Thunderbird – Time Rewind

On This Day December 13

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On This Day September 15

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Celebrity Birthdays

1254 – Venetian merchant and explorer Marco Polo (d. 1324)

1890 – Mystery author and playwright Agatha Christie (d. 1976)

1907 – Actress Fay Wray, most remembered for playing the lead in the original “King Kong” movie (d. 2004)

1922 – Jackie Cooper, the first child actor to be nominated for an Oscar (“Our Gang,” “Little rascals,” “The Champ’) (d. 2011)

1946 – Oscar-winning screenwriter-director Oliver Stone (“Platoon,” “Scarface,” “Born on the Fourth of July,” “JFK,” “Natural Born Killers”)

1946 – Oscar-winning actor Tommy Lee Jones (“Coal Miner’s Daughter,” “Men in Black,” “The Fugitive,” “No Country for Old Men,” “Lincoln,” “Jason Bourne”)

1977 – Actor Tom Hardy (“Black Hawk Down,” “Star Trek: Nemesis,” “Inception,” “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Mad Max: Fury Road,” “Dunkirk,” “Venom”)

1984 – Prince Harry of Wales

History Highlights

1916 – The tank makes its debut as a battlefield weapon, attacking German troops as part of a British assault near Bois d’Elville, or Delville Wood, on the Western Front, during the Battle of the Somme in World War I.

1942 – Three Japanese torpedoes slam into the American aircraft carrier USS Wasp off Guadalcanal in the South Pacific during World War II. The attack claims the lives of nearly 200 of the ship’s 2,000 crewmen. The wreckage of the Wasp was discovered at the bottom of the Coral Sea in January 2019.

1954 – The iconic scene of Marilyn Monroe laughing as her skirt is blown up by the blast of air from a Manhattan subway vent is shot during the filming of “The Seven Year Itch,” directed by Billy Wilder.

1959 – Nikita Khrushchev becomes the first Soviet leader to visit the United States. During the next two weeks, Khrushchev’s visit dominates the headlines and provides some dramatic and humorous moments in the history of the Cold War.

1963 – Four young black girls are killed in a bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, that investigators determine to be a racially motivated terrorist attack. The bombing, which shocks the nation, is Birmingham’s third in 11 days following a federal order to integrate the Alabama schools.

1978 – Muhammad Ali defeats Leon Spinks to win the world heavyweight boxing title for the third time in his career, becoming the first fighter ever to do so.

1981 – The Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approves Sandra Day O’Connor as the first female Supreme Court justice.

1982 – Gannett publishes the first edition of a new national daily newspaper called USA Today.

2008 – The venerable Wall Street brokerage firm Lehman Brothers seeks Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, becoming the largest victim of the subprime mortgage crisis that would devastate financial markets and contribute to the biggest economic downturn since the Great Depression.

Musical Milestones

1956 – Elvis Presley is king of the pop chart with “Don’t Be Cruel,” which becomes his biggest-selling single and, in 2002, is inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The B-side of the disc contains “Hound Dog,” which climbs to No. 2 a few weeks later.

1962 – “Sherry,” by The Four Seasons, is the No. 1 single and remains on top of the pop chart for five weeks.

1965 – Ford Motor Company is the first automaker to introduce factory-installed 8-track tape players in a car — the 1966 Mustang and Thunderbird — a year before 8-track equipment is available for home use.

1973 – Originally a Top-10 country hit for Tanya Tucker, Helen Reddy takes “Delta Dawn” to No. 1 on the Billboard pop chart.

1983 – Huey Lewis and the News release “Sports,” which goes on to top the Billboard album chart the following summer and spawns four Top-10 hits, including “The Heart of Rock & Roll” and “I Want a New Drug.”

1984 – Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got to Do with It” begins its third and final week as a No. 1 single. The track goes on to capture Song of the Year and Record of the Year Grammys.

1990 – “Release Me,” by Wilson Phillips, claims the top spot on the singles chart and holds there for two weeks.

2001 – “I’m Real,” by Jennifer Lopez featuring Ja Rule, is No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

On this Day August 12

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Celebrity Birthdays

1881 – Legendary movie director Cecile B. DeMille (“Cleopatra,” “The Ten Commandments”) (d. 1959)

1910 – Emmy-winning actress Jane Wyatt, best known as housewife and mother Margaret Anderson on the comedy series “Father Knows Best” and as Spock’s human mother in “Star Trek” (d. 2006)

1931 – Two-time Academy Award-winning screenwriter and bestselling author William Goldman (“Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “All the President’s Men”) (d. 2018)

1939 – Golden Globe-winning actor George Hamilton (“Crime and Punishment U.S.A.,” “Light in the Piazza,” “Evel Knievel,” “Love at First Bite,” “Zorro, The Gay Blade,” “The Godfather Part III”)

1949 – Grammy-winning singer-songwriter-guitarist Mark Knopfler, best known as frontman for the rock band Dire Straits

1954 – Grammy-winning jazz guitarist Pat Metheny

1956 – Actor Bruce Greenwood (“Racing Stripes,” “Thirteen Days,” “Eight Below,” “Star Trek,” “Good Kill”)

1965 – Actor Peter Krause (“Six Feet Under,” “Parenthood”)

1971 – Tennis champion Pete Sampras

1975 – Actor-director Casey Affleck (“Oceans” trilogy, “Gerry,” “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” “Gone Baby Gone,” “Out of the Furnace,” “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints”)

History Highlights

30 B.C. – Cleopatra, queen of Egypt and lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, takes her life following the defeat of her forces against Octavian, the future first emperor of Rome.

1851 – Business tycoon Isaac Merritt Singer patents the sewing machine.

1939 – “The Wizard of Oz,” starring Judy Garland and featuring words and music by E.Y. “Yip” Harburg and Harold Arlen, makes its world premiere at the Strand Theatre in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.

1963 – The first 1964 Ford Thunderbird rolls off a Detroit assembly line.

1977 – Space Shuttle Enterprise passes a critical test as it separates from the top of a 747 for its first free flight and makes a smooth landing in the Mojave Desert.

1981 – IBM takes the wraps off the first personal computer (the IBM 5150) with a price tag starting at $1,565. That includes the system unit, a keyboard and color/graphics capability. It costs more for options including a display, a printer, two diskette drives, extra memory, a game adapter and application packages — including one for text processing.

1990 – Digging on a cliff near Faith, South Dakota, paleontologist Susan Hendrickson unearths three huge bones that turn out to be part of the largest Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton ever discovered — a 67 million-year-old specimen dubbed Sue, after its discoverer.

2014 – Lauren Bacall, the smoky-voiced movie legend who taught Humphrey Bogart how to whistle in “To Have and Have Not,” dies at the age of 89. Bacall made more than 40 films during a 70-year career, including “The Big Sleep,” “How to Marry a Millionaire” and “The Mirror Has Two Faces.”

Musical Milestones

1960 – The Silver Beatles become The Beatles, and on this day, the newly renamed band hires Pete Best as drummer. Two years later, he is fired and replaced by Ringo Starr.

1964 – The Beatles’ first film, “A Hard Day’s Night,” opens in 500 U.S. theaters to rave reviews.

1966 – The Beatles’ final U.S. tour begins with two performances at the International Amphitheatre in Chicago. During a pre-show press conference, reporters challenge John Lennon to explain his recent boast that The Beatles were more popular than Jesus Christ.

1967 – The Doors close out three weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Light My Fire.” About a month later, the band performs the song before a national audience on “The Ed Sullivan Show.”

1978 – “Three Times a Lady,” by the Commodores featuring Lionel Richie, is the No. 1 single.

1985 – Japanese singer-actor Kyu Sakamoto is killed at the age of 43 in the crash of a Japan Airlines jetliner outside Tokyo. Sakamoto was the first Asian recording artist to have a No. 1 hit in the U.S.: “Sukiyaki” in June of 1963, which sold more than 13 million copies worldwide.

1995 – TLC is in the midst of a seven-week domination of the singles chart with “Waterfalls.”

2000 – “Incomplete,” by Sisqó, begins a two-week run on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

2009 – Legendary guitarist Les Paul dies of pneumonia at age 94. Paul designed one of the first solid-body electric guitars, which went on sale in 1952 and was “instrumental” in the development of rock ‘n roll. He also pioneered other recording innovations such as multi-track recording and overdubbing.