April 21

It’s Kindergarten Day and Patriot’s Day

ON THIS DAY…
753BC According to legend, twin brothers Romulus and Remus, sons of the god Mars, found the ancient city of Rome
1519 Cortes lands at Veracruz, Mexico
1649 The Maryland Toleration Act was passed, allowing all freedom of worship
1836 Shouting, “Remember the Alamo,” General Sam Houston and his army of Texans defeat Mexican forces in the Battle of San Jacinto, winning independence for Texas
1856 The Mississippi River was crossed by a rail train for the first time
1857 The first US patent for a bustle was issued to Alexander Douglas
1862 The US Congress established the US Mint in Denver, CO
1878 The first US firehouse pole was installed in New York City, by Capt. David B. Kenyon to reduce the time for men to travel to the ground floor from the second floor at Engine Company 21
1892 The first Buffalo was born in Golden Gate Park
1894 George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man opens to cheers, with the sole exception of one who boos. Shaw bows to his detractor: “I quite agree with you, sir, but what can two do against so many?”
1898 The Spanish-American War began
1924 Sherlock Jr., Buster Keaton’s groundbreaking film, opens in the US
1939 Zenobia, starring Oliver Hardy and Harry Langdon, opens in the US
1940 The CBS Radio program, Take It or Leave It offered up the first “$64 Question”
1943 President Roosevelt announced that several Doolittle pilots had been executed by the Japanese
1944 Women in France receive the right to vote
1945 Newcomer Yosemite Sam blasted his way onto movie screens in Hare Trigger from Warner Bros.
1949 Groucho Marx received the George Foster Peabody Award for Broadcasting
1952 Secretary’s Day (now Administrative Professionals’ Day) is first celebrated
1960 Three years after construction of Brasília began, the city replaces the crowded Rio de Janeiro as the capital of Brazil
1960 Dick Clark testified before a congressional committee investigating payola; he admitted that he had a financial interest in 27 percent of the records he played on his show in a period of 28 months
1962 The Seattle World’s Fair on a 74-acre site, Seattle, Washington, was opened by remote control by President John F. Kennedy from Palm Beach, FL; The Space Needle – a 600-ft steel and glass tower – was erected as its dominant central structure
1977 The musical comedy Annie opened on Broadway
1982 The final episode of WKRP in Cincinnati aired on CBS-TV
1986 Geraldo Rivera opened a vault that belonged to Al Capone at the Lexington Hotel in Chicago; nothing of interest was found inside
1989 Field of Dreams, starring Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones, and Pet Sematary, based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, open in the US
1994 The first discoveries of extrasolar planets are announced by astronomer Alexander Wolszczan

BORN:
1782 Friedrich Froebel, laid the foundation for modern education based on the recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities; created the word kindergarten for the Play and Activity Institute he had founded in 1837
1816 Charlotte Brontë, writer (Jane Eyre, Villette, Shirley)
1830 James Starley, inventor and manufacturer, known as the father of the bicycle industry
1838 John Muir, naturalist, farmer, explorer, writer, conservationist, who championed the establishment of Sequoia and Yosemite national parks in California
1843 Walther Flemming, anatomist who was the first to observe and describe systematically the behavior of chromosomes in the cell nucleus during normal cell division (mitosis, a term he coined in 1882)
1870 Edwin S. Porter, writer-director-cinematographer-pioneer of early cinema (The Great Train Robbery)
1889 Paul Karrer, chemist who investigated the constitution of carotenoids, flavins, and vitamins A and B2, for which he shared the 1937 Nobel Prize for Chemistry
1915 Anthony Quinn, two-time Academy Award-winning actor (Lust for Life, Viva Zapata!, Lawrence of Arabia, The Guns of Navarone)
1923 Sir John Mortimer, CBE QC, barrister, dramatist and author (Rumpole of the Bailey, Bunny Lake Is Missing, Tea With Mussolini)
1926 Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom
1932 Elaine May, comdian-actress-screenwriter-director (Heaven Can Wait, The Birdcage, Neil Simon’s The Heartbreak Kid)
1935 Charles Grodin, actor (Rosemary’s Baby, Heaven Can Wait, The Great Muppet Caper, Midnight Run, Dave)
1947 Iggy Pop, punk innovator, singer, songwriter, and occasional actor
1951 Tony Danza, actor (Taxi, Who’s the Boss, She’s Out of Control, Crash)
1951 Michael Hartley Freedman, mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1986 for his proof of the conjecture in four dimensions
1951 Paul Carrack, musician (Mike and the Mechanics, Squeeze)
1958 Andie MacDowell, actress (Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, Sex, Lies, and Videotape, Hudson Hawk, Groundhog Day, Four Weddings and a Funeral)
1959 Robert Smith, musician-songwriter (The Cure)
1963 John Cameron Mitchell, actor-screenwriter-director-producer (Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Girl 6)
1971 Michael Turner, comic book publisher and artist (Witchblade, Fathom)
1979 James McAvoy, actor (Children of Dune, State of Play, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Last King of Scotland, Becoming Jane, Atonement, Wanted)

DIED:
1910 Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), American humorist, satirist, lecturer and writer (The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer), dies at 74
1918 Baron Manfred von Richthofen, a fighter pilot known as “The Red Baron” who was the most successful flying ace of World War I being officially credited with 80 confirmed air combat victories, is killed in action at 25
1983 Walter Slezak, Tony Award-winning actor (Fanny, Lifeboat, The Princess and the Pirate, Bedtime for Bonzo), commits suicide at 80
1999 Charles ‘Buddy’ Rogers, actor (Wings, My Best Girl, Abie’s Irish Rose), dies at 94