Today in History January 2014

Today in history for January 13th brings us up to date…for now!

Today is Monday, Jan. 13, the 13th day of 2014. There are 352 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Jan. 13, 1864, American songwriter Stephen Foster, who’d written such classics as “Swanee River,” ”Oh! Susanna,” ”Camptown Races,” ”My Old Kentucky Home” and “Beautiful Dreamer,” died in poverty in a New York hospital at age 37.

On this date:

In 1733, James Oglethorpe and some 120 English colonists arrived at Charleston, S.C., while en route to settle in present-day Georgia.

In 1794, President George Washington approved a measure adding two stars and two stripes to the American flag, following the admission of Vermont and Kentucky to the Union. (The number of stripes was later reduced to the original 13.)

In 1898, Emile Zola’s famous defense of Capt. Alfred Dreyfus, “J’accuse,” (zhah-KOOZ’) was published in Paris.

In 1941, a new law went into effect granting Puerto Ricans U.S. birthright citizenship. Novelist and poet James Joyce died in Zurich, Switzerland, less than a month before his 59th birthday.

In 1945, during World War II, Soviet forces began a huge, successful offensive against the Germans in Eastern Europe.

In 1962, comedian Ernie Kovacs died in a car crash in west Los Angeles 10 days before his 43rd birthday.

In 1964, Roman Catholic Bishop Karol Wojtyla (voy-TEE’-wah) (the future Pope John Paul II) was appointed Archbishop of Krakow, Poland, by Pope Paul VI.

In 1966, Robert C. Weaver was named Secretary of Housing and Urban Development by President Lyndon B. Johnson; Weaver became the first black Cabinet member.

In 1978, former Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey died in Waverly, Minn., at age 66.

In 1982, an Air Florida 737 crashed into Washington, D.C.’s 14th Street Bridge and fell into the Potomac River after taking off during a snowstorm, killing a total of 78 people; four passengers and a flight attendant survived.

In 1990, L. Douglas Wilder of Virginia became the nation’s first elected black governor as he took the oath of office in Richmond.

In 2012, the Italian luxury liner Costa Concordia ran aground off the Tuscan island of Giglio and flipped onto its side; 32 people were killed.

Ten years ago: Hostile fire brought down a U.S. Army Apache attack helicopter in Iraq, but the two crew members escaped injury. A domestic airliner crashed in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, killing all 37 people aboard. Harold Shipman, the British doctor blamed for killing more than 200 mostly elderly patients, was found hanged in his prison cell, an apparent suicide, a day before his 58th birthday.

Five years ago: President-elect Barack Obama’s nominee for secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton, vowed during her Senate confirmation hearing to revitalize the mission of diplomacy in U.S. foreign policy. Obama’s choice to run the Treasury Department, Timothy Geithner (GYT’-nur), disclosed that he had failed to pay $34,000 in taxes from 2001 to 2004. U.S. Marshals apprehended Marcus Schrenker, 38, in North Florida days after the businessman and amateur daredevil pilot apparently tried to fake his own death in a plane crash. (Schrenker was sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to securities fraud charges, on top of four years in federal prison on charges stemming from the plane crash.) Actor-director Patrick McGoohan died in Los Angeles at age 80. Author Hortense Calisher died in New York at age 97.

One year ago: A Cairo appeals court overturned Hosni Mubarak’s life sentence and ordered a retrial of the former Egyptian president for failing to prevent the killing of hundreds of protesters during the 2011 uprising that toppled his regime. (Mubarak was later ordered released.) “Argo” won best motion picture drama at the Golden Globes; “Les Miserables” won best picture musical or comedy.

Today’s Birthdays: Actress Frances Sternhagen is 84. TV personality Nick Clooney is 80. Comedian Rip Taylor is 80. Actor Billy Gray is 76. Actor Richard Moll is 71. Rock musician Trevor Rabin is 60. Rhythm-and-blues musician Fred White is 59. Rock musician James Lomenzo (Megadeth) is 55. Actor Kevin Anderson is 54. Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus is 53. Rock singer Graham “Suggs” McPherson (Madness) is 53. Country singer Trace Adkins is 52. Actress Penelope Ann Miller is 50. Actor Patrick Dempsey is 48. Actress Traci Bingham is 46. Actor Keith Coogan is 44. Actress Nicole Eggert is 42. Actor Orlando Bloom is 37. Actor Julian Morris is 31. Actor Liam Hemsworth (Film: “The Hunger Games” movies) is 24.

Thought for Today: “The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well.” — Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford, English author (1717-1797).

(Above Advance for Use Monday, Jan. 13)

Copyright 2014, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

I’ve printed a few LOL cats pics. Some of you may know one as my avatar on Pinterest! (JerseyJoanE) There’s another that hangs in my kitchen very similar to the one posted above. The caption is “Bring Up The Dinner Betsy!”.

=^..^=

On to some history…
Today is Tuesday, Jan. 14, the 14th day of 2014. There are 351 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Jan. 14, 1964, former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy, in a brief televised address, thanked Americans for their condolences and messages of support following the assassination of her husband, President John F. Kennedy, nearly two months earlier.

On this date:

In 1784, the United States ratified a peace treaty with England, ending the Revolutionary War.

In 1814, the Treaty of Kiel ended hostilities between Denmark and Sweden, with Denmark agreeing to cede Norway to Sweden, something Norway refused to accept.

In 1900, Puccini’s opera “Tosca” had its world premiere in Rome.

In 1914, Ford Motor Co. greatly improved its assembly-line operation by employing an endless chain to pull each chassis along at its Highland Park plant.

In 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and French General Charles de Gaulle opened a wartime conference in Casablanca.

In 1952, NBC’s “Today” show premiered, with Dave Garroway as the host, or “communicator.”

In 1954, Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio were married at San Francisco City Hall. (The marriage, however, lasted only about nine months.)

In 1963, George C. Wallace was sworn in as governor of Alabama with the pledge, “Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” — a view Wallace later repudiated. Sylvia Plath’s novel “The Bell Jar” was published in London under the pen name “Victoria Lucas,” less than a month before Plath committed suicide.

In 1969, 27 people aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, off Hawaii, were killed when a rocket warhead exploded, setting off a fire and additional explosions.

In 1970, Diana Ross and the Supremes performed their last concert together, at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas.

In 1989, President Ronald Reagan delivered his 331st and final weekly White House radio address, telling listeners, “Believe me, Saturdays will never seem the same. I’ll miss you.”

In 1994, President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed an accord to stop aiming missiles at any nation; the leaders joined Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk in signing an accord to dismantle the nuclear arsenal of Ukraine.

Ten years ago: Former Enron finance chief Andrew Fastow (FAS’-tow) pleaded guilty to conspiracy as he accepted a ten-year prison sentence. (He was actually sentenced to six years and was released in Dec. 2011.) J.P. Morgan Chase and Co. struck a deal to buy Bank One Corp. for $58 billion. A female Palestinian suicide bomber killed three Israeli soldiers and a private security guard at a Gaza crossing. U.N. officials announced that Libya had ratified the nuclear test ban treaty. President George W. Bush unveiled a plan to send astronauts to the moon, Mars and beyond. Death claimed actress Uta Hagen in New York at age 84 and actor Ron O’Neal in Los Angeles at age 66.

Five years ago: Freshly returned from a tour of war zones and global hotspots, Vice President-elect Joe Biden told President-elect Barack Obama that “things are going to get tougher” in Afghanistan. A French court acquitted six doctors and pharmacists in the deaths of at least 114 people who’d contracted brain-destroying Creutzfeldt-Jakob (KROYTS’-felt JAY’-kuhb) disease after being treated with tainted human growth hormones. Actor Ricardo Montalban died in Los Angeles at age 88.

One year ago: Lance Armstrong ended a decade of denial by confessing to Oprah Winfrey that he’d used performance-enhancing drugs to win the Tour de France. Veteran stage and film actor Conrad Bain, 89, died in Livermore, Calif.

Today’s Birthdays: Blues singer Clarence Carter is 78. Singer Jack Jones is 76. Singer-songwriter Allen Toussaint is 76. Former NAACP Chairman Julian Bond is 74. Actress Faye Dunaway is 73. Actress Holland Taylor is 71. Actor Carl Weathers is 66. Singer-producer T-Bone Burnett is 66. Movie writer-director Lawrence Kasdan is 65. Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Maureen Dowd is 62. Rock singer Geoff Tate (Queensryche) is 55. Movie writer-director Steven Soderbergh is 51. Actor Mark Addy is 50. Fox News Channel anchorman Shepard Smith is 50. Rapper Slick Rick is 49. Actor Dan Schneider is 48. Actress Emily Watson is 47. Actor-comedian Tom Rhodes is 47. Rock musician Zakk Wylde (Ozzy Osbourne Band) is 47. Rapper-actor LL Cool J is 46. Actor Jason Bateman is 45. Rock singer-musician Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters) is 45. Actor Kevin Durand is 40. Actress Jordan Ladd is 39. Retro-soul singer-songwriter Marc Broussard is 32. Rock singer-musician Caleb Followill (Kings of Leon) is 32. Actor Zach Gilford is 32. Rock musician Joe Guese (The Click Five) is 31. Actor Jonathan Osser is 25.

Thought for Today: “If you limit your actions in life to things that nobody can possibly find fault with, you will not do much.” — Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (“Lewis Carroll”), English author (1832-1898).

(Above Advance for Use Tuesday, Jan. 14)

Copyright 2014, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Great link, JK! PBS had a good program on last night about the happenings in 1964. Very interesting.

* * * * *

Today is Wednesday, Jan. 15, the 15th day of 2014. There are 350 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Jan. 15, 1929, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was born in Atlanta.

On this date:

In 1559, England’s Queen Elizabeth I was crowned in Westminster Abbey.

In 1777, the people of New Connecticut declared their independence. (The republic later became the state of Vermont.)

In 1862, the U.S. Senate confirmed President Abraham Lincoln’s choice of Edwin M. Stanton to be the new Secretary of War, replacing Simon Cameron.

In 1919, in Boston, a tank containing an estimated 2.3 million gallons of molasses burst, sending the dark syrup coursing through the city’s North End, killing 21 people.

In 1943, work was completed on the Pentagon, headquarters of the U.S. Department of War (now Defense).

In 1947, the mutilated remains of 22-year-old Elizabeth Short, who came to be known as the “Black Dahlia,” were found in a vacant Los Angeles lot; her slaying remains unsolved.

In 1967, the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League defeated the Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League 35-10 in the first AFL-NFL World Championship Game, known retroactively as Super Bowl I.

In 1973, President Richard Nixon announced the suspension of all U.S. offensive action in North Vietnam, citing progress in peace negotiations.

In 1974, the situation comedy “Happy Days” premiered on ABC-TV.

In 1989, NATO, the Warsaw Pact and 12 other European countries adopted a human rights and security agreement in Vienna, Austria.

In 1993, in Paris, a historic disarmament ceremony ended with the last of 125 countries signing a treaty banning chemical weapons.

In 1994, singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson died in Agoura Hills, Calif., at age 52.

Ten years ago: The NASA Spirit rover rolled onto the surface of Mars for the first time since the vehicle bounced to a landing nearly two weeks earlier. Fourteen-year-old golfer Michelle Wie shot a 2-over 72 in the first round at the PGA Sony Open in Honolulu. “First Wives Club” novelist Olivia Goldsmith died in New York at age 54.

Five years ago: US Airways Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger ditched his Airbus 320 in the Hudson River after a flock of birds disabled both engines; all 155 people aboard survived. In a farewell address to the nation, President George W. Bush said while his policies were unpopular, there could be little debate about the results: “America has gone more than seven years without another terrorist attack on our soil.” Congress cleared the release of the final $350 billion in bailout funds for the financial industry. After a wave of controversy, Roland Burris was sworn in as a U.S. senator from Illinois.

One year ago: New York state enacted the nation’s toughest gun restrictions and the first since the Connecticut school massacre, including an expanded assault-weapon ban and background checks for buying ammunition. Twin blasts ripped through a university campus in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, killing more than 80 people, most of them students, in the government-controlled part of the city.

Today’s Birthdays: Actress Margaret O’Brien is 77. Actress Andrea Martin is 67. Actor-director Mario Van Peebles is 57. Actor James Nesbitt is 49. Singer Lisa Lisa (Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam) is 47. Teacher Jennifer Castagno is 23. Actor Chad Lowe is 46. Alt-country singer Will Oldham (aka “Bonnie Prince Billy”) is 44. Actress Regina King is 43. Actor Eddie Cahill is 36. NFL quarterback Drew Brees is 35. Rapper/reggaeton artist Pitbull is 33. Electronic dance musician Skrillex is 26.

Thought for Today: “A man can’t ride your back unless it’s bent.” — Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968).

(Above Advance for Use Wednesday, Jan. 15)

Copyright 2014, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Only “dress up” that I ever had the nerve to try with Dorry was putting one of my faux silver/diamond bracelets on as a sort of collar. Didn’t fit too well, understandably my wrist is way smaller than his little neck, looked purrty tho. And he bore the silliness admirably. Anything more and I’d be risking danger to self LOL.

Today is Thursday, Jan. 16, the 16th day of 2014. There are 349 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Jan. 16, 1944, during World War II, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower formally assumed command of the Allied Expeditionary Forces in London.

On this date:

In 1547, Ivan IV of Russia (popularly known as “Ivan the Terrible”) was crowned Czar.

In 1883, the U.S. Civil Service Commission was established.

In 1920, Prohibition began in the United States as the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution took effect, one year to the day after its ratification. (It was later repealed by the 21st Amendment.)

In 1935, fugitive gangster Fred Barker and his mother, Kate “Ma” Barker, were killed in a shootout with the FBI at Lake Weir, Fla.

In 1942, actress Carole Lombard, 33, her mother Elizabeth and 20 other people were killed when their plane crashed near Las Vegas, Nev., while en route to California from a war-bond promotion tour.

In 1957, three B-52’s took off from Castle Air Force Base in California on the first non-stop, round-the-world flight by jet planes, which lasted 45 hours and 19 minutes.

In 1964, the musical “Hello, Dolly!” opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.

In 1969, two manned Soviet Soyuz spaceships became the first vehicles to dock in space and transfer personnel.

In 1978, NASA named 35 candidates to fly on the space shuttle, including Sally K. Ride, who became America’s first woman in space, and Guion S. Bluford Jr., who became America’s first black astronaut in space.

In 1989, three days of rioting began in Miami when a police officer fatally shot Clement Lloyd, a black motorcyclist, causing a crash that also claimed the life of Lloyd’s passenger, Allan Blanchard. (The officer, William Lozano, was convicted of manslaughter, but then was acquitted in a retrial.)

In 1991, the White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.

In 2003, the space shuttle Columbia blasted off for what turned out to be its last flight; on board was Israel’s first astronaut, Ilan Ramon (ee-LAHN’ rah-MOHN’). (The mission ended in tragedy on Feb. 1, when the shuttle broke up during its return descent, killing all seven crew members.)

Ten years ago: Pop star Michael Jackson pleaded not guilty to child molestation charges during a court appearance in Santa Maria, Calif.; the judge scolded Jackson for being 21 minutes late. (Jackson was eventually acquitted.) NASA announced that the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope would be allowed to degrade and eventually become useless. Freddy Adu, the 14-year-old phenom, was selected by D.C. United as the first pick in the Major League Soccer draft.

Five years ago: President-elect Barack Obama made a pitch for his massive economic stimulus plan at a factory in Bedford Heights, Ohio, saying his proposal would make smart investments in the country’s future and create solid jobs in up-and-coming industries. Painter Andrew Wyeth died in Chadds Ford, Pa., at age 91. John Mortimer, the British lawyer-writer who’d created the curmudgeonly criminal lawyer Rumpole of the Bailey, died in the Chiltern Hills, England, at age 85.

One year ago: Braced for a fight, President Barack Obama unveiled the most sweeping proposals for curbing gun violence in two decades, pressing a reluctant Congress to pass universal background checks and bans on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines like the ones used in the Newtown, Conn., school shooting. The federal government grounded Boeing’s newest and most technologically advanced jetliner, declaring that U.S. airlines could not fly the 787 again until the risk of battery fires was addressed. Pauline Friedman Phillips, better known as advice columnist Dear Abby, died in Minneapolis at age 94.

Today’s Birthdays: Author William Kennedy is 86. Author-editor Norman Podhoretz is 84. Opera singer Marilyn Horne is 80. Hall of Fame auto racer A.J. Foyt is 79. Singer Barbara Lynn is 72. Country singer Ronnie Milsap is 71. Country singer Jim Stafford is 70. Talk show host Dr. Laura Schlessinger is 67. Movie director John Carpenter is 66. Actress-dancer-choreographer Debbie Allen is 64. Singer Sade (shah-DAY’) is 55. Rock musician Paul Webb (Talk Talk) is 52. Rhythm-and-blues singer Maxine Jones (En Vogue) is 48. Actor David Chokachi (CHOH’-kuh-chee) is 46. Actor Richard T. Jones is 42. Actress Josie Davis is 41. Model Kate Moss is 40. Rock musician Nick Valensi (The Strokes) is 33. Actress Renee Felice Smith (TV: “NCIS: Los Angeles”) is 29. NFL quaterback Joe Flacco is 29. Actress Yvonne Zima is 25.

Thought for Today: “Goodwill is the only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.” — Marshall Field, department store founder (1834-1906).

(Above Advance for Use Thursday, Jan. 16)

Copyright 2014, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.