1752 John Graves Simcoe - British soldier and statesman who was the first Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada in 1791 and the founder of York, now the city of Toronto, in 1794. Simcoe began the policy of offering land grants to lure immigrants from the US in the 1790s, and had slavery declared illegal
1841 Pierre-Auguste Renoir - French Impressionist artist (Oarsman at Chatou, The Bathers)
1848 Edward Harriman - US rail baron who was the controversial saviour of the transcontinental Union Pacific Railroad. The son of an Episcopal minister, Harriman disliked school and dropped out to become a broker's boy when he was 14. To the amazement of the stockbrokers on Wall Street, the young Harriman demonstrated an uncanny ability to pick winning stocks. He had his own seat on the stock exchange by the age of 21. Harriman's involvement with railroads began when he attempted to rehabilitate some tired old lines owned by his wife's relatives. He soon developed a passion for every aspect of railroads, from steam technology to traffic flow problems, and particularly enjoyed reviving once great lines that had fallen on hard times. In 1897 Harriman took on the salvation of the bankrupt Union Pacific Railroad. It was his most ambitious railroad project ever. The first transcontinental line to link East and West, the Union Pacific had once been the queen of railroads but had become an outdated and inefficient money pit. Over 10 years, Harriman restored the Union Pacific to its glory days, transforming it into one of the best built and managed lines in the nation. In pursuit of efficiency and predictable profits, Harriman gradually gained control over many of the central western and south-western lines in the US. Alarmed by this concentration of control over a technology that was essential to the economy, President Theodore Roosevelt sued Harriman for violation of federal antitrust regulations. In 1904, the Supreme Court directed that much of Harriman's system be dissolved. As a result of the antitrust litigation, Harriman became a favourite target for turn-of-the-century resentment of big business, and he was often accused of having built his railroad monopolies simply to increase his own profits. The truth was more complicated. Harriman certainly sought good profits, but his brilliant transformation of the Union Pacific and other decrepit lines was motivated as much by a desire to maximise efficiency, as profits. Frank to the point of bluntness, Harriman rarely deigned to explain and defend his complex ideas about railroads to the public, guaranteeing that he would be largely remembered as little more than a greedy robber baron
1873 Enrico Caruso - Italian operatic tenor
1901 Zeppo (Herbert) Marx - Comedian with the Marx Brothers (Animal Crackers, Duck Soup, Horse Feathers)
1913 Gert Fröbe - German actor (Goldfinger, The Longest Day, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang)
1913 Jim Backus - Actor (Gilligan's Island, Johnny Cool, Myra Breckenridge) He was immortalised as the voice of Mr. Magoo in cartoons
1917 Anthony Burgess - British author (A Clockwork Orange, Time for a Tiger, Inside Mr. Enderby)
1928 Larry Gelbart - Writer (M*A*S*H, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Your Show of Shows)
1932 Faron Young - Country singer (Hello Walls) and actor (The Young Sheriff, Daniel Boone, Hidden Guns)
1937 Sir Tom Courtenay - British actor (A Rather English Marriage, The Dresser, The Loneliness of the Distance Runner, King Rat, Doctor Zhivago, The Last Butterfly, Little Dorrit) He played Dr Felix Crawley in the Kavanagh QC episode Memento Mori He was once a room mate of John Thaw’s and they were friends for over 40 years. Tom was the best man at John’s first wedding, to Sally Alexander
1938 Diane Baker - Actress (Journey to the Centre of the Earth, Krakatoa East of Java, The Silence of the Lambs, The Joy Luck Club, Marnie) She was also in the Perry Mason TV movie, The Case of the Heartbroken Bride
1942 Karen Grassle - Actress (Little House on the Prairie, President's Mistress, Wyatt Earp)
1943 George Harrison - Former Beatle who went on to have a solo career (My Sweet Lord, Isn't It A Pity, What is Life?, All Those Years Ago)
1950 Neil Jordan - Irish born film director (The Crying Game, We're No Angels, In the Company of Wolves, Interview with the Vampire)
1966 Téa Leoni - Actress (Madam Secretary, A League of Their Own, The Naked Truth, Wyatt Earp, Deep Impact, Tower Heist, Fun With Dick and Jane)
1971 Sean Astin - Actor (The Goonies, Memphis Belle, Encino Man, Courage Under Fire, The Lord of the Rings movies, Borderland, 24, Toy Soldiers) He is the son of John Astin and Patty Duke
1973 Anson Mount – Actor (Hell on Wheels, The Two Mr. Kissels, Conviction, In Her Shoes, The Battle of Shaker Heights)
Died this Day
1723 Sir Christopher Wren, age 90 - British architect, astronomer and mathematician. He was largely responsible for the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire of 1666. His works include many churches in London, including St. Paul's Cathedral. He also built Marlborough House and Oxford's Ashmolean, the world's first university museum. The Ashmolean Museum was featured in the Inspector Morse episode, The Wolvercote Tongue
1899 Paul Julius von Reuter, age 82 - German born founder of Reuters, the international news agency he based in London
1914 Sir John Tenniel - British artist who illustrated Alice in Wonderland. He died three days before his 94th birthday
1983 Tennessee Williams, age 71 - US playwright (A Streetcar Named Desire, The Glass Menagerie, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Night of the Iguana, Suddenly Last Summer, The Rose Tattoo, Summer and Smoke) He choked to death on a bottle cap
1996 Dr. Haing S. Ngor - Cambodian refugee, physician, and Academy Award-winning actor (The Killing Fields) He was shot to death in Los Angeles, California
1998 W.O. (William Ormonde) Mitchell - Canadian author (Jake and the Kid, Who has Seen the Wind, The Kite, The Vanishing Point, How I Spent My Summer Holidays, Daisy Creek) He died two weeks before his 84th birthday
2006 Darren McGavin, age 83 – Actor (A Christmas Story, The Night Stalker, Airport '77, Billy Madison, Child in the Night, The Man with the Golden Arm, The Martian Chronicles, The Natural, Perfect Harmony, Dead Heat)
On this Day
1308 Edward II of England was crowned
1570 Pope Pius V issued the papal bull Regnans in Excelsis, excommunicating Queen Elizabeth I of England, and absolved her subjects from allegiance. She was the daughter of Henry VIII
1793 The department heads of the US government met with President Washington at his home for the first Cabinet meeting on record
1862 The US Congress passed the Legal Tender Act, authorising the use of paper notes to pay the government's bills. This ended the long-standing policy of using only gold or silver in transactions, and it allowed the government to finance the enormously costly Civil War long after its gold and silver reserves were depleted. Soon after the war began, the federal government began to run low on specie. Several proposals involving the use of bonds were suggested. Finally, Congress began printing money, which the Confederate government had been doing since the beginning of the war. The Legal Tender Act allowed the government to print $150 million in paper money that was not backed by a similar amount of gold and silver. Many bankers and financial experts predicted doom for the economy, as they believed that there would be little confidence in the scheme. There were also misgivings in Congress, as many legislators worried about a complete collapse of the nation's financial infrastructure. These notes, called "greenbacks," worked much better than expected. It allowed the government to pay its bills and, by increasing the money in circulation, greased the wheels of northern commerce. The greenbacks were legal tender, which meant that creditors had to accept them at face value. Another legal tender act passed in 1863, and by war's end nearly a half-billion dollars in greenbacks had been issued. The Legal Tender Act laid the foundation for the creation of a permanent currency in the decades after the Civil War
1880 The New Brunswick legislature in Fredericton was destroyed by fire
1909 Movie studios began submitting films to the Board of Censorship for review. The board was set up by movie studios as a self-policing body to help avoid government censorship
1919 Oregon became the first state to impose a tax on gasoline. The funds collected from the 1 percent tax were used for road construction and maintenance
1928 The Federal Radio Commission issued the first television license to Charles Francis Jenkins Laboratories in Washington, DC. The station was assigned the call letters W3XK, and it operated until October 31, 1932
1935 Louis Lumière screened an experimental 3D film at the Académie des Sciences
1939 The first Anderson Bomb Shelter was erected in Britain, in a garden in Islington
1949 Actor Robert Mitchum was released from a Los Angeles County prison farm after serving time for marijuana possession. In the fall of 1948, Mitchum was smoking a joint at a small party in the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles when detectives arrived on the scene and arrested him. There is some reason to believe that Mitchum's arrest was less than fair and designed to bring publicity to the Los Angeles Police Department's anti-drug efforts. Although high-priced studio lawyers questioned irregularities in the case, it was later agreed that Mitchum would accept 60 days in jail and several years' probation. At the prison farm, Mitchum spent his days making cement blocks
1964 Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali), the 7-1 underdog, knocked out Sonny Liston in the seventh round in Miami to become the World Heavyweight Boxing Champion
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