On This Day

[Kestra]

On Nov. 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. Texas Gov. John B. Connally was seriously wounded. A suspect, Lee Harvey Oswald, was arrested. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as the 36th president of the United States.

[wile1]

I very well remember that day.

I was sitting in my Math class at the high school, was my senior year. We noticed the flags at the city building lowering to half staff. Classes changed and we went into our history class. Not knowing what was going on.

Let me tell you when our teacher told us what had happened and that President Kennedy was dead, There was not a peep in that class or in the whole school the rest of the time. Everyone went home and no one spoke. It was eerie. Everyone was so quiet.

I got home and mom said the President is dead. I said they told us in school. We sat down to watch TV.

I remember watching for hours. And I remember watching the funeral we had the day off. And I also remember watching the shooting of Oswald by Jack Ruby. we were sitting there watching them taking Oswald out of the court and we saw Ruby come up and shoot him. Mom said OMG I think he shot him!!

Well some of what happened is kinda a blurr. But I will never forget that day.

[Deacon]

I remember that my great-grandmotherhad died the day before. She was 96. Since my Mom and Uncle had to do some work, I had driven my Grandmother into town to meet with the minister who was going to conduct the service. We were siting in his office when the church secretary came in and told us. We listened to the reports on the radio and were just stunned.

[wile1]

And have you heard that now they have come out with some sort of video game that recreates the whole thing??? But in this game you get to be the shooter. You get points etc. For shooting him and not hitting anyone else and well I guess there is a reward being offered by the company to the best shooter.

I think this is outrageous. I wish I knew more about it. I've only heard bits and pieces but it just doesn't seem right. Its like you are teaching your kids its okay to shoot someone!

[Kestra]

i was home sick with the flu that day. my brother came home early from school, mom asked him what he was doing home so early, he said Kennedy has been shot. we turned on the telly and watched in disbelief.

wile, i heard about the game on the telly yesterday, it's pretty discusting.

here's another ON THIS DAY:

On Nov. 23, 1943, during World War II, United States forces seized control of the Tarawa and Makin atolls from the Japanese

[NoonienSoong97]

Nov. 22, 1963 um let me see here. Oh yea I wasn't born yet! That would make me -14 years and 28 days old. I do have respect for Kennedy if it wasn't for him there might not have been a space race, which means no NASA, and no space exploration. Also Star Trek wouldn't have had as much impact if Kennedy wasn't there to set the space race off.

[Deacon]

There was a report on today's news that the company that is producing the game is claiming that there is supposed to be an "educational" function to the game because it may make people believe in the "Conspiracy aspect" of the Kennedy shooting.

[O.B.I.T.]

YEA DEACON, I THINK ITS SICK.

I HAVE MY OWN THEORY THAT THE REASON BEHIND ALL THE CRAPPY DRIVERS ON THE NATIONS HIGH WAYS IS A WHOLE GENERATION OF NEW DRIVERS GREW UP PLAYING NINTENDO / COMMODORE / SAGA RACING GAMES.

NOW WITH SO MANY SHOOTER GAMES? TIME WILL TELL.

AS FOR WHERE I WAS 11-22-63, I WAS IN MY 3RD GRADE CLASS STARRING OUT THE WINDOW DEEP IN A DAY DREAM BUILDING A HYDRAULIC TRANSMISION FOR A MACHANICAL SPIDER WHEN OVER THE PUBLIC ADDRESS SYSTEM CAME THE ANNOUNCEMENT.

LIVE LONG AND PROSPER

TRACE

[Dot]

I'd like to know how, when the prezs scheduled route was changed by two hours notice, that mr ozwald found out and had time to find a good place to shoot..that was never explained.

I was in 7th grade.

[Kestra]

^ good question, Dot.

ON THIS DAY
On Nov. 26, 1942, President Roosevelt ordered nationwide gasoline rationing, beginning December 1.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On Dec. 25, 1818, ''Silent Night'' was performed for the first time, at the Church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorff, Austria.

[Deacon]

And, according to what I was told by a minister in one of my churches a long time ago, the first time it was performed, the accompaning instument was a guitar, because the church Organ was broken.

[Deacon]

Also, during the First World War, there was a spontaneous Truce between the British and the Germans in 1914. The Troops laid down their weapons, came out into No-Mans Land, talked, exchanged Christmas greetings and played football, which was probably soccer.

[Kestra]

that's cool.

[Deacon]

1980 - The Selective Service System sent a warning to Mickey Mouse at Disneyland in Anaheim, California: Register for the draft or else! The Selective Service said that Mickey was in violation of registration compliance. Of course, Mickey, age 52 at the time, sent in his registration card proving that he’s a World War II veteran.

[bengel]

Originally posted by Kestra
On Nov. 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. Texas Gov. John B. Connally was seriously wounded. A suspect, Lee Harvey Oswald, was arrested. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as the 36th president of the United States.

Has it been confirmed yet that Oswald did kill the President? Over here, they say this is still an assumption... Do you know something more in America?

Ow, how I would love to visit America! I said that once at the Sphere. Two problems though: Who will look after my cats, and where would I go in the U.S.? It's so enourmously big! Alright, my mother would be willing to look over my cats. But where would I go? I'm not a 'big-town-man'. I'd like to visit small towns or even villages. And the American nature of course (forests, waterfalls, those rocks that were used in movies about cowboys and indians,...). I know the U.S. do have other things to show than the movies or 'the bold and the beautiful'. How do I know? Because I happen to watch other t.v. programmes than the onces that are shown at our commercial t.v. transmitting stations. I watch 'alternative' documentaries, often about natural parks in the U.S. And they show me really beautiful places!!!
It is my humble experience, that one always wants to see something one doesn't have (seen). Perhaps Americans would like to see medieval cathedrals, castles, convents. I don't know. We've got plenty of those, in a country not even twice the size of Los Angeles. But I would like to see the country in which democracy started 'from scratch', without an 'ancient régime', without an aristocracy that had to be put under the guillotine as was the case in France. A pure democracy! And so much nature! And, last but not least, so many friendly creative people, as these BB's have shown to me - thus including the PhilosophySphere - . In one word, America: the place where Star Trek philosophy was invented by a wise man... and continued by his son here at this very platform... nec plus ultra!

Now, ...

Are there any brownies here? I'm starving :D

[bengel]

By the way wile, my nephew went to a Delhaize super market and he gave me three packages... of American brownies!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Apparently they have super markets in the U.S. too. They imported these brownies from the U.S.!

I have 'indulged' myself in them and they are really addictive!!! So nice! But I will still make them together with my sister! Nothing can beat the home made stuff :D !

[Kestra]

Has it been confirmed yet that Oswald did kill the President? Over here, they say this is still an assumption... Do you know something more in America? there are theries, everyone has thier own pov concerning this.

[Kestra]

On Jan. 12, 1915, the United States House of Representatives rejected a proposal to give women the right to vote.

[bengel]

Who do you think would win the elections, Democrats or Republicans, if you would have compulsory voting (like we have)?

[Deacon]

I don't know. There have been several proposals that Election Day should be a Holiday from work, so people would not have an excuse for not voting. I think it could possibly be a good idea.

I want to post this here. It is not yet quite 00:00 here in tucson but for a lot of folks in other times zones it is.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on this day in 1929. His lifelong goal was to bring about social, political and economic equality for blacks. In the quest for his ideals, he became one of the greatest civil rights leaders of the 20th century. A Baptist minister (as were his father and grandfather before him), he preached ‘nonviolent resistance’ to achieve full civil rights for all.

I know the official holiday is observed on Monday. But, I recommend a moment of silence for his honor.

[Boby]

It took quite some time for me to find this tread, and since I don't want it to be lost:

1913 - Virginia Woolf delivers her first novel "The Voyage Out"

1945 - Firebombing of Tokyo

1938 - Comedian Bob Hope makes his first film appearance, singing "Thanks for the Memories" in The Big Broadcast of 1938

1997 - Christopher Wallace, a.k.a Biggie Smalls, a.k.a. the Notorious B.I.G., is shot to death at a stoplight in Los Angeles

1916 - Angered over American support of his rivals for the control of Mexico, the peasant-born revolutionary leader Pancho Villa attacks the border town of Columbus, New Mexico

1976 - Forty-two people, including 15 children, have been killed in northern Italy when the steel line supporting the cable car they were travelling in snapped. The tragedy happened in the ski resort of Cavalese near Trento, in the Dolomite mountains

1967 - The daughter of the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin has requested political asylum at the United States Embassy in India

[bengel]

9 March, 2004: foreign students at the University of Ghent, Belgium, learn the traditional art of chocolate making :D

[Deacon]

This seemed apprpriate for today:
A baby born in Florence, Italy on this day in 1451 was destined to become one of the world’s most famous explorers. Amerigo Vespucci was a merchant and an outfitter of ships, a job that introduced him to Christopher Columbus.

Their stars would cross again in 1507 when a German map maker honored Amerigo Vespucci by naming the new continent on his maps, America. The mapmaker had not heard of Columbus’ discovery at the time. So Columbus got the credit for the discovery; but the discovery bore the name of Vespucci ... forever.

In reality, Vespucci had participated in two major expeditions between the years 1499 and 1502, to the coast of South America. There he discovered the Amazon and Plate Rivers. Vespucci thought he had discovered a new continent ... or a New World.

[Kestra]

ty for reviving this thread, Boby.

ON THIS DAY

On March 9, 1862, during the Civil War, the ironclads Monitor and Virginia (formerly Merrimac) clashed for five hours to a draw at Hampton Roads, Va.

[Boby]

1969 - James Earl Ray is jailed for 99 years by a court in Memphis, Tennessee, after admitting the murder of the American civil rights leader Martin Luther King

1988 - The Prince of Wales narrowly avoids death on the ski slopes of Switzerland in an avalanche which kills one of his closest friends

1990 - A court in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, imposes the death sentence on The Observer journalist Farzad Bazoft

1876 - the first discernible speech is transmitted over a telephone system when inventor Alexander Graham Bell summons his assistant in another room by saying, "Mr. Watson, come here; I want you." Bell had received a comprehensive telephone patent just three days before

1938 - "Jezebel" opens on this day in 1938, giving a needed boost to the career of actress Bette Davis. Her portrayal of a hot-tempered Southern belle won her an Oscar for Best Actress

[Boby]

2004 - at least 170 people have died and 500 have been injured as huge explosions tore through three Madrid train stations during the morning rush-hour. Near simultaneous blasts hit Atocha station in the centre of the Spanish capital and two smaller stations, Santa Eugenia and El Pozo.

1955 - Sir Alexander Fleming - the man who first discovered the life-saving drug penicillin - has died of a heart attack in the age of 73.

1977 . Film director Roman Polanski has been charged with raping a 13-year-old girl at the home of Hollywood star Jack Nicholson.

1990 . Lithuania proclaims its independence from the USSR, the first Soviet republic to do so. The Soviet government responded by imposing an oil embargo and economic blockade against the Baltic republic, and later sent troops.

1818 - Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is published. The book, by 21-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, is frequently called the world's first science fiction novel. In Shelley's tale, a scientist animates a creature constructed from dismembered corpses. The gentle, intellectually gifted creature is enormous and physically hideous. Cruelly rejected by its creator, it wanders, seeking companionship and becoming increasingly brutal as it fails to find a mate.

[Boby]

1993 - at least 200 people are killed when a series of devastating bombs explode in India's financial capital Bombay

1969 - Paul McCartney and Linda Eastman are married in a civil ceremony at Marylebone Register Office in London

1999 - One of the 20th century's finest musicians, violinist Yehudi Menuhin dies, aged 82

1938 - German troops march into Austria to annex the German-speaking nation for the Third Reich

1993 - Following her confirmation by the U.S. Senate, Janet Reno is sworn in as the first female attorney general of the United States

1947 - In a dramatic speech to a joint session of Congress, President Harry S. Truman asks for U.S. assistance for Greece and Turkey to forestall communist domination of the two nations. Historians have often cited Truman's address, which came to be known as the Truman Doctrine, as the official declaration of the Cold War

1923 - inventor Lee de Forest demonstrates Phonofilm, the first film capable of taping sound. Music was recorded on a narrow strip at the edge of the film. The demonstration showed a man and woman dancing, four musicians playing instruments, and an Egyptian dancer, all accompanied by music but no dialogue

1969 - The soundtrack of The Graduate, which features Simon and Garfunkel's song "Mrs. Robinson," is presented with the Grammy for Best Record of 1968. The pair, who had known each other since sixth grade, also won the award for Best Contemporary Pop Vocal Performance. The pair released only six albums, plus a "Greatest Hits" LP, before they broke up in the early 1970s. However, they developed so many loyal fans that a reunion concert in New York's Central Park in 1981 drew an estimated 500,000 people (*I love them, beside ABBA my most favourite band - Boby)

1946 - Liza Minnelli, the only offspring of two Oscar winners to win an Oscar herself, is born to actress Judy Garland and director Vincent Minnelli

What remides me Happy Birthday:

Crystallize
Maryah
Maryah312
(I belive last two are same but didn't want to be rude)

[Boby]

1996 - A lone gunman goes on a shooting spree at a school in Dunblane, Scotland, killing 16 children and their teacher

1868 - For the first time in U.S. history, the impeachment trial of an American president gets underway in the U.S. Senate. President Andrew Johnson, reviled by the Republican-dominated Congress for his views on Reconstruction, stood accused of having violated the controversial Tenure of Office Act, passed by Congress over his veto in 1867

1865 - In a desperate measure, the Confederate States of America reluctantly approve the use of black troops as the main Rebel armies face long odds against much larger Union armies at this late stage of the war

1891 - Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen had written his play Ghosts in 1881. The play, which dealt with syphilis, was swiftly and universally reviled by conventionally minded critics. However, Ibsen's works had caught on with progressive theater companies across Europe. A decade after it was written, the play opens in London, where it continued to be treated harshly by critics. Today, however, the play is one of Ibsen's most commonly performed works

1961 - President John F. Kennedy proposes a 10-year, multibillion-dollar aid program for Latin America. The program came to be known as the Alliance for Progress and was designed to improve U.S. relations with Latin America, which had been severely damaged in recent years

[Boby]

1984 - Gunmen shoot and injure the Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams, in an attack in central Belfast

1964 - Jack Ruby has been sentenced to death after being found guilty of the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald

1958 - A celebratory 101-gun salute has been fired in Monaco after Princess Grace - formerly film star Grace Kelly - gave birth to a son Prince Albert of Monaco

1879 - Albert Einstein is born in Ulm, Germany

1990 - The Congress of People's Deputies elects General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev as the new president of the Soviet Union. While the election was a victory for Gorbachev, it also revealed serious weaknesses in his power base that would eventually lead to the collapse of his presidency in December 1991

1950 - The Federal Bureau of Investigation institutes the "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" list in an effort to publicize particularly dangerous fugitives. The creation of the program arose out of wire service news story in 1949 about the "toughest guys" the FBI wanted to capture. The story drew so much public attention that the "Ten Most Wanted" list was given the okay by J. Edgar Hoover the following year. Since then, over 130 fugitives have been captured after appearing on the list. As of May 1998, 454 fugitives had appeared on the Ten Most Wanted List

And Happy birthday

Gul Iblle

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 14, 1900, Congress ratified the Gold Standard Act.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 15, 1965, addressing a joint session of Congress, President Johnson called for new legislation to guarantee every American's right to vote.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 20, 1995, in Tokyo, 12 people were killed, more than 5,500 others sickened when packages containing the poisonous gas sarin leaked on five separate subway trains.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 21, 1965, than 3,000 civil rights demonstrators led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. began their march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 22, 1972, Congress sent the proposed Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution to the states for ratification. It fell short of the three-fourths approval needed.

[Kestra]

On March 23, 1965, America's first two-person space flight began as Gemini 3 blasted off from Cape Kennedy with astronauts Virgil I. Grissom and John W. Young aboard.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On March 25, 1965, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led 25,000 marchers to the state capitol in Montgomery, Ala., to protest the denial of voting rights to blacks.

[Kestra]

On March 26, 1979, the Camp David peace treaty was signed by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat at the White House.

[Boby]

2000. - Pope John Paul II has prayed for forgiveness of the sins of those involved in the Holocaust. However, he avoided any admission of Church "guilt" over alleged complicity

1973. - Women have been admitted to the London Stock Exchange for the first time in the institution's 200 year history

1953. - American medical researcher Dr. Jonas Salk announces on a national radio show that he has successfully tested a vaccine against poliomyelitis, the virus that causes the crippling disease of polio

1941. - Italy attacks the British fleet at Suda Bay, Crete, using detachable warheads to sink a British cruiser. This was the first time manned torpedoes had been employed in naval warfare, adding a new weapon to the world's navies' arsenals

1920. - This Side of Paradise is published, immediately launching 23-year-old F. Scott Fitzgerald to fame and fortune

[Boby]

1977. - At least 560 people die when two jumbo jets collide on a runway in what is thought to be the world's worst disaster involving aircraft on the ground.

1989. - Russian voters have gone to the polls - with early indications that many Communist candidates have been rejected by the electorate

1994. - The troubled European Fighter Aircraft has made its inaugural flight two years later than expected. The jet successfully completed airborne system and handling checks in a 40-minute flight at Manching in Germany

1905. - The neighbors of Thomas and Ann Farrow, shopkeepers in South London, discover their badly bludgeoned bodies in their home. Thomas was already dead, but Ann was still breathing. She died four days later without ever having regained consciousness. The brutal crime was solved using the newly developed fingerprinting technique. Only three years earlier, the first English court had admitted fingerprint evidence in a petty theft case. The Farrow case was the first time that the cutting-edge technology was used in a high-profile murder case

[Boby]

1814. - The funeral of Guillotin, the inventor and namesake of the infamous execution device, takes place outside of Paris, France. Guillotin had what he felt were the purest motives for inventing the guillotine and was deeply distressed at how his reputation had become besmirched in the aftermath. Before he died he said, "How true it is that it is difficult to benefit mankind without some unpleasantness resulting for oneself."

1979. - At 4 a.m. on March 28, 1979, the worst accident in the history of the U.S. nuclear power industry begins when a pressure valve in the Unit-2 reactor at Three Mile Island fails to close. Cooling water, contaminated with radiation, drained from the open valve into adjoining buildings, and the core began to dangerously overheat

1939. - In Spain, the Republican defenders of Madrid raise the white flag over the city, bringing to an end the bloody three-year Spanish Civil War

1969. - Dwight D. Eisenhower, the 34th president of the United States and one of the most highly regarded American generals of World War II, dies in Washington, D.C., at the age of 78

1776. - Juan Bautista de Anza, one of the great western pathfinders of the 18th century, arrives at the future site of San Francisco with 247 colonists

Happy Birthday:

Roel

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
America's worst commercial nuclear accident occurred inside the Unit Two reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pa.

[Boby]

1981. - President Ronald Reagan has been shot and wounded after a lone gunman opened fire in Washington. Five to six shots were fired as he left the Washington Hilton Hotel where he had been addressing a union convention, about one mile from the White House. A man, firing at close range, also wounded White House Press Secretary James Brady in the head

1979. - Shadow Northern Ireland Secretary Airey Neave is killed by a car bomb as he leaves the House of Commons car park.

1951. - An American electrical engineer and his wife have been found guilty by New York's Federal Court of passing atomic secrets to the Russians. Julius Rosenberg, 33, and his 35-year-old wife, Ethel, were accused of stealing technical information from the atom research centre in Los Alamos and turning it over to the KGB.

1992. - British Prime Minister John Major has mounted his soapbox to urge voters in Cheltenham to elect John Taylor as the first black Conservative MP

1946. - Academy Award, an anthology radio show on CBS, debuts on this day. The show turned Academy Award-winning movies into half-hour radio dramas starring the actors from the original productions. In the debut episode, Bette Davis reprised her Academy Award-winning role in Jezebel. Other episodes featured Humphrey Bogart and Sydney Greenstreet in The Maltese Falcon and Cary Grant in Suspicion. The cost of paying the stars-about $4,000 total per episode-plus a $1,600 payment a week to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the right to use its name-made the show too costly for sponsors, and it was scrapped after 39 episodes

1820. - Anna Sewell is born in Norfolk, England. The daughter of a successful children's book writer, she helped edit her mother's manuscripts from an early age but was not published herself until she was 57. Black Beauty, the first significant children's story in the English language to focus on animal characters, established the precedent for countless other works. Appalled by the cruel treatment of horses by some masters during her day, Sewell wrote the book "to induce kindness, sympathy, and an understanding treatment of horses." The story, narrated by the horse, showed Black Beauty's progression through a series of increasingly cruel owners until the exhausted, ill-treated animal collapses. In the end, the horse is saved by a kind owner

[Boby]

1990. - An anti-poll tax rally in central London has erupted into the worst riots seen in the city for a century. Forty-five police officers are among the 113 people injured as well as 20 police horses

1953. - More than 1,500 attend the funeral of Queen Mary at St George's Chapel in Windsor.

1959. - The spiritual leader of Tibet, the Dalai Lama, has crossed the border into India after an epic 15-day journey on foot from the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, over the Himalayan mountains. There had been no news of his safety or whereabouts since he left Lhasa on 17 March with an entourage of 20 men, including six Cabinet ministers. Many thought he had been killed in the fierce Chinese crackdown that followed the Tibetan uprising earlier this month

1889. - Eiffel Tower is dedicated in Paris in a ceremony presided over by Gustave Eiffel, the tower's designer, and attended by French Prime Minister Pierre Tirard, a handful of other dignitaries, and 200 construction workers. In 1889, to honor of the centenary of the French Revolution, the French government planned an international exposition and announced a design competition for a monument to be built on the Champ-de-Mars in central Paris. Out of more than 100 designs submitted, the Centennial Committee chose Eiffel's plan of an open-lattice wrought-iron tower that would reach almost 1,000 feet above Paris and be the world's tallest man-made structure. Eiffel, a noted bridge builder, was a master of metal construction and designed the framework of the Statue of Liberty that had recently been erected in New York Harbor

1991. - After 36 years in existence, the Warsaw Pact-the military alliance between the Soviet Union and its eastern European satellites-comes to an end. The action was yet another sign that the Soviet Union was losing control over its former allies and that the Cold War was falling apart. The Warsaw Pact was formed in 1955, primarily as a response to the decision by the United States and its western European allies to include a rearmed West Germany in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). NATO had begun in 1949 as a defensive military alliance between the United States, Canada, and several European nations to thwart possible Soviet expansion into Western Europe. In 1954, NATO nations voted to allow a rearmed West Germany into the organization. The Soviets responded with the establishment of the Warsaw Pact. The original members included the Soviet Union, East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Albania. Although the Soviets claimed that the organization was a defensive alliance, it soon became clear that the primary purpose of the pact was to reinforce communist dominance in Eastern Europe. In Hungary in 1956, and then again in Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Soviets invoked the pact to legitimize its interventions in squelching anticommunist revolutions. By the late-1980s, however, anti-Soviet and anticommunist movements throughout Eastern Europe began to crack the Warsaw Pact. In 1990, East Germany left the Warsaw Pact in preparation for its reunification with West Germany. Poland and Czechoslovakia also indicated their strong desire to withdraw. Faced with these protests--and suffering from a faltering economy and unstable political situation--the Soviet Union bowed to the inevitable. In March 1991, Soviet military commanders relinquished their control of Warsaw Pact forces. A few months later, the pact's Political Consultative Committee met for one final time and formally recognized what had already effectively occurred-the Warsaw Pact was no more

1999. - Law enforcement officers in Elephant Butte, New Mexico began digging for evidence near the mobile home of David Parker Ray and Cynthia Lea Hendy after more evidence came to light about the couple's activities. On March 22, a twenty-two year old woman was found running naked, except for a padlocked metal collar around her neck, down an unpaved road near Elephant Butte State Park. She told police that Ray and Hendy had abducted her three days earlier in Albuquerque, before bringing her to the mobile home where she was raped and tortured. As police delved deeper into Ray and Hendy's background they became convinced that the woman was not the only victim. Upon hearing initial news reports, another woman called New Mexico police with her own tale of sexual torture at the hands of the couple. Then, an acquaintance of Hendy investigators that she had previously spoken about Ray burying people near their home.
The woman escaped when Ray was at his job at the State Park. She got into a scuffle with Hendy and hit her on the back of the head with an ice pick. Hendy plead guilty to being an accomplice and then even more was revealed. Soon David Ray's daughter Jesse was also charged for her participation in a similar 1996 attack. And the Ray's friend Dennis Yancy was charged with the murder of a young woman who disappeared from in 1997 from an Elephant Butte bar.
In June 1999, a fisherman discovered a gunny sack in a lake near the Ray's home. The sack contained human flesh but forensics experts were unable to identify the remains any further. Following this string of revelations, tourism in the Elephant Butte area dropped precipitously

1930. - The Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America formally adopt the Production Code on this day in 1930. For the next three decades, the Code imposed strict guidelines on the cinematic treatment of sex, crime, religion, violence, and other controversial subjects. In 1966. the Code was replaced with by the movie ratings system. The first ratings system included categories G (for general audience), MGP (all ages admitted but parental guidance suggested), and R (no one under 16 admitted). In 1970, MGP was replaced by PG (parental guidance suggested) and R movies (no one under 17 admitted without a parent or guardian). In 1984, the PG-13 rating was added, and the X rating was phased out in 1990 in favor of NC-17.

1970. - In response to government scrutiny of Hollywood hiring practices, studios agree on this day in 1970 to increase minority employment and adopt an equal-opportunity employment agreement worked out with the Justice Department banning discrimination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had been warning the industry for more than a year to change its ways or face a government lawsuit

1836. - The first monthly installment of The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, by 24-year-old writer Charles Dickens, is published under the pseudonym Boz. The short sketches were originally commissioned as captions for humorous drawings by caricaturist Robert Seymour, but Dickens' whimsical stories about the kindly Samuel Pickwick and his fellow club members soon became popular in their own right. Only 400 copies were printed of the first installment, but by the 15th episode, 40,000 copies were printed. When the stories were published in book form in 1837, Dickens quickly became the most popular author of the day.

1940. - On this day, the German auxiliary cruiser Atlantis sets off on a mission to catch and sink Allied merchant ships. By the time the Atlantis set sail from Germany, the Allies had already lost more than 750,000 tons worth of shipping, the direct result of German submarine attacks. They had also lost another 281,000 tons because of mines, and 36,000 tons as the result of German air raids. The Germans had lost just eighteen submarines. The Atlantis had been a merchant ship itself, but was converted to a commerce raider with six 5.9-inch guns, 93 mines ready to plant, and two aircraft fit for spying out Allied ships to sink. The Atlantis donned various disguises in order to integrate itself into any shipping milieu inconspicuously


WOW, interesting day!

[Kestra]

On March 31, 1968, President Johnson stunned the country by announcing he would not run for another term of office.

[Boby]

1957. - Not everybody was amused by the BBC's famous spaghetti harvest documentary.
Hundreds of people called the corporation after the broadcast asking where they could get hold of a spaghetti bush so they could grow their own crop. And many viewers - including BBC staff - who had been taken in by the Panorama April Fool criticised the use of a serious factual programme to make an elaborate joke.

2000. - A coding machine used by the Germans to encode messages during World War II has been stolen from the Bletchley Park Museum in Buckinghamshire, south-east England

2001. - Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has been arrested and taken to prison, ending a heavily-armed standoff at his Belgrade villa. The news came shortly after five single shots and a burst of automatic gun fire were heard at Mr Milosevic's home where he had been surrounded by police for nearly 36 hours

1918. - The Royal Air Force (RAF) is formed with the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). The RAF took its place beside the British navy and army as a separate military service with its own ministry

1621. - At the Plymouth settlement in present-day Massachusetts, the leaders of the Plymouth colonists, acting on behalf of King James I, make a defensive alliance with Massasoit, chief of the Wampanoags. The agreement, in which both parties promised to not "doe hurt" to one another, was the first treaty between a Native American tribe and a group of American colonists. According to the treaty, if a Wampanoag broke the peace, he would be sent to Plymouth for punishment; if a colonist broke the law, he would likewise be sent to the Wampanoags

1924. - In Germany, Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler is sentenced to five years in prison for leading the Nazis' unsuccessful "Beer Hall Putsch" in the German state of Bavaria. In the early 1920s, the ranks of Hitler's Nazi Party swelled with resentful Germans who sympathized with the party's bitter hatred of Germany's democratic government, leftist politics, and Jews. In November 1923, after the German government resumed the payment of war reparations to Britain and France, the Nazis launched the "Beer Hall Putsch"--their first attempt at seizing the German government by force. Hitler hoped that his nationalist revolution in Bavaria would spread to the dissatisfied German army, which in turn would bring down the government in Berlin. However, the uprising was immediately suppressed, and Hitler was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison for high treason. Despite his conviction, Hitler was out of jail before the end of the year, with his political position stronger than ever

1916. - Movie mogul Lewis Selznick founds his own movie studio. Selznick's company served as a launching pad for his two sons, Myron and David, who became important players in the Hollywood filmmaking industry. One of 18 children born to a poor family in Kiev, Russia, Lewis Selznick was sent to England as a boy, where he worked in a factory until he earned enough money to sail for America. After arriving in Pittsburgh, he opened a jewelry shop that grew into a chain of successful stores by the time he was 24. In 1912, when he was in his early 40s, Selznick began investing in motion pictures and took positions first at Universal Pictures, then the World Film Corporation. In 1916, he formed Lewis Selznick Pictures, and the company flourished for several years

1877. - Ignoring the taunts of fellow miners who say he will only find his own tombstone, prospector Edward Schieffelin begins his search for silver in the area of present-day southern Arizona. Later that year, Schieffelin was not only alive and well, but he had found one of the richest silver veins in the West. He named it the Tombstone Lode

1816. - Jane Austen responds to a letter from the Prince Regent suggesting she write a historic romance, saying, "I could not sit down to write a serious romance under any other motive than to save my life." Austen's correspondence with the Prince Regent, as well as literary figures of the day, was prompted by the success of her novels Sense and Sensibility, (1811) Pride and Prejudice, (1813) Mansfield Park, (1814) and Emma (1815). Two additional novels were published after her death. Her identity as the author was known to only a small circle; the general reading public only knew that "a lady" had written the books. Although enjoying the appreciation of such leading contemporary authors as Sir Walter Scott, Austen led a quiet, retiring life in the English country until she died at age 42


Happy birthday:

Tova
UK_Trolley

Grace Lee Whitney ("Yeoman Janice Rand", TOS)

Memory wall
Here you'll find people who appeared in Star Trek and died on this day a

Booker Bradshaw
Born May 21, 1940 and died of heart attack April 1, 2003 in Los Angeles, CA.
Played Dr. M'Benga in "A Privare Little War" and "That Which Survives".

[Kestra]

i remember Dr. M'Benga.

On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany, saying, ''The world must be made safe for democracy.''

[Boby]

1982. - On April 2, 1982, Argentina invades the Falklands Islands, a British colony since 1892 and British possession since 1833. Argentine amphibious forces rapidly overcame the small garrison of British marines at the town of Stanley on East Falkland and the next day seized the dependent territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich group. The 1,800 Falkland Islanders, mostly English-speaking sheep farmers, awaited a British response

1513. - Near present-day St. Augustine, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon comes ashore on the Florida coast, and claims the territory for the Spanish crown. Although other European navigators may have sighted the Florida peninsula before, Ponce de Leon is credited with the first recorded landing and the first detailed exploration of the Florida coast. The Spanish explorer was searching for the "Fountain of Youth," a fabled water source that was said to bring eternal youth. Ponce de Leon named the peninsula he believed to be an island "La Florida" because his discovery came during the time of the Easter feast, or Pascua Florida

1902. - The first American theater devoted solely to movies opens in Los Angeles on this day in 1902. Housed in a circus tent, the venue was dubbed "The Electric Theater." Its earliest pictures included "New York in a Blizzard." Admission cost about 10 cents for a one-hour show

1902. - Esther Morris, the first woman judge in American history, dies in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Although widely celebrated as a hero of the early suffragist movement, Esther Morris was hardly a radical advocate for women's rights. She spent the first 55 years of her life living quietly in New York state and Illinois, working as a milliner and housewife. In 1869, Morris moved to Wyoming Territory with her second husband, who had opened a saloon in the gold mining camp of South Pass City. That same year, a territorial representative from South Pass City introduced a bill giving women the right to vote and hold public office. Eager to promote Wyoming Territory and to attract more women settlers, the all-male territorial legislature approved the bill, making Wyoming the first territory or state in American history to enfranchise women. One of the strongest backers of the new law was the territorial governor, John Campbell. Eager to take more actions to further women's political power, in early 1870 Campbell began to search for women qualified and willing to be appointed as justices of the peace. Morris became Campbell's first and only successful appointment

1917. - Jeannette Pickering Rankin, the first woman ever elected to Congress, takes her seat in the U.S. Capitol as a representative from Montana

1805. - Hans Christian Andersen, one of the world's greatest storytellers, is born in Odensk, near Copenhagen. During Andersen's boyhood, his father died, and the child went to work in a factory briefly. However, he showed great talent for languages and entered the University of Copenhagen in 1828. The following year, he published his literary spoof A Walk from Amager, which became his first important work. Andersen wrote several plays that flopped, but he achieved some success with his novel The Improviser (1835). Meanwhile, he entertained himself by writing a series of children's stories that he published as collections. The first, Tales Told for Children, (1835) included "The Princess and the Pea." Andersen released new collections every year or two for decades as he traveled widely in Europe, Africa, and Asia Minor. His stories include "The Ugly Duckling," "The Little Mermaid," and "The Emperor's New Clothes." He died in 1875 at age 70

[Boby]

1860. - The first Pony Express mail simultaneously leaves St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California, carried by Henry Wallace riding west and John Roff riding east. During the 1,800-mile journey, the riders changed horses dozens of times, and on April 13 the westbound packet arrived in Sacramento, beating the eastbound packet's arrival in St. Joseph by two days

1936. - Richard Bruno Hauptmann, convicted in the 1932 kidnapping and murder of the 20-month-old son of Charles A. Lindbergh, is executed by electrocution

1948. - U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs into law the Foreign Assistance Act, commonly known as the Marshall Plan. Named after U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall, the program channeled more than $13 billion in aid to Europe between 1948 and 1951. Meant to spark economic recovery in European countries devastated by World War II, the plan also saved the United States from a postwar recession by providing a broader market for American goods. However, because the USSR prevented countries like Poland and Czechoslovakia from participating, the plan also contributed to the raising of the "Iron Curtain" between Eastern and Western Europe

1996. - Ronald H. Brown, the U.S. secretary of commerce, is killed along with 32 other Americans when their U.S. Air Force plane crashes into a mountain near Dubrovnik, Croatia. Brown was leading a delegation of business executives to the former Yugoslavia to explore business opportunities that might help rebuild the war-torn region

1882. - Jesse James, one of America's most notorious outlaws, is shot to death by Robert Ford, a member of his gang who hoped to collect the bounty on Jesse's head

[bengel]

Today, april the third, 2005, our Tom Boonen has won The Tour of Flanders (cycling) :D!!!

[Boby]

1968. - Just after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. is fatally shot while standing on the balcony outside his second-story room at the Motel Lorraine in Memphis, Tennessee. The civil rights leader was in Memphis to support a sanitation workers' strike and was on his way to dinner when a bullet struck him in the jaw and severed his spinal cord. King was pronounced dead after his arrival at a Memphis hospital. He was 39 years old

1841. - Only 31 days after assuming office, William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the United States, dies of pneumonia at the White House

1949. - The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is established by 12 Western nations: the United States, Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Iceland, Canada, and Portugal. The military alliance, which provided for a collective self-defense against Soviet aggression, greatly increased American influence in Europe.
Greece, Turkey, and West Germany later joined NATO, but in 1966 France withdrew, citing American violations of the 1949 treaty. In 1955, the Warsaw Pact, a Soviet-led Eastern European alliance, was established to counter NATO. In 1994, three years after the end of the Cold War, NATO engaged in its first military action as part of an international effort to end two years of fighting in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic, which all left the Warsaw Pact upon its dissolution in 1991, joined NATO in 1999.

Memory wall:

Anthony Caruso
Born April 7, 1916, Frankfort, IN
Died April 4, 2003, Brentwood, CA - cause of death unknown
Played Bela Oxmyx in "A Piece of Action"

[Kestra]

On April 6, 1909, explorers Robert E. Peary and Matthew A. Henson became the first men to reach the North Pole. The claim, disputed by skeptics, was upheld in 1989 by the Navigation Foundation.

[Kestra]

On April 7, 1862, Union forces led by Gen. Ulysses S. Grant defeated the Confederates at the battle of Shiloh in Tennessee.

[Kestra]

On April 13, 1970, Apollo 13, four-fifths of the way to the moon, was crippled when a tank containing liquid oxygen burst.

[Kestra]

On April 14, 1865, President Lincoln was shot and mortally wounded by John Wilkes Booth while attending the comedy "Our American Cousin" at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. He died the next day.

[gem]

On this day, I was born 51 years ago.:) You know age makes no sense to me. I'm just me, yeah with more experience, not a whole lot of wisdome, I will say a better understanding of people, now that's not saying much, ;)if there are 100% things one must know about people in order to get along, I'd say I know about 3%, but at least I know that. I'd say empathy is most useful...HEY...Gem, get it empath, maybe I do know something after all.

That's cool...empathy most important, and I chose the name Gem.:):):)Happy Birthday to me!:):):)

Gem is nuts, but that's ok, we are all a bit nuts.:)

[Knightstorm]

Our first Republican president was mortally wounded by an insane actor.

[Knightstorm]

In retaliation for the bombing of a West Berlin night club where a U.S. serviceman was killed, Ronald Reagan ordered major bombing raids against Tripoli and Benghazi, in Libya, that killed 60 people.

Thank goodness he took terrorism seriously.

[Boby]

Sorry for my leave of absence, but had really rough few weeks. I'll try to be around more often. Sorry for not being here to say Happy birthday, gem. So, Happy birthday yesterday to you and A Smiles.

Now on today, April 15.

1945. - British troops have entered the German concentration camp of Bergen-Belsen. Inside the camp the horrified soldiers found piles of dead and rotting corpses and thousands of sick and starving prisoners kept in severely overcrowded and dirty compounds

1989. - At least 93 football supporters have been killed in Britain's worst-ever sporting disaster. They were crushed to death at Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield during the FA Cup semi-final between Nottingham Forest and Liverpool. The crush is said to have resulted from too many Liverpool fans being allowed in to the back of an already full stand at the Leppings Lane end of the ground

1942. - The people of Malta have been awarded the George Cross in recognition of their continuing heroic struggle against enemy attack. The British colony in the Mediterranean is of crucial strategic importance to the Allied North African campaign and has been under almost constant attack from Italian and German aircraft since June 1940

1912. - At 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912, the British ocean liner Titanic sinks into the North Atlantic Ocean about 400 miles south of Newfoundland, Canada. The massive ship, which carried 2,200 passengers and crew, had struck an iceberg two and half hours before. Because of a shortage of lifeboats and the lack of satisfactory emergency procedures, more than 1,500 people went down in the sinking ship or froze to death in the icy North Atlantic waters. Most of the 700 or so survivors were women and children. A number of notable American and British citizens died in the tragedy, including the noted British journalist William Thomas Stead and heirs to the Straus, Astor, and Guggenheim fortunes.One hour and 20 minutes after Titanic went down, the Cunard liner Carpathia (did you know Carpatia was Croatian ship manned exclusively by croatian people - had to mention this!) arrived. The survivors in the lifeboats were brought aboard, and a handful of others were pulled out of the water. It was later discovered that the Leyland liner Californian had been less than 20 miles away at the time of the accident but had failed to hear the Titanic's distress signals because its radio operator was off duty

-- A 20th century version of the strong and resourceful women of the Wild West, Molly Brown wins lasting fame by surviving the sinking of the Titanic. Brown's rise to national fame began on this night in 1912, while she was aboard the Titanic, returning from a European trip. After the ship hit an iceberg and began to sink, Brown was tossed into a lifeboat. She took command of the little boat and helped rescue a drowning sailor and other victims. To keep spirits up, she regaled the anxious survivors with stories of her life in the Old West.When newspapers later learned of Brown's courageous actions, they promptly dubbed her "the unsinkable Mrs. Brown" and she became an international heroine. Eventually, Brown's money ran out and she faded from the public view, dying in modest circumstances in New York City in 1932. However, the Broadway musical The Unsinkable Molly Brown revived her fame for a new generation in 1960.

1865. - At 7:22 a.m., Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, dies from a bullet wound inflicted the night before by John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Confederate sympathizer. The president's death came only six days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his massive army at Appomattox, effectively ending the American Civil War

1990. - Actress Ava Gardner dies at the age of 67. Gardner was Hollywood's reigning glamour queen between the eras of Rita Hayworth in the 1940s and Marilyn Monroe in the 1950s

1959. - Four months after leading a successful revolution in Cuba, Fidel Castro visits the United States. The visit was marked by tensions between Castro and the American government.

Happy birthday:

enigma

Memory Wall:

William Meader
Born July 4, 1904 – Massachusetts, USA
Died April 15, 1979 – Riverside County, CA
Played Space Command Representative Lindstrom in “Court Martial”

Gilbert Green
Born January 1, 1914 – New York, NY
Died April 15, 1984 – Tarzana, CA
Played S.S. Major in “Patterns of Force”

[Boby]

1964. - Some of the longest sentences in British criminal history have been imposed on men involved in the so-called "Great Train Robbery". Sentences totalling 307 years were passed on 12 men who stole £2.6m in used bank notes after holding up the night mail train travelling from Glasgow to London

1993. - The United Nations has voted to make the Bosnian town of Srebrenica a safe haven, as the town teeters on the brink of falling to Bosnian Serb forces. In a late-night emergency session, the UN Security Council voted to back the stand taken by the UN's commander in Bosnia, General Philippe Morillon, and offer its protection to the besieged city. Under the proposal, Srebrenica would become a centre for Bosnian Muslim refugees seeking safety from Bosnian Serb aggression. However, the details of how such a safe haven would be defended are unclear. Tens of thousands of civilians trapped in the town are said to be in a state of panic tonight as Serbian forces close in on what may be a final offensive to take the town

1917. - Vladimir Lenin, leader of the revolutionary Bolshevik Party, returns to Petrograd after a decade of exile to take the reins of the Russian Revolution. One month before, Czar Nicholas II had been forced from power when Russian army troops joined a workers' revolt in Petrograd, the Russian capital

1947. - Multimillionaire and financier Bernard Baruch, in a speech given during the unveiling of his portrait in the South Carolina House of Representatives, coins the term "Cold War" to describe relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. The phrase stuck, and for over 40 years it was a mainstay in the language of American diplomacy.

1943. - In Basel, Switzerland, Albert Hoffman, a Swiss chemist working at the Sandoz pharmaceutical research laboratory, accidentally consumes LSD-25, a synthetic drug he had created in 1938 as part of his research into the medicinal value of lysergic acid compounds. After taking the drug, formally known as lysergic acid diethylamide, Dr. Hoffman was disturbed by unusual sensations and hallucinations. In his notes, he related the experience:
"Last Friday, April 16, 1943, I was forced to interrupt my work in the laboratory in the middle of the afternoon and proceed home, being affected by a remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness. At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant, intoxicated-like condition characterized by an extremely stimulated imagination. In a dreamlike state, with eyes closed (I found the daylight to be unpleasantly glaring), I perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors. After some two hours this condition faded away."

1922. - British author Kingsley Amis is born to a lower-middle-class clerk and his wife

Happy Birthday:

Overload
MugatoMike

Memory Wall

Alfred Ryden
Born January 5, 1916 - New York, NY
Died April 16, 1995 – Englewood, NJ
Played Professor Crater in “The Man Trap”

[Kestra]

On April 16, 1947, America's worst harbor explosion occurred in Texas City, Texas, when the French ship Grandcamp, carrying ammonium nitrate fertilizer, caught fire and blew up, devastating the town. Another ship, the Highflyer, exploded the following day. The explosions and resulting fires killed more than 500 people and left 200 others missing.

[Kestra]

On April 17, 1961, about 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles launched the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in a failed attempt to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro.

[Knightstorm]

Martin Luther speaks to the assembly at the Diet of Worms, refusing to recant his teachings, a pivotal moment the Reformation of Christianity and the emergence of modern democratic capitalism.

[Boby]

1790. - American statesman, printer, scientist, and writer Benjamin Franklin dies in Philadelphia at age 84

1941. - During World War II, representatives of Yugoslavia's various regions sign an armistice with Nazi Germany at Belgrade, ending 11 days of futile resistance against the invading German Wehrmacht. More than 300,000 Yugoslav officers and soldiers were taken prisoner. Only 200 Germans died in the conquest of Yugoslavia

1969. - Alexander Dubcek, the communist leader who launched a broad program of liberal reforms in Czechoslovakia, is forced to resign as first secretary by the Soviet forces occupying his country. The staunchly pro-Soviet Gustav Husak was appointed Czechoslovak leader in his place, reestablishing an authoritarian communist dictatorship in the Soviet satellite state

1970. - With the world anxiously watching, Apollo 13, a U.S. lunar spacecraft that suffered a severe malfunction on its journey to the moon, safely returns to Earth

1945. - On this day in 1945, U.S. Lieutenant Colonel Boris T. Pash commandeers over half a ton of uranium at Strassfut, Germany, in an effort to prevent the Russians from developing an A-bomb. Pash was head of the Alsos Group, organized to search for German scientists in the postwar environment in order to prevent the Russians, previously Allies but now a potential threat, from capturing any scientists and putting them to work at their own atomic research plants. Uranium piles were also rich "catches," as they were necessary to the development of atomic weapons

[Boby]

1955. - Eminent scientist Dr Albert Einstein, who developed the theory of relativity, dies in hospital aged 76.

1960. - Tens of thousands of people marked the end of the Aldermaston "ban the bomb" march this afternoon with a rally that built up to a tremendous climax this Easter weekend in London. At least 60,000 protesters gathered at Trafalgar Square. Organisers said the crowds numbered at least 100,000. But there was no doubt this was the largest demonstration London has seen this century

1994 - The ethnic violence in the Rwandan capital Kigali is now spreading throughout the country, aid officials have said.
Tens of thousands of people are believed to have died since Rwanda's president died in a suspicious plane crash on 6 April.
The killing has mainly been carried out by Hutu gangs, who blame Tutsi rebels for downing President Juvenal Habyarimana's plane in a rocket attack. The President of Burundi was also killed. Witnesses in Kigali say Hutu soldiers have been hacking Tutsi civilians to death with machetes in the street

1906. - At 5:13 a.m., an earthquake estimated at close to 8.0 on the Richter scale strikes San Francisco, California, killing hundreds of people as it topples numerous buildings. The quake was caused by a slip of the San Andreas Fault over a segment about 275 miles long, and shock waves could be felt from southern Oregon down to Los Angeles

1983. - The U.S. embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, is almost completely destroyed by a car-bomb explosion that kills 63 people, including the suicide bomber and 17 Americans. The terrorist attack was carried out in protest of the U.S. military presence in Lebanon

1956. - American actress Grace Kelly marries Prince Rainier of Monaco in a spectacular ceremony

1929. - Small Talk, the first "Our Gang" picture with sound, debuts on this day in 1929. Producer Hal Roach had started producing the Our Gang short comedies in 1922. The series' mischievous band of kids, later known as the "Little Rascals," quickly caught on with the public, especially after characters Spanky, Alfalfa, and Darla were added in the early 1930s. In 1938, Roach sold the Our Gang rights to MGM, which produced the shorts until 1944. In total, more than 100 Our Gang films were made

1932. - The Hollywood Reporter states that William Faulkner, "a writer from the South," has been hired to write scripts for MGM. Although the author had already started producing his master works, including The Sound and the Fury (1929), As I Lay Dying (1930) and Light in August (1932), his novels did not earn him enough money to support his family, so he supplemented his income by working as a Hollywood screenwriter. Between 1932 and 1955, he co-wrote several acclaimed screenplays, including To Have and Have Not, starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, and The Big Sleep, starring Humphrey Bogart. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1949 and his Collected Stories (1950) won the National Book Award

1953. - All Star Revue, starring various hosts, including Jimmy Durante and Danny Thomas, airs for the last time. The show, which debuted in 1950, was typical of the early days of television, when programs had a distinctly vaudeville feel, presenting a hodgepodge of slapstick humor, song, dance, acrobatics, and other acts

[Boby]

1861. - The first blood of the American Civil War is shed when a secessionist mob in Baltimore attacks Massachusetts troops bound for Washington, D.C. Four soldiers and 12 rioters were killed

1775. - At about 5 a.m., 700 British troops, on a mission to capture Patriot leaders and seize a Patriot arsenal, march into Lexington to find 77 armed minutemen under Captain John Parker waiting for them on the town's common green. British Major John Pitcairn ordered the outnumbered Patriots to disperse, and after a moment's hesitation the Americans began to drift off the green. Suddenly, the "shot heard around the world" was fired from an undetermined gun, and a cloud of musket smoke soon covered the green. When the brief Battle of Lexington ended, eight Americans lay dead or dying and 10 others were wounded. Only one British soldier was injured, but the American Revolution had begun

1943. - In Warsaw, Poland, Nazi forces attempting to clear out the city's Jewish ghetto are met by gunfire from Jewish resistance fighters, and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising begins

1993. - At Mount Carmel in Waco, Texas, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) launches a tear-gas assault on the Branch Davidian compound, ending a tense 51-day standoff between the federal government and an armed religious cult. By the end of the day, the compound was burned to the ground, and some 80 Branch Davidians, including 22 children, had perished in the inferno

1995. - Just after 9 a.m., a massive truck bomb explodes outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The blast collapsed the north face of the nine-story building, instantly killing more than 100 people and trapping dozens more in the rubble. Emergency crews raced to Oklahoma City from across the country, and when the rescue effort finally ended two weeks later the death toll stood at 168 people killed, including 19 young children who were in the building's day-care center at the time of the blast

1957. - The Brattle Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, presents its first showing of Casablanca (1943) on this day in 1957, introducing a new generation of film viewers to Humphrey Bogart, who had died in January 1957. The showing marked the beginning of a Bogart revival that would boost the star to cult-like status in the 1960s and later

1927. - Mae West is sentenced to 10 days in jail for obscenity. She had written, produced, and directed Sex, a Broadway play about a gigolo, which the courts condemned for its scandalous content. She continued writing plays and battling censors and finally scored a Broadway success with her 1928 play, Diamond Lil. West went on to become a Hollywood star and one of the most highly paid women in the United States

1938. - RCA-NBC launches its first regular TV broadcasts. The programs, broadcast from the Empire State Building, were an experiment and aired only five hours a week. Very few TV sets existed at the time to receive the programs

1903. - Eliot Ness, the man best known for using the tax code to take down Al Capone, was born

Memory Wall:

Charles Seel
Born April 29, 1897 – New York, NY
Died April 19, 1980 – Los Angeles, CA
Played Ed in “Spectre of the gun”

Liam Sullivan
Born May 18, 1923 – Jacksonville, FL
Died April 19, 1998 – California, USA
Played Parmen in “Plato’s Stepchildren”

[Boby]

1999. - A shooting spree by two American high school students is feared to have left up to 25 people dead and injured at least 15 others. The students, wearing balaclavas and trench coats, rampaged through Columbine High School in Denver, Colorado, firing automatic weapons and throwing homemade bombs. The bodies of the two suspects, who had apparently shot themselves, were later found in the library

1972. - The Apollo 16 mission has landed on the Moon after a seven-hour crisis that nearly aborted the mission altogether.
Astronauts John Young and Charles Duke became the fifth team to step down onto the Moon at 0324 BST (0224 GMT). They landed in the Descartes crater region of the lunar highlands.
A delighted Charles Duke exclaimed, "Contact!" as the lunar module, Orion, touched down. His first comment on looking around him was, "We're not going to have to walk far to pick up rocks." It was the end of a seven-hour drama which began at 2036 BST (1936 GMT) the previous evening, when an engine on the command module, Casper, malfunctioned after it had separated from the lunar module.

1902. - Marie and Pierre Curie successfully isolate radioactive radium salts from the mineral pitchblende in their laboratory in Paris. In 1898, the Curies discovered the existence of the elements radium and polonium in their research of pitchblende. One year after isolating radium, they would share the 1903 Nobel Prize in physics with French scientist A. Henri Becquerel for their groundbreaking investigations of radioactivity.

1926. - Western Electric and Warner Bros. announce Vitaphone, a process to add sound to film. The system logged sound on a record linked electronically to the projector, keeping sound synchronized with image

1945. - On this day in 1945, Allied bombers in Italy begin a three-day attack on the bridges over the rivers Adige and Brenta to cut off German lines of retreat on the peninsula. Meanwhile, Adolf Hitler celebrates his 56th birthday as a Gestapo reign of terror results in the hanging of 20 Russian prisoners of war and 20 Jewish children: Of these, at least nine are under the age of 12. All of the victims had been taken from Auschwitz to Neuengamme, the place of execution, for the purpose of medical experimentation

[Kestra]

On April 20, 1971, the United States Supreme Court upheld the use of busing to achieve racial desegregation in schools.

[Knightstorm]

1979: President Jimmy Carter is attacked by a Swamp Rabbit while on vacation in Plains, Georgia. :eek2:

No, I'm not making this up. :D

[Boby]

1945. - Russian troops have captured some outlying suburbs of Berlin at the beginning of what promises to be a bitter battle for control of the city

1987. - More than 100 people have been killed after a bomb exploded in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo. Nearly three hundred others were wounded when the device, planted in a car, went off at Colombo's main bus terminal during the rush hour.
The incident is one of the worst mass killings in the long-running feud between the island's two main ethnic groups, the Tamils and the Sinhalese

753 B.C. - According to tradition, on April 21, 753 B.C., Romulus and his twin brother, Remus, found Rome on the site where they were suckled by a she-wolf as orphaned infants. Actually, the Romulus and Remus myth originated sometime in the fourth century B.C., and the exact date of Rome's founding was set by the Roman scholar Marcus Terentius Varro in the first century B.C

1836. - During the Texan War for Independence, the Texas militia under Sam Houston launches a surprise attack against the forces of Mexican General Santa Anna along the San Jacinto River. The Mexicans were thoroughly routed, and hundreds were taken prisoner, including General Santa Anna himself. After gaining independence from Spain in the 1820s, Mexico welcomed foreign settlers to sparsely populated Texas, and a large group of Americans led by Stephen F. Austin settled along the Brazos River. The Americans soon outnumbered the resident Mexicans, and by the 1830s attempts by the Mexican government to regulate these semi-autonomous American communities led to rebellion. In March 1836, in the midst of armed conflict with the Mexican government, Texas declared its independence from Mexico

1918. - In the skies over Vauz sur Somme, France, Manfred von Richthofen, the notorious German flying ace known as "The Red Baron," is killed by Allied fire

1989. - Six days after the death of Hu Yaobang, the deposed reform-minded leader of the Chinese Communist Party, some 100,000 students gather at Beijing's Tiananmen Square to commemorate Hu and voice their discontent with China's authoritative communist government. The next day, an official memorial service for Hu Yaobang was held in Tiananmen's Great Hall of the People, and student representatives carried a petition to the steps of the Great Hall, demanding to meet with Premier Li Peng. The Chinese government refused such a meeting, leading to a general boycott of Chinese universities across the country and widespread calls for democratic reforms

1895. - Woodville Latham and his sons, Otway and Gray, demonstrate the first projected movie in the United States. The demonstration, on Franklin Street in New York City, used a projector that rolled perforated film in front of a lantern. Although movies had been shown in the United States for several years using Edison's Kinetoscope, the films could only be viewed one at a time in a peep-show box, not projected to a large audience. Projected movies were first shown to paying audiences starting the following year, usually as part of a vaudeville show. The first theater devoted solely to projected movies, The Electric Theater in Los Angeles, didn't open until 1902

1956. - "Heartbreak Hotel" hits the top of the Billboard charts on this day in 1956. The song was Elvis' first No. 1 hit

1816. - Charlotte Brontý, the only one of three novelist Brontý sisters to live past age 31, is born

[Kestra]

On April 21, 1910, author Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, died in Redding, Conn.

[Kestra]

On April 22, 1889, the Oklahoma Land Rush began at noon as thousands of homesteaders staked claims.

[Boby]

1971. - Haiti's ruler, Francois 'Papa Doc' Duvalier, has died after 14 years in power

1997. - Troops have stormed the Japanese embassy in Peru and freed all but one of 72 hostages held inside, ending a four-month siege of the building by anti-government rebels. All 14 Tupac Amaru rebels were killed, including their leader, Nestor Cerpa Cartolini

1915. - German forces shock Allied soldiers along the western front by firing more than 150 tons of lethal chlorine gas against two French colonial divisions at Ypres, Belgium. This was the first major gas attack by the Germans, and it devastated the Allied line

1970. - Earth Day, an event to increase public awareness of the world's environmental problems, is celebrated in the United States for the first time. Millions of Americans, including students from thousands of colleges and universities, participated in rallies, marches, and educational programs

1937. - Film actor Jack Nicholson is born in Neptune, New Jersey

1954. - Senator Joseph McCarthy begins hearings investigating the United States Army, which he charges with being "soft" on communism. These televised hearings gave the American public their first view of McCarthy in action, and his recklessness, indignant bluster, and bullying tactics quickly resulted in his fall from prominence

2000. - US federal agents have seized six-year-old Cuban shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez in an early morning raid on the home of his relatives in Miami. About 25 officers broke down the door of the house and re-emerged minutes later with Elian wrapped in a blanket. They bundled the screaming boy into a vehicle and drove him away, as the crowd outside the house shouted protests. Chaotic scenes followed as the officers retreated and pepper spray was used to keep back the crowd.
Elian was put on a plane and flown to Andrews Air force base outside Washington where he was reunited with his father for the first time in five months. Elian has been at the centre of a bitter custody battle between his Miami relatives and his father in Cuba since being shipwrecked off the Florida coast November 1999

[Boby]

2001. - A former personal assistant to the Duchess of York has gone on trial accused of murdering her boyfriend. Jane Andrews, 34, denies murdering businessman Thomas Cressman, 39, at their home in Fulham, West London, in September 2000

1984. - The discovery of a virus which may cause Aids, the fatal disease sweeping through America, has been hailed as a "monumental breakthrough" in medical research. The development was announced in Washington by US Health Secretary Margaret Heckler. She said the virus was a variant of a known human cancer virus called HTLV-3. A blood test has also been developed, which, she said, would be available within six months, preventing the tragedy of transfusion patients contracting the disease through tainted blood products. Aids, or Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, weakens the immune system, leaving its victims open to a series of wasting diseases

1979. - A 33-year-old man has died from head injuries after a bloody battle broke out between police and demonstrators in Southall. The fighting began when thousands of protesters gathered to demonstrate against a National Front campaign meeting. The extreme right-wing organisation had chosen Southall Town Hall to hold its St George's Day election meeting. The area has one of the country's biggest Asian communities

1564. - According to tradition, the great English dramatist and poet William Shakespeare is born in Stratford-on-Avon on April 23, 1564. It is impossible to be certain the exact day on which he was born, but church records show that he was baptized on April 26, and three days was a customary amount of time to wait before baptizing a newborn. Shakespeare's date of death is conclusively known, however: it was April 23, 1616. He was 52 years old and had retired to Stratford three years before

1859. - Beating a rival publisher by a mere 20 minutes, William Byers distributes the first newspaper ever published in the frontier boomtown of Denver, Colorado

1014. - Brian Boru, the high king of Ireland, is assassinated by a group of retreating Norsemen shortly after his Irish forces defeated them. Brian, a clan prince, seized the throne of the southern Irish state of Dal Cais from its Eogharacht rulers in 963. He subjugated all of Munster, extended his power over all of southern Ireland, and in 1002 became the high king of Ireland. Unlike previous high kings of Ireland, Brian resisted the rule of Ireland's Norse invaders, and after further conquests his rule was acknowledged across most of Ireland. As his power increased, relations with the Norsemen on the Irish coast grew increasingly strained. In 1013, Sitric, king of the Dublin Norse, formed an alliance against Brian, featuring Viking warriors from Ireland, the Hebrides, the Orkneys, and Iceland, as well as soldiers of Brian's native Irish enemies. On April 23, 1014, Good Friday, forces under Brian's son Murchad met and annihilated the Viking coalition at the Battle of Clontarf, near Dublin. After the battle, a small group of Norsemen, flying from their defeat, stumbled on Brian's tent, overcame his bodyguards, and murdered the elderly king. Victory at Clontarf broke Norse power in Ireland forever, but Ireland largely fell into anarchy after the death of Brian

Happy birthday:

Erika

Memory wall:

Rudy Solari
Born December 21, 1934 – Stanislaus County, CA
Died of Cancer, April 23, 1991 – Indio, CA
Played Salish in “The Paradise Syndrome”

Marc Daniels
Born January 27, 1912 – Pennsylvania
Died of Congestive Heart Failure, April 23, 1989 – Santa Monica, CA
Directed 14 original series episodes

[Kestra]

On April 23, 1969, Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death for assassinating New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy. The sentence was later reduced to life

[Boby]

1967. - The Soviet Union has announced the catastrophic failure of its latest space mission, with the crash of Soyuz 1 and the death of the cosmonaut on board. Colonel Vladimir Komarov, 40, is the first known victim of a space flight. He was an experienced cosmonaut, on his second flight, and had completed all his experiments successfully before returning to earth

1993. - A massive bomb has ripped through the heart of the City of London, killing one and injuring more than 40. The explosion shook buildings and shattered hundreds of windows, sending glass showering down into the streets below. A mediaeval church, St Ethelburga's, collapsed; another church and Liverpool Street underground station were also wrecked. Police say they are in no doubt that the bomb was planted by the IRA, although the organisation has not said it carried out the attack

1975. - A tense stand-off at the West German embassy in Stockholm has ended in violence, with the death of at least three people. Five Baader-Meinhof guerrillas had been holding 11 people hostage, including the German ambassador to Sweden, for almost 12 hours. Shortly before midnight, a cache of dynamite detonated, setting the building on fire. Staff in the embassy could be seen at the windows, calling for help

1800. - President John Adams approves legislation to appropriate $5,000 to purchase "such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress," thus establishing the Library of Congress. The first books, ordered from London, arrived in 1801 and were stored in the U.S. Capitol, the library's first home. The first library catalog, dated April 1802, listed 964 volumes and nine maps. Twelve years later, the British army invaded the city of Washington and burned the Capitol, including the then 3,000-volume Library of Congress

1942. - Ingrid Bergman signs with Warner Bros. to play Ilsa, opposite Humphrey Bogart, in Casablanca (1942). Bergman was under contract with David O. Selznick, but he allowed her to do Casablanca in exchange for the right to use Warner Bros.' Olivia de Havilland in another film


Memory wall:

Frank Overton
Born March 12, 1918 – Babylon, New York
Died of Heart Attack, April 24, 1967 – Pacific Palisades, CA
Played Elias Sandoval in “This Sife of Paradise”

[Boby]

1859. - At Port Said, Egypt, ground is broken for the Suez Canal, an artificial waterway intended to stretch 101 miles across the isthmus of Suez and connect the Mediterranean and the Red seas. Ferdinand de Lesseps, the French diplomat who organized the colossal undertaking, delivered the pickax blow that inaugurated construction

1990. - The crew of the U.S. space shuttle Discovery places the Hubble Space Telescope, a long-term space-based observatory, into a low orbit around Earth. The space telescope, conceived in the 1940s, designed in the 1970s, and built in the 1980s, was designed to give astronomers an unparalleled view of the solar system, the galaxy, and the universe. Initially, Hubble's operators suffered a setback when a lens aberration was discovered, but a repair mission by space-walking astronauts in December 1993 successfully fixed the problem, and Hubble began sending back its first breathtaking images of the universe

1945. - Americans and Russians link up, cut Germany in two:
On this day in 1945, eight Russian armies completely encircle Berlin, linking up with the U.S. First Army patrol, first on the western bank of the Elbe, then later at Torgau. Germany is, for all intents and purposes, Allied territory.
The Allies sounded the death knell of their common enemy by celebrating. In Moscow, news of the link-up between the two armies resulted in a 324-gun salute; in New York, crowds burst into song and dance in the middle of Times Square. Among the Soviet commanders who participated in this historic meeting of the two armies was the renowned Russian Marshal Georgi K. Zhukov, who warned a skeptical Stalin as early as June 1941 that Germany posed a serious threat to the Soviet Union. Zhukov would become invaluable in battling German forces within Russia (Stalingrad and Moscow) and without. It was also Zhukov who would demand and receive unconditional surrender of Berlin from German General Krebs less than a week after encircling the German capital. At the end of the war, Zhukov was awarded a military medal of honor from Great Britain

1719. - Daniel Defoe's fictional work The Life and Strange Adventures of Robinson Crusoe is published. The book, about a shipwrecked sailor who spends 28 years on a deserted island, is based on the experiences of shipwreck victims and of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish sailor who spent four years on a small island off the coast of South America in the early 1700s

[Boby]

1986. - World's worst nuclear power plant accident occurs at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in the Soviet Union. Thirty-two people died and dozens more suffered radiation burns in the opening days of the crisis, but only after Swedish authorities reported the fallout did Soviet authorities reluctantly admit that an accident had occurred

1865. - John Wilkes Booth is killed when Union soldiers track him down to a Virginia farm 12 days after he assassinated President Abraham Lincoln

1913. - Thirteen-year-old Mary Phagan is found sexually molested and murdered in the basement of the Atlanta, Georgia, pencil factory where she worked. Her murder later led to one of the most disgraceful episodes of bigotry, injustice, and mob violence in American history. Next to Phagan's body were two small notes that purported to pin the crime on Newt Lee, the night watchman at the factory. Lee was arrested, but it quickly became evident that the notes were a crude attempt by the barely literate Jim Conley to cover up his own involvement. Conley was the factory's janitor, a black man, and a well-known drunk. Conley then decided to shift the blame toward Leo Frank, the Jewish owner of the factory. Despite the absurdity of Conley's claims, they nevertheless took hold. The case's prosecutor was Huge Dorsey, a notorious bigot and friend of Georgia's populist leader, Tom Watson. Reportedly, Watson told Dorsey, "Hell, we can lynch a nigger anytime in Georgia, but when do we get the chance to hang a Yankee Jew?"
Frank was tried by Judge Leonard Roan, who allowed the blatantly unfair trial to go forward even after he was privately informed by Conley's attorney that Conley had admitted to Frank's innocence on more than one occasion. The trial was packed with Watson's followers and readers of his racist newspaper, Jeffersonian. The jury was terrorized into a conviction despite the complete lack of evidence against Frank. Georgia governor John Slaton initiated his own investigation and quickly concluded that Frank was completely innocent. Three weeks before his term ended, Slaton commuted Frank's death sentence in the hope that he would eventually be freed when the publicity died down. However, Watson had other plans: He mobilized his supporters to form the Knights of Mary Phagan. Thousands of Jewish residents in Atlanta were forced to flee the city because police refused to stop the lynch mob. The Knights of Mary Phagan then made their way to the prison farm where Frank was incarcerated. They handcuffed the warden and the guards and abducted Frank, bringing him to Marietta, Phagan's hometown. There he was hanged to death from a giant oak tree. Thousands of spectators came to watch and have their picture taken in front of his lifeless body. The police did nothing to stop the spectacle.

Although most of the country was outraged and horrified by the lynching, Watson remained very popular in Georgia. In fact, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1920.
Frank did not receive a posthumous pardon until 1986

1989. - Comedian Lucille Ball dies at age 78. During her career, she and husband Desi Arnaz transformed TV, creating the first long running hit sitcom (Do I have to explain why choose this one?)

[Boby]

1521. - After traveling three-quarters of the way around the globe, Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan is killed during a tribal skirmish on Mactan Island in the Philippines. Earlier in the month, his ships had dropped anchor at the Philippine island of Cebý, and Magellan met with the local chief, who after converting to Christianity persuaded the Europeans to assist him in conquering a rival tribe on the neighboring island of Mactan. In the subsequent fighting, Magellan was hit by a poisoned arrow and left to die by his retreating comrades

1773. - The British Parliament passes the Tea Act, a bill designed to save the faltering East India Company by greatly lowering its tea tax and thus granting it a monopoly on the American tea trade. The low tax allowed the East India Company to undercut even tea smuggled into America by Dutch traders, and many colonists viewed the act as another example of taxation tyranny.
When three tea ships, the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver, arrived in Boston Harbor, the colonists demanded that the tea be returned to England. After Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused, Patriot leader Samuel Adams organized the so-called Boston Tea Party with about 60 members of the radical Sons of Liberty. On December 16, 1773, the Patriots boarded the British ships disguised as Mohawk Indians and dumped the tea chests, valued at ý18,000, into the water

1667. - Blind poet John Milton sells the copyright to his masterpiece Paradise Lost (1667) for a mere 10 pounds

1954. - White Christmas, starring Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye, debuts on this day. The film, which opened at Radio City Music Hall, was Paramount's first wide-screen film, made with a process called VistaVision. Wide-screen technology had existed since the 1920s but was not pursued aggressively by Hollywood until the 1950s, when television began to compete with cinemas for viewers. The wide-screen format offered audiences an experience not available on television, and movie studios began exploiting the format

1961. - Sierra Leone has become the latest West African state to win independence, after more than 150 years of British colonial rule. The new nation was born at the stroke of midnight, when its green, white and blue flag was unfurled. A huge crowd, gathered at Brookfields Playground in Freetown to watch the historic moment, broke into tumultuous cheering. Independence Day formally began as the Duke of Kent handed over royal instruments recognising Sierra Leone as an independent nation

1992. - The House of Commons has elected a woman to the post of Speaker for the first time in its 700-year history. Betty Boothroyd, the 62-year-old Labour MP for West Bromwich West, won her historic victory by a decisive 134-vote majority. It is the first time since World War II that a member of the opposition party has held the job

Memory wall:

Stanley Adams
Born April 7,1915 – New York, NY
Died April 27, 1977 – Santa Monica CA
Played Cyrano Jones in “The Trouble with Tribbles”

[Boby]

1789. - Three weeks into a journey from Tahiti to the West Indies, the HMS Bounty is seized in a mutiny led by Fletcher Christian, the master's mate. Captain William Bligh and 18 of his loyal supporters were set adrift in a small, open boat, and the Bounty set course for Tubuai south of Tahiti

1969. - Following the defeat of his proposals for constitutional reform in a national referendum, Charles de Gaulle resigns as president of France

1965. - In an effort to forestall what he claims will be a "communist dictatorship" in the Dominican Republic, President Lyndon B. Johnson sends more than 22,000 U.S. troops to restore order on the island nation. Johnson's action provoked loud protests in Latin America and skepticism among many in the United States

1990. - The Broadway musical A Chorus Line closes after 6,237 performances. The show became the longest-running musical on September 29, 1983, when its 3,389th performance broke the record held by Grease. A Chorus Line opened July 25, 1975, and was seen by more than 6.5 million people during its eight-year run. The show, which won a Pulitzer and nine Tony awards, was made into a movie in 1985

1937. - The country's first museum of costumes is incorporated. The Museum of Costume Arts, in New York, created a collection of theater and movie costumes to promote "cultural education" in the design field

1945. - "Il Duce," Benito Mussolini, and his mistress, Clara Petacci, are shot by Italian partisans who had captured the couple as they attempted to flee to Switzerland

2001. - A billionaire businessman from California has become the first paying passenger to go to outer space. Dennis Tito, aged 60, set off from Kazakhstan at 1338 local time (0838 GMT) for an eight-day holiday aboard the International Space Station


Happy birthday:

PaulWScom
One more person, but I'm not going to greet her! :D

Memory wall:

Ben Gage
Born March 18, 1914 – Chicago IL
Died of Heart Failure, April 28, 1978 – Los Angeles, CA
Played Akaar in “Friday’s Child”

[Kestra]

here's one for sports fans.

On April 27, 1947, "Babe Ruth Day" at Yankee Stadium was held to honor the ailing baseball star.

[Kestra]

On April 28, 1947, a six-man expedition sailed from Peru aboard a balsa wood raft named the Kon-Tiki on a 101-day journey across the Pacific Ocean to Polynesia.

[Boby]

1945. - U.S. Seventh Army's 45th Infantry Division liberates Dachau, the first concentration camp established by Germany's Nazi regime. A major Dachau subcamp was liberated the same day by the 42nd Rainbow Division

1945. - Eva Braun met Hitler while employed as an assistant to Hitler's official photographer. Of a middle-class Catholic background, Braun spent her time with Hitler out of public view, entertaining herself by skiing and swimming. She had no discernible influence on Hitler's political career but provided a certain domesticity to the life of the dictator. Loyal to the end, she refused to leave the Berlin bunker buried beneath the chancellery as the Russians closed in. The couple was married only hours before they both committed suicide

1429. - During the Hundred Years' War, the 17-year-old French peasant Joan of Arc leads a French force in relieving the city of Orleans, besieged by the English since October

1969. - Jazz musician, composer, arranger, and bandleader Duke Ellington receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom on his 70th birthday. His hits ranged from pop tunes and jazz classics to ballets, film scores, and religious suites

1854. - By an act of the Pennsylvania legislature, Ashmun Institute, the first college founded solely for African-American students, is officially chartered. Established in the rolling farmlands of southern Chester County, Pennsylvania, Ashmun Institute was named after Jehudi Ashmun, the U.S. agent who helped reorganize and preserve the struggling African-American colony in Africa that later grew into the independent nation of Liberia. The Ashmun Institute, chartered to give theological, classical, and scientific training to African Americans, opened on January 1, 1857, and John Pym Carter served as the college's first president. In 1866, the institution was renamed Lincoln University

Happy Birthday:

apnevarez

debrarae

[Kestra]

On April 29, 1992, deadly rioting that claimed 54 lives and caused $1 billion in damage erupted in Los Angeles after a jury in Simi Valley acquitted four Los Angeles police officers of almost all state charges in the videotaped beating of Rodney King.

[Boby]

1789. - In New York City, George Washington, the great military leader of the American Revolution, is inaugurated as the first president of the United States

1948. - The United States and 20 Latin American nations sign the charter establishing the Organization of American States (OAS). The new institution was designed to facilitate better political relations between the member states and, at least for the United States, to serve as a bulwark against communist penetration of the Western Hemisphere

1945. - Der Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, dictator of Germany, burrowed away in a refurbished air-raid shelter, consumes a cyanide capsule, then shoots himself with a pistol, on this day in 1945, as his "1,000-year" Reich collapses above him

1927. - The Federal Industrial Institute for Women, the first women's federal prison, opens in Alderson, West Virginia. All women serving federal sentences of more than a year were to be brought here. Run by Dr. Mary B. Harris, the prison's buildings, each named after social reformers, sat atop 500 acres. One judge described the prison as a "fashionable boarding school." In some respects the judge was correct; the overriding purpose of the prison was to reform the inmates, not punish them. The prisoners farmed the land and performed office work in order to learn how to type and file. They also cooked and canned vegetables and fruits. Other women's prisons had similar ideals. At Bedford Hills in New York, there were no fences, and the inmates lived in cottages equipped with their own kitchen and garden. The prisoners were even given singing lessons. Reform efforts had a good chance for success since the women sent to these prisons were far from hardened criminals. At the Federal Industrial Institute, the vast majority of the women were imprisoned for drug and alcohol charges imposed during the Prohibition era. Only one of the inmates was imprisoned for homicide

1975. - South Vietnam surrenders


Happy birthday:

Olysher

Memory wall:

David Opatoshu
Born January 30, 1918 – New York, NY
Died April 30, 1996 – Los Angeles, CA
Played Anan 7 in “A Taste of Armageddon”

[Boby]

1898. - At Manila Bay in the Philippines, the U.S. Asiatic Squadron destroys the Spanish Pacific fleet in the first battle of the Spanish-American War. Nearly 400 Spanish sailors were killed and 10 Spanish warships wrecked or captured at the cost of only six Americans wounded

1851. - The Great Exhibition opens to wide acclaim in the Crystal Palace in London. Inside the Crystal Palace, a giant glass-and-iron hall designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, more than 10,000 exhibitors set up eight miles of tables. Technological wonders from around the world were on display, but the exposition was clearly dominated by Britain, the premier industrialized nation and workshop of the world. Conceived by Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, the Great Exposition was a rousing success, hosting 6 million visitors before it closed in October. The many goods displayed ranged from kitchen appliances to false teeth, silks to farm machinery.

1931. - At the White House in Washington, D.C., President Herbert Hoover pushes a button that turns on the lights of New York City's Empire State Building, officially opening the tallest building erected to that date. Standing 102 stories, or 1,454 feet from the top of its lightning rod to its base at 34th Street and Fifth Avenue below, the skyscraper became a world-famous symbol of American ambition and still dominates the Manhattan skyline. Designed by architect William Frederick Lamb, the Empire State Building was constructed during the height of the Great Depression but took just over a year to complete at a cost of only $40 million. The Empire State Building was surpassed as the world's tallest building in 1972 by downtown Manhattan's first World Trade Center tower, but it remains a major tourist destination and a New York City icon

1963. - James Whittaker of Redmond, Washington, becomes the first American to reach the summit of Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world

1997. - After 18 years of Conservative rule, British voters give the Labour Party, led by Tony Blair, a landslide victory in British parliamentary elections. In the poorest Conservative Party showing since 1832, Prime Minister John Major was rejected in favor of Scottish-born Blair, who at age 43 became the youngest British prime minister in more than a century

1941. - Orson Welles' landmark film, Citizen Kane, debuts on this day at the RKO Palace in New York. The opening followed months of acrimonious battles between Welles and media baron William Randolph Hearst, who struggled to suppress the film, which was generally interpreted as a psychological study of Hearst himself

1939. - Folk singer Judy Collins is born on this day in 1939 in Denver, Colorado. Encouraged by her blind father, Collins studied to become a classical pianist but switched to guitar in the late 1950s, inspired by the fledgling folk music revival. A political activist as well as talented musician, Collins began performing in coffeehouses in 1959, covering songs by Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, and other folk heroes. Her recordings were popular throughout the 1960s, '70s, and '80s. Some of her most popular songs included her cover of "Amazing Grace" (1970); a Scottish ballad, "Farewell to Tarwathie" (1970), which featured humpbacked whales in the background; and Stephen Sondheim's "Send in the Clowns" (1975).

1967. - Elvis Presley marries 21-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu. The couple met in West Germany in 1959, where Presley was serving his time in the army and Priscilla's father was serving in the air force. When Elvis finished his army stint, he invited Priscilla to spend Christmas at Graceland in 1960. In 1961, Elvis asked her father's permission for her to finish high school in Memphis, living at Graceland, supervised by Elvis' father. Priscilla moved to Graceland, attended Immaculate Conception High School, and the couple married in Las Vegas in 1967. Their only daughter, Lisa Marie, was born in February 1968. Priscilla and Elvis divorced in 1973, four years before Elvis' death. Elvis left his estate to his daughter



Happy Birthday:

Sabbath Knight

[Kestra]

On May 1, 1960, the Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 reconnaissance plane near Sverdlovsk and captured its pilot, Francis Gary Powers.

[Boby]

1933. - Although accounts of an aquatic beast living in Scotland's Loch Ness date back 1,500 years, the modern legend of the Loch Ness Monster is born when a sighting makes local news on May 2, 1933. The newspaper Inverness Courier related an account of a local couple who claimed to have seen "an enormous animal rolling and plunging on the surface." The story of the "monster" (a moniker chosen by the Courier editor) became a media phenomenon, with London newspapers sending correspondents to Scotland and a circus offering a ý20,000 reward for capture of the beast

1957. - Senator Joseph McCarthy (D-Wisconsin) succumbs to illness exacerbated by alcoholism and passes away at age 48. McCarthy had been a key figure in the anticommunist hysteria popularly known as the "Red Scare" that engulfed the United States in the years following World War II

1808. - During the Peninsular War, a popular uprising against the French occupation of Spain begins in Madrid, culminating in a fierce battle fought out in the Puerta del Sol, Madrid's central square. The Spanish rebels were defeated, and during the night the French army under Grand Duke Joachim Murat shot hundreds of citizens along the Prado promenade in reprisal. The gruesome events of the day were depicted by Spanish artist Francisco de Goya in two well-known prints

1972. - After nearly five decades as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), J. Edgar Hoover dies, leaving the powerful government agency without the administrator who had been largely responsible for its existence and shape

1936. - Edna St. Vincent Millay's work in progress, Conversations at Midnight, is burned in a hotel fire on Sanibel Island, Florida, on this day in 1936. She recreated the work, which was published in 1937

1952. - The world's first ever jet airliner has begun its maiden flight from London to Johannesburg

Happy birthday:

Trekkiemom2

Memory wall:

Ron Soble
Born March 28, 1932 in Chicago, IL
Died of Lung and Brain Cancer, May 2, 2002 in Los Angeles, CA
Played Wyatt Earp in „Spectre of the Gun“

[Kestra]

On May 2, 1945, the Soviet Union announced the fall of Berlin and the Allies announced the surrender of Nazi troops in Italy and parts of Austria.

[Kestra]

On May 3, 1971, anti-war protesters calling themselves the Mayday Tribe began four days of demonstrations in Washington, D.C., aimed at shutting down the nation's capital.

[Kestra]

On May 11, 1973, charges against Daniel Ellsberg for his role in the Pentagon Papers case were dismissed by Judge William M. Byrne, who cited government misconduct.

[Boby]

1981. - A second IRA hunger striker, 25-year-old Francis Hughes, has starved to death in the Maze Prison near Lisburn in County Antrim.
His death comes a week after the death of Bobby Sands on 5 May, the first to die in a republican campaign for political status to be granted to IRA prisoners.

1971. - The Rolling Stones singer, Mick Jagger, has married his fiancée Bianca Perez Morena de Macias at the town hall in the French Mediterranean town of St Tropez.

Memory wall:

Steve Ihnat
Born August 7, 1934 in Czehoslovakia
Died of Heart Attack May 12, 1972 in Cannes, France
Played Captain Garth in „Whom Gods Destroy“

[Kestra]

On May 12, 1943, during World War II, Axis forces in North Africa surrendered.

[Dot]

USAF Sgt. Bare had a very impressive UFO sighting while he was sitting in a car in Roswell, New Mexico on May 12, 1952; this statement gives the particulars of his sighting: "The color of the object changed rapidly... The object's shape appeared to be that of a disc..."

wooga wooga
Hey where's Eni? & Emma?

[Kestra]

^ maybe they were abducted. :D

On May 13, 1981, Pope John Paul II was shot and seriously wounded in St. Peter's Square by Turkish assailant Mehmet Ali Agca.

[Kestra]

On May 14, 1948, British rule in Palestine came to an end, and the independent state of Israel was proclaimed at 12:01 the following day.

[Kestra]

On May 16, 1868, the United States Senate failed by one vote to convict President Andrew Johnson as it took its first ballot on one of 11 articles of impeachment against him. (Johnson was acquitted of all charges.)

[Kestra]

On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court issued its landmark Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka ruling, which declared that racially segregated public schools were inherently unequal.

[Kestra]

On May 19, 1935, T.E. Lawrence, also known as "Lawrence of Arabia," died in England from injuries sustained in a motorcycle crash.

[Kestra]

On May 20, 1961, a white mob attacked a busload of "Freedom Riders" in Montgomery, Ala., prompting the federal government to send in United States marshals to restore order.

[Kestra]

On May 21, 1927, Charles A. Lindbergh landed his "Spirit of St. Louis" near Paris, completing the first solo airplane flight across the Atlantic Ocean.

[Kestra]

On May 22, 1947, the Truman Doctrine was enacted as Congress appropriated military and economic aid for Greece and Turkey.

[Kestra]

On May 24, 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge, linking Brooklyn and Manhattan, was opened to traffic.

[wile1]

And how many times has it been sold? LOL :D

[Kestra]

no idea, you think it would be a good Jeopardy question? :)

On May 25, 1925, John T. Scopes was indicted in Tennessee for teaching Darwin's theory of evolution.

[Kestra]

On May 29, 1953, Mount Everest was conquered as Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and sherpa Tenzing Norgay of Nepal became the first climbers to reach the summit.

[Kestra]

On May 30, 1958, unidentified soldiers killed in World War II and the Korean conflict were buried at Arlington National Cemetery

[Kestra]

On June 2, 1953, Queen Elizabeth II of Britain was crowned in Westminster Abbey, 16 months after the death of her father, King George VI.

[Kestra]

On June 3, 1965, astronaut Edward White became the first American to "walk" in space, during the flight of Gemini 4.

[Little Bengals]

Today, the Belgian Justine Henin-Hardenne won her 4th Grand Slam title (tennis). She won her second Roland Garros final today against Marie Pierce in 2 sets: 6-1 and 6-1 :eek: :D

Go for it Justine. Next month we take Wimbledon :D!!!

[Kestra]

way cool bengel!

On June 4, 1989, Chinese army troops stormed Tiananmen Square in Beijing to crush the pro-democracy movement; hundreds - possibly thousands - of people died.

[Kestra]

On June 5, 1968, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was shot and mortally wounded just after claiming victory in California's Democratic presidential primary. Gunman Sirhan Bishara Sirhan was immediately arrested.

[Kestra]

On June 6, 1944, the D-Day invasion of Europe took place during World War II as Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France.

[Kestra]

On June 7, 1929, the sovereign state of Vatican City came into existence as copies of the Lateran Treaty were exchanged in Rome.

[Kestra]

On June 8, 1968, authorities announced the capture in London of James Earl Ray, the suspected assassin of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

[Kestra]

On June 9, 1954, Army counsel Joseph N. Welch confronted Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy during the Senate-Army Hearings over McCarthy's attack on a member of Welch's law firm, Frederick G. Fisher. Said Welch: "Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"

[Dot]

In 1855 Chief Joseph's father, Old Joseph, signed a treaty with the U.S. that allowed his people to retain much of their traditional lands. (idaho-Washington)

But on this day June 9, 1863 the NezPerce Indian nation was confined to a five mile square (700,000 acres) plot of land in Oklahoma.

The gold rushes in the 1860s and 1870s, brought large numbers of miners and settlers, Protected by the military, onto their lands.

[Kestra]

On June 10, 1967, the Six-Day War ended as Israel and Syria agreed to observe a United Nations-mediated cease-fire.

[Kestra]

On June 13, 1966, the Supreme Court issued its landmark Miranda vs. Arizona decision, ruling that criminal suspects must be informed of their constitutional rights prior to questioning by police.

[Kestra]

On June 14, 1982, Argentine forces surrendered to British troops on the disputed Falkland Islands.

On June 14, 1954, Eisenhower signed order the words “under god” to be added to pledge of allegiance.

[Kestra]

On June 15, 1904, more than 1,000 people died when fire erupted aboard the steamboat General Slocum in New York City's East River.

[Kestra]

On June 16, 1933, President Roosevelt opened his New Deal recovery program, signing bank, rail, and industry bills and initiating farm aid.

[Kestra]

On June 18, 1948, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights adopted its International Declaration of Human Rights.

[Kestra]

On June 19, 1964, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved after surviving an 83-day filibuster in the United States Senate.

[Kestra]

On June 20, 1967, boxer Muhammad Ali was convicted in Houston of violating Selective Service laws by refusing to be drafted. The conviction was later overturned by the Supreme Court.

[Kestra]

On June 21, 1964, three civil rights workers disappeared in Philadelphia, Miss. Their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam six weeks later. Eight members of the Ku Klux Klan went to prison on federal conspiracy charges; none served more than six years.

[Kestra]

On June 22, 1940, during World War II, Adolf Hitler gained a stunning victory as France was forced to sign an armistice eight days after German forces

[Kestra]

On June 23, 1947, the Senate joined the House in overriding President Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act.

[Dot]

and Rod called to say a belated happy birthday :D

HEY EMMA, he's going to Wales get out your party dress :)

[Kestra]

^ me too!!! :D

On June 24, 1997, the Air Force released a report on the so-called "Roswell Incident," suggesting the alien bodies witnesses reported seeing in 1947 were actually life-sized dummies.

yeah uh huh, like ppl can't tell the diff. uh huh, uh huh.

[Kestra]

On June 25, 1876, Lt. Col. George A. Custer and his 7th Cavalry were wiped out by Sioux and Cheyenne Indians in the Battle of Little Big Horn in Montana.

[Kestra]

On June 26, 1963, President Kennedy visited West Berlin, where he made his famous declaration: "Ich bin ein Berliner" (I am a Berliner).

[Kestra]

On June 27, 1950, President Truman ordered the Air Force and Navy into the Korean War following a call from the United Nations Security Council for member nations to help South Korea repel an invasion from the North.

[Kestra]

On June 28, 1919, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in France, ending World War I.

[Kestra]

On June 29, 1995, the shuttle Atlantis and the Russian space station Mir docked, forming the largest man-made satellite ever to orbit the Earth.

[Kestra]

On June 30, 1997, in Hong Kong, the Union Jack was lowered for the last time over Government House as Britain prepared to hand the colony back to China after ruling it for 156 years.

[Kestra]

On July 1, 1997, Hong Kong reverted to Chinese rule after 156 years as a British colony.

[Kestra]

On July 2, 1937, aviator Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight at the equator.

[Kestra]

On July 3, 1863, the Civil War's Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania ended after three days in a major victory for the North as Confederate troops retreated.

[Kestra]

On July 4, 1976, the United States celebrated its Bicentennial. In 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence.

[Kestra]

On July 5, 1975, Arthur Ashe became the first black man to win a Wimbledon singles title as he defeated Jimmy Connors.

[Kestra]

On July 6, 1957, Althea Gibson became the first black tennis player to win a Wimbledon singles title, defeating fellow American Darlene Hard 6-3, 6-2.

[Kestra]

On July 7, 1981, President Reagan announced he was nominating Arizona Judge Sandra Day O'Connor to become the first female justice on the United States Supreme Court.

[Mulder]

On this day, a series of bomb attacks on London's transport network has killed more than 30 people and injured about 350 others.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4661059.stm

[Little Bengals]

The death rate has gone up to 37 now and 700 wounded. It is expected to increase further.

[Kestra]

On July 8, 1950, Gen. Douglas MacArthur was named commander-in-chief of United Nations forces in Korea.

[Kestra]

On July 9, 1896, William Jennings Bryan caused a sensation at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago with his "cross of gold" speech denouncing supporters of the gold standard. Bryan went on to win the party's nomination.

[Mulder]

On July 10, 1985, the French bombed the Greenpeace ship, Rainbow Warrior, to prevent it from protesting French Nuclear Testing in the Pacific.

One Greenpeace person was murdered in the terrorist bombing.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4637897.stm

[Little Bengals]

On this day, we celebrate our "independance day". We commemorate The Battle of the Golden Spurs, "de Guldensporenslag" from 1302.

Battle of the Golden Spurs
The Battle of the Golden Spurs was fought on July 11, 1302, near Kortrijk in Flanders.
The reason for the battle was a French attempt to annex the country of Flanders. In 1300, the French king Philip IV appointed Jacques de Ch⴩llon as governor of Flanders and took the Count of Flanders, Gwijde van Dampierre and his two sons, hostage. This instigated considerable unrest among Flemish urban guilds, who were quite influential.

After being exiled from their homes by French troops, the citizens of Brugge went back to their own city and murdered every Frenchman they could find there on 18 May 1302. They identified the French by asking them to pronounce a Flemish phrase schild en vriend. Everyone who had a problem pronouncing that, was killed.

The French king could not let this go unpunished, so he sent a powerful force of 10,000 men, led by Count Robert II of Artesia. The Flemish response consisted of two groups; one was led by Willem van Gullik, grandson of Count Gwijde, and Pieter de Coninc, one of the leaders of the uprising in Brugge. The other was headed by Gwijde van Namen, son of Count Gwijde. The two groups met at Kortrijk and totalled about 10,000 men, far less organised and disciplined than the professional French army.

After the French unsuccesfully tried to take Kortrijk on 9 July and 10 July, the two forces clashed on 11 July in an open field near the city.

The layout of the field, crossed by numerous streams, made it difficult for the French cavalry to break through the Flemish lines. Hindered by their own infantry and by fallen horses, the French knights were an easy target for the heavily-armed Flemish. When they realised the battle was lost, the surviving French fled, only to be pursued by the Flemish. Having little experience, the Flemish soldiers didn't realise it was possible and even customary to hold important people for ransom. They simply killed whoever they caught.

The large numbers of golden spurs that were collected from the French knights gave the battle its name. The spurs were hung in the Church of Our Lady in Kortrijk to commemorate the victory.

The battle showed that mounted knights were not invincible and so marked the beginning of their decline in European warfare. It is also a landmark in the development of Flemish political independence. It is considered one of the main reasons that Dutch is the language spoken in Flanders today. The day is remembered every year in Flanders, as the Belgian federations' official holiday.

The battle is romanticised in 1838 by Flemish writer Hendrik Conscience in his book De leeuw van Vlaenderen(The Lion of Flanders).


References
J.F. Verbruggen, The Battle of the Golden Spurs: Courtrai, 11 July 1302 ISBN 0851158889

Battle of the Golden Spurs

A contemporary account from the Annales Gandenses (Annals of Ghent)

The Battle of Courtrai

http://fixedreference.org/en/20040424/wikipedia/Battle_of_the_Golden_Spurs

[Kestra]

happy "independance day" to you LB's.

On July 10, 1940, during World War II, the 114-day Battle of Britain began as Nazi forces began attacking southern England by air. By late October, Britain managed to repel the Luftwaffe, which suffered heavy losses.

[Kestra]

On July 11, 1979, the abandoned United States space station Skylab made a spectacular return to Earth, burning up in the atmosphere and showering debris over the Indian Ocean and Australia.

[Kestra]

On July 12, 1984, Democratic presidential candidate Walter F. Mondale announced he had chosen U.S. Rep. Geraldine A. Ferraro of New York to be his running mate; Ferraro was the first woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket.

[Kestra]

On July 13, 1977, a 25-hour blackout hit the New York City area after lightning struck upstate power lines.

[Kestra]

On July 14, 1965, the American space probe Mariner 4 flew by Mars, sending back photographs of the planet.

[Kestra]

On July 15, 1918, the Second Battle of the Marne began during World War I.

[Kestra]

On July 16, 1918, Russia's Czar Nicholas II, his wife and their five children were executed by the Bolsheviks

[Little Kestras]

On July 17, 1975, an Apollo spaceship docked with a Soyuz spacecraft in orbit in the first superpower linkup of its kind.

[Kestra]

On July 18, 1936, the Spanish Civil War began as Gen. Francisco Franco led an uprising of army troops based in Spanish North Africa.

[Kestra]

On July 19, 1941, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill launched his "V for Victory" campaign in Europe.

[Kestra]

On July 20, 1969, Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon when he stepped out of the lunar module.

[Kestra]

On July 21, 1925, the so-called "Monkey Trial" ended in Dayton, Tenn., with John T. Scopes convicted of violating state law for teaching Darwin's theory of evolution. The conviction was later overturned.

[Kestra]

On July 22, 1934, a man identified as bank robber John Dillinger was shot to death by federal agents outside Chicago's Biograph Theater.

[Kestra]

On July 24, 1959, during a visit to the Soviet Union, Vice President Richard M. Nixon got into a "kitchen debate" with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev at a U.S. exhibition.

[Kestra]

On July 25, 1956, the Italian liner Andrea Doria sank after colliding with the Swedish ship Stockholm off the New England coast, killing 51 people.

[Kestra]

On July 26, 1947, President Truman signed the National Security Act, creating the Department of Defense, the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

[Kestra]

On July 27, 1953, the Korean War armistice was signed at Panmunjom, ending three years of fighting.

[Kestra]

On July 28, 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. World War I began as declarations of war by other European nations quickly followed.

[Kestra]

On July 29, 1981, Britain's Prince Charles married Lady Diana Spencer at St. Paul's Cathedral in London.

[Kestra]

On July 30, 1945, the USS Indianapolis, which had just delivered key components of the Hiroshima atomic bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian, was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. Only 316 out of 1,196 men survived the sinking and shark-infested waters.

[Kestra]

On July 31, 1964, the American space probe Ranger 7 transmitted pictures of the moon's surface.

[Kestra]

On August 1, 1936, 100,000 salute Adolf Hitler on his entrance at the opening of the Berlin Olympics.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 4, 1914, Britain declared war on Germany while the United States proclaimed its neutrality.

[Kestra]

On August 5, 1963, the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union signed a treaty in Moscow banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, space and underwater.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 6, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, during World War II, killing an estimated 140,000 people in the first use of a nuclear weapon in warfare.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 7, 1964, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, giving President Johnson broad powers in dealing with reported North Vietnamese attacks on United States forces.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 8, 1974, President Richard Nixon announced he would resign following damaging revelations in the Watergate scandal.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan, the United States exploded a nuclear device over Nagasaki, killing an estimated 74,000 people.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 10, 1977, postal employee David Berkowitz was arrested in Yonkers, N.Y., accused of being the "Son of Sam" gunman responsible for six random slayings and seven woundings. Berkowitz is serving six consecutive terms of 25 years to life in state prison.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 11, 1965, rioting and looting broke out in the predominantly black Watts section of Los Angeles. In the week that followed, 34 people were killed and more than 1,000 injured.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 12, 1898, the peace protocol ending the Spanish-American War was signed.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 13, 1961, Berlin was divided as East Germany sealed off the border between the city's eastern and western sectors in order to halt the flight of refugees. Two days later, work began on the Berlin Wall.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 14, 1945, President Truman announced that Japan had surrendered unconditionally, ending World War II.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 15, 1947, India and Pakistan became independent after some 200 years of British rule.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 16, 1977, singer Elvis Presley died at Graceland Mansion in Memphis, Tenn., at age 42.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 17, 1969, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair concluded near Bethel, N.Y.

[Mod_Bob]

I was there! An instant large city of over 250,000 people. With reletively few *big City* problems.

[Mulder]

Originally posted by Mod_Bob
I was there! An instant large city of over 250,000 people. With reletively few *big City* problems.

You must be very old then.

[Mod_Neb]

Hay Bob, how longs your beard these days!

heh heh heh old timer!

[Mod_Bob]

ZZ top ring a bell?

[Mod_Neb]

cool!

[Kestra]

On this day Aug. 19, 1922, Gene Roddenberry was born in El Paso, Texas. He is most famous for the creation of the Star Trek television series and movies.

On Aug. 19, 1934, a plebiscite in Germany approved the vesting of sole executive power in Adolf Hitler as Fuhrer.

[Dot]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE SPIRIT OF S.T.!!

I'd post a cake but would it be relevent?
In the Sphereite threads it would be reminents :p

[Kestra]

On Aug. 20, 1968, the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the "Prague Spring" liberalization drive of Alexander Dubcek's regime.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 21, 1959, President Eisenhower signed an executive order proclaiming Hawaii the 50th state of the union.

[Dot]

one of the better decisions made by a prez..

[Kestra]

aloha!

On Aug. 22, 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt became the first United States chief executive to ride in an automobile.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 23, 1927, Italian-born anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were executed in Boston for the murders of two men during a 1920 robbery. They were vindicated in 1977 by Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis.

[Kestra]

ON THIS DAY
On Aug. 25, 1944, Paris was liberated by Allied forces after four years of Nazi occupation.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, guaranteeing American women the right to vote, was declared in effect.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 27, 1962, the United States launched the Mariner 2 space probe, which flew past Venus the following December.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 28, 1963, 200,000 people participated in a peaceful civil rights rally in Washington, D.C., where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 29, 1991, the Supreme Soviet, the parliament of the U.S.S.R., suspended all activities of the Communist Party, bringing an end to the institution.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 30, 1963, the hot-line communications link between Washington, D.C., and Moscow went into operation.

[Kestra]

On Aug. 31, 1997, Diana, the Princess of Wales, was killed in an automobile accident in a tunnel by the Seine in Paris. The accident also killed Emad Mohammed al-Fayed, the Harrod's heir.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 1, 1939, World War II began as Nazi Germany invaded Poland.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 2, 1945, Japan formally surrendered in ceremonies aboard the USS Missouri, ending World War II.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 3, 1976, the unmanned U.S. spacecraft Viking 2 landed on Mars to take the first close-up, color photographs of the planet's surface.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 4, 1957, Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus called out the National Guard to prevent nine black students from entering Central High School in Little Rock.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 5, 1972, Palestinian guerrillas attacked the Israeli delegation at the Munich Olympic games; 11 Israelis, five guerrillas and a police officer were killed in the siege.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 6, 1901, President McKinley was shot and mortally wounded by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, N.Y.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 7, 1940, Nazi Germany began its initial blitz on London during World War II.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 8, 1974, President Gerald R. Ford granted an unconditional pardon to former President Richard Nixon.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 9, 1976, Communist Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung died in Beijing at age 82.

[Kestra]

i missed yesterdays one cuz i wasn't at home: On Sept. 10, 1919, New York City welcomed home Gen. John J. Pershing and 25,000 soldiers who had served in the United States 1st Division during World War I.

---------------------------------
On Sept. 11, 2001, suicide hijackers crashed two airliners into the World Trade Center in New York, causing the 110-story twin towers to collapse. Another hijacked airliner hit the Pentagon and a fourth crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 12, 1977, South African black student leader Steven Biko died while in police custody, triggering an international outcry.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 13, 1993, at the White House, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO chairman Yasser Arafat shook hands after signing an accord granting limited Palestinian autonomy.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 14, 1959, the Soviet space probe Luna 2 became the first man-made object to reach the moon as it crashed onto the lunar surface.

[Kestra]

on this day in 1787, the US constitution was completed and signed.

On Sept. 16, 1974, President Ford announced a conditional amnesty program for Vietnam War deserters and draft evaders.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 17, 1862, Union forces hurled back a Confederate invasion of Maryland in the Civil War Battle of Antietam. During the battle, 23,100 were killed, wounded or captured, making it the bloodiest day in United States military history.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 18, 1947, the National Security Act, which unified the Army, Navy and newly formed Air Force, went into effect.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 22, 1862, President Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all slaves in rebel states should be free as of Jan. 1, 1863.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 23, 1952, Republican vice-presidential candidate Richard M. Nixon went on television to deliver what came to be known as the "Checkers'' speech as he denied allegations of improper campaign financing.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 24, 1996, the United States and the world's other major nuclear powers signed a treaty to end all testing and development of nuclear weapons.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 25, 1957, with 300 United States Army troops standing guard, nine black children were escorted to Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, days after unruly white crowds had forced them to withdraw.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 26, 1960, the first televised debate between presidential candidates Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy took place in Chicago.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 27, 1964, the Warren Commission issued a report concluding that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating President John F. Kennedy.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 28, 1924, two United States Army planes landed in Seattle, Washington, having completed the first round-the-world flight in 175 days.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 29, 1957, the New York Giants played their last game at the Polo Grounds, losing to the Pittsburgh Pirates 9-1. The Giants moved to San Francisco for the next season.

[Kestra]

On Sept. 30, 1938, British and French leaders agreed to allow Nazi Germany to occupy sections of the Sudeten region of Czechoslovakia.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 1, 1961, Roger Maris of the New York Yankees hit his 61st home run of the season, breaking Babe Ruth's record of 60 set in 1927.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 2, 1967, Thurgood Marshall was sworn in as an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court; he was the first African-American appointed to the nation's highest court.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 3, 1990, West Germany and East Germany ended 45 years of postwar division, declaring the creation of a new unified country.

[bengel]

On this very day, a solar eclips was visible in Spain, Northern Portugal and other countries. Allthough the sun, the Moon and the Earth were alligned, the famous "diamond ring" was sadly enough not visible, due to the fact that the moon was too far away from the Earth in order to cover the sun completely. Here in Belgium, we saw a partial eclips, only 64% of the sun was covered by the Moon. But it was worth it :D.

Here's a live picture of the eclips taken by a Belgian team in Spain, during the highlight of the eclips. The sun looks a bit purple:

[Kestra]

:UPoint: way cool bengel.

On Oct. 4, 1957, the Space Age began as the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first man-made satellite, into orbit.

[Dot]

remember to have your animals blessed for St. Francis Day :D

[Kestra]

thank, i will.

On Oct. 6, 1981, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was shot to death by extremists while reviewing a military parade.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 7, 1985, Palestinian gunmen hijacked the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro in the Mediterranean with more than 400 people aboard.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 8, 1982, all labor organizations in Poland, including Solidarity, were banned.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 9, 1967, Latin American guerrilla leader Che Guevara was executed in Bolivia while attempting to incite revolution.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 10, 1973, Vice President Spiro T. Agnew pleaded no contest to one count of federal income tax evasion and resigned his office.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 11, 1968, Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo mission, was launched with astronauts Wally Schirra, Donn Fulton Eisele and R. Walter Cunningham aboard.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 12, 1870, Gen. Robert E. Lee died in Lexington, Va., at age 63.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 13, 1943, Italy declared war on Germany, its one-time Axis partner.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 14, 1964, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was named winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 15, 1964, it was announced that Soviet leader Nikita S. Khrushchev had been removed from office. He was succeeded as premier by Alexei N. Kosygin and as Communist Party secretary by Leonid I. Brezhnev.

[Dot]

on this day in 1964 China exploded their first nuclear bomb

China establishes strategic partnership with Russia based on joint opposition to the United States controversial missile defense system, and the Bush administrations pullout of the Start II treaty.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 17, 1931, mobster Al Capone was convicted of income tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years in prison. He was released in 1939.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 18, 1968, the United States Olympic Committee suspended two black athletes, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, for giving a "black power" salute as a protest during a victory ceremony in Mexico City.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 19, 1987, the stock market crashed as the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 508 points, or 22.6 percent in value - its biggest-ever percentage drop.

[Kestra]

On Oct. 20, 1973, in the so-called Saturday Night Massacre, President Nixon abolished the office of special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox, accepted the resignation of Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson and fired Deputy Attorney General William B. Ruckelshaus.