1758 James Monroe - 5th US President, born in Westmoreland County, Virginia. He was the author of the popular Monroe Doctrine, which stated that no European power would colonise any part of the American continent
1801 Anthony Ashley Cooper, Lord Shaftesbury, 7th Earl - He introduced Britain's Coal Mines Act in 1842, which prohibited the employment of women and children underground
1874 Sidney Toler - US actor best known for his role as Charlie Chan in numerous movies
1878 Lionel Barrymore - Actor (A Free Soul, Camille, Captains Courageous, Duel in the Sun, It's a Wonderful Life, Key Largo, The Little Colonel) He was one of the most important US character actors in the early 1900s. He’s the great-uncle of Drew Barrymore
1908 Oskar Schindler – German businessman who is credited with saving 1,200 Jews from the Holocaust
1917 Robert Anderson - Playwright (Tea and Sympathy, Sand Pebbles, I Never Sang for My Father, The Nun's Story)
1926 Harper Lee - Author (To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Set a Watchman) She was born in Monroeville, Alabama, the youngest of four children born to Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Finch Lee
1929 Carolyn Jones - Actress (The Addams Family, The Tender Trap, The Seven Year Itch, Marjorie Morningstar, King Creole, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, House of Wax, How the West was Won) She played Marsha, Queen of Diamonds on the Batman TV series
1941 Ann-Margret - Swedish born actress (Carnal Knowledge, Tommy, Viva Las Vegas, Grumpy Old Men, The Cheap Detective, Bye Bye Birdie, Scarlett)
1948 Marcia Strassman - Actress (Welcome Back Kotter, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Honey I Blew Up the Kids, Another Stakeout, M*A*S*H, Providence, Noah Knows Best, The Aviator, Good Time Harry)
1949 Bruno Kirby - Actor (City Slickers, Donnie Brasco, We're No Angels, When Harry Met Sally, Tin Men, Good Morning Vietnam, This is Spinal Tap, The Godfather: Part II)
1950 Jay Leno - Comedian, TV talk show host (The Tonight Show)
1952 Mary McDonnell - Actress (Dances With Wolves, Independence Day, Matewan, Sneakers, Battlestar Galactica, The Closer, Donnie Darko, Major Crimes)
1955 Paul Guilfoyle – Actor (CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Coyote Waits, Pharaoh's Heart, Random Hearts, Primary Colors, Amistad, L.A. Confidential, Ransom, Celtic Pride, Hoffa, Cadillac Man, Wall Street)
1960 Ian Rankin – Scottish author (Knots & Crosses, Hide & Seek, The Hanging Garden, Let it Bleed, Dead Souls, Beggars Banquet, Watchman)
1971 Bridget Moynahan – Actress (Blue Bloods, Coyote Ugly, Six Degrees, I Robot, The Recruit, The Sum of All Fears, Serendipity, John Wick, Sex and the City)
1973 Elisabeth Röhm – German-born actress (Law & Order, Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous, Push, Eureka Street, Angel, Heroes)
1973 Jorge Garcia – Actor (Lost, Hawaii Five-0, Happily Even After, Becker, Alcatraz)
1974 Penélope Cruz – Spanish born actress (Vanilla Sky, All the Pretty Horses, Don Juan, Framed, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides)
1981 Jessica Alba – Actress (Sin City, Dark Angel, Fantastic Four, Honey, Into the Blue, Valentine’s Day, Machete)
Died this Day
1945 Benito Mussolini and Clara Petacci - Italian dictator and his mistress who were executed as they attempted to flee the country for Switzerland. They were shot by Italian partisans, and their bodies were strung upside down from the rafters of a petrol station. As the Allies fought their way up the Italian peninsula, defeat of the Axis powers all but certain, Mussolini considered his options. Not wanting to fall into the hands of the Allies, and knowing that the communist partisans would try him as a war criminal, he settled on escape to a neutral country. He and his mistress made it to the Swiss border, only to discover that the guards had crossed over to the partisan side. Knowing they would not let him pass, he disguised himself in a Luftwaffe coat and helmet, hoping to slip into Austria with some German soldiers. He and Petacci were discovered by partisans and shot, their bodies then transported by truck to Milan, where they were hung upside down and displayed publicly for revilement by the masses
1976 Richard Hughes - British author, poet and playwright (A High Wind in Jamaica, Gipsy Night, A Comedy of Good and Evil, The Fox in the Attic, The Divided Heart)
On this Day
1559 The English parliament approved the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England
1770 Captain James Cook, in his ship The Endeavour , landed at Botany Bay
1788 Maryland became the seventh state to ratify the US Constitution and join the Union
1789 The mutiny on the Bounty occurred when Captain William Bligh was cast adrift with 18 loyal crewmen. Fletcher Christian, the first mate on the HMS Bounty, led a successful mutiny against Captain William Bligh and his supporters. The British naval vessel was transporting breadfruit saplings from Tahiti for planting on British colonies in the Caribbean. The voyage was difficult, and ill feelings were rampant, although probably no more than on other long sea voyages of the period. However, Captain Bligh's famous temper pushed his men over the edge and the captain and eighteen of his crew were set adrift in a small open boat. By remarkable seamanship, they travelled nearly 4,000 miles and reached Timor in June, and then were transported back to England. Meanwhile, Christian and his men travelled back to Tahiti on the Bounty, and, fearing the British authorities, most elected to flee to a more remote Pacific location. Six Tahitian men and twelve women decided to depart of with them. The dozen or so mutineers who stayed on Tahiti were eventually captured and court-martialed in England. Three of these men were executed. In 1790, the Bounty settled at unpopulated Pitcairn Island, and the mutineers and Tahitians burned the ship and founded a colony. However, the colony suffered through a decade of turmoil and violence, and, by 1800, all the Tahitian and European men were dead, except one, Englishman John Adams. Nevertheless, the men had reproduced prolifically with the Tahitian women before their demise by murder and disease, and Pitcairn's population soon reached a healthy level. John Adams served as leader of the colony until his death in 1829. The population of the English-speaking community peaked in 1937, with 233 people living on Pitcairn Island, which became a British possession in 1839. Descendants of the Bounty mutineers and the Tahitians still live on the island today
1817 The Rush-Bagot treaty was signed by Canada and the US. It limited the number of warships the two countries could maintain on the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain
1897 The Chickasaw and Choctaw Tribes became the first to agree to abolish tribal government and communal ownership of land. The other tribes soon followed, throwing open all of Indian Territory to white settlement. Representatives of the Chickasaw and Choctaw tribes had been negotiating the future of their people with the Dawes Commission since 1893. The Dawes Commission, which was carrying out the mandate of the Dawes Severalty Act, believed Indians would be better able to integrate into mainstream society if they abandoned tribal governments and ownership of land. Instead, every male Indian received a plot of land to own privately. Any tribal land that remained, which in most cases was a substantial amount, would be open to settlement by Anglo-Americans. Most Native American tribes were forced to abide by the Dawes Severalty Act regardless of their wishes. However, a treaty from 1830 promised the five tribes living in Oklahoma Indian Territory their land for "as long as the grass grows and water runs," and the Dawes Act did not apply to them. Instead, the Dawes Commission was formed to convince them to adopt its principles voluntarily. At the same time, Congress also threatened to make it harder for the five tribes to maintain their traditional ways of life, for example, by invalidating the authority of all tribal courts. Recognising that they had little hope of maintaining their old ways, the Choctaws and Chickasaws became the first to agree voluntarily to abandon tribal government and land ownership. By 1902, the other three tribes - the Cherokees, Seminoles, and Creeks - had followed suit
1925 Poet T.S. Eliot accepted a position as editor at Faber and Faber publishers. The job allowed Eliot, who was already recognised as a major poet, to quit his job as a bank clerk at Lloyd's Bank in London. He held the publishing position until his death, in 1965
1940 Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded Pennsylvania 6-5000 for RCA Victor
1947 The Kon-Tiki Expedition departed from Peru on the western coast of South America. Norwegian explorer and anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl led the six-man crew, sailing aboard a balsa wood raft named the Kon-Tiki, on the journey across the Pacific Ocean to the islands east of Tahiti. The purpose of the journey was to demonstrate that people from the Americas could have colonised Polynesia. The 5,000 mile journey was covered in three and a half months
1967 Heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali refused to be inducted into the Army
1969 French President Charles de Gaulle resigned, following the defeat of his proposals for constitutional reform in a national referendum
1990 The musical, A Chorus Line, closed after a record 6,137 performances on Broadway
1992 The US Department of Agriculture unveiled a pyramid-shaped recommended-diet chart that cost nearly $1 million to develop
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