1672 Joseph Addison - British essayist, poet and dramatist (The Campaign, Cato)
1764 Benjamin Latrobe - British-born US architect and civil engineer
1769 Arthur Wellesley, The Duke of Wellington Irish born British commander who was known as the Iron Duke. He defeated Napoleon at Waterloo, and was British Prime Minister from 1828 to 1830
1831 Emily Howard Stowe Canadian doctor, born at South Norwich, Ontario. In 1880, she was the first Canadian woman admitted to practice medicine in Canada
1825 George Inness - Artist (Peace and Plenty, Delaware Valley, Spring Blossoms)
1850 Arthur William Patrick Albert, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn - Governor General of Canada and explorer, born in Buckingham Palace. He was the third son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert
1852 Martha Jane Canary US adventurer and performer known as Calamity Jane, born in rural Missouri. In 1865, she and her family moved west to the booming gold rush town of Virginia City, Montana, where she grew into a tall and powerfully built young woman who liked to wear men's clothing and spend her time in the company of men. Like many young frontier women, Jane learned to ride and shoot at an early age
1887 General Alan Gordon Cunningham Commander of the British forces that captured Ethiopia, liberating it from its Italian invaders in World War II. Overcoming topographical and administrative obstacles, Cunningham's forces entered Italian Somaliland, occupied the ports of Chisimaio and Mogadiscio, and then pursued the Axis enemy into the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa
1907 Kate Smith - US singer (God Bless America, When the Moon Comes Over the Mountain)
1916 Glenn Ford Canadian-born actor (The Big Heat, The Blackboard Jungle, The Teahouse of the August Moon, Gilda, A Stolen Life, The Man From Colorado, Midway, Don't Go Near the Water, Cimarron, Final Verdict, Superman, Dear Heart)
1918 Jack Paar - TV host (The Tonight Show)
1919 Dan O'Herlihy Irish actor (The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Fail-Safe, Colditz, MacArthur, The Tamarind Seed, RoboCop) He was the father of Gavan OHerlihy
1922 Louis Nye Actor (The Steve Allen Show, The Ann Sothern Show, Harper Valley PTA)
1923 Joseph Heller - Author (Catch-22, God Knows, No Laughing Matter, Closing Time) He attended Abraham Lincoln High School in Brooklyn and worked as a filing clerk and blacksmith's assistant before enlisting in the Army. He trained as a bombardier and flew 60 combat missions near the end of World War II. While in the military, he ran across an apparent paradox in Army regulations. A pilot could be grounded if found insane, but if the pilot requested to be grounded because of insanity, the Army considered him perfectly sane for wanting to avoid danger and wouldn't ground him. This paradox defined his first novel, the satirical Catch-22
1929 Sonny James - Country singer (Young Love, First Date, First Kiss, First Love)
1939 Judy Collins - Singer (Both Sides Now, Amazing Grace, Send In the Clowns, Farewell to Tarwathie)
1944 Rita Coolidge - Singer (Higher and Higher, We're All Alone, You, All Time High)
1946 John Woo Chinese-born director (Windtalkers, Once a Thief, Face/Off, Broken Arrow, Hard Target)
1946 Joanna Lumley Indian-born British actress (Absolutely Fabulous, The New Avengers, Coronation Street, The Trail of the Pink Panther, Shirley Valentine, Class Act, James and the Giant Peach, Marple: The Body in the Library, A Rather English Marriage, Lewis: Counter Culture Blues)
1949 Douglas Barr - Actor (The Fall Guy, Designing Women, Spaced Invaders)
1950 John Diehl Actor (Miami Vice, A Time to Kill, The Rat Pack, Nixon, The Client, The Hanoi Hilton, Stripes, Burn Notice: The Fall of Sam Axe, Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise, The Shield, Stargate)
1950 Dann Florek Actor (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Law & Order, The Pentagon Wars, LA Law)
1954 Ray Parker Jr. - Singer-songwriter (Ghostbusters, Girls Are More Fun, Jamie)
1966 Charlie Schlatter - Actor (Diagnosis Murder, 18 Again!, Bright Lights Big City)
1972 Julie Benz Actress (Dexter, No Ordinary Family, A Gifted Man, Hearts Adrift, Darkdrive, Roswell, The Brothers, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel) She was an Olympic skater that only went into acting after she had an injury that kept her from competing
1975 Jodhi May British actress (The Last of the Mohicans, Strike Back, Defiance, The Amazing Mrs. Pritchard, Einstein and Eddington, The Mayor of Casterbridge, The Other Boleyn Girl, Daniel Deronda, The House of Mirth)
1978 James Badge Dale Actor (Rubicon, The Grey, The Conspirator, The Departed, 24, Lord of the Flies)
1982 Jamie Dornan Irish actor (The Fall, Once Upon a Time, Shadows in the Sun, Marie Antoinette, Fifty Shades of Grey)
Died this Day
1700 John Dryden, age 68 British Poet Laureate, dramatist, and literary critic (The Wild Gallant, The Rival Ladies, Astraea Redux, The Indian Emperor, The Conquest of Granada, Don Sebastian, The Hind and the Panther) He is buried in Westminster Abbey
1873 David Livingstone, age 60 - Scottish missionary and explorer. He died in Old Chitambo, now Zambia. The locals embalmed his body and carried it to the coast to be shipped back to Britain, where he was buried in Westminster Abbey. However, before they relinquished his body, they first removed his heart, and buried it in Africa so his heart would always be there
1998 Eldridge Cleaver, age 62 - Former Black Panther leader who later renounced his past and became a Republican. He died in Pomona, California
On this Day
1707 The English and Scottish Parliaments were united by an Act of the English Parliament which declared England, Scotland, and Wales a single kingdom under the name Great Britain
1786 The opera, The Marriage of Figaro, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, premiered in Vienna
1840 The first Penny Black stamps with Queen Victoria's head went on sale five days before the official issue date. They are worth at least tens of thousands of £'s today
1841 The London Library opened. It was founded by Thomas Carlyle, Lord MacCauley and William Gladstone, among others
1851 Queen Victoria opened the Great Exhibition to wide acclaim. It took place in the Crystal Palace, which was erected in London's Hyde Park. Inside the Crystal Palace, a giant glass-and-iron hall designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, more than 10,000 exhibitors set up eight miles of tables. Technological wonders from around the world were on display, but the exposition was clearly dominated by Britain, the premier industrialised nation and workshop of the world. Conceived by Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, the Great Exposition was a rousing success, hosting 6 million visitors before it closed in October. The many goods displayed ranged from kitchen appliances to false teeth, silks to farm machinery. The Crystal Palace was so popular, that it was rebuilt in South London after the Exhibition in Hyde Park ended
1868 In Canada, the Post Office Savings Bank was established
1876 Queen Victoria was proclaimed the Empress of India
1884 Construction began on the first skyscraper. It was a 10-storey structure in Chicago, built by the Home Insurance Company of New York
1885 Electric lighting was used for the first time to illuminate city streets in Ottawa
1888 New York State adopted electrocution for capital punishment
1889 In Germany, the Bayer Company introduced Aspirin in powdered form
1893 The World's Columbian Exposition was officially opened in Chicago by President Cleveland
1898 During the Spanish-American War, Commodore George Dewey gave the command, "You may fire when you are ready, Gridley," as a US naval force destroyed a Spanish fleet in Manila Bay
1909 Prohibition went into effect in Ontario
1931 New York's Empire State Building was dedicated as President Herbert Hoover, at the White House in Washington, DC, pushed a button that turned on the lights of New York City's Empire State Building, the tallest building erected to that date. Standing 102 stories, or 1,454 feet from the top of its lightning rod to its base at 34th Street and Fifth Avenue below, the skyscraper became a world-famous symbol of US ambition and still dominates the Manhattan skyline. Designed by architect William Frederick Lamb, the Empire State Building was constructed during the height of the Great Depression but took just over a year to complete at a cost of only $40 million
1939 Batman, the creation of Bob Kane, made his debut as The Batman in the May Edition (No. 27) of Detective Comics
1941 The Orson Welles motion picture, Citizen Kane, premiered in New York
1960 A US U-2 reconnaissance plane carrying cameras and other intelligence equipment was shot down over the Soviet Union, near Sverdlovsk. Pilot Francis Gary Powers was captured. President Eisenhower admitted responsibility but said he had not authorised the mission. Powers pleaded guilty to charges of spying and was imprisoned. He was exchanged in 1962 for Colonel Rudolph Abel, a Soviet spy convicted in New York in 1957
1967 The Expo 67 world fair was officially opened in Montreal by Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson
1967 Elvis Presley married Priscilla Beaulieu in Las Vegas. They divorced in 1973
1968 Legoland Family Park opened in Billund, Denmark. It began as a permanent display of Lego models, but developed to become Denmark's most popular tourist attraction after the Tivoli Gardens
1971 Amtrak, which combined and streamlined the operations of 18 intercity passenger railroads, went into service
1975 It was announced that the NORAD agreement would be changed to give Canada control of its air space for the first time since the agreement was signed in 1958
1978 Japanese explorer Naomi Uemura became the first person to reach the North Pole alone by dogsled, completing a 57-day journey
1987 During a visit to West Germany, Pope John Paul II beatified Edith Stein, a Jewish-born Carmelite nun who was gassed in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz
2011 The U.S. Navy Seals mounted a raid on the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistani that housed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and killed him. bin Laden was responsible for the horrific attacks on September 11, 2001
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