1781 Sir David Brewster Scottish physicist who did much work with optics and polarised light. He invented the kaleidoscope in 1816
1843 Robert Koch German physicist who was one of the founders of the science of bacteriology. In 1882 he identified the tubercule bacillus and the following year the cholera bacillus
1882 Fiorello La Guardia New York City mayor from 1933-45. La Guardia Airport in NYC bears his name. He did much to fight corruption and improve the city
1892 John A. Larson Canadian-born inventor of the lie detector, which he called the polygraph
1912 Carlo Ponti Italian film producer (The Cassandra Crossing, Zabriskie Point, Doctor Zhivago) He is the husband of Sophia Loren
1918 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - Dissident Russian writer (One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, The Gulag Archipelago, August 1914) He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970 but declined to go to Sweden to accept the award for fear he would be denied re-entry to Russia
1926 Willie Mae 'Big Mama' Thornton - Blues singer (Ball and Chain, Little Red Rooster, Hound Dog)
1931 Rita Moreno Actress (West Side Story, The King and I, The Ritz, Oz, The Rockford Files)
1940 David Gates Singer with the group Bread (Make It With You, If, Baby I'm-A Want You, Diary, Aubrey)
1942 Anna Carteret Indian born British actress (Juliet Bravo, The Patricia Neal Story, The Shell Seekers) She played Anna in the Sherlock Holmes episode The Golden Pince-Nez
1942 Donna Mills - Actress (Knots Landing, Play Misty For Me, Who Is The Black Dahlia?)
1944 Brenda Lee US singer (Im Sorry, I Want to Be Wanted, All Alone Am I, Sweet Nothin's)
1947 Teri Garr Actress (Young Frankenstein, The Conversation, Tootsie, Mr. Mom) She also had an uncredited role in the Batman episode Instant Freeze
1953 Bess Armstrong - Actress (All is Forgiven, On Our Own, Married People, My So-Called Life)
1958 Isabella Hoffman Actress (Homicide: Life on the Street, JAG, Beggars & Choosers, The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, Providence, Dear John, Burlesque)
1966 Gary Dourdan Actor (CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Alien: Resurrection, Beggars and Choosers)
1969 Max Martini Actor (The Unit, Da Vincis Inquest, Revenge, Saving Private Ryan, Contact, Gramercy Park)
Died this Day
1282 Llyewlyn ap Gruffudd Prince of Gwynnedd in northern Wales. He was the only Welsh native to be recognised by the English as the Prince of Wales. A year after his death, Wales fell completely under English rule
1962 Ronald Turpin and Arthur Lucas Convicts executed in Canada's last judicial hanging
1964 Sam Cooke, age 29 - Singer (You Send Me, Chain Gang, Twistin' the Night Away) He was shot and killed by the manager of a Hollywood motel after a woman had run into the motel office claiming Cooke had tried to rape her. Cooke influenced Otis Redding and other soul singers through his merging of gospel music and secular themes. He had sold 15 million records by the time of his death
On this Day
1688 James II of Britain tried to escape to France after the landing of William of Orange and his soldiers
1769 Venetian blinds were patented by Edward Beran of London
1792 France's King Louis XVI went before the Convention to face charges of treason. Louis was convicted and executed the following month
1816 Indiana became the 19th state of the Union
1848 Louis Napoleon was elected President of France
1872 Buffalo Bill Cody made his first stage appearance, in a Chicago-based production of The Scouts of the Prairie. He was already a well-known figure of the Wild West in popular dime novels. Unlike many of his imitators in Wild West shows and movies, William Frederick Cody actually played an important role in the western settlement that he later romanticised and celebrated. Born in Iowa in 1846, Cody joined the western messenger service of Majors and Russell as a rider while still in his teens. He later rode for the famous Pony Express, during which time he completed the third longest emergency ride in the brief history of that company. During the Civil War, Cody joined forces with a variety of irregular militia groups supporting the North, and in 1864, he enlisted in the Union army as a private and served as a cavalry teamster until 1865. Cody began to earn his famous nickname in 1867, when he signed on to provide buffalo meat for the workers of the Eastern Division of the Union Pacific Railroad construction project. His reputation for skilled marksmanship and experience as a rapid-delivery messenger attracted the attention of US Army Lieutenant General Philip Sheridan, who gave Cody an unusual four-year position as a scout, which was a testament to Cody's extraordinary frontier skills. Cody's work as a scout in the western Indian wars laid the foundation for his later fame. From 1868 to 1872, he fought in 16 battles with Indians, participating in a celebrated victory over the Cheyenne in 1869. Later, Cody again gained national attention by serving as a hunting guide for famous Europeans and Americans eager to experience a bit of the "Wild West" before it disappeared. As luck would have it, one of Cody's customers was Edward Judson, a successful writer who penned popular dime novels under the name Ned Buntline. Impressed by his young guide's calm competence and stories of dramatic fights with Indians, Buntline made Cody the hero of a highly imaginative Wild West novel published in 1869. When a stage version of the novel debuted in Chicago as The Scouts of the Prairie, Buntline convinced Cody to abandon his real-life western adventures to play a highly exaggerated version of himself in the play. Cody remained on the Chicago stage for the next 11 years, though he continued to spend time scouting or guiding hunt trips in the West. Buffalo Bill Cody was the hero of more than 1,700 variant issues of dime novels, and he gained even more fame when his world-famous Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show debuted in 1883. The show was still touring when Buffalo Bill Cody died in 1917
1882 The first theatre lit by electric lights was illuminated in Boston, Massachusetts. Some 650 lamps were used to light the theatre and stage for a performance of a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta
1894 The world's first auto show, the Exposition Internationale de Velocipidie et de Locomotion Automobile, opened in Paris, France. Four makes of automobile were on display
1911 The province of Alberta brought in its first Motor Vehicles Act. It set the speed limit in towns and cities at 15 mph, and at 20 mph in less settled areas. Outside urban areas drivers were required to slow down to 6 mph when approaching or passing pedestrians and horses, and to assist any horseman who required assistance. Drivers were required to take out a license, and must be over 16 if a boy or over 18 if a young lady
1936 Britain's King Edward VIII told a radio audience that he was abdicating the British throne to marry US divorcee Wallis Warfield Simpson, explaining, "I have found it impossible to carry on the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge the duties of king, as I would wish to do, without the help and support of the woman I love." Edward had only reigned for 325 days, the shortest reign since that of Edward V in the 15th century. He was the first English monarch to voluntarily abdicate the Throne. That evening, Parliament passed a bill of abdication, and the next day, Edward's younger brother was proclaimed as King George VI. The former king was granted the title of Duke of Windsor, and in June 1937, he married Wallis Warfield in France
1941 Germany and Italy declared war on the US, who responded in kind
1941 The US outlawed spare tires on new cars due to widespread shortages caused by World War II. Rubber, produced overseas, had become almost impossible to get. People didn't mind the spare-tire law too much, though. They were too busy dealing with quotas for gasoline, meat, butter, shoes, and other essentials
1948 Newfoundland signed an agreement to enter Confederation as Canada's 10th province
1956 The movie industry's tight restriction of language and subject matter, known as the Hays Code or the Production Code, was eased slightly for the first time since its adoption in 1930. The easing of the code meant that actors could now mention abortion, drugs, kidnapping, and prostitution. The Production Code was introduced in 1930 by the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), an industry association created to avoid government censorship and to satisfy public demand for morally acceptable movies. After creating the association, the heads of the major Hollywood studios hired William H. Hays, the former US postmaster general under President Harding and past chairman of the Republican National Committee, to head the new group. Hays wielded such power that the MPPDA came to be called the "Hays Office," and the Production Code adopted in 1930 was commonly referred to as the "Hays Code." The Code required that no film should "lower the standards of those who see it. Hence, the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil, or sin." The Code specifically prohibited the portrayal of illegal drug trafficking, "sex perversion," and profanity. It also prohibited the portrayal of clergy members as comic characters or villains, and the portrayal of interracial relationships. The Code deeply influenced the kinds of films that were made. However, as social changes made society more liberal, the Code began to thaw, starting with the changes in 1956, and in 1968, the Code was replaced by the movie ratings system
1961 A US aircraft carrier carrying Army helicopters arrived in Saigon. It was the first direct US military support for South Vietnam's battle against Communist guerrillas
1983 Pope John Paul the Second visited a Lutheran church in Rome, the first visit by a Roman Catholic pontiff to a Protestant church in his own diocese
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