1587 Virginia Dare - The first child of English parents to be born in the New World. She was born on what is now Roanoke Island, North Carolina, a week after Sir Walter Raleigh’s second expedition landed in an attempt to set up a colony
1750 Antonio Salieri – Italian composer and conductor who some believed poisoned Mozart
1774 Meriwether Lewis – US explorer who, with William Clark led the first US-supported overland expedition to the Pacific North-west
1776 Simon Fraser – US-born fur trader and explorer of Canada’s West. His father was a Loyalist Captain who was captured by US revolutionaries and died in prison in Albany, New York. Brought up by his uncle Judge John Fraser in Montréal, Simon joined the North West Company as a clerk in 1792. He became a partner in 1801, and was put in charge of expanding the company’s activities in the northern interior of BC, which he called New Caledonia. He founded many forts and settlements, and in 1808 journeyed down the hazardous river that David Thompson later named in Fraser’s honour. In 1809 he transferred to the Athabasca district, then to Red River, where he was arrested by Lord Selkirk in 1816, and later acquitted for complicity in the Seven Oaks Massacre. In 1819 he retired to his estate on the St. Lawrence, where he died
1834 Marshall Field – US department-store founder who opened a store in Chicago in 1868, which offered special services for his customers, including a restaurant in the store, and the privilege of being able to return goods
1892 Harold Foster – Canadian originator of the adventure comic (Prince Valiant, Tarzan) He was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and raised in Winnipeg. His life mirrored his art. He skippered a 30-foot sloop at age 12, supported his family by hunting, found and lost a gold claim, and rode a bicycle 1,000 miles from Winnipeg to Chicago to study art
1896 Alan Mowbray – British actor (The Man Who Knew Too Much, The King & I, My Man Godfrey, Charlie Chan in London, Topper, My Darling Clementine, Around the World in Eighty Days)
1904 Max Factor - Cosmetic mogul
1920 Shelley Winters - Actress (Patch of Blue, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Poseidon Adventure, A Place in the Sun)
1930 Grant Williams - Actor (Escape from Planet Earth, The Incredible Shrinking Man)
1933 Roman Polanski – Polish-born director (Chinatown, MacBeth, Tess)
1935 Gail Fisher - Actress (Mannix, Mankillers)
1937 Robert Redford – Actor (All the President's Men, The Sting, Sneakers, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Out of Africa, Barefoot in the Park, The Way We Were, The Electric Horseman) and director (Ordinary People, A River Runs Through It, The Milagro Beanfield War) He hosts the annual Sundance Film Festival in Utah. He also played Dick Hart in the Perry Mason episode the Case of the Treacherous Toupee
1937 William Rushton – British actor (Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines, That Was the Week That Was, Up Pompeii, Consuming Passions)
1939 Molly Bee – Country Singer (I Wish I Was a Single Girl Again, Young Romance, Don’t Look Back, 5 Points a Star, I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Clause, The Tennessee Tango, Some Tears Fall Dry)
1939 Johnny Preston – Singer (Running Bear, Cradle of Love)
1941 Christopher Jones – Actor (The Looking Glass War, Ryan's Daughter, Three in the Attic)
1943 Martin Mull – Comedian and actor (Mary Hartman Mary Hartman, Take This Job and Shove It, Roseanne)
1952 Patrick Swayze – Dancer and actor (Dirty Dancing, Ghost, Point Break, North and South, Road House, King Solomon’s Mines) He was in To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar
1957 Denis Leary – Comedian/actor (The Ref, Rescue Me, Company Man, The Thomas Crown Affair, The Job, Wag the Dog, Two If by Sea, Demolition Man, Loaded Weapon 1)
1958 Madeleine Stowe - Actress (Unlawful Entry, The Last of the Mohicans, Stakeout, The Two Jakes, Blink)
1964 Craig Bierko – Actor (The Long Kiss Goodnight, Cinderella Man, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Boston Legal)
1969 Christian Slater - Actor (Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Young Guns, The Name of the Rose, Interview with the Vampire, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Broken Arrow) He also played Billy, in the 1981 TV movie, Sherlock Holmes
1969 Edward Norton – Actor (Fight Club, The Incredible Hulk, The Italian Job, Red Dragon, Frida)
1970 Malcolm Jamal Warner - Actor (The Cosby Show, Tyson, Drop Zone, Mother’s Day, Jeremiah, Malcom & Eddie)
Died this Day
1227 Genghis Khan - Mongol leader who forged an empire stretching from the east coast of China west to the Aral Sea. He died in camp during a campaign against the Chinese kingdom of Xi Xia. The great Khan, who was over 60 and in failing health, may have succumbed to injuries incurred during a fall from a horse in the previous year. Genghis Khan was born as Temujin around 1162. His father, a minor Mongol chieftain, died when Khan was in his early teens. Khan succeeded him, but the tribe would not obey so young a chief. Temporarily abandoned, Khan's family was left to fend for themselves in the wilderness of the Steppes. By his late teens, Khan had grown into a feared warrior and charismatic figure who began gathering followers and forging alliances with other Mongol leaders. After a rival tribe kidnapped his wife, Khan organised a military force to defeat the tribe. Successful, he then turned against other clans and tribes and set out to unite the Mongols by force. Many warriors voluntarily came to his side, but those who did not were defeated and then offered the choice of obedience or death. The nobility of conquered tribes were generally executed. By 1206, he was the leader of a great Mongol confederation and was granted the title Genghis Khan, translated as Oceanic Ruler or Universal Ruler. Using an extensive network of spies and scouts, Khan detected a weakness in his enemies' defences and then attacked the point with as many as 250,000 cavalrymen at once. When attacking large cities, the Mongols used sophisticated weapons such as catapults and mangonels and even diverted rivers to flood out the enemy. Most armies and cities crumbled under the overwhelming show of force, and the massacres that followed a Mongol victory eliminated thoughts of further resistance. Those who survived, and millions did not, were granted religious freedom and protection within the rapidly growing Mongol empire. By 1227, Khan had conquered much of Central Asia and made incursions into Eastern Europe, Persia, and India. On August 18, 1227, while putting down a revolt in the kingdom of Xi Xia, Genghis Khan died. On his deathbed, he ordered that Xi Xia be wiped from the face of the earth. Obedient as always, Khan's successors levelled whole cities and towns, killing or enslaving all their inhabitants. Obeying his order to keep his death secret, Genghis' heirs slaughtered anyone who set eyes on his funeral procession making its way back to Karakorum, the capital of the Mongol Empire. Still bringing death as he had in life, many were killed before his corpse was buried in an unmarked grave. The Mongol Empire continued to grow after Genghis Khan's death, eventually encompassing most of inhabitable Eurasia. The empire disintegrated in the 14th century, but the rulers of many Asian states claimed to be descendants from Genghis Khan and his captains
1877 Frank "Windy" Cahill - US civilian blacksmith at the Camp Grant Army Post. He was the first man to be killed by Billy the Kid. Billy was well liked by others in the camp, but Cahill enjoyed demeaning the scrawny youngster. One day the big blacksmith jumped Billy and pinned him to the ground. Billy panicked and shot the unarmed Cahill. Fearing imprisonment, Billy fled to New Mexico
1940 Walter P. Chrysler, age 65 - Auto manufacturer and founder of the Chrysler Corporation
1998 Persis Khambatta, age 47 – India-born actress (Star Trek the Motion Picture, The Wilby Conspiracy, Nighthawks, Conduct Unbecoming) In 1965 she was crowned Miss India. She died of a heart attack
On this Day
1590 Roanoke Colony was found to be deserted as John White, the governor of the Roanoke Island colony in present-day North Carolina, returned from a supply-trip to England. White and his men found no trace of the 100 or so colonists he left behind, and there was no sign of violence. Among the missing were Ellinor Dare, White's daughter and Virginia Dare, White's granddaughter and the first English child born in America. August 18 was to have been Virginia's third birthday. The only clue to their mysterious disappearance was the word "CROATOAN" carved into the palisade that had been built around the settlement. White took the letters to mean that the colonists had moved to Croatoan Island, some 50 miles away, but a later search of the island found none of the settlers. The Roanoke Island colony, the first English settlement in the New World, was founded by British explorer Sir Walter Raleigh in 1585, but did not fare well, and returned to England in 1586. In 1587, Raleigh sent out another group of 100 colonists under John White. White returned to England to procure more supplies, but the war with Spain delayed his return to Roanoke. By the time he finally returned in August 1590, everyone had vanished. In 1998, archaeologists studying tree-ring data from Virginia found that extreme drought conditions persisted between 1587 and 1589. These conditions undoubtedly contributed to the demise of the so-called Lost Colony, but where the settlers went after they left Roanoke remains a mystery. One theory has them being absorbed into an Indian tribe known as the Croatans
1743 The first rules of boxing, drawn up by Jack Broughton, Britain’s third heavyweight champion, were confirmed on this day. He later devised “mufflers”, the first form of boxing gloves
1833 The steamship, Royal William, departed from Pictou, Nova Scotia to become the first vessel to cross the Atlantic under steam power. It would arrive in Gravesend, England the following month. It later became the first steamship to fire a gun
1869 W. Hamilton received Canada's first patent. It was for a fluid meter that measures gases and liquids
1894 The US Congress established the Bureau of Immigration
1905 Newell S. Wright, an attorney, filed to register the Cadillac crest as a trademark
1914 A Peruvian destroyer became the first warship to pass through the newly-opened Panama Canal
1935 The province of New Brunswick endured its hottest day on record, at 39.4 degrees Celsius, or 102.9 degrees Fahrenheit
1938 Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and US President Roosevelt opened the Thousand Islands International Bridge between Ontario and New York state
1959 The first Mini Minor was unveiled by designer Alec Issigonis at the British Motor Corporation
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