On This Day:
Wednesday January 3, 2007

This is the 3rd day of the year, with 362 days remaining in 2007.

Fact of the Day: Alaska

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Peter Balsam, St. Bertilia of Mareuil, St. Antherus, pope, and St. Genevieve or Genovefa.
• The U.S. Congress assembles, according to the Constitution of the United States of America, unless a different day is appointed.

Events

• 1521 - Martin Luther was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church by Pope Leo X.
• 1777 - General George Washington's army routed the British, led by Lord Cornwallis, in the Battle of Princeton, New Jersey.
• 1833 - Britain seized control of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.
• 1868 - The Meiji Restoration reestablished the authority of Japan's emperor (after 700 years) and brought the fall of the military rulers known as shoguns.
• 1888 - The drinking straw was patented by Marvin Stone of Washington, D.C.
• 1903 - South Dakota's Wind Cave National Park was established.
• 1924 - Two years after British archaeologist Howard Carter discovered the tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamen near Luxor, Egypt, he uncovers the greatest treasure of the tomb -- a stone sarcophagus containing a solid gold coffin with the mummy of Tutankhamen.
• 1938 - The "March of Dimes" campaign to fight polio was organized.
• 1947 - U.S. Congressional proceedings were televised for the first time; these were the opening ceremonies of the 80th Congress.
• 1959 - President Dwight Eisenhower signed a proclamation admitting Alaska to the Union as the 49th state.
• 1961 - The United States broke diplomatic relations with Cuba.
• 1962 - Pope John XXIII excommunicated Cuban prime minister Fidel Castro.
• 1990 - Ousted Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega surrendered to U.S. forces.
• 1993 - President George Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed a historic nuclear missile-reduction treaty in Moscow.
• 2004 - Spirit, the first of the two Mars Exploration Rover missions, landed.

Births

• 106 B.C.E. - (Marcus Tullius) Cicero, Roman statesman.
• 1624 - William Tucker, the first African-American believed to have had his birth recorded in the New World.
• 1793 - Lucretia Coffin Mott, American women's rights advocate and founder of the first Women's Rights Convention.
• 1892 - J.R.R. Tolkien, British writer. British writer? That's it?! How about 'Kick-ass Author' ? That works better for me at least.
• 1945 - Stephen Stills, American singer and songwriter.
• 1956 - Mel Gibson, Australian film actor.

Deaths

• 1967 - Jack Ruby, American who shot accused presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, of cancer in a Dallas hospital.
• 1979 - Conrad Hilton, American hotelier and founder of the Hilton Hotel chain.
• 1980 - Joy Adamson, Austrian naturalist and author, best known for her book, "Born Free."
  

On This Day:
Friday December 1, 2006

This is the 335th day of the year, with 30 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: Old Faithful

Holidays

• United Nations: World AIDS Day.
• Feast day of St. Edmund Campion, St. Agericus or Airy, St. Eligius or Elroy, St. Alexander Briant, St. Anasanus, St. Tudwal, and St. Ralph Sherwin.
• Central African Republic: anniversary of the Proclamation of the Republic (1958).
• Romania: National Day.
• Portugal: Independence Day.

Events

• 1640 - Portugal regained its independence, driving out the Spaniards.
• 1824 - The presidential election was turned over to the U.S. House of Representatives when a deadlock developed among John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, William H. Crawford, and Henry Clay. John Quincy Adams was declared the winner.
• 1842 - Midshipman Philip Spencer, son of Secretary of War John C. Spencer, was hanged for mutiny from the yardarm of the USS Somers, the first Navy officer executed for mutiny.
• 1880 - A telephone was first installed in the White House.
• 1891 - James Naismith, a physical education teacher at a YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts, created the indoor sport of basketball.
• 1913 - In Pittsburgh, the first drive-in automobile service station opened for business. It was operated by the Gulf Refining Company.
• 1918 - Iceland became an independent state from Denmark, though still remained under the king of Denmark.
• 1919 - American-born Lady Nancy Astor was sworn in as the first female member of the British Parliament. She became MP for the Sutton division of Plymouth.
• 1922 - Skywriting was introduced when a pilot flew over New York City and spelled out "hello."
• 1934 - Sergei M. Kirov, political rival of Josef Stalin, was assassinated in Leningrad, beginning Stalin's purge in which he eliminated his opponents in the Communist Party, the government, the armed forces, and the intelligentsia.
• 1939 - The movie "Gone With the Wind" premiered in New York City.
• 1942 - Gas rationing went into effect in the United States, as a result of World War II.
• 1953 - The first issue of "Playboy" magazine was published by Hugh Hefner; it featured Marilyn Monroe as the centerfold.
• 1955 - Rosa Parks, a black seamstress, defied the law by refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery, Alabama city bus. Ms. Parks was arrested, setting off a yearlong boycott of the buses by blacks.
• 1957 - The New York City Ballet debuted "Agon," a collaboration of composer Igor Stravinsky and choreographer George Balanchine.
• 1959 - Twelve countries, including the United States, signed a treaty setting aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve, free from military activity.
• 1965 - An airlift of refugees from Cuba to the United States began in which thousands of Cubans were allowed to leave their homeland.
• 1969 - The United States held its first draft lottery since World War II.
• 1970 - Divorce became legal in Italy, in certain cases.
• 1978 - President Jimmy Carter put more than 56 million acres of Alaska into the national park system.
• 1989 - Pope John Paul II and Mikhail Gorbachev met in Rome, ending 70 years of hostility between the Vatican and the USSR.
• 1990 - The island of Britain was connected to the European mainland for the first time since the Ice Age when a rail tunnel was completed between them.
• 1991 - Ukrainians voted for independence from the Soviet Union.
• 1994 - U.S. Congress passed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) treaty.
• 1999 - An international team of scientists announced it had virtually mapped a human chromosome.
• 2000 - Vicente Fox was sworn in as president of Mexico, ending 71 years of ruling-party domination.
• 2004 - Tom Brokaw signed off "NBC Nightly News" for the last time as principal anchor.

Births

• 1761 - Marie Tussaud, Anglo-French modeler in wax.
• 1935 - Woody Allen (Allen Stewart Konigsberg), American film actor, writer, director.
• 1935 - Lou Rawls, American soul, jazz, and blues singer.
• 1940 - Richard Pryor, American comedian, actor, and writer.
• 1980 - ghettochicky's birthday! Whooohooo! Man...we're getting old o.o
• Also, Josh, another uber-cool cousin o' mine Not sure on which year he was born in, but I'd have to guess between 1987 and 1983 O.o; Rock on, Josh!

Deaths

• 1987 - James Baldwin, American novelist and playwright.

On This Day:
Tuesday November 28, 2006

This is the 332nd day of the year, with 33 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: contact lenses

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Stephen the Younger, St. Catherine Labouré, St. Simeon Metaphrastes, St. James of the March, and St. Joseph Pignatelli.
• Albania: Independence Day/Flag Day (Dit'e Flamurit).
• Mauritania: Independence Day.
• Panama: Independence Day (from Spain 1821).
• United Kingdom, Scotland: Martinmas Term Day (previously, Removal Day).

Events

• 1520 - Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reached the Pacific Ocean after passing through the South American strait at the tip of South America that is now named for him. He was the first European explorer to reach the Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean.
• 1660 - The Royal Society was chartered in London.
• 1868 - Mt. Etna in Sicily violently erupted.
• 1895 - The first automobile race took place, 54 miles to Evanston, Illinois; the winner was James Franklin Duryea.
• 1905 - Sinn Fein (Gaelic for "we ourselves"), a political party dedicated to independence for all of Ireland, was founded in Dublin by Irish nationalist Arthur Griffith.
• 1912 - Albania declared its independence after more than 400 years of Turkish rule.
• 1919 - U.S.-born Lady Nancy Astor was elected the first female member of the British Parliament.
• 1925 - The Grand Ole Opry made its radio debut from Nashville, then called WSM Barn Dance.
• 1942 - A fire destroyed the Cocoanut Grove nightclub in Boston, killing nearly 500 people.
• 1942 - President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet leader Josef Stalin met in Tehran during World War II.
• 1948 - Edwin Land's first Polaroid cameras went on sale.
• 1958 - Chad became an autonomous republic within the French community.
• 1960 - Mauritania gained independence from France.
• 1963 - Cape Canaveral, Florida, was renamed Cape Kennedy.
• 1964 - Mariner 4 was launched, the first successful mission to Mars, taking photographs and instrument readings.
• 1975 - President Gerald Ford nominated Federal Judge John Paul Stevens to the U.S. Supreme Court seat vacated by William O. Douglas.
• 1994 - Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was murdered in the Columbia Correctional Institute in Portage, Wisconsin, by a fellow inmate.
• 1995 - President Bill Clinton signed a bill that ended the federal 55-mph speed limit.
• 1996 - Algerians approved a new constitution and effectively banned Islamic-based parties.

Births

• 1628 - John Bunyan, English preacher and writer.
• 1757 - William Blake, English poet.
• 1820 - Friedrich Engels, German Socialist philosopher.
• 1853 - Helen Magill White, educator and first American woman to earn a Ph.D. degree.
• 1904 - Nancy Mitford, British satiric novelist and essayist.
• 1908 - Claude Lévi-Strauss, French anthropologist.
• 1929 - Berry Gordy, Jr., American recording executive.
• 1949 - Paul Schaffer, Canadian-born musician and composer, bandleader on "The Late Show with David Letterman."
• 1962 - Jon Stewart, American comedian, satirist, actor, author, and producer, best known as host of "The Daily Show."
• 1988 -
• wotcherscamp my favorite-of-est cousins!!!!! Dude...you were born on the same day as Jon Stewart...that's awesome!!! Ok, now hurry up and get on FaceBook...
  

Deaths

• 1859 - Washington Irving, American novelist and short-story writer, best known for the stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle."
• 1954 - Enrico Fermi, Italian-born American physicist who was one of the primary inventors of the nuclear age.
• 1994 - Jerry Rubin, American political activist in the 1960s turned financier and businessman. He was a founding member of the Yippies and a "Chicago Seven" defendant.
• 2000 - Sir Malcolm Bradbury, British author and academic.

On This Day: Wednesday November 8, 2006

This is the 312th day of the year, with 53 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: seven dwarfs

Holidays

Events

• 1685 - Fredrick William of Brandenburg issued the Edict of Potsdam, offering refuge to the Huguenots.
• 1793 - The Louvre opened as a museum in Paris, though only part of the collection could be viewed.
• 1805 - Meriwether Lewis and William Clark reached the Pacific coast after setting out from St. Louis over a year earlier.
• 1837 - Mount Holyoke Seminary, a women's college, opened in South Hadley, Massachusetts.
• 1889 - Montana became the 41st state.
• 1895 - William Röntgen discovered X-rays during an experiment at the University of Wurzburg.
• 1923 - Adolf Hitler made his first attempt at seizing power with a failed coup in Munich, Germany, the "Beer-Hall Putsch."
• 1932 - New York governor Franklin D. Roosevelt won his first term as the 32nd President of the United States of America by defeating incumbent Herbert Hoover.
• 1933 - President Franklin Roosevelt created the Civil Works Administration, to create jobs for the more than four million unemployed.
• 1938 - Crystal Bird Fauset of Pennsylvania became the first African-American woman to be elected to a state legislature.
• 1942 - Under General Dwight Eisenhower's command, British and U.S. forces invaded North Africa in "Operation Torch."
• 1960 - Massachusetts Senator John F. Kennedy (D) defeated Republican Vice President Richard M. Nixon to become the 35th President of the United States of America.
• 1988 - Republican Vice President George Bush defeated Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis for the 41st Presidency of the United States of America.
• 1994 - In Oregon, "Measure 16," which permitted euthanasia in regulated circumstances for the terminally ill, was voted in.
• 1994 - Republicans gained control of the U.S. House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years and won a majority in the Senate in midterm elections.
• 1997 - Chinese engineers diverted the Yangtze River to make way for the Three Gorges Dam.
• 2004 - Thousands of allied troops attacked the toughest strongholds of Sunni insurgents in Fallujah, Iraq, aimed at putting an end to guerrilla control of the city.

Births

• 1656 - Edmund Halley, British astronomer and mathematician.
• 1847 - Bram Stoker, English writer, best known for "Dracula."
• 1884 - Hermann Rorshach, Swiss psychiatrist, inventor of the inkblot test (Rorshach Test).
• 1900 - Margaret Mitchell, American Pulitzer Prize-winning author.
• 1922 - Christiaan Barnard, South African heart transplant pioneer.
• 1931 - Morley Safer, reporter and correspondent for CBS News.
• 1949 - Bonnie Raitt, American blues/R&B singer, songwriter, and guitarist.

Deaths

• 1674 - John Milton, English poet.

On This Day: Friday October 27, 2006

This is the 300th day of the year, with 65 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: vitamins

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Otteran or Odhran of Iona, and St. Frumentius of Ethiopia.
• Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: Independence Day.
• Turkmenistan: Independence Day.
• United States: Navy Day.

Events

• 1659 - Two Quakers who came from England in 1656 to escape religious persecution, were executed in the Massachusetts Bay Colony for their religious beliefs.
• 1662 - England's Charles II sold Dunkirk to Louis XIV of France.
• 1787 - The first of the "Federalist Papers," a series of essays calling for ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America, was published in the New York "Independent Journal."
• 1878 - The Manhattan Savings Bank in New York City was robbed of $3 million by George "Western" Leslie and his gang.
• 1904 - The first rapid transit subway, the IRT, opened in New York City. Today, the New York subway system is the largest in the world.
• 1927 - The first newsreel with sound was released in New York by Fox Movietone News.
• 1936 - Mrs. Wallis Simpson was granted a divorce from her husband, leaving her free to marry Britain's King Edward VIII.
• 1938 - DuPont announced its new synthetic yarn, called "nylon."
• 1947 - "You Bet Your Life," starring Groucho Marx, premiered on radio; it later became a television show.
• 1962 - In the Cuban Missile Crisis, Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev offered to remove Soviet missile bases in Cuba if the United States removed its missile bases in Turkey.
• 1971 - Republic of Congo changed its name to the Republic of Zaire.
• 1978 - Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.
• 1979 - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines gained independence.
• 1994 - U.S. Justice Department announced that the U.S. prison population has topped one million.
• 1998 - Hurricane Mitch in Central America killed more than 7000 in Honduras, Nicaragua, and other countries.
• 2004 - The Boston Red Sox won their first World Series since 1918, beating the St. Louis Cardinals 3-0 in Game 4.

Births

• 1728 - James Cook, British sea captain and explorer.
• 1782 - Niccoló Paganini, Italian violinist and composer.
• 1811 - Isaac Singer, American inventor of the sewing machine.
• 1858 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States of America (1901-1909).
• 1914 - Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet.
• 1923 - Roy Lichtenstein, American sculptor, artist.
• 1924 - Ruby Dee (Ruth Wallace), American actress.
• 1932 - Sylvia Plath, American poet.
• 1939 - John Cleese, English actor and comedian.
• 1984 - Kelly Michelle Lee Osbourne, daughter of rock legend Ozzy Osbourne.
• anowyn was born today! Whooo! Happy Birthday! They're taking the Hobbits to Isengard!....what?....O.o;
  

Deaths

• 1553 - Michael Servetus, Spanish physician and theologian and discoverer of pulmonary blood circulation, burned for heresy in Switzerland.
• 1975 - Rex Stout, American writer best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe.
• 1977 - James Mallahan Cain, American novelist.

On This Day: Monday October 23, 2006

This is the 296th day of the year, with 69 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: mattress

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Severino Boethius, St. Severinus or Seurin of Bordeaux, St. Elfleda or Ethelfled, St. Allucio, St. Ignatius of Constantinople, St. Theodoret, St. Romanus of Rouen, and St. John of Capistrano.
• The swallows leave San Juan Capistrano.
• Hungary: Anniversary of Declaration of Independence.
• Thailand: Chulalongkorn Day.

Events

• 4004 B.C.E. - According to 17th century divine James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh, and Dr. John Lightfoot of Cambridge, the world was created on this day, a Sunday, at 9 a.m.
• 1642 - Battle of Edgehill, the first major conflict of the English Civil War, took place.
• 1864 - Union General Samuel R. Curtis and his troops defeated Confederate General Stirling Price's army in Missouri.
• 1915 - Around 25,000 women marched in New York City, demanding the right to vote.
• 1941 - U.S. Senate passed the $5.98 billion supplemental Lend-Lease bill, bringing the country closer to direct involvement in World War II.
• 1944 - The biggest naval engagement of World War II began, between the United States and Japan, at the Battle of the Philippine Sea.
• 1946 - The United Nations General Assembly convened in New York for the first time, in a Flushing Meadow auditorium.
• 1956 - Hungarian students and workers demonstrated in Budapest against 10 years of Soviet Union domination and Communist rule.
• 1973 - President Richard Nixon agreed to turn White House tape recordings requested by the Watergate special prosecutor over to Judge John J. Sirica.
• 1978 - China and Japan exchanged treaty ratification documents in Tokyo, formally ending 40 years of hostility.
• 1980 - Soviet Union Premier Alexei N. Kosygin resigned.
• 1983 - Two-hundred forty-one U.S. Marines and sailors in Lebanon were killed in a suicide truck-bombing at the Marine Operations Center. At the same time at another peacekeeping base, 58 French paratroopers were killed by a Lebanese suicide truck-bombing.
• 1987 - The U.S. Senate rejected the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.
• 1995 - U.S. President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin agreed to a joint peacekeeping effort in Bosnia.
• 1998 - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat signed a land-for-peace West Bank agreement at the White House.

Births

• 1835 - Adlai Ewing Stevenson, 23rd Vice President of the United States (1893-1897).
• 1906 - Gertrude Ederle, American Olympic swimming champion and first woman to swim the English Channel.
• 1925 - Johnny Carson, American TV host and comedian.
• 1935 - Chi-Chi Rodriguez, professional golfer.
• 1940 - Pelé (Edson Arantes do Nascimento), Brazilian soccer star.
• 1942 - Michael Crichton, American writer.
• 1984 - animequeen, my Twin-san and a serious world-of-warcrafter!!!! I was hoping you'd get your present on or before today, but alas! Amazon.com at its finest -.-'
  

Deaths

• 42 B.C.E. - Marcus Junius Brutus, conspirator in the assassination of Julius Caesar, a suicide.
• 1950 - Al Jolson, American singer and blackface comedian of stage and film.

On This Day: Wednesday October 11, 2006

This is the 284th day of the year, with 81 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: abacus

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Mary Soledad, Saints Andronicus, Tarachus, and Probus, St. Agilbert, St. Alexander Sauli, St. Nectarius of Constantinople, St. Bruno the Great of Cologne, St. Gummarus or Gomaire, and St. Canice or Kenneth.
• Indiana: General Pulaski Memorial Day. (Revolutionary War hero died in 1779 from wounds received at a siege in Savannah.)

Events

• 1521 - Pope Leo X conferred the title of "Defender of the Faith" on England's Henry VIII for his support of Catholic principles. Henry VIII denounced Martin Luther's teachings.
• 1689 - Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia, assumed control.
• 1727 - George II of England was crowned.
• 1776 - The first naval battle of Lake Champlain was fought during the American Revolution.
• 1811 - The first steam-powered ferryboat, Juliana, was put into operation between New York City and Hoboken, New Jersey.
• 1862 - The Confederate Congress in Richmond passed a draft law allowing anyone owning 20 or more slaves to be exempt from military service.
• 1887 - A patent was granted to Dorr Eugene Felt for the first adding machine.
• 1890 - The Daughters of the American Revolution was founded in Washington, D.C.
• 1899 - The South African Boer War began between the British Empire and Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State, who are settlers from the Netherlands.
• 1923 - The first political telecast, sponsored by the Democratic National Committee, aired from New York.
• 1939 - Albert Einstein sent a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, arguing the scientific feasibility of atomic weapons and urging the rapid development of a U.S. atomic program.
• 1945 - Negotiations between Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek and Communist leader Mao Tse-tung broke down.
• 1950 - Federal Communications Commission authorized the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) to began commercial color television broadcasts.
• 1958 - The lunar probe Pioneer 1 was launched, but it failed to go far enough and fell back to Earth, burning up in the atmosphere.
• 1962 - Pope John XXIII convened the first session of the Roman Catholic Church's 21st Ecumenical Council.
• 1968 - Apollo Seven, the first manned Apollo mission, was launched with astronauts Wally Schirra, Donn Fulton Eisele and R. Walter Cunningham aboard.
• 1975 - "Saturday Night Live" made its TV debut, with comedian George Carlin as host.
• 1976 - Mao Zedong's widow, Jiang Qing, and three others were arrested and charged with plotting a coup as the Gang of Four.
• 1984 - On space shuttle Challenger, astronaut Kathy Sullivan became the first American woman to walk in space.
• 1998 - Pope John Paul II canonized the first Jewish-born saint of the modern era: Edith Stein, a nun killed in Auschwitz gas chambers.
• 2002 - Former President Jimmy Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize for his diplomacy in the Middle East in the 1970s.

Births

• 1821 - Sir George Williams, British, founder of the YMCA.
• 1884 - Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady wife of 32nd U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt; U.S. delegate to the United Nations.
• 1884 - Henry Heinz, American ketchup and pickle entrepreneur.
• 1906 - Charles Revson, American entrepreneur, founder of Revlon cosmetics.
• 1918 - Jerome Robbins (Rabinowitz), American Academy Award-winning and Tony Award-winning director, and choreographer.
• 1925 - Elmore Leonard, American author.
• 1985 - Sephiroth!!!!! Happy Birthday, Sev!

Deaths

• 1809 - Meriwether Lewis, American explorer who with William Clark led the first overland expedition to the Pacific Northwest.
• 1961 - Chico Marx, American comedian and member of the Marx Brothers comedy team.

On This Day: Friday October 6, 2006

This is the 279th day of the year, with 86 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: blue jeans

Holidays

• Feast day of St. Mary Frances of Naples, St. Faith of Agen, St. Nicetas of Constantinople, and St. Bruno.
• Egypt: Armed Forces Day.
• Ireland: Ivy Day.
• United Nations: Children's Day.

Events

• 1683 - The first Mennonites arrived in America aboard the Concord.
• 1769 - English naval explorer Captain James Cook, aboard the Endeavour, landed in New Zealand.
• 1847 - Charlotte Bronte's novel "Jane Eyre" was published in London.
• 1866 - The Reno brothers committed the country's first train robbery, near Seymour, Indiana.
• 1876 - The American Library Association was founded at Philadelphia.
• 1883 - The Orient Express completed its first run from Paris to Constantinople (now Istanbul); it took nearly 78 hours.
• 1884 - Naval War College was established in Newport, Rhode Island.
• 1889 - The Moulin Rouge in Paris first opened its doors to the public.
• 1889 - Thomas Edison showed his first motion pictures.
• 1908 - Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina.
• 1927 - The first successful talking picture was shown: "The Jazz Singer," starring Al Jolson (Warner Brothers), in New York City.
• 1928 - Nationalist General Chiang Kai-shek became president of China.
• 1949 - President Harry Truman signed the Mutual Defense Assistance Act, totaling $1.3 billion in military aid to NATO countries.
• 1961 - U.S. president John F. Kennedy, advised Americans to build or buy a bomb shelter to protect them from atomic fallout in the event of a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union.
• 1965 - Patricia Harris took a post as U.S. Ambassador to Belgium, becoming the first African-American U.S. ambassador.
• 1973 - War erupted in the Middle East as Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, beginning the Yom Kippur War.
• 1974 - "Monty Python's Flying Circus" debuted on TV.
• 1979 - Pope John Paul II, on a U.S. tour, became the first pontiff to visit the White House.
• 1981 - Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was shot to death by extremists at a military rally.
• 1994 - Michael Jordan announced his retirement from professional basketball to play professional baseball.

Births

• 1820 - Jenny Lind, "The Swedish Nightingale" Swedish singer.
• 1846 - George Westinghouse, American inventor, developer of AC electricity, founder of Westinghouse Electric Company.
• 1887 - Le Corbusier, Swiss architect.
• 1905 - Helen Wills Moody, American professional tennis champion.
• 1906 - Janet Gaynor (Laura Gainor), American actress, winner of the first Academy Award.
• 1908 - Carole Lombard (Jane Peters), American actress.
• 1914 - Thor Heyerdahl, Norwegian explorer, anthropologist, and author.
• 1983 - MM was born ^.^
  

Deaths

• 1536 - William Tyndale, English translator of the "New Testament," burned at the stake for heresy in France.
• 1637 - Ben Jonson, English poet and dramatist.
• 1892 - Alfred Tennyson, English poet.

On This Day: Sunday September 24, 2006

This is the 267th day of the year, with 98 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: Muppets

Holidays

• Guinea-Bissau: Independence Day.
• South Africa: National Heritage Day.
• Islam: Awwal Muharram.
• Dominican Republic: Feast of Our Lady Mary.
• Ghana: Third Republic Day.
• New Caledonia: Territorial Day.
• Peru: Feast of Our Lady Mary.
• Trinidad and Tobago: Republic Day.
• Venezuela: Day of the Public Functionary.
• Rwanda: Government Day/National Assembly Day/Referendum Day/Kamarampaka Day.

Events

• 622 - Mohammed and his followers commenced the Hegira, or "flight," to Medina, where he founded Islam.
• 1742 - Faneuil Hall opened in Boston.
• 1788 - French Parliament of Paris reassembled after having been dissolved.
• 1789 - Congress passed the first Judiciary Act, which provided for an attorney general and a Supreme Court.
• 1852 - French engineer Henri Giffard made the first flight in an airship that was powered by a steam engine.
• 1869 - Wall Street panic took place when financiers Jay Gould and James Fisk attempted to corner the gold market.
• 1906 - President Theodore Roosevelt signed a bill designating Devils Tower, a natural rock formation in the Black Hills of Wyoming, as the country's first National Monument.
• 1914 - German army captured St. Mihiel.
• 1929 - First all-instrument flight took place; it was piloted by U.S. Army Lieutenant James H. Doolittle.
• 1930 - Noel Coward's comedy "Private Lives" opened in London.
• 1960 - USS Enterprise, the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, was launched at Newport News, Virginia.
• 1962 - University of Mississippi agreed to admit James Meredith as the first black university student.
• 1963 - U.S. Senate ratified a treaty with Britain and the Soviet Union limiting nuclear testing and development.
• 1964 - "The Munsters" premiered on TV.
• 1969 - Trial of the so-called "Chicago Eight" (or "Chicago Seven") began for the political radicals accused of conspiring to incite the riots that occurred during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
• 1969 - "60 Minutes" debuted.
• 1975 - Brits Dougal Huston and Doug Scott became the first to reach the summit of Mount Everest via the southwest face.
• 1976 - Newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst was sentenced to seven years in prison for her part in a 1974 bank robbery. She is later released after 22 months, having received clemency.
• 1988 - The first female Episcopal assistant bishop was ordained (Barbara Harris).
• 1993 - Imelda Marcos, wife of the late Ferdinand Marcos, former dictator of the Philippines, was sentenced to 18 years imprisonment for corruption.
• 1993 - Sihanouk was reinstalled as king of Cambodia.
• 1998 - New, harder-to-counterfeit US $20 bill was introduced.

Births

• 1501 - Gerolamo Cardano, Italian mathematician.
• 1717 - Horace Walpole, British creator of the Gothic novel genre
• 1755 - John Marshall, fourth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
• 1896 - F. Scott Fitzgerald, American author.
• 1921 - Jim McKay (McManus), American sportscaster.
• 1936 - Jim Henson, American creator of the Muppets.

Deaths

• 1991 - Theodor "Dr. Suess" Geisel, American children's book author.

On This Day: Friday September 1, 2006

This is the 244th day of the year, with 121 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: chess pieces

Holidays

• Cameroon: Union Nationale Camerounaise Day.
• Japan: Disaster Prevention Day.
• Libya: Revolution Day.
• Slovakia: Constitution Day.
• Tanzania: Heroes' Day.
• Uzbekistan: Independence Day (from USSR, 1991).
• Beginning of Orthodox ecclesiastical year.
• Vietnam: Independence Day.

Events

• 1661 - First yacht race took place; participants were England's King Charles versus his brother, James.
• 1676 - Nathaniel Bacon led an uprising at Jamestown, Virginia, in which the settlement was burned down.
• 1773 - Phillis Wheatley's "Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral," was published, making her the first African-American poet to be published.
• 1807 - Former Vice President Aaron Burr was acquitted on charges of plotting to annex territory in Louisiana and Missouri to establish an independent republic.
• 1821 - William Becknell took a group of traders from Independence, Missouri, toward Santa Fe, blazing the Santa Fe Trail.
• 1836 - Marcus Whitman and wife Narcissa established the first American settlement in northern Oregon Territory. Narcissa was one of the first white women to travel the Oregon Trail.
• 1859 - First Pullman sleeping car was put into service.
• 1864 - Confederate forces, led by General John Bell Hood, evacuated Atlanta, anticipating the arrival of Union General William T. Sherman's troops.
• 1865 - Joseph Lister performed first surgery using antiseptics.
• 1870 - The Prussians defeated the French at Sedan in the last battle of the Franco-Prussian War.
• 1878 - Emma Nutt of Boston became the first female telephone operator.
• 1882 - The first Labor Day was observed in New York City by the Carpenters and Joiners Union.
• 1890 - First baseball tripleheader was played: Boston vs Pittsburgh.
• 1894 - Labor Day was declared a national holiday by an act of Congress.
• 1904 - Helen Keller graduated with honors from Radcliffe College.
• 1905 - Alberta and Saskatchewan became provinces of Canada.
• 1914 - St. Petersburg, Russia changed its name to Petrograd.
• 1916 - Bulgaria declared war on Rumania, expanding the World War I.
• 1923 - The Kanto earthquake leveled Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan, killing 300,000.
• 1939 - Germany invaded Poland, beginning World War II in Europe.
• 1939 - "Physical Review" published first article describing black holes.
• 1941 - Yellow star became obligatory wear for Jews under the Third Reich.
• 1945 - Japan surrendered to the United States, ending World War II. (Japan's date is 9/2.)
• 1969 - Moammar Gadhafi deposed King Idris in the Libyan revolution.
• 1970 - Dr. Hugh Scott of Washington, D.C. became the first African-American superintendent of schools of a major American city.
• 1971 - Qatar declared independence from Great Britain.
• 1972 - Bobby Fischer of the United States defeated Boris Spassky of Russia for the world chess title.
• 1976 - Representative Wayne L. Hayes (D-Ohio) resigned because of scandal with Elizabeth Ray.
• 1983 - Korean Airlines Flight 007, flying from New York to Seoul, was shot down by the Soviets after it strayed into restricted airspace over Sakhalin Island in the Sea of Japan. All 269 people aboard were killed, including 61 Americans, among them U.S. Representative Larry McDonald.
• 1985 - Seventy-three years after it sunk in the North Atlantic, the wreck of the R.M.S. Titanic was found by a US-French expedition; it was four hundred miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.

Births

• 1875 - Edgar Rice Burroughs, American novelist who wrote "Tarzan, the Ape Man."
• 1907 - Walter Reuther, American labor leader who merged the American Federation of Labor with the Congress of International Organizations.
• 1923 - Rocky Marciano, American world heavyweight boxer who retired undefeated.
• 1933 - Conway Twitty, American country and western music star.
• 1939 - Lily Tomlin, American comedienne and actress.
• 1957 - Gloria Estefan, Cuban singer.

Deaths

• 1557 - Jacques Cartier, French explorer.
• 1715 - Louis XIV, king of France.
• 1838 - William Clark, American explorer who with Meriwether Lewis led the first overland expedition to the Pacific Northwest.
• 1914 - Martha, last known passenger pigeon, at Cincinnati Zoo.
• 1977 - Ethel Waters, American actress and singer.
• 1983 - Henry "Scoop" Jackson, Democratic United States Senator from Washington.
• 1989 - A. Bartlett Giamatti, former president of Yale University and Commissioner of Baseball.