On this Day: July 8

On this Day July 8

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1935 – Pop singer-actor Steve Lawrence, best known as half of the “Steve and Eydie duo with his wife, Eydie Gormé 

1944 – Actor Jeffrey Tambor (“…And Justice For All,” “The Larry Sanders Show,” “Arrested Development”)

1951 – Oscar-winning actress Anjelica Huston (“Prizzi’s Honor,” “The Grifters,” “The Addams Family,” “The Royal Tenenbaums”) 

1958 – Golden Globe-winning actor Kevin Bacon (“Footloose,” “Apollo 13,” “The River Wild,” “A Few Good Men,” “Mystic River,” “The Following”)

1961 – Country music singer-songwriter and actor Toby Keith (“Should’ve Been a Cowboy,” “How Do You Like Me Now?!”)

1962 – Singer-songwriter Joan Osborne, best known for her 1995 hit “One of Us” 

1970 – Rock singer-songwriter Beck, born Bek David Campbell

1998 – Actor Jaden Smith (“The Pursuit of Happyness,” “The Karate Kid,” “After Earth”) 

History Highlights
History Highlights

1776 – The Liberty Bell rings out from the tower of the Pennsylvania State House (now known as Independence Hall) in Philadelphia, summoning citizens to the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. 

1947 – Reports are broadcast that a “flying disc” has crash-landed in Roswell, New Mexico, however U.S. Air Force officials claim it is a weather balloon. The incident triggers conspiracy theories about a government coverup and accounts of aliens and UFOs that are still debated today.

1959 – American troops suffer their first casualties in the Vietnam War with the deaths of Maj. Dale R. Buis and Master Sgt. Chester M. Ovnand.

1960 – An emerging Cold War détente between the United States and Soviet Union suffers a setback when the Soviets charge U.S. Air Force and CIA pilot Francis Gary Powers with espionage. The move comes two months after the Soviets shoot Powers down while flying a secret spy mission.

1994 – Kim Il-Sung, the communist dictator of North Korea since 1948, dies of a heart attack at the age of 82. Hoping to reunify Korea by force, Kim launched an invasion of South Korea in 1950, igniting the Korean War, which ended in a stalemate in 1953. 

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1957 – “(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear” by Elvis Presley begins a seven-week run on top of the singles chart. Two months earlier, Elvis was king of the pop chart with “All Shook Up,” which spent eight weeks at No. 1.

1958 – The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) awards the first official Gold album (for achieving sales of $1 million). It goes to the cast album for the stage production of “Oklahoma!” featuring Gordon MacRae. 

1967 – The Monkees begin a 29-date concert tour with The Jimi Hendrix Experience as the opening act. However, Hendrix is dropped after eight performances because the producers felt his act was not suitable for their “teeny-bopper” audiences.

1970 – “The Everly Brothers Show” starts an 11-week prime-time run on ABC- TV. 

1972 – Bill Withers scores the first and only No. 1 hit of his career when “Lean On Me” reaches the top of the pop chart. It holds that position for three weeks. 

1978 – Gerry Rafferty’s “City To City” reaches the top of the Billboard album chart, dethroning the “Saturday Night Fever” soundtrack which occupied that spot for nearly six months.

1989 – “Good Thing,” by Fine Young Cannibals, begins a week at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. The track is the second chart-topper from the band’s “The Raw & The Cooked” album. Three months earlier, “She Drives Me Crazy” claimed the top spot.

1995 – TLC flows to the top of the Billboard pop chart with “Waterfalls.” The song remains at No. 1 for seven weeks.

2000 – Enrique Iglesias begins his third and final week on top of the singles chart with “Be With You.”

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On this Day: June 24

On this Day June 24

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1895 – World heavyweight boxer Jack Dempsey, known as the “Manassa Mauler”(d. 1983)

1919 – Actor Al Molinaro, remembered for his TV sitcom roles as Al Delvecchio in “Happy Days” and Murray Greshler in “The Odd Couple” (d. 2015)

1935 – Director-actor Robert Downey, Sr. (“Putney Swope,” “Tower Heist”)

1942 – Actress Michele Lee (“How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,” “Knots Landing,” “Wicked”)

1944 – Grammy-winning rock guitarist and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Jeff Beck, a former member of the band The Yardbirds (d. 2023)

1947 – Actor Peter Weller (“RoboCop,” “RoboCop 2,” “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension,” “Naked Lunch,” “Mighty Aphrodite,” “Longmire”)

1947 – Rock and Roll Hall of Fame drummer and Fleetwood Mac co-founder Mick Fleetwood

1967 – Actress and former “ER” star Sherry Stringfield

History Highlights
History Highlights

1901 – The first major exhibition of Pablo Picasso’s artwork opens in Paris.

1947 – Pilot Kenneth Arnold reports seeing strange objects near Mount Rainier, Washington. He describes them as “saucers skipping across the water,” and so the term “flying saucers” is born.

1948 – The Soviet Union begins a blockade of Berlin. Allied forces respond with what would be known as the Berlin Airlift, flying in more than two million tons of supplies over the next year.

1953 – Jacqueline Bouvier and Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy publicly announce their engagement. They marry three months later in Newport, Rhode Island. Kennedy wins election as 35th U.S. president in 1960, and as first lady, Jackie, as she was known, makes restoration of the White House her first major project. 

1975 – Wind shear from thunderstorms is blamed for the crash of an Eastern Airlines 727 on final approach to New York’s JFK Airport that leaves 113 dead. The accident leads to the installation of low-level wind shear detectors at airports.

1993 – Yale University computer science professor David Gelernter is seriously injured while opening his mail when a padded envelope explodes in his hands. The bombing, along with 14 others since 1978 that killed three people and injured 23 others, was eventually linked to “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski.

1997 – U.S. Air Force officials release a 231-page report dismissing long-standing claims of an alien spacecraft crash in Roswell, New Mexico, almost exactly 50 years earlier.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1967 – “Groovin’,” by The Young Rascals, enjoys its fourth and final week as a No. 1 single.

1967 – British rock band Procol Harum’s “A Whiter Shade Of Pale” lands on the Billboard Hot 100 and climbs as high as No. 5. Meanwhile, in the U.K., it is a No. 1 hit for six weeks. The track becomes one of the anthems of 1967’s so-called “Summer of Love.”

1972 – Sammy Davis, Jr. begins a third and final week on top of the singles chart with his interpretation of “The Candy Man,” from the movie “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.”

1989 – Richard Marx scores his second No. 1 single with “Satisfied.”

1995 – Bryan Adams’ “Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?” is No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. The track is from the Johnny Depp-Marlon Brando movie “Don Juan DeMarco.”

2000 – Enrique Iglesias kicks off three weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Be With You.”

2006 – “Hips Don’t Lie,” by Shakira featuring Wyclef Jean, begins its second and final week on top of the pop chart.

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