On This Day July 4th

July 4 is the 185th day of the year there are 180 days remaining until the end of the year

1776: This is a very special day for the United States of America, and considered the most important day in it’s History!  So important – it warrants a page unto itself!  So see what we wrote on the American Independence Day by clicking here

1976: Israelis rescue Entebbe hostages

Israeli commandos have rescued 100 hostages, mostly Israelis or Jews, held by pro-Palestinian hijackers at Entebbe airport in Uganda. Read the complete story on the BBC web site by clicking here

1603: Philippe de Monte, Flemish composer died (b. 1521)

1623: William Byrd, English composer Died

1754: Philippe Néricault Destouches, French dramatist and author died (b. 1680)

1761: Samuel Richardson, English writer died (b. 1689)

1802: At West Point, New York the United States Military Academy opens.

1817: At Rome, New York, United States, construction on the Erie Canal begins.

1821: Richard Cosway, English artist (b. 1742)

1826: John Adams, dies 2nd President of the United States dies at 90 (b. 1735)

1826: Thomas Jefferson third president of the United States, dies the same day as John Adams, second president of the United States, on the fiftieth anniversary of the adoption of the United States Declaration of Independence. (b. 1743)

1827: Slavery is abolished in New York State

1831: Samuel Francis Smith wrote My Country, ‘Tis of Thee for the Boston, MA July 4th festivities.

1832: The patriotic anthem “America” is first heard in public, in Boston Massachusetts

1845: Henry David Thoreau moves into a little shack on Walden Pond

1855: In Brooklyn, New York, the first edition of Walt Whitman’s book of poems, titled Leaves of Grass, is published.

1862: Lewis Carroll tells Alice Liddell a story that would grow into Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and its sequels.

1863: Sufferng the worse casulties in American history: General Lee’s army withdraws from Gettysburg

1865: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is published.

1875: White Democrats kill several blacks in terrorist attacks in Vicksburg

1878: Thoroughbred horses Ten Broeck and Mollie McCarty run a match race, immortalized in the song Molly and Tenbrooks

1881: In Alabama, Booker T. Washington establishes the Tuskegee Institute

1882: Soon to become a land mark in a city of many: Telegraph Hill Observatory opens in San Francisco

1882: Joseph Brackett, American composer dies (b. 1797)

1884: It’s a little known fact: but the U.S. did put on Bullfights!  The very first was held, in Dodge City Kansas

1886: The people of France offer the Statue of Liberty to the people of the United States

1888: The first organized rodeo competition held is hel in Prescott, Arizona

1902: Swami Vivekanandam founder of Ramakrishna Mission, chief disciple of Ramakrishna, responsible for bringing Vedanta and Yoga to Europe, America, introduced Hinduism at Parliament of World Religions at Chicago, 1893, dies at age 39, (b. 1863)

1903: Dorothy Levitt is reported as the first woman in the world to compete in a ‘motor race’

1911: White Sox Ed Walsh stops Ty Cobb’s 40-game hitting streak.  The Georgia Peach as he was known, was an American Major League Baseball outfielder. He spent 22 seasons with the Detroit Tigers

1911: 105 degrees F (41 degrees C) is recorded in Vernon, Vermont: a state record that stands to this day

1911: 106 degrees F (41 degrees C) is recorded Nashua, New Hampshire: a state record that stands to this day

1919: Jack Dempsey KOs Jess Willard in Cuba for heavyweight championship

1916: Alan Seeger, American war poet (b. 1888)

1923: Jack Dempsey beats Tommy Gibbon in 15 for heavyweight boxing title

1931: Buddie Petit, American jazz musician (b. 1895)

1933: Work begins on Oakland California Bay Bridge

1939: Red Sox Jim Tabor hits 2 grand slams in 1 game

1939: Lou Gehrig, recently diagnosed with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, shocks a crowd at New Yorks Yankee Stadium that he considers himself “The luckiest man on the face of the earth” as he announces his retirement from major league baseball. His jersey #4, starts the tradition of retiring uniforms for the Yankees

1944: 1st Japanese kamikaze attack on the U.S. fleet occurs off the coast of Iwo Jima

1946: After 381 years of near-continuous colonial rule by various powers, the Philippines attains full independence from the United States

1950: As part of the “cold war”: The first broadcast by Radio Free Europe

1959: With the admission of Alaska as the 49th U.S. state earlier in the year, the 49-star flag of the United States debuts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1960: Due to the post-Independence Day admission of Hawaii as the 50th U.S. state on August 21, 1959, the 50-star flag of the United States debuts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania almost ten and a half months later

1962: Island Records opens for busienss

1963: Grant Richards, actor…Doug in Doorway to Danger, dies at 48

1964: Beachboy’s “I Get Around” reaches #1

1964: Henry (Hank) Sylvern, American radio personality (b. 1908)

1965: Homophile activists picket at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, the first in a series of Annual Reminders of the second-class status of LGBT people in the United States.

1966: Beatles attacked in Philippines after insulting Imelda Marcos

1966: President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Freedom of Information Act into United States law. The act goes into effect the next year

1969: 140,000 attend Atlanta Pop Festival featuring Led Zep and Janis Joplin

1970: Barnett Newman, American artist (b. 1905)

1970:  Casey Kasem, along with Don Bustany and Ron Jacobs, founded the popular American Top 40 franchise in 1970, hosting it from 1970 to 1988 and then from 1998 to 2004.  Trivia Question: What was Casey doing every Saturday morning between 1969 and 2009? The Answer…can be found at the end of this post!

1970: Harold Stirling Vanderbilt, American industrialist (b. 1884)

1970: 100 injured in race rioting in Asbury Park, New Jersey

1975: 82nd Wimbledon Womens Tennis: Billie Jean King beats Goolagong (60 61)

1976: Israeli commandos raid Entebbe airport in Uganda, rescuing all but four of the passengers and crew of an Air France jetliner seized by Palestinian terrorists.

1976: Yonatan Netanyahu, dies, Israeli soldier and Entebbe rescue commander (b. 1946)

1977: Boston Red Sox wallop a major league-record 8 home runs beating Toronto 9-6

1980: MLB great Nolan Ryan strikes out his 3,000th batter, he retires in 1993 with leading the all time list with 5,714!

1983: Claus Adam, composer, cellist, teacher, performed with Julliard String Quartet 1955: 1974, composed music for a string trio and cello concerto, dies at 65

1984: Jimmie Spheeris, American singer-songwriter (b. 1949)

1986: Flor Peeters, Belgian composer and organist (b. 1903)

1987: Nazi Klaus Barbie, “Butcher of Lyon” sentenced to life in France

1988: Adrian Adonis (b. 1954) and Keith Franke, WWF wrestler, are killed in auto accident

1989: Jack Haig, British actor (b. 1913)

1990: 2 Live Crew release “Banned in the USA”

1992: Joe Newman, U.S. jazz trumpet player.  Best known for his work with Count Basie, dies

1992: Ástor Piazzolla, Argentinian composer (b. 1921)

1993: Dave Winfield hits his 442nd home run to move into 19th place on the all time Home Run list

1995: Eva Gabor, widely known for her role on Green Acres as Lisa Douglas, the wife of Eddie Albert’s character, Oliver Wendell Douglas, Duchess in the 1970 Disney film The Aristocats, and Miss Bianca in Disney’s The Rescuers and The Rescuers Down Under. Gabor had success as an actress in film, Broadway and television. Her elder sisters, Zsa Zsa Gabor and the late Magda Gabor, were also actresses and socialites (b. 1919)

1995: Bob Ross, American artist and television host (b. 1942)

1996: HotMail, free internet E-mail service begins

1997: Charles Kuralt, American television presenter (b. 1934)

1997: NASA’s Pathfinder space probe lands on the surface of Mars

1999: Leo Garel, American artist and cartoonist (b. 1917)

2001: Keenan Milton, American skateboarder (b. 1974)

2002: Winnifred Quick, American Titanic survivor (b. 1904)

2003: André Claveau, French singer (b. 1915)

2003: Barry White, “the man with velvet voice”, maybe best known for “Can’t Get Enough of Your Love, Babe”, dies at 58 (b. 1944)

2004: Jean-Marie Auberson, Swiss conductor (b. 1920)

2004: Frank Robinson (Xylophone Man), British street entertainer (b. 1932)

2004: The cornerstone of the Freedom Tower is laid on the site of the World Trade Center in New York City

2005: Hank Stram, American football coach (b. 1923)

2007: Baris Akarsu, Turkish rock musician (b. 1979)

2007: Bill Pinkney, American singer and performer (b. 1925)

2008: Evelyn Keyes, American actress (b. 1916)

2009: The Statue of Liberty’s crown reopens to the public after 8 years, due to security reasons following the World Trade Center attacks

2009: Brenda Joyce, American actress (b. 1917)

2009: Allen Klein, American music executive (b. 1931)

2009: Drake Levin, American rock musician (b. 1946)

2009: Steve McNair, American football player (b. 1973)

2009: Jim Chapin, drummer passes away  (b. 1919)

2010: Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, Iraqi-born Lebanese Shiite Muslim cleric and Hezbollah mentor (b. 1935)

2010: An Iranian woman convicted of adultery is sentenced to death by stoning

 

1330: Ashikaga Yoshiakira, Japanese shogun (d. 1367)

1694: Louis-Claude Daquin, French composer (d. 1772)

1804: Nathaniel Hawthorne, American writer (d. 1864)

1816: Hiram Walker, American grocer and distiller (d. 1899)

1826: Stephen Foster, American songwriter (d. 1864)

1847: James Anthony Bailey, American circus impresario of Barnum & Bailey fame (d. 1906)

1850: Ole Olsen, Hammerfest, Norway, composer, organist, teacher, wrote opera ‘Stig Hvide’, wrote Symphony in G major

1880: Pat Rooney, vaudevillian and actor

1881: Ulysses S. Grant III, American soldier (d. 1968)

 

 

 

1882: Louis B. Mayer, American film producer (d. 1957)

1883: Rube Goldberg, American cartoonist (d. 1970) Known world wide as the “inventor” of extremly complicated machines to accomplish extremly simply tasks!  So much so that the Meriam-Webster dictionary in 1931 defined “Rube Goldbert” as an adjective meaning accomplishing something simple through complex means.  Still famous, but almost unknown today via a board game published by the Ideal company in 1963 called “Mouse Trap.”

1895: Irving Caesar, an American lyricist and theater composer who wrote lyrics for “Swanee,” “Sometimes I’m Happy,” “Crazy Rhythm,” and “Tea for Two,” one of the most frequently recorded tunes ever written. He was born and died in New York. (d. 1996)

1902: Meyer Lansky, Russian-born American gangster, mathamatitian. “Credited” with the invention of the “nunmbers racket” (d. 1983)

1902: George Murphy, entertainer (d. 1992)

1907: Gordon Griffith, director (d. 1958)

1907: Howard Taubman, music and theater critic (d. 1996)

1910: Gloria Stuart, actress, played Rose in the Titanic, founder, Screen Actors Guild (SAG) (d. 2010)

1911: Mitch Miller, born in Rochester, New York, best know for his “Sing along with Mitch” recordings and TV varity show, Yellow Rose of Tx(d. 2010)

1916: Iva Toguri D’Aquino, better known as “Tokyo Rose” propagandist, WW II

1918: Ann Landers, advice columnist (d. 2002)

1918: Johnnie Parsons, race car driver (d. 1984)

1920: Norm Drucker, basketball referee

1920: Leona Helmsley, born in New York, billionaire hotel operator, real estate investor, and sadly convicted of tax evasion (d. 2007)

1921: Tibor Varga, Hungarian violinist (d. 2003)

1924: Eva Marie Saint, born in Newark, New Jersey, actress, On the Waterfront

1927: Gina Lollobrigida, born in Subiaco, Italy, actress, Trapeze, Falcon Crest

1927: Neil Simon, playwright

1928: Stephen Boyd, William Millar, Ire, actor, Fantastic Voyage, Ben-Hur

1928: Chuck Tanner, baseball player (d. 2011)

1929: Al Davis, born in Brocton, Massachusetts, NFL team owner, Los Angeles Raiders

1929: Bill Tuttle, American baseball player (d. 1998)

1930: George Steinbrenner, principal owner and managing partner of Major League Baseball’s New York Yankees. During Steinbrenner’s 37-year ownership from 1973 to his death in July 2010, the longest in club history, the Yankees earned 7 World Series titles and 11 pennants. His outspokenness and role in driving up player salaries made him one of the sport’s most controversial figures. Steinbrenner was also involved in the Great Lakes shipping industry. (d. 2010) Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Steinbrenner

1938: Bill Withers, Slab Fork, West Virginia, rhythm and blues singer, Lean on Me

1940: Karolyn Grimes, actress

1941: Brian Willson, American peace activist

1943: Konrad “Conny” Bauer, German musician

1943: Geraldo Rivera, reporter

1943: Al “Blind Owl” Wilson, rock guitarist and vocalist withCanned Hea (d. 1970)

 

 

1943: Emerson Boozer,  Top running back in the AFL and NFL. He played his entire professional career with the Jets. Boozer was a member of the Jets team that defeated the NFL’s champion Baltimore Colts, 16-7, in Super Bowl III.

1946: Michael Milken, financier and philanthropist noted for his role in the development of the market for high-yield bonds (also called junk bonds) during the 1970s and 1980s, for his 1990 guilty plea to felony charges for violating US securities laws, and for his funding of medical research. Wikipedia Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Milken

1948: Jeremy Spencer, rock guitarist, Fleetwood Mac

1949: Dr. Joyce Brothers, psychologist/author/columnist

1954: Jim Beattie, American baseball player

1954: Morganna Roberts, American entertainer

1955: John Waite, vocalist, Babies/Bad English-Forget Me Not, Missing You

1956: Mark Belling, American radio talkshow host

1958: Kirk Pengilly, Australian musician

1958: Steve Hartman, American sports radio host

 

Trivia Question: What was Casey Kasem doing every Saturday morning between 1969 and 2009?

Answer? The voice of radios “American Top 40,”  was being heard as the voice of…Shaggy… in the popular cartoon series “Scooby-Doo”