This Day in History

[xoxoxoBruce]

37 – The Roman Senate annuls Tiberius's will and proclaims Caligula emperor.

Good for them, it was about time for a fun emperor.

[DanaC]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Good for them, it was about time for a fun emperor.

I'm sure y'all can relate :p

[Gravdigr]

Anybody who can get Helen Mirren in a Penthouse movie is alright with me.

[Gravdigr]

March 19

1649 – The House of Commons of England passes an act abolishing the House of Lords, declaring it "useless and dangerous to the people of England".

1687 – Explorer Robert Cavelier de La Salle, searching for the mouth of the Mississippi River, is murdered by his own men.

1863 – The SS Georgiana, said to have been the most powerful Confederate cruiser, is destroyed on her maiden voyage with a cargo of munitions, medicines and merchandise then valued at over $1,000,000.

1895 – Auguste and Louis Lumière record their first footage using their newly patented cinematograph.

1918 – The U.S. Congress establishes time zones and approves daylight saving time.

1920 – The United States Senate rejects the Treaty of Versailles for the second time (the first time was on November 19, 1919).

1931 – Gambling is legalized in Nevada. And there was much rejoicing. I mean, like, a lot of rejoicing. They're still rejoicing.

1941 – World War II: The 99th Pursuit Squadron also known as the Tuskegee Airmen, the first all-black unit of the US Army Air Corps, is activated.

1945 – World War II: Adolf Hitler issues his "Nero Decree" ordering all industries, military installations, shops, transportation facilities and communications facilities in Germany to be destroyed.

1954 – Willie Mosconi sets a world record by running 526 consecutive balls without a miss during a straight pool exhibition at East High Billiard Club in Springfield, Ohio, setting a record which remains unbroken.

1962 – Bob Dylan releases his first album, Bob Dylan, for Columbia Records.

1965 – The wreck of the SS Georgiana, valued at over $50,000,000 and said to have been the most powerful Confederate cruiser, is discovered by teenage diver and pioneer underwater archaeologist E. Lee Spence, exactly 102 years after its destruction.

1966 – Texas Western, coached by Don Haskins, becomes the first college basketball team to win the Final four (defeating University of Kentucky) with an all-black starting lineup. The story is told in Haskins' autobiography (and movie of the same name) Glory Road.

1969 – The 385 metres (1,263 ft) tall TV-mast at Emley Moor transmitting station, United Kingdom, collapses due to ice build-up.

1979 – The United States House of Representatives begins broadcasting its day-to-day business via the cable television network C-SPAN.

1982 – Falklands War: Argentinian forces land on South Georgia Island, precipitating war with the United Kingdom.

1987 – Televangelist Jim Bakker resigns as head of the PTL Club due to a brewing sex scandal; he hands over control to Jerry Falwell.

2008 – GRB 080319B: A gamma ray burst that is the farthest object visible to the naked eye is briefly observed. It originated 7.5 billion light-years from Earth, and was visible to the naked eye for approximately 30 seconds.

Births

1813 – David Livingstone (subject of Henry Stanley's famous quote "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?". Livingstone was, literally, the only other white person for hundreds of miles in any direction.), 1883 – Norman Haworth, 1848 – Wyatt Earp, 1849 – Alfred von Tirpitz, 1860 – William Jennings Bryan, 1891 – Earl Warren, 1894 – Moms Mabley♪ ♫, 1905 – Albert Speer, 1906 – Adolf Eichmann, 1923 – Pamela Britton (Lorelei on My Favorite Martian), 1925 – Brent Scowcroft, 1928 – Patrick McGoohan (The Prisoner), 1936 – Ursula Andress, 1946 – Paul Atkinson(The Zombies), 1946 – Ruth Pointer♪ ♫(eldest of The Pointer Sisters), 1947 – Glenn Close, 1952 – Harvey Weinstein (co-founded Miramax movie studio), 1953 – Ricky Wilson♪ ♫(The B-52s), 1955 – Bruce Willis, 1958 – Andy Reid, 1964 – Jake Weber, 1973 – Brant Bjork(Kyuss)

Deaths

1687 – René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, 1943 – Frank Nitti (mobster), 1950 – Edgar Rice Burroughs (created Tarzan, and John Carter), 1950 – Norman Haworth, 1982 – Randy Rhoads(Quiet Riot, Ozzy Osbourne), 1990 – Andrew Wood♪ ♫(Mother Love Bone), 2005 – John DeLorean\_____(founded the DeLorean Motor Company), 2008 – Arthur C. Clarke (2001: A Space Odyssey), 2008 – Paul Scofield, 2014 – Fred Phelps (scum)

[Gravdigr]

March 20

Today is the first day of Spring.

Today is also World Storytelling Day, as well as Extraterrestrial Abduction Day, The Great American Meatout, International Day of Happiness, UN French Language Day, National Native HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, and World Sparrow Day.

Events

1602 – The Dutch East India Company is established.

1616 – Sir Walter Raleigh is freed from the Tower of London after 13 years of imprisonment.

1760 – The Great Boston Fire of 1760 destroys 349 buildings.

1815 – After escaping from Elba, Napoleon enters Paris with a regular army of 140,000 and a volunteer force of around 200,000, beginning his "Hundred Days" rule.

1852 – Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin is published.

1915 – Albert Einstein publishes his general theory of relativity.

1933 – Giuseppe Zangara is executed in Florida's electric chair for fatally shooting Anton Cermak in an assassination attempt against President-Elect Franklin D. Roosevelt.

1942 – World War II: General Douglas MacArthur, at Terowie, South Australia, makes his famous speech regarding the fall of the Philippines, in which he says: "I came out of Bataan and I shall return".


1969 - John Lennon married Yoko Ono in Gibraltar.

1972 – The Troubles: The first Provisional IRA car bombing in Belfast kills seven people and injures 148 others in Northern Ireland.

1980 - 28 year- old Joseph Riviera held up the Asylum Records office in New York and demanded to see either Jackson Browne or The Eagles. Riviera wanted to talk to them to see if they would finance his trucking operation. He gave him-self up when told that neither act was in the office at the time.

1985 – Libby Riddles becomes the first woman to win the 1,135-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race.

1987 – The Food and Drug Administration approves the anti-AIDS drug, AZT.

1991 - Eric Clapton's four year old son, Conor, fell to his death from the 53rd story of a New York City apartment after a housekeeper who was cleaning the room left a window open. The boy was in the custody of his mother, Italian actress, Lori Del Santo and the pair were visiting a friend's apartment. Clapton was staying in a nearby hotel after taking his son to the circus the previous evening. The tragedy inspired his song ‘Tears in Heaven’.

1991, Michael Jackson signed a $1 billion (£0.6 billion) contract with Sony, the richest deal in recording history.

1995 – The Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo carries out a sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, killing 12 and wounding over 1,300 people.

2003 – Invasion of Iraq: In the early hours of the morning, the United States and three other countries (the UK, Australia and Poland) begin military operations in Iraq.

2015 – A Solar eclipse, equinox, and a Supermoon all occur on the same day.

Births

43 BC – Ovid, 1821 – Ned Buntline, 1828 – Henrik Ibsen, 1882 – René Coty, 1903 – Edgar Buchanan, 1906 – Ozzie Nelson (The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet), 1908 – Michael Redgrave, 1914 – Wendell Corey, 1917 – Vera Lynn ("Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn?"), 1918 – Jack Barry, 1922 – Carl Reiner, 1928 – Fred 'Mr.' Rogers, 1931 – Hal Linden, 1935 – Ted Bessell, 1937 – Jerry Reed, 1943 – Douglas Tompkins (co-founded The North Face outdoor products), 1943 – Paul Junger Witt, 1944 – Camille Cosby, 1945 – Pat Riley, 1946 – Douglas B. Green♪ ♫('Ranger Doug' in the band Riders In The Sky), 1948 – John de Lancie ('Q' in Star Trek:TNG), 1948 – Bobby Orr, 1950 – William Hurt, 1950 – Carl Palmer(Emerson, Lake & Palmer), 1951 – Jimmie Vaughan(The Fabulous Thunderbirds), 1957 – Spike Lee, 1957 – Theresa Russell, 1958 – Holly Hunter, 1961 – Slim Jim Phantom(The Stray Cats), 1963 – Kathy Ireland, 1967 – Mookie Blaylock, 1970 – Michael Rapaport, 1976 – Chester Bennington♪ ♫(Linkin Park)

Deaths

1726 – Isaac Newton, 1933 – Giuseppe Zangara, 1974 – Chet Huntley, 1994 – Lewis Grizzard, 2013 – George Lowe, 2015 - A. J. Pero(Twisted Sister, Adrenaline Mob)

[xoxoxoBruce]

1602 – The Dutch East India Company is established.

1969 - John Lennon married Yoko Ono in Gibraltar.

1991 - Eric Clapton's four year old son, Conor, fell to his death from the 53rd story of a New York City apartment after a housekeeper who was cleaning the room left a window open.

2003 – Invasion of Iraq: In the early hours of the morning, the United States and three other countries (the UK, Australia and Poland) begin military operations in Iraq.

Pretty sad day.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by Gravdigr

March 20

1991 - Eric Clapton's four year old son, Conor, fell to his death from the 53rd story of a New York City apartment after a housekeeper who was cleaning the room left a window open. The boy was in the custody of his mother, Italian actress, Lori Del Santo and the pair were visiting a friend's apartment. Clapton was staying in a nearby hotel after taking his son to the circus the previous evening. The tragedy inspired his song ‘Tears in Heaven’.

[Undertoad]

1991 – Leo Fender

Rest in peace sir, your contributions changed everything.

[Gravdigr]

March 22

1508 – Ferdinand II of Aragon commissions Amerigo Vespucci chief navigator of the Spanish Empire.

1622 – Jamestown massacre: Algonquians kill 347 English settlers around Jamestown, Virginia, a third of the colony's population, during the Second Anglo-Powhatan War.

1630 – The Massachusetts Bay Colony outlaws the possession of cards, dice, and gaming tables.

1739 – Nader Shah occupies Delhi in India and sacks the city, stealing the jewels of the Peacock Throne.

1765 – The British Parliament passes the Stamp Act that introduces a tax to be levied directly on its American colonies.

1784 – The Emerald Buddha is moved with great ceremony to its current location in Wat Phra Kaew, Thailand.

1872 – Illinois becomes the first state to require gender equality in employment.

1894 – The first playoff game for the Stanley Cup starts.

1943 – World War II: the entire village of Khatyn (in what is the present-day Republic of Belarus) is burnt alive by Schutzmannschaft Battalion 118.

1972 – In Eisenstadt v. Baird, the United States Supreme Court decides that unmarried persons have the right to possess contraceptives. [...the fuck?]

1975 – A fire at the Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant in Decatur, Alabama causes a dangerous reduction in cooling water levels.

1978 – Karl Wallenda of The Flying Wallendas dies after falling off a tight-rope between two hotels in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

1993 – The Intel Corporation ships the first Pentium chips (80586), featuring a 60 MHz clock speed, 100+ MIPS, and a 64 bit data path.

1995 – Cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov returns to earth after setting a record of 438 days in space.

1997 – Tara Lipinski, aged 14 years and 9 months, becomes the youngest women's World Figure Skating Champion.

2006 – Three Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT) hostages are freed by British forces in Baghdad after 118 days of captivity and the murder of their colleague from the U.S., Tom Fox.

2017 – A terrorist attack in London near the Houses of Parliament leaves four people dead and at least 20 injured.

Births

1814 – Thomas Crawford, 1817 – Braxton Bragg, 1884 – Arthur H. Vandenberg, 1887 – Chico Marx, 1908 – Louis L'Amour, 1912 – Karl Malden, 1920 – James Brown, 1920 – Werner Klemperer, 1923 – Marcel Marceau, 1924 – Al Neuharth, 1930 – Pat Robertson, 1931 – William Shatner, 1934 – Orrin Hatch, 1935 – M. Emmet Walsh, 1936 – Roger Whittaker, 1940 – Haing S. Ngor, 1941 – Bruno Ganz, 1942 – Dick Poundsnicker, 1943 – George Benson, 1947 – James Patterson, 1948 – Wolf Blitzer, 1948 – Andrew Lloyd Webber, 1952 – Bob Costas, 1955 – Lena Olin, 1955 – Pete Sessions, 1959 – Matthew Modine, 1971 – Keegan-Michael Key, 1972 – Elvis Stojko, 1975 – Cole Hauser, 1976 – Reese Witherspoon, 1989 – J. J. Watt

Deaths

1820 – Stephen Decatur, 1978 – Karl Wallenda, 1994 – Dan Hartman, 1994 – Walter Lantz, 1999 – David Strickland, 2001 – William Hanna, 2005 – Rod Price, 2016 – Rob Ford

[Gravdigr]

March 23

1775 – American Revolutionary War: Patrick Henry delivers his speech – "Give me liberty, or give me death!" – at St. John's Episcopal Church, Richmond, Virginia.

1801 – Tsar Paul I of Russia is struck with a sword, then strangled, and finally trampled to death inside his bedroom at St. Michael's Castle.

1806 – After traveling through the Louisiana Purchase and reaching the Pacific Ocean, explorers Lewis and Clark and their "Corps of Discovery" begin their arduous journey home.

1857 – Elisha Otis's first elevator is installed at 488 Broadway New York City.

1862 – The First Battle of Kernstown, Virginia, marks the start of Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign. Although a Confederate defeat, the engagement distracts Federal efforts to capture Richmond.

1868 – The University of California is founded in Oakland, California when the Organic Act is signed into law.

1909 – Theodore Roosevelt leaves New York for a post-presidency safari in Africa. The trip is sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution and National Geographic Society.

1919 – In Milan, Italy, Benito Mussolini founds his Fascist political movement.

1933 – The Reichstag passes the Enabling Act of 1933, making Adolf Hitler dictator of Germany.

1956 – Pakistan becomes the first Islamic republic in the world. (Republic Day in Pakistan)

1977 – The first of The Nixon Interviews (12 will be recorded over four weeks) are videotaped with British journalist David Frost interviewing former United States President Richard Nixon about the Watergate scandal and the Nixon tapes.

1983 – Strategic Defense Initiative: President Ronald Reagan makes his initial proposal to develop technology to intercept enemy missiles.

1991 – The Revolutionary United Front, with support from the special forces of Charles Taylor's National Patriotic Front of Liberia, invades Sierra Leone in an attempt to overthrow Joseph Saidu Momoh, sparking a gruesome 11-year Sierra Leone Civil War.

1994 – A United States Air Force (USAF) F-16 aircraft collides with a USAF C-130 at Pope Air Force Base and then crashes, killing 24 United States Army soldiers on the ground. This later became known as the Green Ramp disaster.

2001 – The Russian Mir space station is disposed of, breaking up in the atmosphere before falling into the southern Pacific Ocean near Fiji.

2003 – Battle of Nasiriyah, first major conflict during the invasion of Iraq.

2009 – FedEx Express Flight 80: A McDonnell Douglas MD-11 flying from Guangzhou, China crashes at Tokyo's Narita International Airport, killing both the captain and the co-pilot.

Births

1887 – Josef Čapek, 1910 – Akira Kurosawa, 1912 – Wernher von Braun, 1921 – Donald Campbell, 1922 – Ugo Tognazzi, 1929 – Roger Bannister, 1931 – Viktor Korchnoi, 1937 – Craig Breedlove, 1949 – Ric Ocasek, 1953 – Chaka Khan, 1957 – Amanda Plummer, 1959 – Catherine Keener, 1964 – Hope Davis, 1976 – Michelle Monaghan, 1976 – Keri Russell, 1989 – Ayesha Curry

Deaths

1801 – Paul I of Russia, 1964 – Peter Lorre, 2006 – Desmond Doss, 2006 – Cindy Walker, 2011 – Elizabeth Taylor, 2013 – Joe Weider, 2016 – Joe Garagiola, Sr., 2016 – Ken Howard

[Gravdigr]

March 24

1401 – Turco-Mongol emperor Timur sacks Damascus.

1663 – The Province of Carolina is granted by charter to eight Lords Proprietor in reward for their assistance in restoring Charles II of England to the throne.

1765 – Great Britain passes the Quartering Act, which requires the Thirteen Colonies to house British troops.

1832 – In Hiram, Ohio, a group of men beat and tar and feather Mormon leader Joseph Smith.

1882 – Robert Koch announces the discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis.

1900 – Mayor of New York City Robert Anderson Van Wyck breaks ground for a new underground "Rapid Transit Railroad" that would link Manhattan and Brooklyn.

1944 – World War II: In an event later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape, 76 Allied prisoners of war begin breaking out of the German camp Stalag Luft III.

1958 – Rock 'n' roll teen idol Elvis Presley is drafted in the U.S. Army.

1965 – Images from the Ranger 9 lunar probe are broadcast live on network television.

1976 – In Argentina, the armed forces overthrow the constitutional government of President Isabel Perón and start a 7-year dictatorial period self-styled the National Reorganization Process.

1986 – The Loscoe gas explosion leads to new UK laws on landfill gas migration and gas protection on landfill sites.

1989 – In Prince William Sound in Alaska, the Exxon Valdez spills 240,000 barrels (38,000 m3) of crude oil after running aground.

1993 – Discovery of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9.

1999 – Kosovo war: NATO began attacks on Yugoslavia without United Nations Security Council (UNSC) approval , marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country.

1999 – A lorry carrying margarine and flour catches fire inside the Mont Blanc Tunnel. The resulting inferno kills 38 people.

2008 – Bhutan officially becomes a democracy, with its first ever general election.

2015 – Germanwings Flight 9525 crashes in the French Alps in an apparent pilot mass murder-suicide, killing all 150 people on board.

births

1725 – Samuel Ashe, 1820 – Edmond Becquerel, 1834 – John Wesley Powell, 1874 – Harry Houdini, 1887 – Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle, 1901 – Ub Iwerks, 1902 – Thomas E. Dewey, 1909 – Clyde Barrow, 1910 – Richard Conte, 1911 – Joseph Barbera, 1919 – Lawrence Ferlinghetti, 1924 – Norman Fell, 1930 – Steve McQueen, 1940 – Bob Mackie, 1944 – R. Lee Ermey, 1949 – Nick Lowe, 1951 – Tommy Hilfiger, 1956 – Steve Ballmer, 1959 – Renaldo Nehemiah, 1960 – Kelly Le Brock, 1960 – Annabella Sciorra, 1960 – Nena, 1962 – Star Jones, 1965 – The Undertaker, 1970 – Lara Flynn Boyle, 1973 – Jim Parsons, 1974 – Alyson Hannigan, 1976 – Peyton Manning, 1977 – Jessica Chastain, 1979 – Lake Bell

Deaths

1603 – Elizabeth I of England, 1882 – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1905 – Jules Verne, 1984 – Sam Jaffe, 1990 – Ray Goulding, 1993 – John Hersey, 2008 – Richard Widmark, 2010 – Robert Culp, 2016 – Garry Shandling

[glatt]

1999 – A lorry carrying margarine and flour catches fire inside the Mont Blanc Tunnel. The resulting inferno...

as I read this, I started off thinking it was the set-up for a joke.

And then the punchline:

kills 38 people.

Wait. That's not funny. That's horrible.

[BigV]

Re: Fresnel

I have a large Fresnel lens I scavenged from a big projection TV. On a sunny day it can concentrate enough sunlight to make a dark rag burst into flame in about six seconds.

[Gravdigr]

March 25

Today is the International Day Of The Unborn Child.

Also, today is marked as an International Day Of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Today is observed as International Day of Solidarity with Detained and Missing Staff Members by the United Nations General Assembly.

This date also marks Maryland Day, in the U.S. state of Maryland, while Tolkien fans can celebrate Tolkien Reading Day, and Sweden celebrates Waffle Day.

There are 281 days remaining in the year, and 274 days until Christmas. Don't want it to sneak up on ya, dontcha know.


Events

1199 – Richard I (Richard The Lion Heart) is wounded by a crossbow bolt while fighting France, leading to his death on April 6.

1306 – Robert the Bruce becomes King of Scots (Scotland).

1584 – Sir Walter Raleigh is granted a patent to colonize Virginia.

1807 – The Swansea and Mumbles Railway, then known as the Oystermouth Railway, becomes the first passenger-carrying railway in the world.

1811 – Percy Bysshe Shelley is expelled from the University of Oxford for publishing the pamphlet The Necessity of Atheism.

1911 – In New York City, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire kills 146 garment workers.

1931 – The Scottsboro Boys are arrested in Alabama and charged with rape.

1948 – The first successful tornado forecast predicts that a tornado will strike Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma.

1949 – More than 92,000 kulaks are suddenly deported from the Baltic states to Siberia.

1957 – United States Customs seizes copies of Allen Ginsberg's poem "Howl" on obscenity grounds.

1965 – Civil rights activists led by Martin Luther King Jr. successfully complete their 4-day 50-mile march from Selma to the capitol in Montgomery, Alabama.

1969 – During their honeymoon, John Lennon and Yoko Ono hold their first Bed-In for Peace at the Amsterdam Hilton Hotel (until March 31).

1979 – The first fully functional Space Shuttle orbiter, Columbia, is delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center to be prepared for its first launch.

1995 – WikiWikiWeb, the world's first wiki, and part of the Portland Pattern Repository, is made public by Ward Cunningham.

1999 - 73-year-old country music singer Ray Price was arrested in his Texas home for possession of marijuana. He was fined $200 after pleading no contest to the charges. According to Price in a 2008 interview, old friend Willie Nelson - no stranger to marijuana arrests - phoned and told him he'd just earned $5 million in free publicity with the drug bust.

2000 - Former Bay City Rollers drummer Derek Longmuir was given 300 hours community service after being caught with a hoard of child pornography including 150 videos and 73 floppy disks.

2006 – Capitol Hill massacre: A gunman kills six people before taking his own life at a party in Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood.

Births

1840 – Myles Keogh, 1867 – Gutzon Borglum (designed Mount Rushmore), 1867 – Arturo Toscanini♪ ♫, 1881 – Béla Bartók, 1901 – Ed Begley, 1903 – Binnie Barnes, 1908 – David Lean, 1918 – Howard Cosell, 1921 – Simone Signoret, 1922 – Eileen Ford (co-founded Ford Models), 1925 – Flannery O'Connor, 1928 – Jim Lovell, 1934 – Gloria Steinem, 1937 – Tom Monaghan (founded Domino's Pizza), 1938 – Hoyt Axton♪ ♫, 1942 – Aretha Franklin♪ ♫, 1947 – Elton John♪ ♫, 1948 – Bonnie Bedelia, 1950 – Ronnie McDowell♪ ♫, 1965 – Sarah Jessica Parker, 1966 – Jeff Healey, 1967 – Doug Stanhope, 1967 – Debi Thomas, 1976 – Wladimir Klitschko, 1981 – Danica Patrick, 1984 – Katharine McPhee

Deaths

1918 – Claude Debussy♪ ♫, 1969 – Max Eastman, 1982 – Goodman Ace, 1988 – Robert Joffrey (co-founded the Joffrey Ballet), 1992 – Nancy Walker, 1999 – Cal Ripken, Sr., 2005 – Paul Henning (developed several "rural" comedies for CBS including The Beverly Hillbillies), 2006 - Buck Owens♪ ♫, 2008 – Herb Peterson (created the McMuffin), 2009 – Dan Seals♪ ♫(England Dan & John Ford Coley), 2012 – John Crosfield (founded Crosfield Electronics), 2014 – Ralph Wilson (founded the Buffalo Bills)

[DanaC]

1872 – Illinois becomes the first state to require gender equality in employment.

Wow, that was ahead of the curve.