1596 Rene Descartes - French mathematician, scientist and philosopher. He is known as the Father of Modern Philosophy
1693 John Harrison - British horologist who invented the marine chronometer, winning the first prize in a competition sponsored by the British Government to accurately determine longitude
1732 Franz Joseph Haydn - Austrian composer who is known as the father of the symphony. He encouraged young Mozart, but was less enthusiastic about his pupil, Beethoven
1809 Edward FitzGerald - British poet (Euphranor, Polonius: A Collection of Wise Saws and Modern Instances) and translator (Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, Salámán and Absál an Allegory Translated from the Persian of Jámi)
1811 Robert Wilhelm Bunsen - German physicist and chemist who, besides inventing the Bunson Burner, also invented the galvanic battery and an ice calorimeter. He also co-discovered spectrum analysis
1867 Noah Timmins - Canadian mining industry leader, after whom the northern Ontario town of Timmins is named. He played a major role in the development of the Canadian mining industry in the 1920s and 1930s
1878 Jack Johnson - US boxer and heavyweight champion known as Galveston Jack
1895 Vardis Fisher - US author of Westerns (Toilers of the Hills, Children of God, Tale of Valor) His non-fiction book, Suicide or Murder?, made the controversial case that Meriwether Lewis might have been a victim of murder rather than suicide. His last novel, Mountain Man, celebrated the footloose life of the 19th century mountain men and became the primary fictional source for the film Jeremiah Johnson
1922 Richard Kiley - Actor (The Thorn Birds, The Blackboard Jungle, The Bad Seed, Looking for Mr. Goodbar)
1926 John Fowles - British author (The French Lieutenant's Woman, The Ebony Tower, Daniel Martin)
1927 William Daniels - Actor (St. Elsewhere, The Graduate, Oh God!, A Thousand Clowns, The Parallax View, Black Sunday, Knight Rider, Boy Meets World)
1928 Lefty Frizzell - Country Music Hall of Famer (If You've Got the Money, I've Got the Time, Always Late, Saginaw Michigan)
1928 Gordie Howe - Hockey Hall of Famer, who is best remembered playing for the Detroit Red Wings. He was born in Floral, Saskatchewan. Howe was the first player to score 1000 career major-league goals, in 1977, and was a key member of 4 Stanley Cup winning teams. He retired in 1980, at age 52, as the NHL leader in career goals scored with 801. He is second only to Wayne Gretzky on the NHL list for total points scored (goals and assists combined), with 1,850
1934 Shirley Jones - Singer, actress (Carousel, Music Man, Oklahoma!, Elmer Gantry, The Partridge Family, General Hospital)
1934 Richard Chamberlain - Actor (Dr. Kildare, The Thorn Birds, Centennial, Shogun, The Towering Inferno, Julius Caesar, The Madwoman of Chaillot, The Bourne Identity, King Solomon's Mines)
1935 Herb Alpert - Bandleader with the Tijuana Brass (The Lonely Bull, Taste of Honey, The Work Song, This Guy's In Love With You, Rise, Spanish Flea)
1943 Christopher Walken - Actor (The Deerhunter, Batman Returns, Wayne's World 2, Pulp Fiction, The Dead Zone, Sarah Plain and Tall, Mousehunt, Sleepy Hollow, Catch Me If You Can, Domino)
1945 Gabriel Kaplan - Actor, comedian (Welcome Back Kotter, The Hoboken Chicken Emergency, Nobody's Perfekt)
1948 Rhea Perlman - Actress (Cheers, Carwash, Ratings Game, Class Act, Ted & Venus, Intimate Strangers, Canadian Bacon, Matilda, Kate Brasher, Pearl) She is the wife of Danny DeVito
1950 Ed Marinaro – Actor (Hill Street Blues, Blue Mountain State, Sisters)
1957 Marc McClure - Actor (Freaky Friday, Back to the Future, Apollo 13)
1971 Ewan McGregor - Scottish actor (Star Wars: Episodes I & II, Little Voice, Brassed Off, Karaoke, Emma, Trainspotting, Lipstick on Your Collar, Moulin Rouge) He also appeared in the Kavanagh QC episode Nothing But the Truth
Died this Day
1631 John Donne - British poet (The Sun Rising, Air and Angels, The Good Morrow) He wrote the often quoted line "Perchance he for whom the bell tolls"
1855 Charlotte Brontë - British author (Jane Eyre, Shirley, The Professor, Villette) She was one of six siblings born to an Anglican clergyman. Two of her sisters died in childhood. Charlotte and her remaining siblings, Branwell, Emily, and Anne, invented and wrote about elaborate fantasy worlds to amuse themselves. In 1846, Charlotte ran across some poems that Emily had written, which led to the revelation that all three sisters were closet poets. The sisters published their own book, Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Only two copies sold, but publishers became interested in the sisters' work. Charlotte, under the nom de plum Currer Bell, published Jane Eyre in 1847. Sadly, all three of Charlotte's remaining siblings died within the next two years. Left alone, Charlotte cared for her ill father and married his curate, Arthur Bell Nicholls. Shortly after her marriage to Arthur Bell Nicholls, she became pregnant. She died due to complications from a chill caught early in her pregnancy. She died three weeks before her 39th birthday
1931 Knute Rockne - Norwegian born US college football coach (Notre Dame) He was killed in a plane crash near Bazaar, Kansas, almost a month after his 43rd birthday
1978 Charles Best, age 79 - Canadian biochemist and the co-discoverer of insulin, used to treat diabetes. He died in Toronto
1980 Jesse Owens, age 66 - US athlete and gold medal winner at the Berlin Olympics, where he was snubbed by Hitler because he was black
1995 Selena Quintanilla-Perez, age 23 - Mexican-American singer. She was shot to death in Corpus Christi, Texas, by the founder of her fan club
On this Day
1492 King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain issued a royal edict advising Jews to either become Catholics, leave the country, or be executed
1713 The Treaty of Utrecht returned Nova Scotia to Britain. France retained Cape Breton and the Island of St. John, which is now Prince Edward Island
1821 Montréal's McGill University was granted its Royal charter
1831 Québec and Montréal were incorporated as cities
1836 Charles Dickens had his first major break when The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club was published in monthly serial form. The 24-year-old writer published his story 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 instalment, 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
1889 French engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel unfurled the French tricolour from atop the Eiffel Tower, officially marking its completion. The Tower was 985 feet high, and cost £260,000 at the time. It took two years to build
1892 The world's first fingerprinting bureau was formally opened by the Buenos Aires Chief of Police, although it had been operating unofficially since 1891
1896 Whitcomb L. Judson, a Chicago inventor, patented the first zipper. It had too many imperfections, and it would not be until 1913 that a Swede living in New Jersey would give us the zipper that we know today
1917 The US took possession of the Virgin Islands from Denmark
1923 The first US dance marathon, held in New York City, ended with Alma Cummings setting a world record of 27 hours on her feet
1932 Ford Motor Company unveiled its V-8 engine
1945 The Tennessee Williams' play, The Glass Menagerie, opened on Broadway
1949 Newfoundland, the oldest Dominion in the British Commonwealth, became Canada's 10th province, 82 years after Confederation. Two referenda were held after the Second World War, and both were close. Joey Smallwood, who had led the drive for joining Canada, became Newfoundland's first premier. Often called Canada's only living Father of Confederation, Smallwood was premier until 1972 and died in 1991
1956 Colin Dexter married Dorothy Cooper
1958 The song Johnny B Goode by Chuck Berry was released
1959 The Dalai Lama was granted political asylum in Northern India
1976 The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that coma patient Karen Anne Quinlan could be disconnected from her respirator. Quinlan, who remained comatose, died in 1985
1984 In St. John's Harbour, Newfoundland, one-legged runner Steve Fonyo began his successful cross-Canada run to raise money for cancer research
1990 Hundreds of people were injured when rioting erupted in London over Britain's so-called "poll tax"
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