot 100.

2001 – Alicia Keys enters a third week atop the singles chart with her Grammy-winning debut single “Fallin’.

On this Day May 31

Click each item below to learn more!

Celebrity Birthdays

1819 – Poet Walt Whitman (d. 1892)

1908 – Actor Don Ameche ( “Trading Places,” “Cocoon”) (d. 1993)

1930 – Oscar-winning actor-director Clint Eastwood (“A Fistful of Dollars,” “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly” and the “Dirty Harry” movies, “Unforgiven,” “Million Dollar Baby,” “Mystic River,” “Gran Torino,” “American Sniper,” “Sully”)

1938 – Singer-songwriter Peter Yarrow of the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary

1943 – Pro Football Hall of Famer Joe Namath, who was a star quarterback for the New York Jets

1949 – Emmy and Golden Globe winning actor Tom Berenger (“Platoon,” “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “Rough Riders,” “Training Day,” “Inception,” “Hatfields & McCoys”)

1960 – Emmy-winning actor-comedian-writer Chris Elliott (“The David Letterman Show,” “Get a Life,” “Groundhog Day,” “There’s Something About Mary,” “How I Met Your Mother”)

1961 – Actress Lea Thompson (“Back to the Future” trilogy, “Some Kind of Wonderful,” “Caroline in the City”)

1965 – Actress-model Brooke Shields (“Pretty Baby,” “The Blue Lagoon,” “Endless Love,” “Suddenly Susan”)

1976 – Golden Globe-winning actor Colin Farrell (“Tigerland,” “American Outlaws,” “Phone Booth,” “Minority Report,” “In Bruges,” “Horrible Bosses,” “Crazy Heart,” “Miami Vice,” “True Detective”)

History Highlights

1790 – The first U.S. copyright law is enacted to protect books, maps and other original materials.

1889 – Heavy rains cause the South Fork Dam to collapse, sending 20 million tons of water into Johnstown, Pennsylvania and claiming the lives of more than 2,200 people.

1911 – An estimated 100,000 people gather in Belfast, Ireland for the launch of the RMS Titanic into the River Lagan. The ill-fated passenger liner, still missing its distinctive smokestacks, is towed to a berth where its engines, stacks and superstructure are installed and the interior is fitted out. Less than a year later, in one of the world’s greatest disasters, the ship sinks on its maiden voyage from Southampton, England to New York after striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic. More than 1,500 passengers are crew are killed.

1921 – In Tulsa, Oklahoma, a White mob begins a horrific two-day attack on Black residents of the city’s thriving Greenwood district, burning homes and businesses to the ground and killing at least 300 Black Americans. Long misrepresented as a race riot rather than mass murder, the Tulsa Race Massacre becomes one of the bloodiest incidents of racial violence in American history.

1962 – The architect of the Holocaust is executed in Israel. Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi SS officer who organized Adolf Hitler’s “final solution of the Jewish question,” hangs for his crimes against humanity.

1977 – The Trans-Alaska Pipeline is completed. Built after the 1973 oil crisis caused a sharp rise in oil prices in the United States, it is one of the largest pipeline systems in the world.

1996 – Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres is narrowly defeated in national elections by Likud Party leader Benjamin Netanyahu.

Musical Milestones

1966 – British vocalist Lulu and actor Sidney Poitier begin shooting scenes for the movie “To Sir, With Love” at England’s Pinewood Studios. Poitier plays a teacher in London’s tough East End and Lulu is one of his students.

1969 – “Get Back,” by The Beatles with Billy Preston, is in the midst of a five-week ride on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

1975 – Freddy Fender claims the No. 1 slot on the singles chart with “Before the Next Teardrop Falls.”

1980 – “Funkytown,” by Lipps Inc., is the No.1 single and holds the top spot for four weeks. The track, off the band’s “Mouth to Mouth” album, is considered the swan song for the disco era.

1997 – The sibling trio, Hanson, rules the pop chart with “MMMBop.”

2000 – Soul singer Johnnie Taylor dies of a heart attack shortly after his 62nd birthday. Taylor had been a member of The Highway QCs and The Five Echoes, and in 1957, replaced Sam Cooke in The Soul Stirrers. He is best known for his 1976 chart-topper, “Disco Lady.”

2008 – “Lollipop,” by Lil Wayne featuring Static Major, kicks off four weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100.