January 1, 2017

Today is New Year's Day, marking the first day of the new year.<---Get it?;)

Today is the last day of Kwanzaa.

Today is Global Family Day, "One day of peace and sharing.".

Today, you can celebrate National Bloody Mary Day, if you maybe celebrated New Year's Eve a little too much.;)

There are 364 days remaining in 2017.

There are 357 days until Christmas.:D


Events

45 BC – The Julian calendar takes effect as the civil calendar of the Roman Empire, establishing January 1 as the new date of the new year.

42 BC – The Roman Senate posthumously deifies Julius Caesar.

404 – Telemachus, a Christian monk, is killed for attempting to stop a gladiators' fight in the public arena held in Rome.

1001 – Grand Prince Stephen I of Hungary is named the first King of Hungary by Pope Sylvester II.

1068 – Romanos IV Diogenes marries Eudokia Makrembolitissa and is crowned Byzantine Emperor.

1259 – Michael VIII Palaiologos is proclaimed co-emperor of the Empire of Nicaea with his ward John IV Laskaris.

1438 – Albert II of Habsburg is crowned King of Hungary.

1515 – King Francis I of France succeeds to the French throne.

1527 – Croatian nobles elect Ferdinand I of Austria as King of Croatia.

1651 – Charles II is crowned King of Scotland.

1707 – John V is crowned King of Portugal.

1772 – The first traveler's cheques, which can be used in 90 European cities, go on sale in London, England.

1773 – The hymn that became known as "Amazing Grace", then titled "1 Chronicles 17:16–17" is first used to accompany a sermon led by John Newton in the town of Olney, England.

1781 – American Revolutionary War: One thousand five hundred soldiers of the 6th Pennsylvania Regiment under General 'Mad' Anthony Wayne's command rebel against the Continental Army's winter camp in Morristown, New Jersey in the Pennsylvania Line Mutiny of 1781.

1788 – First edition of The Times of London, previously The Daily Universal Register, is published.

1801 – The legislative union of Kingdom of Great Britain and Kingdom of Ireland is completed to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

1801 – Ceres, the largest and first known object in the Asteroid belt, is discovered by Giuseppe Piazzi.

1808 – The United States bans the importation of slaves.

1833 – The United Kingdom claims sovereignty over the Falkland Islands.

1847 – The world's first "Mercy" Hospital is founded in Pittsburgh by the Sisters of Mercy; the name will go on to grace over 30 major hospitals throughout the world.

1863 – American Civil War: The Emancipation Proclamation takes effect in Confederate territory.

1881 – Ferdinand de Lesseps begins French construction of the Panama Canal.

1892 – Ellis Island opens to begin processing immigrants into the United States.

1898 – New York, New York annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The four initial boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx, are joined on January 25 by Staten Island to create the modern city of five boroughs.

1902 – The first American college football bowl game, the Rose Bowl, is held in Pasadena, California.

1934 – Alcatraz Island becomes a United States federal prison.

1937 – Safety glass in vehicle windscreens becomes mandatory in the United Kingdom.

1942 – The Declaration by United Nations is signed by twenty-six nations. This is the basis for the modern United Nations.

1947 – The American and British occupation zones in Germany, after World War II, merge to form the Bizone, which later (with the French zone) became part of West Germany.

1947 – The Canadian Citizenship Act 1946 comes into effect, converting British subjects into Canadian citizens. Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King becomes the first Canadian citizen.

1948 – The British railway network is nationalized to form British Railways.

1953 - American singer-songwriter Hank Williams, Sr. died of a heart attack brought on by a lethal cocktail of pills and alcohol aged 29.

1959 – Fulgencio Batista, dictator of Cuba, is overthrown by Fidel Castro's forces during the Cuban Revolution.

1959 - Johnny Cash played a free concert for the inmates of San Quentin Prison. One of the audience members was 19 year-old Merle Haggard, who was in the midst of a 15 year sentence (he served three years) for grand theft auto and armed robbery.

1971 – Cigarette advertisements are banned on American television.

1983 – The ARPANET officially changes to using the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.

1984 – The original American Telephone & Telegraph Company is divested of its 22 Bell System companies as a result of the settlement of the 1974 United States Department of Justice antitrust suit against AT&T.

1985 – The first British mobile phone call is made by Michael Harrison to his father Sir Ernest Harrison, chairman of Vodafone.

1989 – The Montreal Protocol comes into force, stopping the use of chemicals contributing to ozone depletion.

1990 – David Dinkins is sworn in as New York City's first black mayor.

1994 – The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) comes into effect.

1995 – The Draupner wave in the North Sea in Norway is detected, confirming the existence of freak waves.

1999 – The Euro currency is introduced in 11 countries - members of the European Union (with the exception of the United Kingdom, Denmark, Greece and Sweden).

Continued in next post

Continued from previous post

2002 – The Open Skies mutual surveillance treaty, initially signed in 1992, officially comes into force.

2011 - Chuck Berry cut short a concert at Congress Theater, Chicago, Illinois after collapsing on stage an hour into the show. Berry slumped over a keyboard and did not move for a couple of minutes before being helped off stage, he returned 15 minutes later only to be forced off again almost immediately. The 84 year-old later re-emerged on stage but told fans he had no strength to continue performing.

2014 – Asteroid 2014 AA impacts the Earth over the Atlantic Ocean.

2016 – The Address Downtown Dubai burns over midnight as the New Year is rung in. The blaze started on the night of New Year's Eve 2015, by currently unknown causes. There was one fatality, a heart attack.

2017 – A nightclub in Istanbul, Turkey was attacked by gunmen. At least 39 people died from the shooting while attackers' motives are still unknown.

Births

1735 – Paul Revere; 1745 – Mad Anthony Wayne; 1752 – Betsy Ross; 1864 – Alfred Stieglitz; 1888 – John Garand:devil:(designed the M1 Garand rifle); 1889 – Charles Bickford; 1895 – J. Edgar Hoover; 1900 – Xavier Cugat; 1919 – Rocky Graziano:boxers:; 1919 – J. D. Salinger; 1924 – Charlie Munger; 1925 – Matthew Beard ('Stymie' on Our Gang); 1936 – James Sinegal (co-founded Costco); 1937 – Matt Robinson ('Gordon' on Sesame Street); 1938 – Frank Langella; 1942 – Country Joe McDonald♪ ♫(Country Joe and the Fish); 1943 – Don Novello (Father Guido Sarducci from SNL); 1944 – Jimmy Hart 'The Mouth of the South'; 1956 - Diane Warren♪ ♫(writer of over 80 Top 20 hits); 1958 – Grandmaster Flash♪ ♫; 1967 – Spencer Tunick; 1969 – Morris Chestnut; 1969 – Verne Troyer (mini-Me); 1973 – Danny Lloyd (the boy from The Shining)

Deaths

404 – Telemachus; 1748 – Johann Bernoulli; 1953 – Hank Williams, Sr.♪ ♫; 1972 – Maurice Chevalier; 1982 – Victor Buono ('King Tut' on Batman TOS); 1992 – Grace Hopper (co-developed COBOL); 1994 – Cesar Romero ('The Joker' on Batman TOS); 1996 – Arleigh Burke; 1997 – Townes Van Zandt♪ ♫; 2001 – Ray Walston (My Favorite Martian); 2003 – Royce D. Applegate; 2005 – Shirley Chisholm; 2013 – Patti Page♪ ♫; 2014 – Juanita Moore (Imitation of Life, Momdigr's favorite movie); 2015 – Mario Cuomo; 2015 – Donna Douglas

January 2

Today is Nat'l Cream Puff Day, in the U.S.

Also celebrated in the U.S. today, is Nat'l Science Fiction Day, celebrated on Isaac Asimov's observed birthday.


Events

533 – Mercurius becomes Pope John II, the first pope to adopt a new name upon elevation to the papacy.

1777 – American Revolutionary War: American forces under the command of George Washington repulsed a British attack at the Battle of the Assunpink Creek near Trenton, New Jersey. [Assunpink? Ass & pink? Really?:jig:]

1860 – The discovery of the planet Vulcan is announced at a meeting of the French Academy of Sciences in Paris, France.

1920 – The second Palmer Raid takes place with another 6,000 suspected communists and anarchists arrested and held without trial. These raids take place in several U.S. cities.

1941 – World War II: German bombing severely damages the Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom.

1942 – The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) convicts 33 members of a German spy ring headed by Fritz Joubert Duquesne in the largest espionage case in United States history—the Duquesne Spy Ring.

1971 – The second Ibrox disaster kills 66 fans at a Rangers-Celtic association football (soccer) match.

1974 - US country singer, actor and radio presenter Tex Ritter died of a heart attack when he was trying to bail a member of his band out of jail in Nashville.

1974 – United States President Richard Nixon signs a bill lowering the maximum U.S. speed limit to 55 MPH in order to conserve gasoline during an OPEC embargo.

1976 – The Gale of January 1976 begins, which results in coastal flooding around the southern North Sea coasts, resulting in at least 82 deaths and US$1.3 billion in damage.

1979 - Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious went on trial in New York accused of murdering his girlfriend Nancy Spungen three months earlier, when he claimed to have awoken from a drugged stupor to find Spungen dead on the bathroom floor of their room at the Hotel Chelsea in Manhattan.

1981 – One of the largest investigations by a British police force ends when serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, the "Yorkshire Ripper", is arrested in Sheffield, South Yorkshire.

1997 - Guitarist Randy California from US group Spirit drowned when rescuing his 12-year old son after he was sucked into a riptide off Hawaii.

1999 – A brutal snowstorm smashes into the Midwestern United States, causing 14 inches (359 mm) of snow in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and 19 inches (487 mm) in Chicago, where temperatures plunge to -13 °F (-25 °C); 68 deaths are reported.

1999 - Chef went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with Chocolate Salty Balls (PS I Love You). Chef appeared in the cult TV series South Park, the voice was that of Isaac Hayes (who had a hit with Shaft in 1971).

2004 – Stardust successfully flies past Comet Wild 2, collecting samples that are returned to Earth.

2006 – An explosion in a coal mine in Sago, West Virginia traps and kills 12 miners, leaving only one survivor.

Births

1647 – Nathaniel Bacon; 1901 – Bob Marshall (Bob Marshall Wilderness Area); 1909 – Barry Goldwater; 1913 – Anna Lee (General Hospital); 1920 – Isaac Asimov; 1930 – Julius La Rosa♪ ♫; 1936 – Roger Miller♪ ♫; 1942 – Dennis Hastert; 1947 – Jack Hanna; 1952 – Wendy Phillips (Touched By An Angel, Promised Land, Falcon Crest); 1964 – Pernell 'Sweet Pea' Whitaker:boxers:; 1968 – Cuba Gooding, Jr.; 1969 – Robby Gordon:driving:; 1969 – Glen Johnson:boxers:; 1969 – Christy Turlington; 1971 – Taye Diggs; 1975 – Dax Shepard; 1978 – Karina Smirnoff; 1986 – Trombone Shorty♪ ♫

Deaths

1904 – James Longstreet; 1953 – Guccio Gucci (founded Gucci); 1963 – Dick Powell; 1963 – Jack Carson; 1974 – Tex Ritter♪ ♫; 1983 – Dick Emery; 1986 – Una Merkel:love:; 1990 – Alan Hale, Jr. ('Skipper' on Gilligan's Island, The Gunfighter); 2000 – Elmo Zumwalt (namesake of the guided missile destroyer USS Zumwalt, and the Zumwalt-class of destroyers); 2011 – Anne Francis:love:(Honey West, Forbidden Planet); 2011 – Pete Postlethwaite; 2012 – Larry Reinhardt♪ ♫(Iron Butterfly)

No cream puffs, to many leftovers from the weekend.

January 3

Today the U.S. celebrates National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day.


Events

1521 – Pope Leo X excommunicates Martin Luther in the papal bull Decet Romanum Pontificem.

1749 – Benning Wentworth issues the first of the New Hampshire Grants, leading to the establishment of Vermont.

1777 – American General George Washington defeats British General Lord Cornwallis at the Battle of Princeton.

1823 – Stephen F. Austin receives a grant of land in Texas from the government of Mexico.

1870 – Construction of the Brooklyn Bridge begins.

1888 – The James Lick telescope at the Lick Observatory, measuring 91 cm in diameter, is used for the first time. It was the largest refracting telescope in the world at the time.

1911 – A gun battle in the East End of London left two dead and sparked a political row over the involvement of then-Home Secretary Winston Churchill.

1913 – An Atlantic coast storm sets the lowest confirmed barometric pressure reading (28.21 inHg) for a non-tropical system in the continental United States.

1938 – The March of Dimes is established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

1946 – Popular Canadian American jockey George Woolf dies in a freak accident during a race; the annual George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award is created to honor him. [Woolf is famous for having ridden Seabiscuit to victory in a match race over Triple Crown winner War Admiral. When asked what was the best race horse he'd ever ridden, Woolf didn't hesitate when he answered "Seabiscuit.":devil:]

1947 – Proceedings of the U.S. Congress are televised for the first time.

1953 – Frances P. Bolton and her son, Oliver from Ohio, become the first mother and son to serve simultaneously in the U.S. Congress.

1956 – A fire damages the top part of the Eiffel Tower.

1957 – The Hamilton Watch Company introduces the first electric watch, the Hamilton Electric 500.

1959 – Alaska is admitted as the 49th U.S. state.

1961 – The SL-1 nuclear reactor is destroyed by a steam explosion in the only reactor incident in the United States to cause immediate fatalities.

1962 – Pope John XXIII excommunicates Fidel Castro.

1967 - Having received a US army draft notice, The Beach Boys' Carl Wilson refused to be sworn in, saying he was a conscientious objector.

1977 – Apple Computer is incorporated.

1987 - Aretha Franklin became the first woman inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

1990 – Manuel Noriega, former leader of Panama, surrenders to American forces.

1999 – The Mars Polar Lander is launched.

2002 – Israeli forces seize the Palestinian freighter Karine A in the Red Sea, finding 50 tons of weapons.

Births

106 BC – Cicero; 1892 – J.R.R. Tolkien:devil:; 1894 – ZaSu Pitts; 1907 – Ray Milland; 1909 – Victor Borge:keys:; 1911 – John Sturges (director The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral); 1923 – Hank Stram; 1926 – George Martin "The Fifth Beatle"; 1929 – Sergio Leone (invented the 'spaghetti western', director of the Dollars Trilogy); 1929 – Gordon Moore (co-founder of Intel Corporation); 1930 – Robert Loggia ("Get on the wire, tell them how to bring those sons of bitches down."); 1932 – Dabney Coleman; 1937 – Glen A. Larson (created B. J. and the Bear, The Fall Guy, Magnum, P.I., Knight Rider, Quincy M.E., Alias Smith & Jones, et al); 1939 – Bobby Hull; 1945 – Stephen Stills♪ ♫(Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young, Buffalo Springfield); 1946 – John Paul Jones:bass:(Led Zeppelin); 1950 – Victoria Principal:love:; 1956 – Mel Gibson; 1969 – Michael Schumacher:driving:; 1975 – Danica McKellar; 1981 – Eli Manning; 1988 – J. R. Hildebrand:driving:

Deaths

1795 – Josiah Wedgwood (fine china); 1903 – Alois Hitler (if only he'd used a condom:(); 1945 – Edgar Cayce (<--Interesting read.); 1946 – William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw); 1967 – Jack Ruby (shot Lee Harvey Oswald); 1979 – Conrad Hilton; 1988 – Joie Chitwood:driving:(stunt car driver); 2009 – Pat Hingle (the judge in Hang 'Em High); 2014 – Phil Everly♪ ♫(The Everly Bros)

January 4

Today is World Braille Day, celebrating Louis Braille, who developed the 6-dot finger tip reading system known as Braille [by the age of 15].


Events

1490 – Anne of Brittany announces that all those who would ally with the King of France will be considered guilty of the crime of lèse-majesté.

1642 – King Charles I of England sends soldiers to arrest members of Parliament, commencing England's slide into civil war.

1717 – The Netherlands, Great Britain, and France sign the Triple Alliance.

1847 – Samuel Colt sells his first revolver pistol to the United States government. ["God created all men. Sam Colt made them equal."]

1853 – After having been kidnapped and sold into slavery in the American South, Solomon Northup regains his freedom; his memoir Twelve Years a Slave later becomes a national bestseller.

1865 – The New York Stock Exchange opens its first permanent headquarters near Wall Street in New York City.

1889 – The Oklahoma Land Run opens two million acres of unused Oklahoma Territory to first-come first-served settlers on April 22.

1896 – Utah is admitted as the 45th U.S. state.

1903 – Topsy, a performing elephant, is poisoned, strangled, and electrocuted by the owners of Luna Park, Coney Island, . The Edison film company shoots the film Electrocuting an Elephant of Topsy's death.

1912 – The Scout Association is incorporated throughout the British Empire by royal charter.

1951 – Korean War: Chinese and North Korean forces capture Seoul.

1958 – Sputnik 1 falls to Earth from orbit.

1959 – Luna 1 becomes the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Moon.

1972 – Rose Heilbron becomes the first female judge to sit at the Old Bailey in London, England.

1976 – The Troubles: The Ulster Volunteer Force shoots dead six Irish Catholic civilians in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The next day, gunmen shoot dead ten Protestant civilians nearby in retaliation.:headshake

1987 – The Maryland train collision: An Amtrak train en route to Boston from Washington, D.C., collides with Conrail engines in Chase, Maryland, killing 16 people.

1989 – Second Gulf of Sidra incident: A pair of Libyan MiG-23 "Floggers" are shot down by a pair of US Navy F-14 Tomcats during an air-to-air confrontation.

1998 – A massive ice storm hits eastern Canada and the northeastern United States, continuing through January 10 and causing widespread destruction.

1999 – Former professional wrestler Jesse 'The Body' Ventura is sworn in as governor of Minnesota.

2004 – Spirit, a NASA Mars rover, lands successfully on Mars.

2007 – The 110th United States Congress convenes, electing Nancy Pelosi as the first female Speaker of the House in U.S. history.

Births

1785 – Jacob Grimm (Grimm's Fairy Tales); 1809 – Louis Braille; 1838 – General Tom Thumb; 1890 – Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson (founder DC Comics); 1895 – Leroy Grumman (co-founded Grumman Aeronautical Engineering Co.); 1900 – Bond, James Bond (no, not that one, this one's an orthin- an onritho- he studies birds); 1905 – Sterling Holloway; 1920 – William Colby; 1927 – Barbara Rush (Peyton Place, All My Children); 1930 – Don Shula [Bum Phillips was asked who was the greatest coach, he said "Don Shula. He can take his'n, and beat yourn, then take yourn, and beat his'n."]; 1935 – Floyd Patterson:boxers:; 1937 – Dyan Cannon; 1957 – Patty Loveless♪ ♫; 1958 – Matt Frewer; 1958 – Julian Sands; 1959 – Vanity♪ ♫:love:; 1960 – Michael Stipe♪ ♫(R.E.M.); 1962 – Robin Guthrie♪ ♫(Cocteau Twins); 1962 – Peter Steele:bass:(Type O Negative); 1963 – Dave Foley; 1963 – Till Lindemann♪ ♫(Rammstein); 1965 – Julia Ormond; 1966 – Deana Carter♪ ♫

Deaths

1821 – Elizabeth Ann Seton; 1877 – Cornelius Vanderbilt; 1960 – Albert Camus; 1961 – Erwin Schrödinger (Schrödinger's cat); 1965 – T. S. Eliot; 1967 – Donald Campbell:driving:; 1986 – Phil Lynott:bass:(Thin Lizzy); 1997 – Harry Helmsley (Leona's husband); 1999 – Iron Eyes Cody (the crying Native American in the old anti-pollution commercial); 2001 – Les Brown♪ ♫; 2011 – Gerry Rafferty♪ ♫(Stealer's Wheel)

Never heard of Peter Steele, but the "Type O Negative" comment intrigued me, so I looked it up, expecting some bloody story to follow.

Turns out it's a story of intellectual property and trying to come up again and again with a unique band name only to find out somebody beat you to it. For those as ignorant as I am, his band was "Repulsion" first but had to change its name because there was already another "Repulsion." Then it was "Subzero" and he even got a tattoo with a zero containing a minus sign, when he found out there was already another "Subzero." He already was committed to the tattoo and "Type O Negative" also could be used to describe that ink, so he stuck with "Type O Negative." It appears there are no other "Type O Negatives."

January 5

Today is the last of the Twelve Days of Christmas.

Tonight is Twelfth Night.

Today is Sausage Day, at least in Clitheroe, Lancashire in the northwest of England, and this is the only mention of it I could find.

Today is Nat'l Bird Day in the U.S.

The Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival begins today in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China.


Events

1066 – Edward the Confessor dies childless, sparking a succession crisis that will eventually lead to the Norman conquest of England.

1477 – Battle of Nancy: Charles the Bold is killed and Burgundy becomes part of France.

1757 – Louis XV of France survives an assassination attempt by Robert-François Damiens, the last person to be executed in France by drawing and quartering, the traditional and gruesome form of capital punishment used for regicides.

1781 – American Revolutionary War: Richmond, Virginia, is burned by British naval forces led by Benedict Arnold, causing Governor Thomas Jefferson to flee the city.

1875 – The Palais Garnier, one of the most famous opera houses in the world, is inaugurated in Paris.

1895 – Dreyfus affair: French army officer Alfred Dreyfus is stripped of his rank and sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil's Island.

1914 – The Ford Motor Company announces an eight-hour workday.

1919 – The German Workers' Party, which would become the Nazi Party, is founded.

1933 – Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge begins in San Francisco Bay.

1949 – United States President Harry S Truman unveils his Fair Deal program.

1957 – In a speech given to the United States Congress, United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces the establishment of what will later be called the Eisenhower Doctrine.

1972 – United States President Richard Nixon orders the development of a Space Shuttle program.

1974 – Warmest reliably measured temperature below the Antarctic Circle of +59 °F (+15 °C) recorded at Vanda Station.

1975 – The Tasman Bridge in Tasmania, Australia, is struck by the bulk ore carrier Lake Illawarra, killing twelve people.

1991 – The United States Embassy to Somalia in Mogadishu is evacuated by helicopter airlift days after violence enveloped Mogadishu during the Somali Civil War.

1998 - Sonny Bono died in a skiing accident at a resort near Lake Tahoe, he was 62.

2004 - Kinks singer Ray Davies was shot in the leg while on holiday in New Orleans. The 59-year-old singer-songwriter was shot while running after two men who stole his girlfriend's purse at gunpoint.

2005 – Eris, the most massive and second-largest known dwarf planet in the Solar System, is discovered by the team of Michael E. Brown, Chad Trujillo, and David L. Rabinowitz using images originally taken on October 21, 2003, at the Palomar Observatory.

2014 – A launch of the communication satellite GSAT-14 aboard the GSLV MK.II D5 marks the first successful flight of an Indian cryogenic engine.

2016 - Donald Fagen, lead singer and founder of Steely Dan, was arrested by New York police and charged with assaulting his wife at their home. Fagen, was accused of pushing Libby Titus into a marble window frame, knocking her to the floor of their Manhattan apartment.

Deaths

1778 – Zebulon Pike (Pike's Peak); 1779 – Stephen Decatur; 1855 – King Camp Gillette (founded the Gillette Company); 1904 – Jeane Dixon; 1914 – George Reeves (Adventures of Superman); 1917 – Jane Wyman; 1923 – Sam Phillips♪ ♫(Sun Records); 1928 – Walter Mondale (42nd VPOTUS); 1931 – Robert Duvall:devil:; 1932 – Umberto Eco; 1932 – Chuck Noll; 1940 – Athol Guy:bass:(The Seekers); 1942 – Charlie Rose; 1945 – Roger Spottiswoode (director Tomorrow Never Dies, The 6th Day); 1946 – Diane Keaton; 1948 – Ted Lange ('Isaac' the bartender on The Love Boat); 1950 – Chris Stein:shred:(Blondie); 1953 – Pamela Sue Martin (The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, Dynasty); 1953 – George Tenet; 1959 – Clancy Brown (head guard 'Hadley' in The Shawshank Redemption); 1962 – Suzy Amis (The Ballad of Little Jo, Titanic); 1964 – Grant Young:drummer:(Soul Asylum); 1965 – Vinnie Jones:devil:; 1966 – Kate Schellenbach:drummer:(Luscious Jackson, The Beastie Boys); 1968 – Carrie Ann Inaba:love:; 1969 – Marilyn Manson♪ ♫; 1975 – Bradley Cooper; 1978 – January Jones; 1922 – Ernest Shackleton; 1943 – George Washington Carver; 1979 Charles Mingus:bass:; 1982 – Hans Conried; 1988 – 'Pistol' Pete Maravich; 1990 – Arthur Kennedy (The Glass Menagerie, They Died with Their Boots On, Fantastic Voyage); 1994 – Tip O'Neill; 1998 – Sonny Bono♪ ♫(Sonny & Cher); 2005 – Danny Sugerman♪ ♫(manager The Doors); 2007 – Momofuku Ando (founded Nissin Foods, makers of Top Ramen:devil:); 2014 – Carmen Zapata

January 6

Western Christianity celebrates today as Epiphany, the day the Magi visited Baby Jesus.

In Ireland and Scotland, and other places, today is known as Little Christmas. Also known as Women's Christmas.


Events

1017 – Cnut the Great is crowned King of England.

1066 – Harold Godwinson (or Harold II) is crowned King of England.

1205 – Philip of Swabia becomes King of the Romans.

1322 – Stephen Uroš III is crowned King of Serbia.

1355 – Charles I of Bohemia is crowned with the Iron Crown of Lombardy as King of Italy.

1449 – Constantine XI is crowned Byzantine Emperor.

[Izzit just me, or, is there a pattern here?:eyebrow:]

1492 – The Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella enter Granada, completing the Reconquista.

1540 – King Henry VIII of England marries Anne of Cleves.

1690 – Joseph, son of Emperor Leopold I, becomes King of the Romans.

1838 – Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph system using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code).

1839 – The most damaging storm in 300 years sweeps across Ireland, damaging or destroying more than 20% of the houses in Dublin.

1853 – President-elect of the United States Franklin Pierce and his family are involved in a train wreck near Andover, Massachusetts. Pierce's 11-year-old son Benjamin is killed in the crash.

1907 – Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome, Italy.

1912 – New Mexico is admitted to the Union as the 47th U.S. state.

1929 – Mother Teresa arrives in Calcutta, India, to begin her work among India's poorest and sick people.

1930 – The first diesel-engined automobile trip is completed, from Indianapolis, Indiana, to New York, New York.

1931 – Thomas Edison signs his last patent application.

1947 – Pan American Airlines becomes the first commercial airline to offer a round-the-world ticket.

1958 - Gibson Guitars launched it's 'Flying V' electric guitar. Guitarists who played a Flying V include, Albert Collins, Jimi Hendrix, Marc Bolan and Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top.

1967 – Vietnam War: United States Marine Corps and ARVN troops launch "Operation Deckhouse Five" in the Mekong River delta.

1974 – In response to the 1973 oil crisis, daylight saving time commences nearly four months early in the United States.

1994 – Nancy Kerrigan is clubbed on the knee at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Detroit.

2000 – Celia, the last Pyrenean ibex, was found dead after a tree had fallen on her.

2001 - Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour won the right to his dot com name. Dave took legal action in his battle to reclaim davidgilmourdotcom from Andrew Herman who had registered the URL and was selling Pink Floyd merchandise through the site.

2005 – American Civil Rights Movement: Edgar Ray Killen is arrested as a suspect in the 1964 murders of three civil rights workers.

2005 – A train collision in Graniteville, South Carolina, releases about 60 tons of chlorine gas.

Births

1412 – Joan of Arc; 1745 – Jacques-Etienne Montgolfier; 1832 – Gustave Doré:artist:; 1878 – Carl Sandburg; 1880 – Tom Mix; 1882 – Sam Rayburn; 1912 – Danny Thomas:turd:; 1913 – Loretta Young; 1924 – Earl Scruggs♪ ♫; 1925 – John DeLorean; 1926 – Mickey Hargitay (w/Jayne Mansfield, father of Mariska Hargitay); 1928 – Capucine; 1930 – Vic Tayback (owner of Mel's Diner in Alice); 1931 – E. L. Doctorow; 1937 – Lou Holtz; 1940 – Van McCoy♪ ♫(wrote "The Hustle"); 1944 – Bonnie Franklin (One Day At A Time); 1946 – Syd Barrett♪ ♫(Pink Floyd); 1947 – Sandy Denny♪ ♫(Fairport Convention); 1950 – Louis Freeh; 1951 – Kim Wilson♪ ♫(The Fabulous Thunderbirds:devil:); 1953 – Malcolm Young:shred:(AC/DC); 1954 – Trudie Styler (wife of Sting); 1955 – Rowan Atkinson:devil:; 1959 - Kathy Sledge♪ ♫(Sister Sledge); 1960 - Muzz Skillings:bass:(Living Colour); 1960 – Paul Azinger; 1960 – Howie Long; 1962 – Michael Houser:shred:(Widespread Panic); 1964 – Mark O'Toole:bass:(Frankie Goes To Hollywood); 1968 – John Singleton; 1969 – Norman Reedus ('Daryl Dixon' on The Walking Dead, Boondock Saints I & II); 1970 – Julie Chen:love:; 1970 – Gabrielle Reece; 1982 – Eddie Redmayne; 1984 – Eric Trump (second son of the President-elect of the United States, Donald Trump); 1986 – Alex Turner♪ ♫(Arctic Monkeys)

Deaths

1852 – Louis Braille; 1919 – Theodore Roosevelt (26th POTUS, "a cross between a walrus, and the spirit of war"); 1921 – Devil Anse Hatfield; 1944 – Ida Tarbell; 1949 – Victor Fleming (director Gone With The Wind, The Wizard Of Oz, et al); 1978 – Burt Munro (subject of The World's Fastest Indian); 1993 – Dizzy Gillespie♪ ♫; 1993 – Rudolf Nureyev; 2000 – Don Martin ("Mad's Maddest Artist"); 2006 – Lou Rawls♪ ♫; 2009 – Ron Asheton:bass:(The Stooges); 2016 – Pat Harrington, Jr. (building super 'Schneider' on One Day At A Time)

Well played

This Day in History: FREEDOM DIED ON THE CELLAR

Must you spread your shit absolutely everywhere?

Everyone here knows, KNOWS, you are bat shit insane for whatever reason, no need to spread it everywhere.

:p:

January 7

Today the United States of America celebrates (JFC) Nat'l Bobblehead Day.:facepalm: God save us.


Events

1558 – France takes Calais, the last continental possession of England.

1610 – Galileo Galilei makes his first observation of the four Galilean moons: Ganymede, Callisto, Io and Europa, although he is not able to distinguish the last two until the following day.

1782 – The Bank of North America opened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as the United States' first de facto central bank.

1785 – Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England, to Calais, France, [a distance of ~25 miles] in a gas balloon.

1835 – HMS Beagle drops anchor off the Chonos Archipelago.

1894 – William Kennedy Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film.

1927 – The first transatlantic telephone service is established from New York, New York to London.

1942 – World War II: The siege of the Bataan Peninsula begins.

1945 – World War II: British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge.

1948 – Kentucky Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell crashes while in pursuit of a supposed UFO. [Capt. Mantell crashed his P-51 Mustang in my hometown, about 3 miles from my house. My house wasn't here then.:)]

1959 – The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro.

1980 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation giving $1.5 billion in loans to bail out the Chrysler Corporation.

1999 – The Senate trial in the impeachment of U.S. President Bill Clinton begins.

2006 - Gary Glitter was formally charged with committing obscene acts with two girls aged 11 and 12 in Vietnam, the prosecutor in the southern province of Ba Ria Vung Tau said the charges would carry prison terms of three to seven years. Glitter, (Paul Gadd), had been held since November as he tried to flee the country over child sex allegations.

2006 - Pink married her motocross racer boyfriend Carey Hart on a beach in Costa Rica. More than 100 people attended the singer's big day, including Lisa-Marie Presley. Pink proposed to him during one of his races in Mammoth Lakes, California, by holding up a sign that read "Will you marry me?" Hart pulled out of the race to say yes.

2015 – Two gunmen commit mass murder at the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris, shooting twelve people execution style, and wounding eleven others.

Births

1800 – Millard Fillmore (13th POTUS); 1873 – Adolph Zukor (co-founded Paramount Pictures); 1895 – Hudson Fysh (co-founded Qantas Airways Limited); 1910 – Orval Faubus; 1911 – Butterfly McQueen (she didn't know nothin' 'bout birthin' no babies); 1912 – Charles Addams (created The Addams Family); 1920 – Vincent Gardenia; 1929 – Terry Moore; 1930 – Jack Greene♪ ♫; 1938 – Paul Revere:keys:(& The Raiders); 1946 – Jann Wenner (co-founded Rolling Stone Magazine); 1948 – Kenny Loggins♪ ♫; 1952 – Sammo Hung (Martial Law); 1956 – David Caruso (YEEEAAAAAHHHH!!!!!); 1957 – Katie Couric; 1959 – Kathy Valentine:bass:(The Go-Gos); 1963 – Rand Paul; 1964 – Nicolas Cage; 1970 – Doug E. Doug; 1971 – Jeremy Renner; 1974 – John Rich♪ ♫(Big & Rich); 1980 – Ivan L. Moody♪ ♫(Five Finger Death Punch); 1980 – Merritt Wever ('Nurse Zoey' on Nurse Jackie)

Deaths

1536 – Catherine of Aragon; 1932 – André Maginot (The Maginot Line); 1943 – Nikola Tesla:shocking:; 1980 – Larry Williams♪ ♫; 1988 – Trevor Howard; 1989 – Hirohito (124th Emperor of Japan); 1990 – Bronko Nagurski; 2001 – James Carr♪ ♫:devil:; 2002 – Avery Schreiber; 2007 – Bobby Hamilton:driving:; 2013 – Huell Howser; 2016 – Kitty Kallen♪ ♫

January 8

387 – Siyaj K'ak' conquers Waka, Fozzie Bear's homeland.

1297 – François Grimaldi, disguised as a monk, leads his men to capture the fortress protecting the Rock of Monaco, establishing his family as the rulers of Monaco.

1697 – Thomas Aikenhead, a student at Edinburgh, becomes the last person executed for blasphemy in Britain.

1746 – Second Jacobite rising: Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling.

1790 – George Washington delivers the first State of the Union address in New York City.

1815 – War of 1812: Battle of New Orleans: Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British.

1835 – The United States national debt is zero for the only time.

1867 – African American men are granted the right to vote in Washington, D.C.

1877 – Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle against the United States Cavalry at Wolf Mountain, Montana Territory.

1940 – World War II: Britain introduces food rationing.

1963 – Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time, at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

1972 - The New Seekers were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing, (in Perfect Harmony'). The song started as a Coca Cola TV ad. It originally included the line, 'I'd like to buy the world a Coke.'

1973 – Watergate scandal: The trial of seven men accused of illegal entry into Democratic Party headquarters at Watergate begins.

1981 – A local farmer reports a UFO sighting in Trans-en-Provence, France, claimed to be "perhaps the most completely and carefully documented sighting of all time".

1989 – Kegworth air disaster: British Midland Flight 92, a Boeing 737-400, crashes into the M1 motorway, killing 47 of the 126 people on board.

1994 – Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov leaves for the Mir space station on Soyuz TM-18. He would stay on the station until March 22, 1995, for a record 437 days in space.

2002 – President George W. Bush signs into law the No Child Left Behind Act.

2004 – The RMS Queen Mary 2, the largest ocean liner ever built, is christened by her namesake's granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II.

2005 – The nuclear sub USS San Francisco collides at full speed with an undersea mountain south of Guam. One man is killed, but the sub surfaces and is repaired.

2011 – The attempted assassination of Arizona Representative Gabrielle Giffords and subsequent shooting in Casas Adobes, Arizona, in which five people were shot dead.

2016 - David Bowie released his twenty-fifth and final studio album Blackstar, on his 69th birthday and two days before his death. It became his first and only album to reach No.1 on the Billboard 200 album chart in the US.

Births

1821 – James Longstreet; 1862 – Frank Nelson Doubleday (founded the Doubleday Publishing Company); 1904 – Karl Brandt; 1908 – William Hartnell (the 1st Dr. Who); 1911 – Gypsy Rose Lee:ggw:; 1912 – José Ferrer; 1923 – Larry Storch (F Troop); 1926 – Soupy Sales; 1931 – Bill Graham♪ ♫(concert promoter); 1933 – Charles Osgood (CBS News Sunday Morning); ♪ ♫1935 – Elvis Presley♪ ♫; 1937 – Shirley Bassey♪ ♫; 1938 – Bob Eubanks (The Newlywed Game); 1941 – Graham Chapman ("You vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous pervert!"); 1942 – Stephen Hawking:wheelchr:; 1942 – Yvette Mimieux; 1946 – Robby Krieger:shred:(The Doors); 1947 – David Bowie♪ ♫; 1947 – Terry Sylvester♪ ♫(The Hollies); 1951 – John McTiernan; 1955 – Mike Reno♪ ♫(Loverboy); 1959 – Kim Duk-koo:boxers:(died after a match against Ray 'BoomBoom' Mancini); 1959 – Paul Hester:drummer:(Crowded House); 1966 – Andrew Wood♪ ♫(Mother Love Bone); 1967 – R. Kelly:urinal:; 1979 – Sarah Polley; 1984 – Kim Jong-un (Dear Leader)

Deaths

1825 – Eli Whitney; 1880 – Emperor Norton; 1896 – Paul Verlaine; 1914 – Simon Bolivar Buckner; 1916 – Ada Rehan; 1979 – Sara Carter♪ ♫(The Carter Family); 1981 – Matthew Beard ('Stymie' on Our Gang); 1990 – Terry-Thomas; 1991 – Steve Clark:shred:(Def Leppard, died the rock star's death, alcohol poisoning); 1994 – Pat Buttram ('Mr. Haney' on Green Acres); 1996 – François Mitterrand; 2002 – Dave Thomas (founder Wendy's); 2007 – Yvonne De Carlo:love:('Lily Munster' on The Munsters); 2015 – Andraé Crouch♪ ♫; 2015 – Patsy Garrett (Benji movie series)

January 9

475 – Byzantine Emperor Zeno is forced to flee his capital at Constantinople, and his general, Basiliscus gains control of the empire.

1349 – The Jewish population of Basel, Switzerland believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing Black Death, is rounded up and incinerated.

1431 – Judges' investigations for the trial of Joan of Arc begin in Rouen, France, the seat of the English occupation government.

1806 – Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson receives a state funeral and is interred in St Paul's Cathedral.

1816 – Sir Humphry Davy tests his safety lamp for miners at Hebburn Colliery.

1839 – The French Academy of Sciences announces the Daguerreotype photography process.

1861 – American Civil War: "Star of the West" incident occurs near Charleston, South Carolina, when she was fired upon by cadets from The Citadel. [Effectively, the first shots fired in the American Civil War.]

1909 – Ernest Shackleton, leading the Nimrod Expedition to the South Pole, plants the British flag 97 nautical miles (180 km; 112 mi) from the South Pole, the farthest South anyone had ever reached at that time.

1916 – World War I: The Battle of Gallipoli concludes with an Ottoman Empire victory when the last Allied forces are evacuated from the peninsula.

1918 – Battle of Bear Valley: The last battle of the American Indian Wars.

1960 – President of Egypt Gamal Abdel Nasser opens construction on the Aswan Dam by detonating ten tons of dynamite to demolish twenty tons of granite on the east bank of the Nile river.

1963b - Drummer Charlie Watts joined The Rolling Stones after leaving Blues Incorporated and his job working as a graphic designer.

1991 – Representatives from the United States and Iraq meet at the Geneva Peace Conference to try to find a peaceful resolution to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

1996 – First Chechen War: Chechen separatists launch a raid against the helicopter airfield and later a civilian hospital in the city of Kizlyar in the neighboring Dagestan, which turns into a massive hostage crisis involving thousands of civilians.

2007 – Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduces the original iPhone at a Macworld keynote in San Francisco.

2015 – The perpetrators of the Charlie Hebdo shooting in Paris two days earlier are both killed after a hostage situation. Elsewhere, a second hostage situation, related to the Charlie Hebdo shooting, occurs at a Jewish market in Vincennes.

Births

1854 – Lady Randolph Churchill (mother of Sir Winston Churchill); 1870 – Joseph Strauss (co-designed the Golden Gate Bridge); 1901 – Chic Young (created comic strip Blondie); 1915 – Anita Louise (My Friend Flicka); 1925 – Lee Van Cleef:devil:; 1928 – Judith Krantz; 1934 – Bart Starr; 1935 – Bob Denver (Gilligan); 1935 – Dick Enberg; 1936 – Anne Rivers Siddons; 1941 – Joan Baez♪ ♫; 1944 – Jimmy Page:shred:(Led Zeppelin, The Yardbirds, The Firm); 1948 – Bill Cowsill♪ ♫(The Cowsills); 1950 - David Johansen♪ ♫(The New York Dolls); 1951 – Crystal Gayle♪ ♫; 1955 – J.K. Simmons; 1959 – Mark Martin:driving:; 1965 – Joely Richardson; 1967 – Dave Matthews:shred:(Dave Matthews Band); 1978 – A. J. McLean♪ ♫(Backstreet Boys)

Deaths

1324 – Marco Polo; 1766 – Thomas Birch; 1858 – Anson Jones; 1987 – Arthur Lake; 1992 – Steve Brodie; 1997 – Jesse White (The Maytag Repairman); 2015 – Bud Paxson (Fuck you, Bud Paxson.:flipbird:); 2016 – Angus Scrimm (The Tall Man in the Phantasm movies)

January 10

49 BC – Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon, signalling the start of civil war.

1776 – Thomas Paine publishes his pamphlet Common Sense.

1861 – American Civil War: Florida secedes from the Union.

1870 – John D. Rockefeller incorporates Standard Oil.

1927 – Fritz Lang's futuristic film Metropolis is released in Germany.

1946 – The United States Army Signal Corps successfully conducts Project Diana, bouncing radio waves off the Moon and receiving the reflected signals.

1962 – Apollo program: NASA announces plans to build the C-5 rocket launch vehicle, which became known as the Saturn V Moon rocket, which launched every Apollo Moon mission.

1985 – Sandinista Daniel Ortega becomes president of Nicaragua and vows to continue the transformation to socialism and alliance with the Soviet Union and Cuba; American policy continues to support the Contras in their revolt against the Nicaraguan government.

1990 – Time Warner is formed by the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications.

2015 – A mass poisoning at a funeral in Mozambique involves beer that was deliberately contaminated with crocodile bile leaving at least 56 dead and nearly 200 hospitalized.

2016 - English singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist/record producer/painter/actor David Bowie died from liver cancer at his New York home two days after releasing the album Blackstar on his 69th birthday.

Births

1836 – Charles Ingalls (father of Laura Ingalls Wilder, known for her Little House series of books); 1843 – Frank James (elder brother of Jesse James, member of the James Gang, the gang, not the musical group); 1904 – Ray Bolger ('Scarecrow' in The Wizard Of Oz); 1908 – Paul Henreid; 1917 – Jerry Wexler♪ ♫; 1924 – Max Roach:drummer:; 1927 – Johnnie Ray♪ ♫; 1930 – Roy E. Disney; 1935 – Ronnie Hawkins♪ ♫(his backing band became The Band); 1936 – Stephen E. Ambrose; 1939 – Scott McKenzie♪ ♫("San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair))"; 1939 – Sal Mineo; 1943 – Jim Croce:shred:; 1944 – Frank Sinatra, Jr.♪ ♫; 1945 – Rod Stewart♪ ♫; 1946 – Aynsley Dunbar:drummer:; 1947 – Neal Smith:drummer:; 1948 – Donald Fagen♪ ♫(Steely Dan); 1949 – George Foreman:boxers:; 1949 – Linda Lovelace:bj2:; 1952 – Scott Thurston♪ ♫(Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers); 1953 – Pat Benatar♪ ♫; 1953 – Bobby Rahal:driving:; 1955 – Michael Schenker:shred:(UFO, Scorpions); 1956 – Shawn Colvin♪ ♫; 1958 – Eddie Cheever:driving:; 1964 – Brad Roberts♪ ♫(Crash Test Dummies); 1973 – Félix Trinidad:boxers:

Deaths

1778 – Carl Linnaeus; 1862 – Samuel Colt (founded Colt's Manufacturing Company); 1917 – Buffalo Bill Cody; 1951 – Sinclair Lewis; 1961 – Dashiell Hammett; 1971 – Coco Chanel; 1976 – Howlin' Wolf:shred:; 1982 – Paul Lynde; 1997 – Sheldon Leonard; 2000 – Sam Jaffe; 2004 – Spalding Gray; 2007 – Carlo Ponti; 2015 – Taylor Negron; 2016 – David Bowie♪ ♫

January 11

Today is Nat'l Human Trafficking Awareness Day in the U.S.


Events

532 – Nika riots in Constantinople: A quarrel between supporters of different chariot teams—the Blues and the Greens—in the Hippodrome escalates into violence. [HIPPODROME'S GOT HOOLIGANS!!!]

1569 – First recorded lottery in England.

1759 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the first American life insurance company is incorporated.

1787 – William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus.

1805 – The Michigan Territory is created.

1861 – Alabama secedes from the United States.

1863 – American Civil War: CSS Alabama encounters and sinks the USS Hatteras off Galveston Lighthouse in Texas.

1908 – Grand Canyon National Monument is created.

1917 – The Kingsland munitions factory explosion [<--Interesting read.] occurs, in Lyndhurst, NJ, as a result of sabotage.

1922 – First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient.

1927 – Louis B. Mayer, head of film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), announces the creation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, at a banquet in Los Angeles, California.

1935 – Amelia Earhart becomes the first person to fly solo from Hawaii to California.

1949 – The first "networked" television broadcasts took place as KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania goes on the air connecting the east coast and mid-west programming.

1962 – An avalanche on Huascarán in Peru causes around 4,000 deaths.

1964 – Surgeon General of the United States Dr. Luther Terry, M.D., publishes the landmark report Smoking and Health: Report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon General of the United States saying that smoking may be hazardous to health, sparking national and worldwide anti-smoking efforts.

1967 - The Jimi Hendrix Experience recorded 'Purple Haze' at De Lane Lea studios in London. Hendrix later stated 'The Purple Haze,' was about a dream he had and that he was "walking under the sea."

1973 – Major League Baseball owners vote in approval of the American League adopting the designated hitter position.

2000 - It was reported that Whitney Houston was under investigation after allegedly trying to smuggle 15.2 grams of Marijuana out of Hawaii. A security officer found the drug in the singer's handbag, Houston then walked away when he tried to detain her.

2003 – Illinois Governor George Ryan commutes the death sentences of 167 prisoners on Illinois's death row based on the Jon Burge scandal, in which, suspects were beaten and tortured with cattle prods, burning on radiators, and Violet Wands, in order to obtain confessions.

Births

1755 – Alexander Hamilton (founded the Federalist Party, The U.S. Coast Guard, & The N.Y. Post); 1807 – Ezra Cornell (founded Western Union and Cornell University); 1858 – Harry Gordon Selfridge (founded Selfridges dept stores); 1870 – Alexander Stirling Calder:artist(father & son of Alexander Calder); 1887 – Aldo Leopold; 1895 - Laurens Hammond♪ ♫(invented the Hammond organ, as well as the Hammond clock); 1906 – Albert Hofmann (discovered LSD:devil:, [May God Bless And Keep Him]); 1908 – Lionel Stander (butler/Man Friday on Hart To Hart); 1912 – Don "Red" Barry; 1923 – Carroll Shelby AC Cobra, Shelby Mustangs, and an awesome chili cook); 1925 – Grant Tinker (former Chairman/CEO of NBC, tv producer, married to Mary Tyler Moore for 19 yrs); 1928 – David L. Wolper (producer Roots, The Thorn Birds, Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory (1971)); 1930 – Rod Taylor; 1942 – Clarence Clemons♪ ♫(E Street Band); 1946 – Naomi Judd♪ ♫(The Judds, mother to WYnona & Ashley); 1946 – Tony Kaye:keys:(Yes); 1951 – Charlie Huhn:shred:(Ted Nugent); 1952 – Ben Crenshaw; 1952 – Lee Ritenour:shred:; 1956 – Robert Earl Keen:shred::devil:; 1958 – Vicki Peterson:shred:(The Bangles); 1959 – Brett Bodine:driving:; 1968 - Tom Dumont:shred:(No Doubt); 1971 – Mary J. Blige♪ ♫; 1972 – Amanda Peet

Deaths

1836 – John Molson (founded the Molson Brewing Company); 1843 – Francis Scott Key (lyricist "Star Spangled Banner"); 1928 – Thomas Hardy (author "Tess of the d'Urbervilles"; 1981 – Beulah Bondi (played Jimmy Stewart's mother in four films Of Human Hearts, Vivacious Lady, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) and It's a Wonderful Life (1946)); 1988 – Greg 'Pappy' Boyington (fighter pilot w/Flying Tigers, Black Sheep Squadron, inspiration for the tv series Baa Baa Black Sheep); 2008 – Edmund Hillary (w/Tenzing Norgay, 1st to summit Mt. Everest); 2008 – Carl Karcher (co-founded fast food chain Carl's Jr.); 2013 – Tom Parry Jones (invented the breathalyzer); 2015 – Anita Ekberg:love:; 2016 – David Margulies

January 12

1528 – Gustav I of Sweden is crowned king.

1866 – The Royal Aeronautical Society is formed in London.

1895 – The National Trust is founded in the United Kingdom.

1908 – A long-distance radio message is sent from the Eiffel Tower for the first time.

1915 – The United States House of Representatives rejects a proposal to require states to give women the right to vote.

1921 – Acting to restore confidence in baseball after the Black Sox Scandal, Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis is elected as Major League Baseball's first commissioner.

1926 – Original radio show Sam 'n' Henry aired on Chicago radio, later renamed Amos 'n' Andy in 1928.

1932 – Hattie Caraway becomes the first woman elected to the United States Senate.

1962 – Vietnam War: Operation Chopper, the first American combat mission in the war, takes place.

1967 – Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation.

1969 – The New York Jets of the American Football League defeat the Baltimore Colts of the National Football League to win Super Bowl III in what is considered to be one of the greatest upsets in sports history.

1971 – The Harrisburg Seven: Rev. Philip Berrigan and five other activists [1 + 5 = 7?] are indicted on charges of conspiring to kidnap Henry Kissinger and of plotting to blow up the heating tunnels of federal buildings in Washington, D.C.

1991 – Persian Gulf War: An act of the U.S. Congress authorizes the use of American military force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.

1998 – Nineteen European nations agree to forbid human cloning.

2004 – The world's largest ocean liner, RMS Queen Mary 2, makes its maiden voyage.

2005 – Deep Impact (the spacecraft, not the movie) launches from Cape Canaveral on a Delta II rocket.

2010 – An earthquake in Haiti occurs, killing over 100,000 people and destroying much of the capital Port-au-Prince.

Births

1822 – Étienne Lenoir (designed the internal combustion engine); 1856 – John Singer Sargent:artist:; 1876 – Jack London; 1879 – Ray Harroun:driving:(won 1st Indy 500); 1893 – Hermann Göring; 1901 – Karl Künstler; 1904 – Mississippi Fred McDowell♪ ♫; 1905 – Tex Ritter♪ ♫; 1910 – Patsy Kelly; 1910 – Luise Rainer; 1916 – P. W. Botha; 1918 – Maharishi Mahesh Yogi; 1923 – Ira Hayes (one of the Marines to raise the flag on Iwo Jima, subject of "Ira Hayes" by Johnny Cash); 1926 – Ray Price♪ ♫; 1930 – Tim Horton (founded Tim Hortons); 1939 – William Lee Golden♪ ♫(The Oak Ridge Boys, he was the mountain man); 1941 – Long John Baldry♪ ♫; 1944 – Smokin' Joe Frazier:boxers:; 1947 – Tom Dempsey (NFL place kicker, was notable for being born with no right toes (nor right fingers), who kicked a no-time-left, game-winning field goal from 63 yards in 1970, that was the NFL record, until it was broken by Matt Prater in 2013); 1951 – Kirstie Alley; 1951 – Chris Bell♪ ♫(Big Star); 1951 – Rush Limbaugh (gas bag); 1952 – Ricky Van Shelton♪ ♫; 1954 – Howard Stern's Ass; 1960 – Oliver Platt; 1964 – Jeff Bezo$ (Amazon.com); 1965 – Rob Zombie♪ ♫:devil:; 1970 – Zack de la Rocha♪ ♫(Rage Against The Machine); 1974 – Melanie C♪ ♫(Spice Girls, she was 'Sporty Spice'); 1981 – Amerie:love:

Deaths

1899 – Hiram Walker (founded Canadian Club whisky); 1976 – Agatha Christie; 2001 – William Redington Hewlett (co-founded Hewlett-Packard); 2003 – Maurice Gibb♪ ♫(The Bee Gees); 2004 – Randy VanWarmer♪ ♫

January 13

Today is Friday The Thirteenth.

Today is Stephen Foster Memorial Day in the U.S., celebrating the life of Stephen Foster on the anniversary of his death.:eyebrow:

Today is the feast day of St. Mungo, founder , and patron saint of Glasgow, Scotland.

Also today, the Korean-American community celebrates Korean-American Day, commemorating Korean immigration to the United States, and contributions of Korean-Americans to American culture.


Events

1797 – French Revolutionary Wars: A naval battle between a French ship of the line and two British frigates off the coast of Brittany ends with the French vessel running aground, resulting in over 900 deaths.

1815 – War of 1812: British troops capture Fort Peter in St. Marys, Georgia, the only battle of the war to take place in the state.

1842 – Dr. William Brydon, an assistant surgeon in the British East India Company Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, becomes famous for being the sole survivor of an army of 4,500 men and 12,000 camp followers when he reaches the safety of a garrison in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.

1893 – U.S. Marines land in Honolulu, Hawaii from the USS Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.

1888 – The National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C.

1898 – Émile Zola's J'accuse…! exposes the Dreyfus affair.

1908 – The Rhoads Opera House fire in Boyertown, Pennsylvania kills 171 people.

1910 – The first public radio broadcast takes place; a live performance of the operas Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci are sent out over the airwaves from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York.

1939 – The Black Friday bush fires burn 20,000 square kilometers [almost 5 million acres] of land in Australia, claiming the lives of 71 people.

1942 – Henry Ford patents a plastic automobile, which is 30% lighter than a regular car.

1942 – World War II: First use of an aircraft ejection seat by a German test pilot in a Heinkel He 280 jet fighter.

1960 – The Gulag system of forced labor camps in the Soviet Union is officially abolished.

1962 - Chubby Checker went back to No.1 on the US singles chart with 'The Twist'. The song first went to No.1 in Sept 1960 and became the only record in American chart history to top the charts on two separate occasions.

1968 – Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom State Prison in California.

1978 – United States Food and Drug Administration requires all blood donations to be labeled "paid" or "volunteer" donors.

1982 – Shortly after takeoff, Air Florida Flight 90, a Boeing 737 jet, crashes into Washington, D.C.'s 14th Street Bridge and falls into the Potomac River, killing 78, including four motorists.

1985 – A passenger train plunges into a ravine in Ethiopia, killing 428 in the worst railroad disaster in Africa.

1990 – Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American governor as he takes office in Richmond, Virginia.

2012 – The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off the coast of Italy due to the captain's negligence and irresponsibility. There are 32 confirmed deaths.

Births

1808 – Salmon P. Chase; 1832 – Horatio Alger, Jr.; 1885 – Alfred Fuller (founded the Fuller Brush Company); 1901 – A. B. Guthrie, Jr.; 1919 – Robert Stack (The Untouchables, Unsolved Mysteries); 1927 – Liz Anderson♪ ♫(wrote "(My Friends Are Gonna Be) Strangers" & "I'm a Lonesome Fugitive" for Merle Haggard, Lynn Anderson's mother); 1929 – Joe Pass:shred:; 1930 – Frances Sternhagen (The Closer); 1931 – Ian Hendry; 1931 – Charles Nelson Reilly; 1943 – Richard Moll (Night Court); 1949 – Brandon Tartikoff; 1954 – Trevor Rabin♪ ♫(Yes); 1957 – Mark O'Meara; 1961 – Wayne Coyne♪ ♫(The Flaming Lips); 1961 – Julia Louis-Dreyfus:love:; 1962 – Trace Adkins♪ ♫; 1964 – Penelope Ann Miller; 1966 – Patrick Dempsey ('McDreamy' on Grey's Anatomy); 1970 – Shonda Rhimes (creator, head writer, executive producer, and showrunner of Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, and Scandal); 1972 – Nicole Eggert; 1977 – Orlando Bloom ('Legolas' in The Lord Of the Rings trilogy, 'Will' in Pirates of the Caribbean movie series, 'Paris' in Troy); 1990 – Liam Hemsworth (The Hunger Games movies)

Deaths

614 – Saint Mungo; 1864 – Stephen Foster♪ ♫("Oh! Susanna", "Camptown Races", "Old Folks at Home" ("Swanee River"), "My Old Kentucky Home"); 1882 – Wilhelm Mauser (Mauser bolt-action rifle); 1885 – Schuyler Colfax (17th VPOTUS); 1929 – Wyatt Earp; 1941 – James Joyce; 1962 – Ernie Kovacs; 1978 – Hubert Humphrey (38th VPOTUS); 1979 – Donny Hathaway♪ ♫; 2009 – Patrick McGoohan (The Prisoner, 'King Edward "The Longshanks"' in Braveheart; 2010 – Teddy Pendergrass♪ ♫; 2012 – Richard Threlkeld

January 14

Today is Ratification Day in the United States, celebrating the anniversary of the ratification of the 1783 Treaty of Paris.


Events

1539 – Spain annexes Cuba.

1639 – The "Fundamental Orders", the first written constitution that created a government, is adopted in Connecticut.

1784 – American Revolutionary War: Ratification Day, United States - Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain.

1911 – Roald Amundsen's South Pole expedition makes landfall on the eastern edge of the Ross Ice Shelf.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill begin the Casablanca Conference to discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to travel by airplane while in office when he travels from Miami to Morocco, to meet with Winston Churchill, where they discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war.

1950 – The first prototype of the MiG-17 makes its maiden flight.

1952 – NBC's long-running morning news program Today debuts, with host Dave Garroway.

1954 – The Hudson Motor Car Company merges with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation forming the American Motors Corporation.

1960 – The Reserve Bank of Australia, the country's central bank and banknote issuing authority, is established.

1967 – Counterculture of the 1960s: The Human Be-In takes place in San Francisco, California's Golden Gate Park, launching the Summer of Love.

1969 – An accidental explosion aboard the USS Enterprise near Hawaii kills 27 people.

1973 – Elvis Presley's concert Aloha from Hawaii is broadcast live via satellite, and sets the record as the most watched broadcast by an individual entertainer in television history.

2004 – The national flag of the Republic of Georgia, the so-called "five cross flag", is restored to official use after a hiatus of some 500 years.

2011 – Former president of Tunisia, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali flees his country to Saudi Arabia after a series of street demonstrations against his regime and corrupt policies, asking for freedom, rights and democracy, considered as the anniversary of the Tunisian Revolution and the birth of the Arab Spring.

2015 – Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson completed the first-ever free climb of the Dawn Wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

83 BC– Mark Antony; 1741 – Benedict Arnold; 1875 – Albert Schweitzer; 1886 – Hugh Lofting (created Doctor Dolittle); 1892 – Hal Roach; 1896 – John Dos Passos; 1906 – William Bendix; 1915 – Mark Goodson (created Family Feud and The Price Is Right); 1919 – Andy Rooney; 1926 – Tom Tryon; 1932 – Big Daddy Don Garlits:driving::devil:; 1936 – Clarence Carter♪ ♫("Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, oooohh shit!, Clarence Carter!"); 1938 – Allen Toussaint:keys:; 1941 – Faye Dunaway; 1943 – Shannon Lucid (astronaut); 1948 – T Bone Burnett:shred:; 1948 – Carl Weathers; 1949 – Lawrence Kasdan; 1952 – Sydney Biddle Barrows; 1963 – Steven Soderbergh; 1964 – Shepard Smith; 1967 - Zakk Wylde:shred:(Ozzy, Black Label Society); 1969 – Jason Bateman (Hancock); 1969 – Dave Grohl:shred::drummer:(Nirvana, Foo Fighters); 1982 - Caleb Followill♪ ♫(Kings of Leon)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1742 – Edmond Halley; 1898 – Lewis Carroll (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland); 1920 – John Francis Dodge (co-founded the Dodge Automobile Company); 1957 – Humphrey Bogart; 1961 – Barry Fitzgerald; 1965 – Jeanette MacDonald; 1977 – Peter Finch (He was mad as hell and he wasn't going to take it anymore.); 1977 – Anaïs Nin; 1984 – Ray Kroc; 1986 – Donna Reed; 1987 – Douglas Sirk; 2004 – Uta Hagen; 2004 – Ron O'Neal (Superfly); 2006 – Shelley Winters; 2009 – Ricardo Montalbán; 2012 – Dan Evins (founded Cracker Barrel Old Country Store); 2013 – Conrad Bain; 2016 – Alan Rickman

January 15

Today is Wikipedia Day. Wikipedia is 16 years old.:devil: I'm not entirely sure we can live without Wikipedia.


Events

1559 – Elizabeth I is crowned Queen of England in Westminster Abbey, London, England.

1759 – The British Museum opens.

1777 – American Revolutionary War: New Connecticut (present-day Vermont) declares its independence.

1844 – University of Notre Dame receives its charter from the state of Indiana.

1870 – A political cartoon for the first time symbolizes the Democratic Party with a donkey ("A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion" by Thomas Nast for Harper's Weekly).

1889 – The Coca-Cola Company, then known as the Pemberton Medicine Company, is incorporated in Atlanta.

1892 – James Naismith publishes the rules of basketball.

1910 – Construction ends on the Buffalo Bill Dam in Wyoming, United States, which was the highest dam in the world at the time, at 325 ft (99 m).

1936 – The first building to be completely covered in glass, built for the Owens-Illinois Glass Company, is completed in Toledo, Ohio.

1943 – The Pentagon is dedicated in Arlington, Virginia.

1967 – The first Super Bowl is played in Los Angeles. The Green Bay Packers defeat the Kansas City Chiefs 35–10.

1970 – Muammar Gaddafi is proclaimed premier of Libya.

1973 – Vietnam War: Citing progress in peace negotiations, President Richard Nixon announces the suspension of offensive action in North Vietnam.

1976 – Gerald Ford's would-be assassin, Sara Jane Moore, is sentenced to life in prison.

2001 – Wikipedia, a free wiki content encyclopedia, goes online.

2002 - 1980's British pop legend Adam Ant was admitted to a mental ward 24 hours after being charged by police with pulling a gun on staff in a London pub.

2005 – ESA's SMART-1 lunar orbiter discovers elements such as calcium, aluminum, silicon, iron, and other surface elements on the Moon.

2009 – Captain Sully (Chesley Sullenberger) emergency landed a US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River saving all 155 passengers after the plane collided with birds few minutes after take-off. [The event became known as The Miracle On The Hudson.]

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1622 – Molière; 1870 – Pierre S. du Pont; 1902 – Saud of Saudi Arabia; 1906 – Aristotle Onassis; 1909 – Gene Krupa:drummer:; 1913 – Lloyd Bridges; 1918 – Gamal Abdel Nasser; 1924 – George Lowe; 1926 – Maria Schell:love:; 1929 – Earl Hooker; 1929 – Martin Luther King, Jr.; 1941 – Captain Beefheart♪ ♫; 1948 – Ronnie Van Zant♪ ♫:devil:; 1953 – Randy White; 1957 – Mario Van Peebles; 1958 - Ken Judge; 1965 – Bernard 'The Executioner' Hopkins:boxers:; 1966 – Lisa Lisa♪ ♫; 1968 – Chad Lowe; 1971 – Regina King; 1979 – Drew Brees; 1988 – Skrillex♪ ♫

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1876 – Eliza McCardle Johnson (18th FLOTUS); 1896 – Mathew Brady; 1950 – Henry H. Arnold; 1964 – Jack Teagarden♪ ♫; 1970 – William T. Piper (founded Piper Aircraft); 1987 – Ray Bolger ('Scarecrow' in The Wizard Of Oz); 1990 – Gordon Jackson (Upstairs Downstairs); 1993 – Sammy Cahn♪ ♫; 1994 – Harry Nilsson♪ ♫; 1996 – Minnesota Fats; 1998 – Junior Wells♪ ♫; 2005 – Ruth Warrick(All My Children); 2007 – James Hillier (co-invented the electron microscope); 2014 – Roger Lloyd-Pack; 2016 – Dan Haggerty; 2016 – Ken Judge

I eagerly await the day that there are more notable deaths than births. I don't know why.

Freaky about that guy Ken Judge but I guess it happens to about one in 365 of us

And more often than you'd think.

Helluva thing, dying on yer birthday.

January 16

Today is Nat'l Nothing Day in the U.S., "to provide Americans with one National day when they can just sit without celebrating, observing or honoring anything." [Good enough for me. It's day drinking and goofing off all day. Wait, that's what I do everyday! I'm a valueless lump (:finger: you know who you are;)), yay me!!:jig:]

Also celebrated today in the U.S. is Nat'l Religious Freedom Day.


Events

27 BC – Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus is granted the title Augustus by the Roman Senate, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire.

1362 – A storm tide in the North Sea ravages the East coast of England and destroys the German city of Rungholt on the island of Strand.

1412 – The Medici family is appointed official banker of the Papacy.

1547 – Ivan IV of Russia a.k.a. Ivan the Terrible becomes Czar of Russia.

1605 – The first edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by Miguel de Cervantes is published in Madrid, Spain.

1707 – The Scottish Parliament ratifies the Act of Union, paving the way for the creation of Great Britain.

1786 – Virginia enacts the Statute for Religious Freedom, authored by Thomas Jefferson.

1847 – John C. Frémont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.

1862 – Hartley Colliery disaster: Two hundred and four men and boys killed in a mining disaster, prompted a change in UK law which henceforth required all collieries to have at least two independent means of escape.

1883 – The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the United States Civil Service, is passed.

1909 – Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.

1919 – Temperance movement: The United States ratifies the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, requiring Prohibition in the United States one year after ratification.

1920 – The League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, France.

1942 – Crash of TWA Flight 3, killing all 22 aboard, including film star Carole Lombard.

1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Führerbunker.

1964 – Hello, Dolly! opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.

1969 – Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of manned spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a space walk.

1973 - Bruce Springsteen appeared at Villanova University, Philadelphia, to an audience of 25 people. Due to a strike at the time by Villanova's school newspaper The Villanovan, this concert went unadvertised, so this is probably the smallest crowd Bruce and The E Street Band have ever played in front of.

1977 - One half of TV cop show "Starsky & Hutch" (he was blonde Hutch), David Soul went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Don't Give Up On Us'. Also a No.1 in the US.

1979 – The last Iranian Shah flees Iran with his family for good and relocates to Egypt.

1985 - David Bowie's schizophrenic half-brother Terry Burnes killed himself after laying down on the railway lines at Coulsdon South station, London. He was killed instantly by a passing train. He was 47.

1988 - Tina Turner gave herself a place in the record books when she performed in front of 182,000 people in Rio De Janeiro. The largest audience ever for a single artist.

1990 - Ike Turner was convicted of driving under the influence of cocaine and being under the influence of cocaine [shocker, I know] and sentenced to a four year prison sentence in California.

1991 – Coalition Forces go to war with Iraq, beginning the Gulf War.

1992 - Eric Clapton recorded his Unplugged session for MTV. The set, which included his current hit single 'Tears in Heaven' and a reworked acoustic version of 'Layla', earned six Grammy Awards for the album including Record of the Year.

1996 - Jamaican authorities opened fire on Jimmy Buffett's seaplane, The Hemisphere Dancer, mistaking it for a drug trafficker's plane. U2 singer Bono was also on the plane; neither singer was injured in the incident. The incident inspired Buffett to write a song called 'Jamaica Mistaica'.

2001 – US President Bill Clinton awards former President Theodore Roosevelt a posthumous Medal of Honor for his service in the Spanish–American War.

2003 – The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107 which would be its final one. Columbia would disintegrate 16 days later on re-entry.

2004 - Michael Jackson appeared in court and pleaded not guilty to seven charges of child molestation. The singer, who arrived 21 minutes late, was told off by the Santa Barbara judge saying 'Mr. Jackson, you have started out on the wrong foot here, it is an insult to the court.'

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1821 – John C. Breckinridge (14th VPOTUS); 1878 – Harry Carey; 1900 – Edith Frank (Anne Frank's mother); 1901 – Frank Zamboni (yeah, that Zamboni); 1908 – Ethel Merman♪ ♫; 1910 – Dizzy Dean; 1917 – Carl Karcher (founded Carl's Jr.); 1920 – Elliott Reid (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes); 1932 – Dian Fossey; 1933 – Susan Sontag; 1934 – Bob Bogle♪ ♫(The Ventures); 1935 – A. J. Foyt:driving:; 1936 – Michael White (producer Monty Python And The Holy Grail); 1943 – Ronnie Milsap:cool::keys:; 1944 – Jim Stafford:shred::lol2:; 1947 – Laura Schlessinger (Dr. Laura); 1948 – John Carpenter (director, screenwriter, producer, Halloween (1978), The Fog (1980), Escape from New York (1981), Starman, Assault on Precinct 13, Christine, Big Trouble in Little China); 1950 – Debbie Allen; 1950 – Robert Schimmel; 1959 – Sade♪ ♫; 1962 – Maxine Jones♪ ♫(En Vogue); 1965 - Jill Sobule♪ ♫(she kissed a girl); 1969 – Stevie Jackson♪ ♫(Belle & Sebastion); 1969 – Roy Jones Jr.:boxers:; 1971 – Jonathan Mangum (white dude); 1974 – Kate Moss; 1979 – Aaliyah♪ ♫

Continued in next post

Continued from previous post

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1891 – Léo Delibes:keys:; 1906 – Marshall Field (founded Marshall Field's dept stores); 1942 – Carole Lombard; 1957 – Arturo Toscanini♪ ♫; 1967 – Robert J. Van de Graaff (high-voltage Van de Graaff generators); 1968 – Bob Jones, Sr. (founded Bob Jones University); 1972 – Ross Bagdasarian, Sr. (created Alvin and the Chipmunks), co-wrote "Come on-a My House"); 1981 – Bernard Lee ('M' in 11 James Bond movies); 2007 – Benny Parsons:driving:; 2009 – Andrew Wyeth:artist:; 2010 – Glen Bell (founded Taco Bell); 2013 – Pauline Phillips (created Dear Abby); 2014 – Ruth Duccini (Munchkin); 2014 – Dave Madden (the band's manager on The Partridge Family)

Jill Sobule is not actually Katy Perry but the singer/songwriter who wrote the same titled song ten years before Katy Perry.

And had a radio hit with it.

Thanks for correcting me on that lyric. I confused the two. My head transposes my facts (and lyrics) sometimes.:)

I still bet she liked it.

January 17

1773 – Captain James Cook commands the first expedition to sail south of the Antarctic Circle.

1811 – Mexican War of Independence: In the Battle of Calderón Bridge, a heavily outnumbered Spanish force of 6,000 troops defeats nearly 100,000 Mexican revolutionaries.

1893 – Lorrin A. Thurston, along with the Citizens' Committee of Public Safety, led the Overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii and the government of Queen Liliʻuokalani.

1899 – The United States takes possession of Wake Island in the Pacific Ocean.

1904 – Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard receives its premiere performance at the Moscow Art Theatre.

1912 – Robert Falcon Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition reached the South Pole, only to find Roald Amundsen's team, who had beaten them by 33 days.

1917 – The United States pays Denmark $25 million for the Virgin Islands.

1929 – Popeye the Sailor Man, a cartoon character created by E. C. Segar, first appears in the Thimble Theatre comic strip.

1944 – World War II: Allied forces launch the first of four assaults on Monte Cassino with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome, an effort that would ultimately take four months, and cost 105,000 Allied casualties.

1945 – The SS-Totenkopfverbände begin the evacuation of the Auschwitz concentration camp as Soviet forces close in.

1945 – World War II: The Vistula–Oder Offensive forces German troops out of Warsaw.

1945 – Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg [posthumously, one of only eight Honarary Citizens of The United States] is taken into Soviet custody while in Hungary; he is never publicly seen again.

1950 – The Great Brink's Robbery: Eleven thieves steal more than $2 million from an armored car company's offices in Boston. Only $58,000 of the $2.7 million was recovered.

1961 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a televised farewell address to the nation three days before leaving office, in which he warns against the accumulation of power by the "military–industrial complex" as well as the dangers of massive spending, especially deficit spending.

1966 – Palomares incident: A B-52 bomber collides with a KC-135 Stratotanker over Spain, killing seven airmen, and dropping three 70-kiloton nuclear bombs near the town of Palomares, and another one into the sea.

1981 – President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos lifts martial law eight years and five months after declaring it.

1991 – Operation Desert Storm begins early in the morning. Iraq fires eight Scud missiles into Israel in an unsuccessful bid to provoke Israeli retaliation.

1994 – The Northridge earthquake shakes the Greater Los Angeles Area with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), leaving 57 people dead and more than 8,700 injured.

1995 – The Great Hanshin earthquake shakes the southern Hyōgo Prefecture with a maximum Shindo of VII, leaving 5,502–6,434 people dead, and 251,301–310,000 displaced.

1997 – Cape Canaveral Air Force Station: A Delta II carrying a GPS2R satellite explodes 13 seconds after launch, dropping 250 tons of burning rocket remains around the launch pad.

1998 – Lewinsky scandal: Matt Drudge breaks the story of the Bill Clinton–Monica Lewinsky affair on his Drudge Report website.

2002 – Mount Nyiragongo erupts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, displacing an estimated 400,000 people.

2007 – The Doomsday Clock is set to five minutes to midnight in response to North Korea's nuclear testing.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1706 – Benjamin Franklin; 1820 – Anne Brontë; 1880 – Mack Sennett; 1882 – Noah Beery, Sr. (The Mark Of Zorro); 1886 – Glenn L. Martin (of Martin Marietta, & Lockheed Martin); 1899 – Al Capone; 1908 – Cus D'Amato:boxers:(manager); 1911 – John S. McCain Jr.; 1922 – Betty White; 1926 – Moira Shearer; 1927 – Eartha Kitt♪ ♫('Catwoman' on Batman TOS); 1928 – Vidal Sassoon; 1931 – James Earl Jones; 1932 – Sheree North; 1933 – Dalida♪ ♫; 1933 – Shari Lewis (put her hand up Lambchop); 1939 – Maury Povich; 1942 – Muhammad Ali:boxers::devil:; 1949 – Anita Borg:borg:; 1949 – Andy Kaufman; 1949 – Mick Taylor:shred:(John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, The Rolling Stones); 1954 – Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; 1955 – Steve Earle♪ ♫; 1956 – Paul Young♪ ♫; 1957 – Steve Harvey; 1959 – Susanna Hoffs♪ ♫(The Bangles); 1960 – John Crawford♪ ♫(Berlin); 1961 – Brian Helgeland (wrote screenplays for L.A. Confidential, Mystic River, 42); 1962 – Jim Carrey (moron); 1964 – Michelle Obama (46th FLOTUS); 1966 – Joshua Malina (West Wing, Sports Night); 1967 – Richard Hawley♪ ♫; 1969 – Naveen Andrews (Lost); 1971 – Lil Jon (Waht? Okaay. Get Crunk!); 1971 – Kid Rock:shred::keys::drummer::devil:(Twisted Brown Trucker Band); 1980 – Maksim Chmerkovskiy (DWTS); 1980 – Zooey Deschanel♪ ♫:eyeball::eyeball:; 1984 – Calvin Harris♪ ♫

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1468 – Skanderbeg; 1874 – Chang and Eng Bunker (Thai conjoined twins); 1893 – Rutherford B. Hayes (19th POTUS); 1927 – Juliette Gordon Low (founder of the Girl Scouts of the USA); 1933 – Louis Comfort Tiffany; 1952 – Walter Briggs, Sr. (co-owner/sole owner Detroit Tigers, co-founded Detroit Zoo); 1997 – Clyde Tombaugh (discovered planet Pluto); 2003 – Richard Crenna (The Sand Pebbles, 3 Rambo movies, The Real McCoys, Our Miss Brooks); 2004 – Noble Willingham (City Slickers, The Last Boy Scout, Walker Texas Ranger); 2005 – Virginia Mayo; 2007 – Art Buchwald; 2008 – Bobby Fischer; 2010 – Erich Segal (author Love Story); 2011 – Don Kirshner (Don Kirshner's Rock Concert); Don Harron (KORN radio announcer 'Charlie Farquharson' on Hee Haw)

January 18

1486 – King Henry VII of England marries Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV.

1535 – Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro founds Lima, the capital of Peru.

1670 – Henry Morgan captures Panama.

1778 – James Cook is the first known European to visit the Hawaiian Islands, which he names the "Sandwich Islands".

1788 – The first elements of the First Fleet carrying 736 convicts from Great Britain to Australia arrive at Botany Bay.

1884 – Dr. William Price attempts to cremate the body of his infant son, Jesus Christ Price, setting a legal precedent for cremation in the United Kingdom.

1886 – Modern hockey is born with the formation of The Hockey Association in England.

1911 – Eugene B. Ely lands on the deck of the USS Pennsylvania stationed in San Francisco Bay, the first time an aircraft landed on a ship.

1919 – World War I: The Paris Peace Conference opens in Versailles, France.

1960 – Capital Airlines Flight 20 crashes into a farm in Charles City County, Virginia, [Charles City County, VA is not a misprint] killing all 50 aboard, the third fatal Capital Airlines crash in as many years.

1967 – Albert DeSalvo, "The Boston Strangler", is convicted of numerous crimes and is sentenced to life imprisonment.

1974 – A Disengagement of Forces agreement is signed between the Israeli and Egyptian governments, ending conflict on the Egyptian front of the Yom Kippur War.

1974 - Former members from Free, (Paul Rodgers & Simon Kirke), Mott The Hoople (Mick Ralphs), and King Crimson, (Boz Burrell), formed Bad Company. The band went on to score a US No.1 album with their debut release.

1977 – Scientists identify a previously unknown bacterium, Legionella, as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires' disease.

1981 – Phil Smith and Phil Mayfield parachute off a Houston skyscraper, becoming the first two people to BASE jump from objects in all four categories: buildings, antennae, spans (bridges), and earth (cliffs).

1983 – The International Olympic Committee restores Jim Thorpe's Olympic medals to his family.

1989 - At just 38 years old, Stevie Wonder became the youngest living person to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

1990 – Washington, D.C. Mayor Marion Barry is arrested for drug possession (crack cocaine) in an FBI sting.

1993 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is officially observed for the first time in all 50 states.

2000 - Spencer Goodman was executed by lethal injection in Huntsville, Texas. Goodman was convicted of kidnapping and murdering the wife of ZZ Top manager Bill Ham in 1991. Ham was present for the execution.

2003 – A bushfire kills four people and destroys more than 500 homes in Canberra, Australia.

2007 – The strongest storm in the United Kingdom in 17 years kills 14 people and Germany sees the worst storm since 1999 with 13 deaths. Hurricane Kyrill causes at least 44 deaths across 20 countries in Western Europe. [Peak wind gust of 155 mph.]

2016 - The Eagles guitarist Glenn Frey died at the age of 67 in New York City from complications arising from rheumatoid arthritis, colitis and pneumonia.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1782 – Daniel Webster; 1854 – Thomas A. Watson (assistant to Alexander Graham Bell); 1882 – A. A. Milne (author Winnie-The-Pooh); 1888 – Thomas Sopwith (Sopwith Camel); 1892 – Oliver Hardy (Laurel & Hardy); 1904 – Cary Grant; 1911 – Danny Kaye; 1933 – John Boorman; 1933 – Ray Dolby (founded Dolby Laboratories); 1938 – Curt Flood; 1941 – Bobby Goldsboro♪ ♫; 1941 – David Ruffin♪ ♫(The Temptations); 1943 – Paul Freeman ('Belloq' in Raiders of the Lost Ark); 1944 – Paul Keating; 1950 – Gilles Villeneuve:driving:; 1954 – Tom Bailey♪ ♫(The Thompson Twins); 1954 – Ted DiBiase; 1955 – Kevin Costner; 1961 – Mark Messier; 1969 – Dave Bautista; 1969 – Jesse L. Martin (Law & Order, Rent); 1971 – Jonathan Davis♪ ♫(Korn); 1971 – Christian Fittipaldi:driving:(Emerson Fittipaldi's nephew); 1973 – Luther Dickinson:shred:(North Mississippi All Stars); 1980 – Jason Segel (How I Met Your Mother, Despicable Me, Forgetting Sarah Marshall)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1862 – John Tyler (10th POTUS); 1936 – Rudyard Kipling; 1952 – Curly Howard (The Three Stooges); 1954 – Sydney Greenstreet (The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca); 1966 – Kathleen Norris; 2005 – Lamont Bentley (Moesha, The Parkers); 2010 – Kate McGarrigle♪ ♫; 2011 – Sargent Shriver; 2015 – Dallas Taylor:drummer:(Crosby, Stills, & Nash); 2016 – Glenn Frey:shred::keys::devil:(The Eagles)

January 19

Today Texas celebrates Confederate Heroes Day, while much of the southern U.S. (including Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia and Mississippi) celebrates today as Robert E. Lee Day.


Events

1419 – Hundred Years' War: Rouen surrenders to Henry V of England, completing his reconquest of Normandy.

1661 – Thomas Venner is hanged, drawn and quartered in London.

1817 – An army of 5,423 soldiers, led by General José de San Martín, crosses the Andes from Argentina to liberate Chile and then Peru.

1829 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust: The First Part of the Tragedy receives its premiere performance.

1853 – Giuseppe Verdi's opera Il trovatore receives its premiere performance in Rome.

1861 – American Civil War: Georgia joins South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama in seceding from the United States.

1862 – American Civil War: Battle of Mill Springs: The Confederacy suffers its first significant defeat in the conflict.

1915 – Georges Claude patents the neon discharge tube for use in advertising.

1915 – World War I: German zeppelins bomb the towns of Great Yarmouth and King's Lynn in the United Kingdom killing at least 20 people, in the first major aerial bombardment of a civilian target.

1917 – Seventy-three people are killed and 400 injured in an explosion in a munitions plant in London.

1920 – The United States Senate votes against joining the League of Nations.

1937 – Howard Hughes sets a new air record by flying from Los Angeles to New York City in seven hours, 28 minutes, 25 seconds.

1945 – World War II: Soviet forces liberate the Łódź Ghetto. Of more than 200,000 inhabitants in 1940, less than 900 had survived the Nazi occupation.

1953 – Almost 72% of all television sets in the United States are tuned into I Love Lucy to watch Lucy give birth.

1971 - Tracks from The Beatles' The White Album (including 'Helter Skelter'), were played in the courtroom at the Sharon Tate murder trial to find out if any songs could have influenced Charles Manson and his followers to commit murder. Actress Sharon Tate who was married to film director Roman Polanski, was eight and a half months pregnant when she was murdered in her home, along with four others, by followers of Charles Manson.

1977 – President Gerald Ford pardons Iva Toguri D'Aquino (a.k.a. "Tokyo Rose").

1978 – The last Volkswagen Beetle made in Germany leaves VW's plant in Emden. Beetle production in Latin America continues until 2003.

1981 – Iran hostage crisis: United States and Iranian officials sign an agreement to release 52 American hostages after 14 months of captivity.

1983 – Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is arrested in Bolivia.

1983 – The Apple Lisa, the first commercial personal computer from Apple Inc. to have a graphical user interface and a computer mouse, is announced.

1986 – The first IBM PC computer virus is released into the wild. A boot sector virus dubbed (c)Brain, it was created by the Farooq Alvi Brothers in Lahore, Pakistan, reportedly to deter unauthorized copying of the software they had written.

1988 - Bon Jovi and Mötley Crüe manager Doc McGhee pleaded guilty to importing more than 40,000lb of marijuana into the US from Colombia via a shrimp boat. McGhee received a five-year suspended prison sentence, a fine of $15,000, and was ordered to set up an anti-drugs foundation.

1999 – British Aerospace agrees to acquire the defence subsidiary of the General Electric Company plc, forming BAE Systems in November 1999.

2012 – The Hong Kong-based file-sharing website Megaupload is shut down by the FBI.

2017 – Plasco Building in Tehran, Iran burns and collapses.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1736 – James Watt (Watt steam engine); 1807 – Robert E. Lee; 1809 – Edgar Allan Poe; 1813 – Henry Bessemer (Bessemer steel process); 1839 – Paul Cézanne:artist:; 1887 – Alexander Woollcott; 1914 – Lester Flatt:shred:(Flatt & Scruggs); 1923 – Jean Stapleton ('Edith' on All In The Family); 1924 – Nicholas Colasanto ('Coach' on Cheers); 1926 – Fritz Weaver (that guy who was in that thing); 1930 – Tippi Hedren (The Birds, Marnie, I Heart Huckabees); 1931 – Robert MacNeil (The MacNeil/Lehrer Report); 1932 – Richard Lester (director Superman movies); 1935 – Johnny O'Keefe♪ ♫; 1936 – Willie "Big Eyes" Smith♪ ♫; 1936 – Fred J. Lincoln:doit:; 1939 – Phil Everly♪ ♫(The Everly Bros); 1940 – Mike Reid (EastEnders); 1942 – Michael Crawford♪ ♫; 1943 – Janis Joplin:flower:♪ ♫(Big Brother & The Holding Company); 1944 – Shelley Fabares:love:; 1944 – Dan Reeves; 1946 – Dolly Parton♪ ♫:ggw:; 1947 – Paula Deen; 1947 – Rod Evans♪ ♫(Deep Purple, Captain Beyond); 1949 – Robert Palmer♪ ♫:devil:(Power Station); 1951 – Martha Davis♪ ♫(The Motels); 1952 – Dewey Bunnell:shred:(America); 1953 – Desi Arnaz, Jr.♪ ♫; 1954 – Katey Sagal (Married...With Children, Futurama, Sons Of Anarchy); 1955 – Paul Rodriguez; 1957 – Roger Ashton-Griffiths ('Mace Terrell' on Game of Thrones); 1958 – Thomas Kinkade:artist:; 1959 – Jeff Pilson:bass:(Dokken, Dio, Foreigner); 1961 – William Ragsdale ('Herman' on Herman's Head); 1966 – Stefan Edberg; 1968 – Whitfield Crane♪ ♫(Ugly Kid Joe); 1969 – Junior Seau; 1971 – Shawn Wayans; 1974 – Frank Caliendo

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1661 – Thomas Venner; 1853 – Karl Faber; 1968 – Ray Harroun:driving:(won 1st Indy 500); 1975 – Thomas Hart Benton:artist:; 1996 – Don Simpson (co-produced Flashdance, Beverly Hills Cop, Top Gun, The Rock); 1998 – Carl Perkins♪ ♫(wrote "Blue Suede Shoes"); 2000 – Hedy Lamarr; 2006 – Anthony Franciosa; 2006 – Wilson Pickett♪ ♫; 2007 – Denny Doherty♪ ♫(The Mamas & The Papas); 2008 – Suzanne Pleshette:love:(The Bob Newhart Show); 2008 – John Stewart♪ ♫("Gold", wrote "Daydream Believer"); 2013 – Stan 'The Man' Musial; 2014 – Ben Starr

January 20

Today is International Fetish Day, so, get your freak on!

Today is Inauguration Day in the United States. We swore in a brand new President today! And there was much rejoicing...by some. Others, not so much.


Events

1265 – The first English parliament to include not only Lords but also representatives of the major towns holds its first meeting in the Palace of Westminster, now commonly known as the "Houses of Parliament".

1356 – Edward Balliol surrenders his claim to the Scottish throne to Edward III in exchange for an English pension.

1649 – Charles I of England goes on trial for treason and other "high crimes".

1783 – The Kingdom of Great Britain signs a peace treaty with France and Spain, officially ending hostilities in the American Revolutionary War.

1841 – Hong Kong Island is occupied by the British.

1887 – The United States Senate allows the Navy to lease Pearl Harbor as a naval base.

1920 – The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is founded.

1929 – In Old Arizona, the first full-length talking motion picture filmed outdoors, is released.

1936 – Edward VIII becomes King of the United Kingdom.

1937 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John Nance Garner are sworn in for their second terms as U.S. President and U.S. Vice President, the first occasion a Presidential Inauguration to take place on 20 January following the ratification of the 20th Amendment.

1942 – World War II: At the Wannsee Conference held in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee, senior Nazi German officials discuss the implementation of the "Final Solution to the Jewish question".

1945 – World War II: Germany begins the evacuation of 1.8 million people from East Prussia, a task which will take nearly two months.

1949 – Point Four Program a program for economic aid to poor countries announced by United States President Harry S Truman in his inaugural address for a full term as President.

1981 – Twenty minutes after Ronald Reagan was inaugurated, Iran releases 52 American hostages.

1986 – In the United States, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is celebrated as a federal holiday for the first time.

2009 – A protest movement in Iceland culminates as the 2009 Icelandic financial crisis protests start.

2009 – Barack Obama (remember him?) is inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States of America, becoming the first African-American United States President.

2017 – Donald Trump is inaugurated as the 45th President of the United States of America, becoming the first United States President to have never held political office.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1798 – Anson Jones; 1894 – Harold Gray (created Little Orphan Annie); 1896 – George Burns; 1906 – Aristotle Onassis; 1920 – Federico Fellini; 1920 – DeForest Kelley (Star Trek TOS); 1923 – Slim Whitman♪ ♫; 1926 – Patricia Neal; 1929 – Arte Johnson; 1929 – Fireball Roberts:driving:; 1930 – Buzz Aldrin; 1934 – Tom Baker (4th Doctor Who); 1946 – David Lynch; 1952 – Paul Stanley:shred:(KISS); 1956 – Bill Maher (American asshat); 1958 – Lorenzo Lamas; 1959 – R. A. Salvatore:devil:; 1959 – Tami Hoag; 1960 – Scott Thunes:bass:; 1963 – James Denton (Desperate Housewives); 1964 – Jack Lewis; 1965 – John Michael Montgomery♪ ♫; 1966 – Rainn Wilson; 1967 – Stacey Dash; 1970 – Skeet Ulrich; 1971 – Questlove♪ ♫

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1965 – Alan Freed; 1984 – Johnny Weissmuller (Tarzan movies); 1990 – Barbara Stanwyck (The Big Valley); 1993 – Audrey Hepburn; 2003 – Al Hirschfeld:artist:; 2012 – Etta James♪ ♫

January 21

Today is Nat'l Hugging Day in the U.S., so hug somebody, dammit!


Events

1535 – Following the Affair of the Placards, French Protestants are burned at the stake in front of the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris.

1789 – The first American novel, The Power of Sympathy or the Triumph of Nature Founded in Truth, is printed in Boston.

1793 – After being found guilty of treason by the French National Convention, Louis XVI of France is executed by guillotine.

1861 – American Civil War: Jefferson Davis resigns from the United States Senate.

1911 – The first Monte Carlo Rally takes place.

1915 – Kiwanis International is founded in Detroit.

1950 – American lawyer and government official Alger Hiss is convicted of perjury.

1961 – Four hundred thirty-five workers are buried alive when a mine in Coalbrook, Free State, South Africa collapses.

1968 – Vietnam War: Battle of Khe Sanh: One of the most publicized and controversial battles of the war begins.

1976 – Commercial service of Concorde begins with the London-Bahrain and Paris-Rio routes.

1981 – Production of the iconic DeLorean DMC-12 sports car begins in Dunmurry, Northern Ireland.

1999 – War on Drugs: In one of the largest drug busts in American history, the United States Coast Guard intercepts a ship with over 4,300 kilograms (9,500 lb:3_eyes:) of cocaine on board.

2004 – NASA's MER-A (the Mars Rover Spirit) ceases communication with mission control. The problem lies in the management of its flash memory and is fixed remotely from Earth on February 6.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1738 – Ethan Allen; 1813 – John C. Frémont; 1824 – Stonewall Jackson; 1905 – Christian Dior; 1905 – Karl Wallenda (of The Flying Wallendas); 1922 – Telly Savalas; 1924 – Benny Hill; 1938 – Wolfman Jack; 1940 – Jack Nicklaus; 1941 – Plácido Domingo♪ ♫; 1941 – Richie Havens♪ ♫; 1942 – Mac Davis♪ ♫; 1942 – Edwin Starr♪ ♫(sang "War"); 1947 – Jill Eikenberry; 1950 – Billy Ocean♪ ♫(sang "Caribbean Queen"); 1951 – Eric Holder; 1953 – Paul Allen (co-founded Microsoft); 1956 – Robby Benson; 1956 – Geena Davis; 1960 – Toxey Haas (Mossy Oak camo); 1965 – Jam Master Jay♪ ♫; 1970 – Ken Leung (lost); 1985 – Salvatore Giunta (genuine American bad-ass:devil:)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1793 – Louis XVI of France:behead:; 1901 – Elisha Gray (co-founded Western Electric); 1924 – Vladimir Lenin; 1959 – Cecil B. DeMille ("I must've killed more men than Cecil B. DeMille."; 1967 – Ann Sheridan; 1983 – Lamar Williams:bass:(The Allman Bros); 1998 – Jack Lord (Hawaii Five-O); 1999 – Susan Strasberg; 2002 – Peggy Lee♪ ♫

I've been catching up :P



Love that man's writing. His work is eminently quotable.


My favourite two passages from Common Sense:

As a mission statement for the early United States it's pretty awesome.

And this one, on the origin of the British crown:

:)

January

Today is the day after yesterday.

Today is also the day before tomorrow.


Events

613 – Eight-month-old Constantine is crowned as co-emperor (Caesar) by his father Heraclius at Constantinople.

1506 – The first contingent of 150 Swiss Guards arrives at the Vatican.

1889 – Columbia Phonograph is formed in Washington, D.C. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in the recorded sound business.

1901 – Edward VII is proclaimed King upon the death of his mother, Queen Victoria, on this date.

1905 – Bloody Sunday in Saint Petersburg, beginning of the 1905 revolution.

1915 – Over 600 people are killed in Guadalajara, Mexico, when a train plunges off the tracks into a deep canyon.

1924 – Ramsay MacDonald becomes the first Labour Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

1941 – World War II: British, Australian and Indian forces capture Tobruk from Italian forces during Operation Compass.

1944 – World War II: The Allies commence Operation Shingle, an assault on Anzio and Nettuno, Italy.

1946 – Creation of the Central Intelligence Group, forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency.

1947 – KTLA, the first commercial television station west of the Mississippi River, begins operation in Hollywood.

1957 – Israel withdraws from the Sinai Peninsula.

1957 – The New York City "Mad Bomber", George P. Metesky, is arrested in Waterbury, Connecticut and charged with planting more than 30 bombs.

1968 – Apollo 5 lifts off carrying the first Lunar Module into space.

1970 – The Boeing 747, the world's first "jumbo jet", enters commercial service.

1973 – The Supreme Court of the United States delivers its decisions in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, legalizing elective abortion in all fifty states.

1983 - The new 24-hour music video network MTV [Remember when MTV used to show music videos?:rolleyes:] started broadcasting to the West Coast of America after being picked up by Group W Cable in Los Angeles.

1984 – The Apple Macintosh, the first consumer computer to popularize the computer mouse and the graphical user interface, is introduced during a Super Bowl XVIII television commercial.

1994 - American actor and singer Telly Savalas died of prostate cancer aged 72. ["Telly Savalas can make bad slang sound like good slang, and good slang sound like lyric poetry." --Clive James]

1999 – Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons are burned alive by radical Hindus while sleeping in their car in Eastern India.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1440 – Ivan III (Ivan The Great) of Russia; 1552 – Walter Raleigh; 1561 – Francis Bacon; 1645 – William Kidd; 1654 – Richard Blackmore (no, not Ritchie); 1788 – Lord Byron; 1875 – D. W. Griffith; 1877 – Tom Jones (No that one, and not that one, either, this one was a baseball player); 1892 – Marcel Dassault (founded Dassault Aviation); 1897 – Rosa Ponselle♪ ♫; 1904 – George Balanchine (co-founded the New York City Ballet); 1907 – Douglas 'Wrong Way' Corrigan; 1909 – Ann Sothern; 1931 – Sam Cooke♪ ♫; 1932 – Piper Laurie; 1934 – Bill Bixby; 1934 – Graham Kerr; 1937 – Joseph Wambaugh; 1940 – John Hurt; 1946 – Malcolm McLaren♪ ♫(manager); 1949 – J.P. Pennington♪ ♫; 1949 – Steve Perry♪ ♫(Journey); 1953 – Jim Jarmusch; 1960 – Michael Hutchence♪ ♫(INXS); 1962 – Jimmy Herring♪ ♫(Widespread Panic, Allman Bros, Phil Lesh & Friends, The Dead); 1965 – Steven Adler:drummer:(Guns 'N' Roses); 1965 – DJ Jazzy Jeff♪ ♫; 1965 – Diane Lane; 1968 – Guy Fieri; 1969 – Olivia d'Abo♪ ♫; 1973 – Larry Birkhead; 1975 – Balthazar Getty; 1981 – Ben Moody♪ ♫(Evanescence)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1901 – Queen Victoria:queen:; 1925 – Fanny Bullock Workman; 1950 – Alan Hale, Sr.; 1971 – Harry Frank Guggenheim (co-founded Newsday); 1973 – Lyndon B. Johnson (36th POTUS); 1994 – Telly Savalas; 2004 – Ann Miller♪ ♫; 2008 – Heath Ledger; 2010 – Jean Simmons; 2012 – Joe Paterno; 2015 – Wendell H. Ford

Really? Fer sure? thank you, I didn't know that. :notworthy

January 23

Today is Nat'l Pie Day in the U.S.


Events

971 – Using crossbows, Song dynasty troops soundly defeat a war elephant corps of the Southern Han at Shao.

1556 – The deadliest earthquake in history, the Shaanxi earthquake, hits Shaanxi province, China. The death toll may have been as high as 830,000.

1570 – James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, regent for the infant King James VI of Scotland, is assassinated by firearm, the first recorded instance of such.

1656 – Blaise Pascal publishes the first of his Lettres provinciales.

1795 – After an extraordinary charge across the frozen Zuiderzee, the French cavalry captured 14 Dutch ships and 850 guns, in a rare occurrence of a battle between ships and cavalry.

1849 – Elizabeth Blackwell is awarded her M.D. by the Geneva Medical College of Geneva, New York, becoming the United States' first female doctor.

1870 – In Montana, U.S. cavalrymen kill 173 Native Americans, mostly women and children, in what becomes known as the Marias Massacre.

1909 – RMS Republic, a passenger ship of the White Star Line, becomes the first ship to use the CQD distress signal after colliding with another ship, the SS Florida, off the Massachusetts coastline, an event that kills six people. The Republic sinks the next day.

1920 – The Netherlands refuses to surrender the exiled Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany to the Allies.

1957 – American inventor Walter Frederick Morrison sells the rights to his flying disc to the Wham-O toy company, which later renames it the "Frisbee".

1960 – The bathyscaphe USS Trieste breaks a depth record by descending to 10,911 metres (35,797 ft) in the Pacific Ocean.

1967 – Milton Keynes (England) is founded as a new town by Order in Council, with a planning brief to become a city of 250,000 people.

1973 – United States President Richard Nixon announces that a peace accord has been reached in Vietnam.

1986 – The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducts its first members: Little Richard, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Fats Domino, The Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley.

1997 – Madeleine Albright becomes the first woman to serve as United States Secretary of State.

1998 – Netscape announced Mozilla, with the intention to release Communicator code as open source.

2002 – U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl is kidnapped in Karachi, Pakistan and subsequently murdered.

2003 – A very weak signal from Pioneer 10 (launched Mar 3, 1972) is detected for the last time, but no usable data can be extracted.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1737 – John Hancock; 1832 – Édouard Manet; 1855 – John Browning; 1898 – Randolph Scott; 1907 – Dan Duryea; 1910 – Django Reinhardt; 1913 – Wally Parks; 1919 – Ernie Kovacs; 1920 – Walter Frederick Morrison; 1933 – Chita Rivera; 1943 – Gil Gerard; 1944 – Rutger Hauer; 1950 – Richard Dean Anderson; 1951 – Chesley Sullenberger; 1953 – Robin Zander; 1964 – Mariska Hargitay; 1974 – Tiffani Thiessen

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1622 – William Baffin; 1803 – Arthur Guinness; 1883 – Gustave Doré; 1944 – Edvard Munch; 1973 – Kid Ory; 1976 – Paul Robeson; 1977 – Toots Shor; 1978 – Jack Oakie; 1989 – Salvador Dalí; 2003 – Nell Carter; 2004 – Bob Keeshan; 2005 – Johnny Carson; 2011 – Jack LaLanne; 2015 – Ernie Banks

January 24

Today is Moebius Syndrome Awareness Day.


Events

1848 – California Gold Rush: James W. Marshall finds gold at Sutter's Mill near Sacramento.

1908 – The first Boy Scout troop is organized in England by Robert Baden-Powell.

1916 – In Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co., the Supreme Court of the United States declares the federal income tax constitutional.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill conclude a conference in Casablanca.

1961 – Goldsboro B-52 crash: A bomber carrying two H-bombs breaks up in mid-air over North Carolina. The uranium core of one weapon remains lost.

1968 – Vietnam War: The 1st Australian Task Force launches Operation Coburg against the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong during wider fighting around Long Bình and Biên Hòa.

1972 – Japanese Sgt. Shoichi Yokoi is found hiding in a Guam jungle, where he had been since the end of World War II.

1978 – Soviet satellite Kosmos 954, with a nuclear reactor on board, burns up in Earth's atmosphere, scattering radioactive debris over Canada's Northwest Territories. Only 1% is recovered.

2003 – The United States Department of Homeland Security officially begins operation.

2005 - Country singer Lynn Anderson was arrested for shoplifting after being caught stealing a Harry Potter DVD from a New Mexico supermarket and punching a police officer during her arrest.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

76 – Hadrian; 1862 – Edith Wharton; 1905 – J. Howard Marshall; 1917 – Ernest Borgnine; 1918 – Oral Roberts; 1919 – Coleman Francis; 1939 – Ray Stevens♪ ♫; 1941 – Neil Diamond♪ ♫; 1941 – Aaron Neville♪ ♫; 1943 – Sharon Tate; 1946 – Michael Ontkean; 1947 – Warren Zevon♪ ♫; 1949 – John Belushi; 1951 – Yakov Smirnoff; 1958 – Jools Holland♪ ♫; 1961 – Nastassja Kinski; 1967 – Phil LaMarr; 1968 – Mary Lou Retton; 1970 – Matthew Lillard; 1974 – Ed Helms; 1979 – Nik Wallenda; 1983 – Scott Speed:driving:; 1986 – Mischa Barton

:skull:Deaths:skull:

41 – Caligula; 1920 – Amedeo Modigliani; 1965 – Winston Churchill; 1971 – Bill W.; 1975 – Larry Fine; 1983 – George Cukor; 1986 – L. Ron Hubbard; 1986 – Gordon MacRae; 1993 – Thurgood Marshall; 2010 – Pernell Roberts; 2015 – Joe Franklin

January 25

Tonight Scots, and fans of Robert Burns, celebrate Burns Night.


Events

41 – After a night of negotiation, Claudius is accepted as Roman Emperor by the Senate.

1533 – Henry VIII of England secretly marries his already-pregnant second wife Anne Boleyn.

1787 – Shays's Rebellion: The rebellion's largest confrontation, outside the Springfield Armory, results in the killing of four rebels and the wounding of twenty.

1858 – The Wedding March by Felix Mendelssohn is played at the marriage of Queen Victoria's daughter, Victoria, and Friedrich of Prussia, and becomes a popular wedding processional.

1890 – Nellie Bly completes her round-the-world journey in 72 days.

1909 – Richard Strauss's opera Elektra receives its debut performance at the Dresden State Opera.

1915 – Alexander Graham Bell inaugurates U.S. transcontinental telephone service, speaking from New York to Thomas Watson in San Francisco.

1924 – The 1924 Winter Olympics opens in Chamonix, in the French Alps, the first Winter Olympic Games.

1937 – The Guiding Light debuts on NBC radio from Chicago. In 1952 it moves to CBS television, where it remains until September 18, 2009.

1945 – World War II: The Battle of the Bulge ends.

1947 – Thomas Goldsmith Jr. files a patent for a "Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device", the first ever electronic game.

1949 – The first Emmy Awards are presented; at the Hollywood Athletic Club.

1960 – The National Association of Broadcasters reacts to the "payola" scandal by threatening fines for any disc jockeys who accept money for playing particular records.

1961 – In Washington, D.C., President John F. Kennedy delivers the first live presidential television news conference.

1964 – Blue Ribbon Sports is founded by University of Oregon track and field athletes, which would later become Nike.

1971 – Charles Manson and three female "Family" members are found guilty of the 1969 Tate–LaBianca murders.

1971 – Idi Amin leads a coup deposing Milton Obote and becomes Uganda's president.

1975 - The last Sunbury Rock Festival in Victoria, Australia was held. The promoters, who had taken heavy losses only paid Deep Purple. AC/DC were scheduled to play after Deep Purple but a fight started on stage between road crews after Deep Purple's set, when they began packing up the lights and PA, and denied AC/DC use of them, who then left the festival site without playing at all.

1993 – Five people are shot outside the CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Two are killed and three wounded.

1995 – The Norwegian rocket incident: Russia almost launches a nuclear attack after it mistakes Black Brant XII, a Norwegian research rocket, for a US Trident missile.

1996 – Billy Bailey becomes the last person to be hanged in the USA.

2011 – The first wave of the Egyptian revolution begins in Egypt, with a series of street demonstrations, marches, rallies, acts of civil disobedience, riots, labour strikes, and violent clashes in Cairo, Alexandria, and throughout other cities in Egypt.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1640 – William Cavendish; 1736 – Joseph-Louis Lagrange (Lagrangian points); 1759 – Robert Burns; 1860 – Charles Curtis (31st VPOTUS); 1874 – W. Somerset Maugham; 1882 – Virginia Woolf; 1919 – Edwin Newman; 1928 – Eduard Shevardnadze; 1931 – Dean Jones; 1938 – Etta James♪ ♫; 1941 – Buddy Baker:driving:; 1943 – Tobe Hooper; 1945 – Leigh Taylor-Young; 1951 – Steve Prefontaine:bolt:; 1981 – Alicia Keys♪ ♫

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1947 – Al Capone; 1981 – Adele Astaire; 1990 – Ava Gardner

January 26

Today our friends and Dwellers down under celebrate Australia Day.


Events

1531 – The Lisbon earthquake kills about thirty thousand people.

1564 – The Council of Trent establishes an official distinction between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism.

1699 – For the first time, the Ottoman Empire permanently cedes territory to the Christian powers.

1700 – The Cascadia earthquake takes place off the west coast of North America, as evidenced by Japanese records.

1808 – Governor of New South Wales William Bligh (pictured) was deposed by the New South Wales Corps in the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia's recorded history. Known as the Rum Rebellion.

1837 – Michigan is admitted as the 26th U.S. state.

1856 – First Battle of Seattle. Marines from the USS Decatur drive off American Indian attackers after all day battle with settlers.

1861 – American Civil War: The state of Louisiana secedes from the Union.

1863 – American Civil War: General Ambrose Burnside is relieved of command of the Army of the Potomac after the disastrous Fredericksburg campaign. He is replaced by Joseph Hooker.

1863 – American Civil War: Governor of Massachusetts John Albion Andrew receives permission from the Secretary of War to raise a militia organization for men of African descent.

1870 – Reconstruction Era: Virginia rejoins the Union.

1905 – The world's largest diamond ever, the Cullinan weighing 3,106.75 carats (0.621350 kg), is found at the Premier Mine near Pretoria in South Africa.

1915 – The Rocky Mountain National Park is established by an act of the U.S. Congress.

1920 – Former Ford Motor Company executive Henry Leland launches the Lincoln Motor Company which he later sold to his former employer. Leyland also founded (or co-founded) Cadillac Motor Cars.

1942 – World War II: The first United States forces arrive in Europe landing in Northern Ireland.

1945 – World War II: Audie Murphy displays valor and bravery in action (at the age of 19) at the Colmar Pocket, for which he will later be awarded the Medal of Honor. Audie Murphy's Medal of Honor Citation.

1949 – The Hale telescope at Palomar Observatory sees first light under the direction of Edwin Hubble, becoming the largest aperture optical telescope (until BTA-6 is built in 1976).

1965 - During a Rolling Stones tour of Australia and New Zealand, guitarist Keith Richards had his shirt torn off after 50 fans invaded the stage during the gig at The Town Hall in Brisbane. And on Australia Day, too.:headshake

1980 - Prince made his TV debut on the US show American Bandstand. When interviewed after his performance the singer froze up and struggled to reply to the questions he was being asked.

1986 - Allen Collins, guitarist from Lynyrd Skynyrd, crashed his car, paralyzing him from the waist down and killing his girlfriend Debra Jean Watts. Collins had survived the plane crash in 1977 that killed two other band members. As part of his plea bargain for the 1986 accident, Collins addressed fans at every Skynyrd concert with an explanation of why he could not perform, citing the dangers of drinking and driving, as well as drugs and alcohol.

1992 – Boris Yeltsin announces that Russia will stop targeting United States cities with nuclear weapons.

1998 – Lewinsky scandal: On American television, U.S. President Bill Clinton denies having had "sexual relations" with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky." Liar.;):fumette::bj4:

2003 - Billy Joel was airlifted to a hospital after his car smashed into a tree in The Hamptons. The singer lost control of his Mercedes S500 and skidded for 100 yards before crashing.

2005 – Glendale train crash: Two trains derail killing 11 and injuring 200 in Glendale, California, near Los Angeles. The derailment is caused by an SUV parked on the tracks. The SUV owner was charged with, and convicted of, 11 counts of murder "with special circumstances". Ultimately, he was sentenced to 11 consecutive life sentences, without the possibility of parole.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1832 – George Shiras, Jr.; 1880 – Douglas MacArthur; 1891 – Frank Costello "The Prime Minister of the Underworld" (mob boss); 1905 – Charles Lane; 1905 – Maria von Trapp (of the The Sound of Music von Trapps); 1913 – Jimmy Van Heusen:keys:; 1918 – Nicolae Ceaușescu; 1921 – Eddie Barclay (founded Barclay Records); 1921 – Akio Morita (co-founded Sony); 1925 – Joan Leslie (Sergeant York); 1925 – Paul Newman:eyeball::eyeball:; 1935 – Bob Uecker ("I must be in the front row."); 1941 – Scott Glenn; 1944 – Merrilee Rush♪ ♫; 1944 – Jerry Sandusky (kiddie fiddler); 1946 – Gene Siskel:thumb:; 1949 – David Strathairn; 1951 – Christopher North:keys:(Ambrosia); 1953 – Lucinda Williams♪ ♫; 1955 – Eddie Van Halen:shred:(Van Halen, duh); 1958 – Anita Baker♪ ♫; 1961 – Wayne Gretzky "The Great One"; 1961 – Tom Keifer♪ ♫(Cindrella); 1963 – Andrew Ridgeley♪ ♫(Wham!); 1970 – Kirk Franklin♪ ♫

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1893 – Abner Doubleday; 1932 – William Wrigley, Jr. (the gum guy); 1948 – John Lomax♪ ♫; 1962 – Charles "Lucky" Luciano; 1973 – Edward G. Robinson; 1979 – Nelson Rockefeller (41st VPOTUS); 1983 – Bear Bryant; 1992 – José Ferrer; 1997 – Jeane Dixon; 2004 – Fred Haas; 2011 – Charlie Louvin♪ ♫(Louvin Bros); 2016 – Abe Vigoda (no, he really was dead this time)

January 27

Today, our friends and Dwellers in Canadia celebrate Family Literacy Day.

Also, the liberation of the remaining inmates of the Auschwitz concentration camp is commemorated by many countries on this date as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.


Events

98 – Trajan succeeded his adoptive father Nerva as Roman emperor; under his rule the Roman Empire would reach its maximum extent.

1302 – Dante Alighieri is exiled from Florence.

1606 – Gunpowder Plot: The trial of Guy Fawkes and other conspirators begins, ending with their execution on January 31.

1776 – American Revolutionary War: Henry Knox's "noble train of artillery" arrives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

1785 – The University of Georgia is founded, the first public university in the United States.

1825 – The U.S. Congress approves Indian Territory (in what is present-day Oklahoma), clearing the way for forced relocation of the Eastern Indians on what became known as the "Trail of Tears".

1880 – Thomas Edison receives the patent on the incandescent lamp.

1939 – First flight of the Lockheed P-38 Lightning.

1943 – World War II: The Eighth Air Force sorties ninety-one B-17s and B-24s to attack the U-boat construction yards at Wilhelmshaven, Germany. This was the first American bombing attack on Germany.

1944 – World War II: The 900-day Siege of Leningrad is lifted.

1945 – World War II: The Red Army liberates the remaining inmates of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

1951 – Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site begins with Operation Ranger.

1967 – Astronauts Gus Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee are killed in a fire during a test of their Apollo 1 spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The astronauts' rescue was prevented by the plug door hatch, which could not be opened against the higher internal pressure of the cabin.

1967 – The United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union sign the Outer Space Treaty in Washington, D.C., banning deployment of nuclear weapons in space, and limiting use of the Moon and other celestial bodies to peaceful purposes.

1970 - John Lennon wrote, recorded and mixed his new single 'Instant Karma!' all in one day. It ranks as one of the fastest-released songs in pop music history, recorded at London's Abbey Road Studios and arriving in stores only ten days later.

1980 – Through cooperation between the U.S. and Canadian governments, six American diplomats secretly escape hostilities in Iran in the culmination of the Canadian Caper.

1996 – Germany first observes International Holocaust Remembrance Day. [Really Germany?:eyebrow: It took you over 50 fucking years?]

2003 – The first selections for the National Recording Registry are announced by the Library of Congress.

2011 – Arab Spring: The Yemeni Revolution begins as over 16,000 protestors demonstrate in Sana'a.

2013 – Two hundred forty-two people die in a nightclub fire in the Brazilian city of Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul.

2015 - Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne were given a song writing credit on Sam Smith's hit 'Stay With Me', because of the similarities to his 1989 track 'I Won't Back Down'. 'Stay With Me' had been nominated for three Grammys, including song of the year - which honors the writers of the track. Petty's publisher had contacted Smiths publisher who made an out of court settlement.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1756 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:keys:; 1795 – Eli Whitney Blake (invented the Mortise lock); 1832 – Lewis Carroll (wrote Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass); 1885 – Jerome Kern♪ ♫; 1900 – Hyman G. Rickover; 1901 – Art Rooney (founded the Pittsburgh Steelers); 1905 – Howard McNear (Mayberry's barber 'Floyd The Barber'); 1908 – William Randolph Hearst, Jr.; 1918 – Skitch Henderson:keys:; 1918 – Elmore James:shred:; 1919 – Ross Bagdasarian, Sr. (created Alvin and the Chipmunks); 1921 – Donna Reed; 1930 – Bobby "Blue" Bland♪ ♫; 1936 – Troy Donahue; 1937 – Buddy Emmons♪ ♫(pedal steel guitarist); 1940 – James Cromwell ("That'll do, Pig. That'll do."); 1940 – Reynaldo Rey; 1942 – John Witherspoon; 1944 – Nick Mason:drummer:(Pink Floyd); 1946 – Nedra Talley♪ ♫(The Ronettes); 1948 – Mikhail Baryshnikov; 1951 – Brian Downey:drummer:(Thin Lizzy); 1951 – Seth Justman:keys:(The J. Geils Band, wrote "Centerfold"); 1952 – G. E. Smith:shred:(Hall & Oates, Bob Dylan's touring band, musical director SNL); 1955 – John Roberts (Chief Justice SCOTUS); 1956 – Mimi Rogers; 1957 – Janick Gers:shred:(Iron Maiden); 1957 – Frank Miller (comic book artist, graphic novelist); 1959 – Cris Collinsworth; 1959 – Keith Olbermann; 1964 – Bridget Fonda; 1965 – Alan Cumming; 1966 – Tamlyn Tomita (Four Rooms); 1968 – Mike Patton♪ ♫(Faith No More); 1969 – Patton Oswalt

:skull:Deaths:skull:

98– Nerva; 1596 – Francis Drake; 1851 – John James Audubon; 1901 – Giuseppe Verdi♪ ♫; 1910 – Thomas Crapper; 1922 – Nellie Bly; 1967 – Roger B. Chaffee, Gus Grissom, & Ed White; 1972 – Mahalia Jackson♪ ♫; 1989 – Thomas Sopwith; 1994 – Claude Akins (Movin' On, BJ & The Bear); 2004 – Jack Paar; 2006 – Gene McFadden♪ ♫(McFadden & Whitehead); 2009 – John Updike (wrote Rabbit Run, Rabbit Redux, Rabbit Is Rich, Rabbit at Rest, & Rabbit Remembered); 2010 – J. D. Salinger (author The Catcher in the Rye); 2011 – Charlie Callas; 2014 – Pete Seeger

Family Literacy Day? Those Canucks have some strange ideas. :lol:

January 28

Today is Data Privacy Day. If mind your own bidness, then you won't be minding mine.;)


Events

814 – Charlemagne dies of pleurisy in Aachen as the first Holy Roman Emperor. He is succeeded by his son Louis the Pious as king of the Frankish Empire.

1547 – Henry VIII dies. His nine-year-old son, Edward VI, becomes King.

1624 – Sir Thomas Warner founds the first British colony in the Caribbean, on the island of Saint Kitts.

1754 – Sir Horace Walpole coins the word serendipity in a letter to Horace Mann.

1813 – Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is first published in the UK.

1820 – A Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and Mikhail Petrovich Lazarev discovers the Antarctic continent, approaching the Antarctic coast.

1896 – Walter Arnold of East Peckham, Kent, becomes the first person to be convicted of speeding. He was fined one shilling, plus costs, for speeding at 8 mph (13 km/h), thereby exceeding the contemporary speed limit of 2 mph (3.2 km/h).

1909 – United States troops leave Cuba with the exception of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base after being there since the Spanish–American War.

1922 – Knickerbocker Storm, Washington D.C.'s biggest snowfall, causes the city's greatest loss of life when the roof of the Knickerbocker Theatre collapses and kills 98 people.

1938 – The World Land Speed Record on a public road is broken by Rudolf Caracciola in the Mercedes-Benz W195 at a speed of 432.7 kilometres per hour (268.9 mph).

1956 – Elvis Presley makes his first American television appearance.

1958 – The Lego company patents the design of its Lego bricks, still compatible with bricks produced today.

1964 – An unarmed United States Air Force T-39 Sabreliner on a training mission is shot down over Erfurt, East Germany, by a Soviet MiG-19.

1977 – The first day of the Great Lakes Blizzard of 1977 which dumps 10 feet (3.0 m) of snow in one day in Upstate New York, with Buffalo, Syracuse, Watertown, and surrounding areas are most affected.

1980 – USCGC Blackthorn collides with the tanker Capricorn while leaving Tampa, Florida and capsizes, killing 23 Coast Guard crewmembers.

1981 – Ronald Reagan lifts remaining domestic petroleum price and allocation controls in the United States helping to end the 1979 energy crisis and begin the 1980s oil glut.

1982 – US Army general James L. Dozier is rescued by Italian anti-terrorism forces from captivity by the Red Brigades.

1985 – Supergroup USA for Africa (United Support of Artists for Africa) records the hit single We Are the World, to help raise funds for Ethiopian famine relief.

1986 – Space Shuttle program: STS-51-L mission: Space Shuttle Challenger explodes after liftoff, killing all seven astronauts on board.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1457 – Henry VII of England; 1864 – Charles Williams Nash (Nash Motors); 1864 – Herbert Akroyd Stuart (invented the hot-bulb engine and Hornsby-Akroyd oil engine); 1887 – Arthur Rubinstein:keys:; 1890 – Robert Stroud <--Interesting read.(the real Bird Man of Alcatraz); 1912 – Jackson Pollock; 1936 – Alan Alda; 1940 – Carlo$ $lim; 1948 – Charles Taylor; 1951 – Billy Bass Nelson:bass:(Parliament-Funkadelic); 1955 – Nicolas Sarkozy; 1959 – Frank Darabont; 1959 – Dave Sharp♪ ♫(The Alarm); 1968 – Sarah McLachlan♪ ♫; 1969 – Mo Rocca; 1976 – Rick Ross♪ ♫; 1977 – Joey Fatone♪ ♫(NSYNC); 1980 – Nick Carter♪ ♫(Backstreet Boys); 1981 – Elijah Wood ('Frodo'); 1998 – Ariel Winter (Modern Family)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

814 – Charlemagne; 1547 – Henry VIII; 1939 – W. B. Yeats; 1986 - Gregory Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, Dick Scobee, & Michael J. Smith; 1988 – Klaus Fuchs; 1996 – Jerry Siegel (co-created Superman); 2005 – Jim Capaldi♪ ♫(Traffic); 2009 – Billy Powell:keys:(Lynyrd Skynyrd); 2016 – Paul Kantner♪ ♫(Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship)

Unfortunately there are people making big bucks minding your bidness, so they won't stop... neither will the gumint.

I seem to remember my first PC as having about 500 MB of ram, and the old hands (who had one a year before me), put the fear of Bill Gates in me not to try to overfill or the blue screen of death would get me. Like being potty trained, or the monster under the bed, it stayed with me.

Now when I clear my cookies, which I do a half dozen times a day, there will be several hundred MB, and occasionally 8 or 9 hundred. Yeah some is the make things more better surfing the net, but a shitload of the in info gathering.

Apologies for missing yesterday's installment.

Better late than never.


January 29

1790 – The first boat specializing as a lifeboat is tested on the River Tyne.

1834 – US President Andrew Jackson orders first use of federal soldiers to suppress a labor dispute.

1845 – "The Raven" is published in The Evening Mirror in New York, the first publication with the name of the author, Edgar Allan Poe.

1850 – Henry Clay introduces the Compromise of 1850 to the U.S. Congress.

1861 – Kansas is admitted as the 34th U.S. state.

1863 – The Bear River Massacre: A detachment of California Volunteers led by Colonel Patrick Edward Connor engage the Shoshone at Bear River, Washington Territory, killing hundreds of men, women, and children.

1886 – Karl Benz patents the first successful gasoline-driven automobile.

1907 – Charles Curtis of Kansas becomes the first Native American U.S. Senator.

1916 – World War I: Paris is first bombed by German zeppelins.

1936 – The first inductees into the Baseball Hall of Fame are announced.

1963 – The first inductees into the Pro Football Hall of Fame are announced.

1967 – The "ultimate high" of the hippie era, the Mantra-Rock Dance, takes place in San Francisco and features Janis Joplin, Grateful Dead, and Allen Ginsberg.

1991 – Gulf War: The Battle of Khafji, the first major ground engagement of the war, as well as its deadliest, begins.

2002 – In his State of the Union address, President George W. Bush describes "regimes that sponsor terror" as an Axis of evil, in which he includes Iraq, Iran and North Korea.

2005 – The first direct commercial flights from mainland China (from Guangzhou) to Taiwan since 1949 arrived in Taipei. Shortly afterwards, a China Airlines flight lands in Beijing.

2009 – Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich is removed from office following his conviction of several corruption charges, including the alleged solicitation of personal benefit in exchange for an appointment to the United States Senate as a replacement for then-U.S. president-elect Barack Obama.

Births

1754 – Moses Cleaveland; 1756 – Henry Lee III; 1761 – Albert Gallatin; 1843 – William McKinley; 1860 – Anton Chekhov; 1880 – W. C. Fields; 1901 – Allen B. DuMont; 1913 – Victor Mature; 1917 – John Raitt; 1918 – John Forsythe; 1923 – Paddy Chayefsky; 1936 – James Jamerson; 1937 – Bobby Scott; 1940 – Katharine Ross; 1945 – Tom Selleck; 1948 – Marc Singer; 1949 – Tommy Ramone; 1950 – Ann Jillian; 1954 – Terry Kinney; 1954 – Oprah Winfrey; 1960 – Greg Louganis; 1962 – Nicholas Turturro; 1968 – Edward Burns; 1970 – Heather Graham; 1970 – Paul Ryan; 1975 – Sara Gilbert; 1979 – Andrew Keegan; 1981 – Jonny Lang; 1982 – Adam Lambert

Deaths

661 – Ali; 757 – An Lushan; 1820 – George III; 1933 – Sara Teasdale; 1956 – H. L. Mencken; 1963 – Robert Frost; 1964 – Alan Ladd; 1977 – Freddie Prinze; 1980 – Jimmy Durante; 1992 – Willie Dixon; 2008 – Margaret Truman; 2009 – Hélio Gracie; 2015 – Rod McKuen

January 30

516 BCE – The Second Temple of Jerusalem finishes construction.

1649 – King Charles I of England is beheaded.

1661 – Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, is ritually executed more than two years after his death, on the 12th anniversary of the execution of the monarch he himself deposed. See 1649, immediately above.

1703 – The Forty-seven Ronin, under the command of Ōishi Kuranosuke, avenge the death of their master.

1806 – The original Lower Trenton Bridge (also called the Trenton Makes the World Takes Bridge), which spans the Delaware River between Morrisville, Pennsylvania and Trenton, New Jersey, is opened.

1820 – Edward Bransfield sights the Trinity Peninsula and claims the discovery of Antarctica.

1835 – In the first assassination attempt against a President of the United States, Richard Lawrence attempts to shoot president Andrew Jackson, but fails and is subdued by a crowd, including several congressmen as well as Jackson himself.

1847 – Yerba Buena, California is renamed San Francisco, California.

1862 – The first American ironclad warship, the USS Monitor is launched.

1933 – Adolf Hitler is sworn in as Chancellor of Germany.

1945 – World War II: The Wilhelm Gustloff, overfilled with German refugees, sinks in the Baltic Sea after being torpedoed by a Soviet submarine, killing approximately 9,500 people.

1948 – Mahatma Gandhi is assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu extremist.

1959 – MS Hans Hedtoft, said to be the safest ship afloat and "unsinkable" like the RMS Titanic, strikes an iceberg on her maiden voyage and sinks, killing all 95 aboard.

1968 – Vietnam War: Tet Offensive launch by forces of the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army against South Vietnam, the United States, and their allies.

1969 – The Beatles' last public performance, on the roof of Apple Records in London. The impromptu concert is broken up by the police.

1973 - After recently changing their name from Wicked Lester, Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Ace Frehley and Peter Criss made their first appearance as KISS at the Popcorn Club in Queens, New York.

1975 – The Monitor National Marine Sanctuary is established as the first United States National Marine Sanctuary. See 1862, above.

1979 – A Varig Boeing 707-323C freighter, flown by the same commander as Flight 820, disappears over the Pacific Ocean 30 minutes after taking off from Tokyo.

1982 - American blues guitarist/singer Lightnin' Hopkins died of cancer aged 70.

1982 – Richard Skrenta writes the first PC virus code, which is 400 lines long and disguised as an Apple boot program called "Elk Cloner". [A PC virus disguised as an APPLE boot program?:eyebrow:]

1988 - During a court case involving Holly Johnson and ZTT Records it was revealed that Frankie Goes To Hollywood had not played on their hits 'Relax' and 'Two Tribes'. The court was told that top session musicians were used to make the records.

1995 – Workers from the National Institutes of Health announce the success of clinical trials testing the first preventive treatment for sickle-cell disease.

2003 – The Kingdom of Belgium officially recognizes same-sex marriages.

2016 - David Bowie left an estate valued at about $100m (£70m), according to his will which was filed in New York. Half would go to his widow, Iman, along with the home they shared in New York. The rest was shared between his son and daughter. Bowie's personal assistant, Corinne Schwab, was left $2m and another $1m went to a former nanny, Marion Skene.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1882 – Franklin D. Roosevelt (32nd POTUS); 1914 – John Ireland; 1915 – John Profumo (the Profumo affair); 1922 – Dick Martin; 1925 – Douglas Engelbart (invented the computer mouse); 1925 – Dorothy Malone (Written On The Wind, Peyton Place); 1930 – Gene Hackman; 1935 – Elsa Martinelli:love:; 1937 – Jeanne Pruett♪ ♫; 1937 – Vanessa Redgrave; 1937 – Boris Spassky; 1941 – Dick Cheney (46th VPOTUS); 1942 – Marty Balin♪ ♫(Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship); 1947 – Steve Marriott:shred:(Humble Pie, Small Faces); 1951 – Phil Collins:drummer:(Genesis); 1951 – Charles S. Dutton (Roc, Alien 3, Threshold); 1957 – Payne Stewart; 1959 – Jody Watley♪ ♫; 1974 – Christian Bale; 1980 – Wilmer Valderrama

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1836 – Betsy Ross; 1838 – Osceola; 1889 – Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria; 1934 – Frank Nelson Doubleday (founded Doubleday Publishing Company); 1948 – Mahatma Gandhi; 1948 – Orville Wright; 1951 – Ferdinand Porsche; 1958 – Ernst Heinkel (founded Heinkel Aircraft Company); 1980 – Professor Longhair♪ ♫; 1982 - Lightnin' Hopkins; 2006 – Coretta Scott King; 2007 – Sidney Sheldon; 2014 – The Mighty Hannibal♪ ♫

January 31

314 – Pope Sylvester I succeeds Pope Miltiades. It is not known how Pope Tweety Bird fits into the chronology. You'd have to ask Pope Granny.

1606 – Gunpowder Plot: Guy Fawkes is executed for plotting against Parliament and King James.

1747 – The first VD clinic opens at London Lock Hospital. And there was much rejoicing.

1801 – John Marshall is appointed Chief Justice of the United States.

1846 – After the Milwaukee Bridge War(<--Interesting read.), Juneautown and Kilbourntown unify as the City of Milwaukee.

1848 – John C. Frémont is court-martialed for mutiny and disobeying orders.

1849 – Corn Laws are abolished in the United Kingdom pursuant to legislation in 1846.

1865 – American Civil War: The United States Congress passes the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, abolishing slavery and submits it to the states for ratification.

1865 – American Civil War: Confederate General Robert E. Lee becomes general-in-chief.

1915 – World War I: Germany is the first to make large-scale use of poison gas in warfare in the Battle of Bolimów against Russia.

1917 – World War I: Germany announces that its U-boats will resume unrestricted submarine warfare after a two-year hiatus.

1918 – A series of accidental collisions on a misty Scottish night leads to the loss of two Royal Navy submarines with over a hundred lives, and damage to another five British warships.

1929 – The Soviet Union exiles Leon Trotsky.

1930 – 3M begins marketing Scotch Tape.

1944 – World War II: During the Anzio campaign the 1st Ranger Battalion (Darby's Rangers) is destroyed behind enemy lines in a heavily outnumbered encounter at the Battle of Cisterna, Italy.

1945 – US Army private Eddie Slovik is executed for desertion, the first such execution of an American soldier since the Civil War.

1950 – United States President Harry S. Truman announces a program to develop the hydrogen bomb.

1958 – The first successful American satellite detects the Van Allen radiation belt.

2001 – In the Netherlands, a Scottish court convicts Libyan Abdelbaset al-Megrahi and acquits another Libyan citizen for their part in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988.

2007 – Suspects are arrested in Birmingham in the UK, accused of plotting the kidnap, holding and eventual beheading of a serving Muslim British soldier in Iraq.

2009 – In Kenya, at least 113 people are killed and over 200 injured following an oil spillage ignition in Molo.

2010 – Avatar becomes the first film to gross over $2 billion worldwide.

2011 – A winter storm hits North America for the second time in the same month, causing $1.8 billion in damage across the United States and Canada and killing 24 people.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1673 – Louis de Montfort; 1797 – Franz Schubert:keys:; 1872 – Zane Grey; 1892 – Eddie Cantor; 1902 – Tallulah Bankhead; 1914 – Jersey Joe Walcott; 1915 – Alan Lomax; 1919 – Jackie Robinson; 1920 – Stewart Udall; 1921 – Carol Channing; 1921 – Mario Lanza; 1922 – Joanne Dru; 1923 – Norman Mailer; 1929 – Jean Simmons; 1931 – Ernie Banks; 1934 – James Franciscus; 1937 – Suzanne Pleshette; 1938 – Beatrix of the Netherlands; 1941 – Dick Gephardt; 1944 – Charlie Musselwhite; 1947 – Nolan Ryan; 1951 – Harry Wayne Casey; 1956 – John Lydon; 1959 – Anthony LaPaglia; 1959 – Kelly Lynch; 1970 – Minnie Driver; 1973 – Portia de Rossi; 1977 – Kerry Washington; 1981 – Justin Timberlake

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1606 – Guy Fawkes; 1956 – A. A. Milne; 1974 – Samuel Goldwyn; 2016 – Terry Wogan

February 1

February is Black History Month in the U.S. and Canada, while the United Kingdom celebrates LGBT History Month.

Today is Nat'l Freedom Day in the U.S.

February is also Nat'l Bird Feeding Month in the U.S.

World Hijab Day is observed on this date. So get a hijab ya bum.

There are 333 days remaining in 2017.

There are 326 days until Christmas.;)


Events

1327 – Teenaged Edward III is crowned King of England, but the country is ruled by his mother Queen Isabella and her lover Roger Mortimer.

1861 – American Civil War: Texas secedes from the Union.

1865 – President Abraham Lincoln signs the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

1893 – Thomas A. Edison finishes construction of the first motion picture studio, the Black Maria in West Orange, New Jersey.

1942 – Voice of America (VOA), the official external radio and television service of the United States government, begins broadcasting with programs aimed at areas controlled by the Axis powers.

1953 – North Sea flood of 1953 was caused by a heavy storm which occurred overnight, 31 January-1 February 1953. The floods struck the Netherlands, Belgium and the U.K.

1960 – Four black students stage the first of the Greensboro sit-ins at a lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina.

1968 – Vietnam War: The execution of Viet Cong officer Nguyễn Văn Lém by South Vietnamese National Police Chief Nguyễn Ngọc Loan is filmed and photographed by Eddie Adams.

1968 – The New York Central Railroad and the Pennsylvania Railroad are merged to form Penn Central Transportation.

1979 – Iranian Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran after nearly 15 years of exile.

1981 – The Underarm bowling incident of 1981 occurred when Trevor Chappell bowls underarm on the final delivery of a game between Australia and New Zealand at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).

1991 – A runway collision between USAir Flight 1493 and SkyWest Flight 5569 at Los Angeles International Airport results in the deaths of 34 people, and injuries to 30 others.

1992 – The Chief Judicial Magistrate of Bhopal court declares Warren Anderson, ex-CEO of Union Carbide, a fugitive under Indian law for failing to appear in the Bhopal disaster case.

2002 – Daniel Pearl, American journalist and South Asia Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal, kidnapped January 23, 2002, is beheaded and mutilated by his captors.

2003 – Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during the reentry of mission STS-107 into the Earth's atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

2004 – Hajj pilgrimage stampede: In a stampede at the Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia, 251 people are trampled to death and 244 injured.

2009 – The first cabinet of Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir was formed in Iceland, making her the country's first female prime minister and the world's first openly LGBT head of government.

2013 – The Shard, the tallest building in the European Union, is opened to the public.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1894 – John Ford; 1901 – Frank Buckles (at his death (in 2011) he was the last surviving veteran of WW I); 1901 – Clark Gable; 1902 – Langston Hughes; 1904 – S.J. Perelman; 1909 – George Beverly Shea♪ ♫; 1923 – Ben Weider (well known in two areas: Bodybuilding and Napoleonic history); 1931 – Boris Yeltsin; 1934 – Bob Shane♪ ♫(The Kingston Trio); 1937 – Don Everly♪ ♫(Everly Bros); 1937 – Garrett Morris (President of the New York School for the Hard of Hearing); 1937 – Ray Sawyer♪ ♫(Dr. Hook); 1938 – Jimmy Carl Black:drummer:(The Mothers Of Invention); 1938 – Sherman Hemsley(The Jeffersons, Amen); 1939 – Del McCoury♪ ♫(The Del McCoury Band); 1939 – Joe Sample:keys:; 1942 – Bibi Besch:love:; 1942 – Terry Jones (Monty Python); 1947 – Jessica Savitch; 1948 – Rick James Bitch♪ ♫; 1950 – Mike Campbell:shred:(Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers); 1950 – Rich Williams:eyeball::shred:(Kansas); 1951 – Sonny Landreth:shred:; 1954 – Chuck Dukowski:bass:(Black Flag); 1964 – Jani Lane♪ ♫(Warrant); 1964 – Linus Roache (Law & Order); 1965 – Brandon Lee (son of Bruce Lee); 1965 – Sherilyn Fenn; 1968 – Lisa Marie Presley; 1968 – Pauly Shore; 1969 – Andrew Breitbart; 1969 – Patrick Wilson:drummer:(Weezer); 1971 – Michael C. Hall (Dexter); 1971 – Ron Welty:drummer:(The Offspring); 1986 – Lauren Conrad; 1987 – Ronda Rousey:boxers:; 1994 – Harry Styles♪ ♫(One Direction)

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1851 – Mary Shelley; 1940 – Philip Francis Nowlan (created Buck Rogers); 1966 – Hedda Hopper; 1966 – Buster Keaton; 1976 – Werner Heisenberg (physicist and namesake of 'Walter White's' alter ego in Breaking Bad); 1981 – Donald Wills Douglas, Sr. (of the McDonnell Douglas Corporation); 1988 – Heather O'Rourke ("They're heeeeere."); 2003 – crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia: Michael P. Anderson, David M. Brown, Kalpana Chawla, Laurel Clark, Rick Husband, William C. McCool, Ilan Ramon; 2005 – John Vernon (The Outlaw Josey Wales); 2012 – Don Cornelius (host of Soul Train for 22 years); 2013 – Ed Koch; 2014 – Maximilian Schell

February 2

Today most of the U.S. and Canadia celebrates Groundhog Day, but Alaska, Alaska just haaaad to be different. They will be celebrating Marmot Day.

World Wetlands Day is celebrated on this date, as well.


Events

1141 – The Battle of Lincoln, at which Stephen, King of England is defeated and captured by the allies of Empress Matilda. [I didn't know Stephen King was that old. Also, I thought he was from Maine.:neutral:]

1461 – Wars of the Roses: The Battle of Mortimer's Cross is fought in Herefordshire, England, which is just down the road from Therefordshire.

1536 – Spaniard Pedro de Mendoza founds Buenos Aires, Argentina.

1653 – New Amsterdam (later renamed The City of New York) is incorporated.

1709 – Alexander Selkirk is rescued after being shipwrecked on a desert island, inspiring Daniel Defoe's adventure book Robinson Crusoe.

1848 – Mexican–American War: The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed.

1887 – In Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania the first Groundhog Day is observed.

1899 – The Australian Premiers' Conference held in Melbourne decides to locate Australia's capital city, Canberra, between Sydney and Melbourne.

1913 – Grand Central Terminal is opened in New York City.

1922 – Ulysses by James Joyce is published.

1925 – Serum run to Nome: Dog sleds reach Nome, Alaska with diphtheria serum, inspiration of the Iditarod race.

1935 – Leonarde Keeler administers polygraph tests to two murder suspects, the first time polygraph evidence was admitted in U.S. courts.

1943 – World War II: The Battle of Stalingrad comes to an end when Soviet troops accept the surrender of the last German troops in the city.

1959 - Buddy Holly, Richard Valens and The Big Bopper all appeared at the Surf Ballroom, Clear Lake, Iowa. This was all three acts' last ever gig, before being killed in a plane crash the following day.

1971 – Idi Amin replaces President Milton Obote as leader of Uganda.

1973 - Keith Emerson of Emerson Lake and Palmer injured his hands when his piano, rigged to explode as a stunt, detonated prematurely during a concert in San Francisco.

1979, Sex Pistols' bassist Sid Vicious died of a heroin overdose in New York City. There had been a party to celebrate Vicious' release on $50,000 (£29,412) bail pending his trial for the murder of his former girlfriend, Nancy Spungen, the previous October. Party guests, said that Vicious had taken heroin at midnight. An autopsy confirmed that Vicious died from an accumulation of fluid in the lungs that was consistent with heroin overdose. A syringe, spoon and heroin residue were discovered near the body.

1980 – Reports surface that the FBI is targeting allegedly corrupt Congressmen in the Abscam operation.

1990 – Apartheid: F. W. de Klerk announces the unbanning of the African National Congress and promises to release Nelson Mandela.

1993 - Willie Nelson agreed to pay $9 million of the $16.7 million he owed the Internal Revenue Service. His accountants, Price Waterhouse, had not been paying Nelson's taxes for years.

2004 – Swiss tennis player Roger Federer becomes the No. 1 ranked men's singles player, a position he will hold for a record 237 weeks.

2004 - TV network CBS apologised for its broadcast of the American Super Bowl after Janet Jackson was left exposed when Justin Timberlake ripped her top. The pair had been performing a raunchy half-time duet when one of Jackson's breasts was exposed as Timberlake pulled at her top. CBS quickly cut away from the scene but was still flooded with calls from angry viewers about the half-time entertainment, produced by MTV. Timberlake insisted it had been an accident saying "I am sorry that anyone was offended by the wardrobe malfunction during the half-time performance of the Super Bowl."

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1803 – Albert Sidney Johnston (General in three (3) separate armies, The United States Army, The Confederate States Army, & The Army of The Republic of Texas); 1861 – Solomon R. Guggenheim; 1882 – James Joyce; 1895 – George Halas (owner/founder of THE Chicago Bears:devil:); 1897 – Howard Deering Johnson (founded Howard Johnson's); 1905 – Ayn Rand; 1923 – James Dickey (the writer, not the actor); 1925 – Elaine Stritch; 1927 – Stan Getz♪ ♫; 1932 – Robert Mandan (Soap); 1933 – M'el Dowd; 1937 – Tom Smothers (The Smothers Bros.); 1942 – Graham Nash♪ ♫(Crosby, Stills, & Nash); 1946 - Howard Bellamy♪ ♫(The Bellamy Bros); 1947 – Farrah Fawcett; 1949 – Brent Spiner ('Data' on Star Trek TNG); 1949 – Ross Valory:bass:(Journey, Frumious Bandersnatch and Steve Miller Band); 1952 – Rick Dufay♪ ♫(Aerosmith); 1954 – Christie Brinkley:love:; 1966 – Robert DeLeo:bass:(Stone Temple Pilots, Hollywood Vampires); 1977 – Shakira♪ ♫:love:

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1918 – John L. Sullivan:boxers:; 1969 – Boris Karloff; 1979 – Sid Vicious:bass:(Sex Pistols); 1987 – Alistair MacLean; 1992 – Bert Parks (host of Miss America pageant for 24 years); 1995 – Donald Pleasence ("The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep"); 1996 – Gene Kelly♪ ♫; 1999 – David McComb♪ ♫(The Triffids, The Blackeyed Susans); 2004 – Bernard McEveety (director/producer Rawhide, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, The Virginian, The Big Valley,Young Maverick, How the West Was Won); 2005 – Max Schmeling:boxers:); 2013 – Chris Kyle (wrote American Sniper (his autobiography)); 2014 – Philip Seymour Hoffman; 2016 – Bob Elliott (Bob & Ray, Chris Elliott's father)

*snort*

:D

February 3

Today is Four Chaplains Day in the U.S.


Events

1377 – More than 2,000 people of the Italian city of Cesena are killed by the Condottieri (papal armed forces) in the "Cesena Bloodbath".

1488 – Bartolomeu Dias of Portugal lands in Mossel Bay after rounding the Cape of Good Hope, becoming the first known European to travel so far south.

1690 – The colony of Massachusetts issues the first paper money in the Americas.

1781 – American Revolutionary War: British forces seize the Dutch-owned Caribbean island Sint Eustatius.

1809 – The Territory of Illinois is created by the 10th United States Congress.

1834 – Wake Forest University is established.

1870 – The Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, guaranteeing voting rights to male citizens regardless of race.

1913 – The Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, authorizing the Federal government to impose and collect an income tax.

1943 – The SS Dorchester is sunk by a German U-boat. Only 230 of 902 men aboard survive. The Chapel of the Four Chaplains, dedicated by President Harry Truman, is one of many memorials established to commemorate the Four Chaplains story.

1945 – World War II: As part of Operation Thunderclap, 1,000 B-17s of the Eighth Air Force bomb Berlin, a raid which kills between 2,500 and 3,000 and dehouses another 120,000.

1959 – The Day The Music Died: Deaths of rock and roll musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, in a plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa.

1961 – The United States Air Forces begins Operation Looking Glass, and over the next 30 years, a "Doomsday Plane" is always in the air, with the capability of taking direct control of the United States' bombers and missiles in the event of the destruction of the SAC's command post.

1967 - Producer Joe Meek shot his landlady Violet Shenton and then shot himself at his flat in London.

1969 – In Cairo, Yasser Arafat is appointed Palestine Liberation Organization leader at the Palestinian National Congress.

1971 – New York Police Officer Frank Serpico is shot during a drug bust in Brooklyn and survives to later testify against police corruption.

1972 – The first day of the seven-day 1972 Iran blizzard, which would kill at least 4,000 people, making it the deadliest snowstorm in history.

1984 – John Buster and the research team at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center announce history's first embryo transfer, from one woman to another resulting in a live birth.

1984 – Space Shuttle program: STS-41-B is launched using Space Shuttle Challenger.

1995 – Astronaut Eileen Collins becomes the first woman to pilot the Space Shuttle as mission STS-63 gets underway from Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

1998 – Cavalese cable car disaster: a United States military pilot causes the death of 20 people when his low-flying plane cuts the cable of a cable-car near Trento, Italy.

2004 - R. Kelly appeared in court and entered of plea of not guilty to 21 charges of child pornography. Kelly, who was free on bond, did not talk during the brief hearing. Outside the Cook County Criminal Courthouse fans voiced their support for the singer, proclaiming his innocence with placards and T-shirts. Kelly had been arrested in Florida after he was indicted by a grand jury in Chicago on 21 counts of child pornography, stemming from a videotape that allegedly shows the star performing sexual acts with a 14-year-old girl.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1807 – Joseph E. Johnston; 1809 – Felix Mendelssohn; 1811 – Horace Greeley ("Go West, young man, and grow up with the country."); 1859 – Hugo Junkers (designed the Junkers J 1); 1874 – Gertrude Stein; 1894 – Norman Rockwell; 1904 – Pretty Boy Floyd:rattat:; 1907 – James A. Michener; 1918 – Joey Bishop; 1920 – Henry Heimlich; 1925 – John Fiedler ('Lawyer Daggett' in True Grit); 1935 – Johnny "Guitar" Watson♪ ♫; 1938 – Victor Buono; 1939 – Michael Cimino; 1940 – Fran Tarkenton; 1943 – Blythe Danner; 1945 – Bob Griese; 1947 – Dave Davies♪ ♫(The Kinks); 1947 – Stephen McHattie; 1950 – Morgan Fairchild:love:; 1956 – Nathan Lane; 1962 – Michele Greene:love:; 1965 – Maura Tierney; 1969 – Beau Biden; 1969 – Retief Goosen; 1970 – Warwick Davis

:skull:Deaths:skull:

1468 – Johannes Gutenberg; 1883 – Richard Wagner; 1889 – Belle Starr; 1924 – Woodrow Wilson (28th POTUS); 1935 – Hugo Junkers; 1959 – The Day the Music Died, The Big Bopper, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens; 1961 – Anna May Wong; 1989 – John Cassavetes; 1991 – Nancy Kulp (Miss Hathaway on The Beverly Hillbillies); 1996 – Audrey Meadows (The Honeymooners); 2006 – Al Lewis ('Grandpa' on The Munsters); 2010 – Frances Reid (Days of Our Lives); 2012 – Ben Gazzara; 2012 – Zalman King

February 4

Today Missouri and California celebrate Rosa Parks Day.

Today is also World Cancer Day, so...Fuck cancer.

This day marks the approximate mid-point of winter, in the Northern Hemisphere, and the approximate mid-point of summer in the Southern Hemisphere.


Events

1555 – John Rogers is burned at the stake, becoming the first English Protestant martyr under Mary I of England.

1703 – In Edo (now Tokyo), 46 of the Forty-seven Ronin commit seppuku (ritual suicide) as recompense for avenging their master's death.

1789 – George Washington is unanimously elected as the first President of the United States by the U.S. Electoral College.

1846 – The first Mormon pioneers make their exodus from Nauvoo, Illinois, westward towards Salt Lake Valley.

1941 – The United Service Organization (USO) is created to entertain American troops.

1945 – World War II: The Yalta Conference between the "Big Three" (Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin) opens at the Livadia Palace in the Crimea.

1974 – M62 coach bombing: The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) explodes a bomb on a bus carrying off-duty British Armed Forces personnel in Yorkshire, England. Nine soldiers and three civilians are killed.

1977 – A Chicago Transit Authority elevated train rear-ends another and derails, killing 11 and injuring 180, the worst accident in the agency's history.

1992 – A coup d'état is led by Hugo Chávez against Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez.

1996 – Major snowstorm paralyzes Midwestern United States, Milwaukee, Wisconsin and ties all-time record low temperature at −26 °F (−32.2 °C).

1997 – En route to Lebanon, two Israeli Sikorsky CH-53 troop-transport helicopters collide in mid-air over northern Galilee, Israel killing 73.

1999 – Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot 41 times by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, inflaming race relations in the city.

2004 – Facebook, a mainstream online social networking site, is founded by Mark Zuckerberg.

:knockdup:Births:knockdup:

1895 – Nigel Bruce ('Dr. Watson' in Sherlock Holmes movies); 1900 – Jacques Prévert; 1902 – Charles Lindbergh; 1906 – Clyde Tombaugh (discovered planet Pluto); 1912 – Byron Nelson; 1913 – Rosa Parks; 1915 – William Talman; 1918 – Ida Lupino; 1923 – Conrad Bain (Diff'rent Strokes); 1936 – David Brenner; 1940 – George A. Romero; 1941 – John Steel; 1947 – Dan Quayle (44th POTUS); 1948 – Alice Cooper; 1949 – Michael Beck; 1951 – Patrick Bergin; 1951 – Phil Ehart; 1959 – Lawrence Taylor; 1962 – Clint Black; 1970 – Gabrielle Anwar; 1973 – Oscar De La Hoya; 1975 – Natalie Imbruglia; 1977 – Gavin DeGraw

:skull:Deaths:skull:

211 – Septimius Severus; 1555 – John Rogers; 1894 – Adolphe Sax; 1975 – Louis Jordan; 1982 – Alex Harvey; 1983 – Karen Carpenter; 1987 – Liberace; 1992 – John Dehner; 2005 – Ossie Davis; 2006 – Betty Friedan; 2007 – Barbara McNair; 2016 – Dave Mirra; 2016 – Maurice White