On This Day February 10

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On This Day February 6

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1917 – Three days after U.S. President Woodrow Wilson severs diplomatic relations with Germany and warns that war would follow if American interests at sea were again assaulted, a German submarine torpedoes and sinks the passenger steamer California off the Irish coast.

1933 – The 20th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, establishing the beginning and ending of the terms of elected federal offices, takes effect. 

1937 – John Steinbeck’s novella, “Of Mice and Men,” the story of the bond between two migrant workers during the Great Depression, is published. Eight months later, the stage adaptation opens in New York and earns Steinbeck the New York Drama Critics’ Circle’s Best Play Award in 1938.

1952 – Princess Elizabeth becomes Queen of England when her father, King George VI, dies following a long illness. But it takes the 25-year-old Elizabeth more than a day to learn of her new royal status. She was on safari at the time, inside a Kenyan tree hut watching a herd of elephants gather at a watering hole.

1978 – One of the worst Nor’easters in New England history pounds the region for more than 30 hours, with wind gusts exceeding 100 mph and snowfall of four inches an hour. High tides cause damaging coastal flooding, while inland, thousands of cars are stranded in snow drifts. Remembered as “The Blizzard of ’78,” the monster storm leaves about 100 people dead and 4,500 others injured.

1993 – Tennis champion Arthur Ashe, the only African-American man to win Wimbledon and the U.S. and Australian Opens, dies of complications from AIDS, at age 49 in New York City.

On This Day February 3

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On This Day January 16

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Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1938 – Acclaimed clarinetist and band leader Benny Goodman (a.k.a. “The King of Swing”) makes history when he takes the stage at New York’s Carnegie Hall. It not only marks the first time jazz is played in the hallowed music venue, but the first time a racially integrated ensemble performs.

1965 – The Supremes have a No. 1 single on the Billboard Hot 100 with “Come See About Me.”

1971 – George Harrison marks his fourth and final week at No. 1 on the pop chart with “My Sweet Lord.”

1979 – Cher’s divorce from Gregg Allman is finalized.

1988 – Twenty-four years after The Beatles first rule the singles chart, “Got My Mind Set On You” by George Harrison is No. 1. The track was originally recorded by R&B singer James Ray in 1962.

1988 – After huge success as half of the pop duo Wham! during the early to mid-80s, George Michael claims the top spot on the Billboard album chart with his debut solo album, “Faith.” The production packs several major hits, including the title track, “Father Figure,” “One More Try” and “Monkey.”

1993 – “I Will Always Love You,” by Whitney Houston, is in the middle of a 14-week domination of the Billboard singles chart.

1999 – Brandy’s “Have You Ever?” tops the Billboard Hot 100 and remains there for two weeks. 

2004 – King of Pop, Michael Jackson, pleads not guilty to child molestation charges, as fans, reporters and TV crews from around the world swarm outside the California courthouse. The judge admonishes Jackson for arriving late.

On This Day December 5

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On This Day November 5

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1911 – American singer, cowboy and actor Roy Rogers, born Leonard Franklin Slye and known as the “King of the Cowboys” (d. 1998)

1913 – Actress Vivian Leigh (“Gone With the Wind,” “A Streetcar Named Desire”) (d. 1967)

1931 – R&B singer-songwriter Ike Turner who had a string of hits with then-wife Tina Turner (d. 2007)

1940 – Golden Globe-winning actress Elke Sommer (“The Prize,” “A Shot in the Dark,” “The Art of Love,” “The Oscar,” “Boy, Did I Get the Wrong Number”)

1941 – Singer-songwriter Art Garfunkel, formerly of the Grammy-winning rock-folk duo Simon & Garfunkel

1943 – Pulitzer Prize-winning actor and playwright Sam Shepard (“Days of Heaven,” “Paris, Texas,” “The Right Stuff,” “Country,” “Steel Magnolias”) (d. 2017)

1947 – Peter Noone, born Peter Blair Denis Bernard Noone, frontman for the 1960s British pop group Herman’s Hermits

1959 – Grammy-winning rock singer-songwriter Bryan Adams (“Cuts Like a Knife,” “Summer of ’69,” “(Everything I Do) I Do It for You”)

1960 – Oscar-winning actress Tilda Swinton (“Edward II,” “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe,” “Michael Clayton,” “Burn After Reading,” “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” “Doctor Strange”)

1963 – Oscar-winning actress Tatum O’Neal (“Paper Moon,” “The Bad News Bears,” “Nickelodeon,” “Little Darlings”)

1968 – Actor Sam Rockwell (“The Green Mile,” “Galaxy Quest” “Iron Man 2,” “Cowboys & Aliens,” “A Single Shot”)

History Highlights
History Highlights

1912 – Democrat Woodrow Wilson is elected the 28th president of the United States in a landslide victory, defeating Republican incumbent William Howard Taft and Progressive Party candidate Theodore Roosevelt. It is the only presidential election in American history in which two former presidents were defeated by another candidate.

1940 –  Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt is re-elected for an unprecedented third term as president of the United States. He is re-elected again in 1944, which paves the way for ratification of the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution in 1951, limiting all future presidents to two elected terms.

1968 – Republican Richard Nixon wins the presidential election, defeating Vice President Hubert Humphrey in one of the closest political races in U.S. history.

1968 – New York Democrat Shirley Chisholm becomes the first African American woman elected to the U.S. Congress. She serves for 14 years. In 1972, she becomes the first woman and African American to seek the nomination for president of the United States from one of the two major political parties.

1994 – Forty-five-year-old George Foreman knocks out 26-year-old Michael Moorer to become the oldest heavyweight champion in the history of boxing. More than 12,000 spectators at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas watch Foreman dethrone Moorer, who entered the fight with a 35-0 record.

2007 – A writers strike in New York and Los Angeles interrupts the production of more than 60 television shows and results in the loss of an estimated $3 billion to the LA economy alone. The walkout, by members of the Writers Guild of America (WGA), lasts more than three months.

2009 – Thirteen people are killed and more than 30 others are wounded, nearly all of them unarmed soldiers, when a U.S. Army officer goes on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood in central Texas. The deadly assault, carried out by Major Nidal Malik Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, becomes the worst mass murder at a U.S. military installation.

On This Day September 17

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History Highlights
History Highlights

1787 – Drafted in secret by delegates to the Constitutional Convention, the four-page U.S. Constitution is signed, establishing a framework for the government of the United States and an intricate system of checks and balances.

1862 – At the Battle of Antietam, Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia and Union General George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac fight to a standstill along a Maryland creek. The bloodiest day in American military history ends with nearly 23,000 soldiers killed, wounded or missing, and changes the course of the Civil War.

1937 – The stone likeness of President Abraham Lincoln’s face is officially dedicated at Mount Rushmore.

1963 – New programming premieres on ABC: “The Greatest Show on Earth” and “The Fugitive,” the latter of which is made into a movie 30 years later, starring Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones. 

1966 – The spy series “Mission: Impossible” debuts on CBS. Thirty years later, in 1996, the first in a series of “Mission: Impossible” movies is produced starring, starring Tom Cruise. 

1972 – The Korean War-era series “M*A*S*H,” starring Alan Alda, begins an 11-year run on CBS

1976 – NASA unveils the first space shuttle, Enterprise, a $10 billion technological marvel that took a decade to develop. 

1978 – A milestone is achieved on the road to a Middle East peace, with the signing of the Camp David Accords. U.S. President Jimmy Carter presides as Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli President Menachem Begin agree to end three decades of hostilities between their nations. 

1996 – Daytime talk show host Oprah Winfrey launches a television book club. Oprah’s Book Club quickly becomes an influential force in the publishing world, with Winfrey’s endorsements capable of catapulting a previously little-known book onto best-seller lists.

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1967 – The Doors are banned from “The Ed Sullivan Show” after front man Jim Morrison breaks his agreement with the producers to replace the word “higher” with “better” in the line “Girl, we couldn’t get much higher” in the song “Light My Fire.” After learning that his band would not be welcome back on the program, Morrison reportedly said, “Hey, that’s okay – we just did the Ed Sullivan Show.”

1969 – Media on both sides of the Atlantic report that Paul McCartney of The Beatles is dead — supposedly killed in a car accident in Scotland in November 1966 and that a double had been standing in for him during public appearances. In fact, Paul and his girlfriend, Jane Asher, were vacationing in Kenya at the time.

1977 – Andy Gibb owns the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 with “I Just Want to Be Your Everything.”

1988 – Guns N’ Roses begins the second and final week at No. 1 on the singles chart with “Sweet Child o’ Mine,” off the band’s debut album, “Appetite for Destruction.”

1994 – “I’ll Make Love to You,” by Boyz II Men, is in the midst of a 14-week domination of the singles chart.

2005 – “Gold Digger,” by Kanye West featuring Jamie Foxx, kicks off 10 weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100.

2011 – Adele dominates the pop chart for a week with “Someone Like You,” off her “21” album. It becomes her second U.S. No. 1.

2016 – Barbra Streisand extends her record as the artist with the most No. 1 albums in chart history (11) when “Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway” reaches the top of the Billboard album chart.

On this Day August 18

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Celebrity Birthdays
Celebrity Birthdays

1927 – Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter

1933 – Director Roman Polanski, born Raimund Polanski, whose first American movie was 1968’s “Rosemary’s Baby”

1936 – Oscar-winning actor, director, producer and Sundance Film Festival founder Robert Redford (“Barefoot in the Park,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “The Candidate,” “The Way We Were,” “The Sting,” “All the President’s Men,” “Ordinary People,” “Out of Africa,” “Legal Eagles,” “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”)

1943 – Actor-comedian Martin Mull (“Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman,” “Fernwood 2 Night,” ” Sabrina, the Teenage Witch,” “Two and a Half Men”)

1952 – Actor Patrick Swayze (“Red Dawn,” “Uncommon Valor,” “Dirty Dancing,” “Ghost,” “Donnie Darko”) (d. 2009)

1957 – Actor-comedian Denis Leary (“True Crime,” the “Ice Age” movie series, “Rescue Me,” “Recount,” “The Amazing Spider-Man,” “Draft Day,” “Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll”)

1969 – Golden Globe-winning actor Christian Slater (“The Legend of Billie Jean,” “Heathers,” “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” “True Romance,” “Murder in the First,” “Mr. Robot”)

1969 – Oscar-winning actor-director Edward Norton (“Primal Fear,” “American History X,” “Fight Club,” “The Italian Job,” “The Illusionist,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “Moonrise Kingdom,” “The Grand Budapest Hotel”)

1970 – Actor-director Malcolm-Jamal Warner, best known for his role as Theo Huxtable on the NBC sitcom “The Cosby Show”

1978 – Golden Globe-winning comedian, actor, musician and “SNL” alum Andy Samberg (“Hot Rod,” “I Love You, Man,” “That’s My Boy,” “Celeste and Jesse Forever,” the “Hotel Transylvania” movies, “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping,” “Brooklyn Nine-Nine”)

Musical Milestones
Musical Milestones

1962 – “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do,” by Neil Sedaka, is Billboard’s top-ranked single. 

1962 – Two days after firing Pete Best, The Beatles introduce new drummer Ringo Starr in time for a performance in Birkenhead, England. Starr was no stranger to the band, having stood in on several occasions in Hamburg and Liverpool, where he primarily played for Rory Storm and the Hurricanes.

1969 – Jimi Hendrix brings the Woodstock Music and Art Fair to a memorable close with one of the most powerful, searing renditions of “The Star Spangled Banner” ever recorded. While some believe that Hendrix improvised the electrified anthem on the spot, he had actually been experimenting with it for more than a year and would continue to play it until his untimely death in September 1970.

1973 – With “Touch Me in the Morning,” Diana Ross scores her second No. 1 single since leaving The Supremes.

1979 – “Good Times,” by Chic, tops the Billboard Hot 100. The disco standard is one of the most sampled tracks in music history, especially in hip hop. It is the band’s second No. 1 hit.

1984 – Ray Parker, Jr. continues to haunt the top spot on the pop chart with his theme from the movie “Ghostbusters.” The single spends three weeks at No. 1.

1990 – Mariah Carey is midway through a four-week run at No. 1 on the pop chart with “Vision of Love.”

2001 – Alicia Keys kicks off three weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Fallin,” which goes on to capture three Grammy Awards.

On this Day July 28

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On this Day June 28

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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.

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