A quick look at Today in History, check out some Celebrity Birthdays, and find out what Days of the Year to celebrate.
TODAY IN HISTORY:
1620 – William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims landed on what is now known as Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, MA.
1891 – The first game of basketball, invented by faculty member James Naismith, was believed to have been played at Springfield College in Massachusetts.
1898 – The radioactive element radium was discovered by scientists Pierre and Marie Curie.
1913 – Arthur Wynne published a new “word-cross” puzzle in the “New York World” in England. The name was later changed to “crossword.”
1914 – Marie Dressler, Charlie Chaplin, Mabel Normand and Mack Swain appeared in the first six-reel, feature-length comedy — “Tillie’s Punctured Romance”.
1937 – Walt Disney debuted the first, full-length, animated feature in Hollywood, CA. The movie was “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”.
1944 – Horse racing was banned in the United States until after the end of World War II.
1951 – Joe DiMaggio announced his retirement from major league baseball.
1960 – The Disney movie “Swiss Family Robinson” premiered in theaters.
1967 – Louis Washkansky, the first man to undergo a heart transplant, died in Cape Town, South Africa. He lived for 18 days after the transplant.
1967 – “The Graduate”, starring Dustin Hoffman, premiered in New York, NY.
1968 – Apollo 8 was launched from the Kennedy Space Center on a mission to orbit the moon. It was the first visit to another celestial body by humans. The craft landed safely in the Pacific Ocean on December 27th.
1970 – Elvis Presley went to the White House to volunteer his services to President Richard Nixon in the fight against drugs.
1978 – Police in Des Plaines, IL, arrested John W. Gacy Jr. and began unearthing the remains of 33 men and boys that Gacy was later convicted of having murdered.
1979 – Willie Nelson made his acting debut in “The Electric Horseman”, starring with Robert Redford and Jane Fonda.
1988 – The movie “Working Girl”, starring Melanie Griffith, premiered in theaters.
1988 – A terrorist bomb went off on Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. All 259 passengers on board, and 11 people on the ground, were killed.
1997 – Detroit Lion Barry Sanders set a NFL rushing record, when he became the third NFL player to rush for over 2,000 yards in a single season.
1998 – The first vaccine for Lyme disease was approved.
2001 – Congress passed a $20 billion package to finance the “war against terrorism” being fought in Afghanistan.
2002 – Larry Mayes was released after spending 21 years in prison for a rape that maintained that he never committed. He was the 100th person in the U.S. to be released after DNA tests were performed.
2004 – A suicide bomber killed 22 at the forward operating base next to the main U.S. military airfield at Mosul, Iraq. It was the single deadliest suicide attack on American soldiers.
2012 – The Walt Disney Company completed its acquisition of Lucasfilm and of the “Star Wars” franchise.
2012 – People wondered if the world would end when a Mayan calendar predicted it would happen on this date. It obviously didn’t happen!
2012 – The song “Gangnam Style” became the first video to hit one billion views on YouTube.com.
2020 – A great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn occurred, with the two planets separated in the sky by 0.1 degrees. This was the closest conjunction between the two planets since 1623.
BIRTHDAYS:
Phil Roman – 95 years old (1930) – Animator
Edward Hoagland – 93 years old (1932) – Author and critic
Robert Worcester – 92 years old (1933) – Businessman and academic, founded MORI
Jane Fonda – 88 years old (1937) – Actress and activist
Larry Bryggman – 87 years old (1938) – Actor
Carla Thomas – 83 years old (1942) – Singer
Michael Tilson Thomas – 81 years old (1944) – Pianist, composer, and conductor
Roy Karch – 79 years old (1946) – Director, producer, and screenwriter
Barry Gordon – 77 years old (1948) – Actor and voice artist; longest-serving president of the Screen Actors Guild (1988–95)
Samuel L. Jackson – 77 years old (1948) – Actor and producer
Dave Kingman – 77 years old (1948) – Baseball player
Jeffrey Katzenberg – 75 years old (1950) – Screenwriter and producer, co-founded DreamWorks Animation
Dennis Boutsikaris – 73 years old (1952) – Actor
Steve Furniss – 73 years old (1952) – Swimmer
Chris Evert – 71 years old (1954) – Tennis player and coach
Jane Kaczmarek – 70 years old (1955) – Actress
Ray Romano – 68 years old (1957) – Actor, producer, and screenwriter
Andy Dick – 60 years old (1965) – Actor and comedian
Michelle Hurd – 59 years old (1966) – Actress
Terry Mills – 58 years old (1967) – Basketball player and coach
Natalie Grant – 54 years old (1971) – Singer-songwriter and author
Buddy Carlyle – 48 years old (1977) – Baseball player
Freddy Sanchez – 48 years old (1977) – Baseball player
Charles Dera – 47 years old (1978) – Pornographic actor, dancer, model, and mixed martial arts fighter
Rutina Wesley – 47 years old (1978) – Actress
Philip Humber – 43 years old (1982) – Baseball player
Taylor Teagarden – 42 years old (1983) – Baseball player
Steven Yeun – 42 years old (1983) – Actor
Khris Davis – 38 years old (1987) – Baseball player
Danny Duffy – 37 years old (1988) – Baseball player
Mark Ingram II – 36 years old (1989) – Football player
Otis – 34 years old (1991) – Wrestler
Ha Ha Clinton-Dix – 33 years old (1992) – Football player
Kaitlyn Dever – 29 years old (1996) – Actress
Madelyn Cline – 28 years old (1997) – Actress and model
Charlie McAvoy – 28 years old (1997) – Ice hockey player
Cooper Flagg – 19 years old (2006) – Basketball player
TODAY IS:
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For additional information check out websites like: www.on-this-day.com, www.born-today.com, www.famousbirthdays.com, www.daysoftheyear.com, and www.nationaldaycalendar.com.
