1782 Martin Van Buren - 8th US President
1830 Christina Rossetti – British poet (Goblin Market, The Prince’s Progress, Sing Song: A Nursery Rhyme Book, The Face of the Deep: A Devotional Commentary on the Apocalypse)
1839 George Armstrong Custer – US cavalry commander who made his “last stand” at the Little Bighorn River in Montana
1870 Bill Pickett - Rodeo star, born near Austin, Texas. Pickett learned his roping and riding skills working as a cowboy on a Texas ranch. He attracted the attention of the Miller brothers, who ran the 101 Ranch Wild West Show, the successful touring extravaganza that also made stars of Will Rogers and Tom Mix. Pickett introduced bulldogging, now better known as steer wrestling, to the world of rodeo entertainment. He would ride his horse alongside a running longhorn steer, grab the steer's head and bite its upper lip, forcing the steer to follow Pickett's commands. Since bulldogs were known to control cattle by biting onto their lower lips and ferociously hanging on, Pickett's steer wrestling method became known as "bulldogging." Steer wrestling became a standard rodeo competition, although few cowboys were willing to copy Pickett's lip-biting method
1890 Fritz Lang – Vienna born Hollywood director (Metropolis, Ministry of Fear, M, The Big Heat)
1901 Walter Elias Disney – Animation pioneer and founder of the Disney Empire. Born on a Missouri farm, Disney attended the Kansas City Art Institute at night while he was in high school. At age 16, during World War I, Disney went overseas with the Red Cross and drove an ambulance that he decorated with cartoon characters. He and his brother, Roy, left Kansas City for Hollywood with $40 and some art supplies, built a camera stand in their uncle's garage, and started their company in the back of a Hollywood real estate office. Walt began making a series of animated short films and introduced Mickey Mouse in 1928. In 1961, he helped establish the California Institute of the Arts, and in 1965, he designed the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow (EPCOT), which he envisioned as an aid toward improving the quality of life in US cities. His 43-year career earned him honours and citations from throughout the world. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, France's Legion of Honour and Officer d'Academie decorations, Thailand's Order of the Crown, Brazil's Order of the Southern Cross, Mexico's Order of the Aztec Eagle, and the Showman of the World Award from the National Association of Theatre Owners
1906 Otto Preminger – Austrian director (Porgy and Bess, Anatomy of a Murder, Exodus) He also played Mr. Freeze #2 in the Batman episodes Green Ice and Deep Freeze
1932 Little Richard (Pennimann) – Singer and preacher (Good Golly Miss Molly, Tutti Frutti, Long Tall Sally, Lucille)
1926 George Savalas – Actor (Kojak, Kelly’s Heroes) He was the brother of Telly Savalas
1946 José Carreras – Spanish operatic tenor
1951 Morgan Brittany – Actress (Dallas, Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat, Glitter, The Wild Women of Chastity Gulch, The Scarlett O'Hara War, Gable and Lombard, Yours Mine and Ours, Gypsy) She played Marianne Clayman in the Perry Mason movie The Case of the Scandalous Scoundrel
1952 Andy Kim – Canadian songwriter (Rock Me Gently, Sugar Sugar)
1968 Margaret Cho – Actress/comedienne (Drop Dead Diva, 17 Again, Face/Off, All American Girl)
Died this Day
1791 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, age 35 – Austrian composer. He died of typhus in Vienna, and was buried in an unmarked grave along with several other paupers
1870 Alexandre Dumas, Sr, age 68 – French author (The Count of Monty Cristo, The Three Musketeers)
1873 Bridget Landregan – The first victim of the Boston Belfry Murderer. She was found beaten and strangled to death in the Boston suburb of Dorchester. According to witnesses, a man in black clothes and a flowing cape attempted to sexually assault the dead girl before running away. In 1874, a man fitting the same description clubbed another young girl, to death, and in 1875 a third victim was bludgeoned in her bed. Residents of Boston were shocked to learn that the killer had been among them all along. Thomas Piper, the sexton at the Warren Avenue Baptist Church, was known for his flowing black cape, but because he was friendly with the parishioners, nobody suspected his involvement. But when a five-year-old girl, who was last seen with the sexton, was found dead in the church's belfry in the summer of 1876, Piper became the prime suspect. Piper, who was dubbed The Boston Belfry Murderer, confessed to the four killings after his arrest. He was convicted and sentenced to die, and he was hanged in 1876
1926 Claude-Oscar Monet – French painter and founder of the Impressionist movement
1983 Robert Alderich – US film director (The Dirty Dozen, The Frisco Kid, The Chiorboys, The Longest Yard, Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?)
On this Day
1766 James Christie, founder of the famous auctioneers, held his first sale in London
1848 President Polk triggered the Gold Rush of '49 by confirming that gold had been discovered in California
1854 The folding theatre chair was patented
1879 Daniel and Thomas Connolly and Thomas McTighe received a patent for the first automatic telephone system. Previously, telephone calls were placed through operators. The system patented on this day allowed users to place their own calls, but it was never commercially applied. The first successful system was put into use in 1892
1890 While working with the Barnum circus, Quebec strongman Louis Cyr lifted 490 lbs with one finger
1892 Tchaikovsky's ballet, The Nutcracker, premiered in St. Petersburg, Russia. It has since become a favourite Christmas ballet all around the world
1893 The first electric car appeared. It was built by Dickson's of Toronto and could travel about 16 miles before getting its batteries recharged
1932 German physicist Albert Einstein was granted a visa, making it possible for him to travel to the US
1933 The 21st Amendment to the US Constitution was ratified, repealing the 18th Amendment and bringing an end to the era of national prohibition of alcohol in the US. The movement for the prohibition of alcohol began in the early 19th century, when those concerned about the adverse effects of drinking began forming temperance societies. By the late 19th century, these groups had become a powerful political force, campaigning on the state level and calling for national liquor abstinence. Several states outlawed the manufacture or sale of alcohol within their own borders. In December 1917, the 18th Amendment, prohibiting the "manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors for beverage purposes," was passed by Congress, and the Volstead Act was passed in October 1919, providing for the enforcement of Prohibition, including the creation of a special Prohibition unit of the Treasury Department. In its first six months, the unit destroyed thousands of illicit stills run by bootleggers. However, federal agents and police did little more than slow the flow of booze, and organised crime flourished. Large-scale bootleggers like Al Capone of Chicago built criminal empires out of illegal distribution efforts, and federal and state governments lost billions in tax revenue. In most urban areas, the individual consumption of alcohol was largely tolerated and drinkers gathered at "speakeasies," the Prohibition-era term for saloons. Prohibition, failing fully to enforce sobriety and costing billions, rapidly lost popular support in the early 1930s. After the repeal of the 18th Amendment, some states continued Prohibition by maintaining state-wide temperance laws. Mississippi, the last dry state in the Union, ended Prohibition in 1966
1945 At 2:10 pm, five US Avenger torpedo bombers, comprising Flight 19, took off on a routine two-hour training flight from the Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station in Florida. Flight 19 was scheduled to take them due east for 120 miles, north for 73 miles, and then back over a final 120-mile leg that would return them to the naval base. They never returned. Approximately two hours later, the leader of the squadron, who had experience flying in the area for over six months, reported that his compass and back-up compass had failed and that his position was unknown. The other planes experienced similar instrument malfunctions. Radio facilities on land were contacted to find the location of the lost squadron, but none were successful. After two more hours of confused messages from the fliers, a distorted radio transmission from the squadron leader was heard at 6:20 pm, apparently calling for his men to prepare to ditch their aircraft simultaneously because of lack of fuel. At 7:27 pm, a Mariner aircraft was sent from Banana River on a search expedition. Three minutes later, the Mariner aircraft radioed to its home base that its mission was underway. It, too, was never heard from again. The disappearance of the 14 men of Flight 19 and the 13 men of the Mariner led to one of the largest air and sea searches to that date, and despite that, no trace of bodies or any of the aircraft were ever found. The search was carried out by hundreds of ships and aircraft, which combed over 200,000 square miles of the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and remote locations within the interior of Florida. Although naval officials maintained that the remains of the six aircraft and 27 men were not found because stormy weather destroyed the evidence, the story of the "Lost Squadron" helped cement the legend of the Bermuda Triangle, an area of the Atlantic Ocean where ships and aircraft are said to disappear without a trace. The Bermuda Triangle is said to stretch from the southern US coast across to Bermuda and down to the Atlantic coast of Cuba and Santo Domingo
1970 The Stanley Cup, Conn Smythe trophy and Bill Masterton trophy were all stolen from the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto
1985 Christopher Forbes paid $157,000 for a single bottle of Chateau Lafite wine that had been initialled by Thomas Jefferson
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