April 17
It’s Blah, Blah, Blah Day and National Cheeseball Day
ON THIS DAY…
1397 Geoffrey Chaucer tells the Canterbury Tales for the first time at the court of Richard II
1521 Martin Luther was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church
1524 Giovanni da Verrazano reached present-day New York harbor
1629 Horses were first imported into the colonies by the American Massachusetts Bay Colony
1810 Pineapple cheese was patented by Lewis M. Norton
1844 The first US patent for a cylinder and flatbed combination printing press was issued to Robert Hoe
1850 In a confrontation presaging the Civil War, Mississippi Senator Henry Foote, a slaveholder, threatens Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton with a pistol in the Senate chamber during a debate about slavery
1865 Mary Surratt was arrested as a conspirator in the Lincoln assassination
1875 The game “snooker” was invented by Sir Neville Chamberlain
1907 Ellis Island immigration center processes 11,747 people, more than any other day
1924 Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures, and the Louis B. Mayer Company merge to form Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (or MGM)
1932 Destry Rides Again starring Tom Mix, Zasu Pitts and Tony the Horse opens in the US
1937 Daffy Duck debuted in Warner Bros.’ Porky’s Duck Hunt
1941 Yugoslavia surrendered to Germany in World War II
1953 Benny Goodman returned to Carnegie Hall after an absence of 15 years
1960 Eddie Cochran died in Bath, England, from severe brain injuries sustained in a car crash near Chippenham, Wiltshire; Gene Vincent was seriously injured in the accident
1961 About 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles launched the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in a failed attempt to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro
1964 The Rolling Stones’ debut album, “The Rolling Stones” was released in the UK
1964 The FBI lab reported that it could not determine the lyrics to “Louie, Louie”
1964 Ford Motor Co. unveiled the Mustang at the New York Worlds Fair
1964 Jerrie Mock of Columbus, Ohio, became the first woman to complete a solo airplane flight around the world
1969 In Los Angeles, Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of assassinating US Senator Robert F. Kennedy
1970 Apollo 13 splashed down safely in the Pacific, four days after a ruptured oxygen tank crippled their spacecraft
1973 Federal Express delivers its first package
1975 The Khmer Rouge captures the capital Phnom Penh and Cambodian government forces surrender
1981 Caveman starring Ringo Starr and Dennis Quaid opens in the US
1983 In Warsaw, police routed 1,000 Solidarity supporters
1989 In Poland, courts gave Solidarity legal status
1993 A federal jury in Los Angeles convicted two former police officers of violating the civil rights of beaten motorist Rodney King; two other officers were acquitted
1996 Erik and Lyle Menendez were sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing their parents
BORN:
1598 Giovanni Riccioli, astronomer who was the first to observe (1650) a double star (two stars so close together that they appear to be one) – Mizar in Ursa Major, the middle star in the handle of the Big Dipper
1853 William John McGee, geologist, hydrologist, archaeologist who was noted for his pioneer studies documenting the occurrence of waves of invasions and recessions of ice sheets in North America, thus establishing the complexity of the Great Ice Age
1866 Ernest Henry Starling, physiologist whose prolific contributions to a modern understanding of body functions include Starling’s hypothesis (in which he described the forces that propel fluids through blood vessels) and his discovery of how hormones and nerves control digestion
1874 Clarence Hungerford Mackay, communications executive and philanthropist who supervised the completion of the first transpacific cable between the United States and the Far East in 1904
1880 Sir Leonard Woolley, archaeologist who greatly advanced knowledge of ancient Mesopotamian civilization upon excavation of the ancient Sumerian city of Ur (in modern Iraq), the royal burial site of many Mesopotamian royalties
1894 Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and Chairman of the Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964
1899 Sir Vincent Wigglesworth, entomologist who pioneered in the study of insect physiology; he was particularly respected for his research into the role of hormones in insect growth, metamorphosis, and reproduction and for his insights into simple mechanisms, such as how insects walk upside down
1905 Arthur Lake, actor (28 Blondie movies, The Big Show-Off, The Ghost That Walks Alone)
1918 William Holden, Academy Award-winning actor (Stalag 17, Sunset Blvd., Network, Picnic, The Wild Bunch, The Bridge on the River Kwai)
1923 Lindsay Anderson, director (This Sporting Life, If…, O Lucky Man!, Britannia Hospital, The Whales of August)
1934 Don Kirshner, song publisher and rock producer who is best known for managing songwriting talent as well as successful pop groups such as The Monkees and The Archies
1940 Billy Fury, actor and the most successful artist in British chart history never to have had a #1 record (That’ll Be the Day, Play it Cool)
1951 Olivia Hussey, actress (Romeo and Juliet, Black Christmas, The Man with Bogart’s Face, Ivanhoe, It)
1957 Nick Hornby, novelist (About a Boy, High Fidelity, Fever Pitch)
1958 Sean Bean, actor (The Lord of the Rings, Sharpe, Troy, Equilibrium)
1965 William Mapother, actor and brother of Tom Cruise (Lost, Lords of Dogtown, The Grudge, Swordfish)
1972 Jennifer Garner, actress (Alias, Electra, Juno, Pearl Harbor, Dude, Where’s My Car?)
DIED:
1790 Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America he was also a leading author and printer, satirist, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, civic activist, statesman and diplomat; he invented the lightning rod, bifocals, the Franklin stove, a carriage odometer and helped establish institutions people now take for granted: a fire company (1736), a library (1731), an insurance company (1752), an academy (1751), and a hospital (1751), dies at 84
1942 Jean Perrin, physicist who, in his studies of the Brownian motion of minute particles suspended in liquids, verified Albert Einstein’s explanation of this phenomenon and thereby confirmed the atomic nature of matter, dies at 57
1960 Eddie Cochran, rock and roll musician and an important influence on popular music during the late 1950s, early 1960s, and beyond, dies at 21
1987 Dick Shawn, one-of-a-kind nightclub comedian/singer and actor (The Producers, Love at First Bite, It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World), dies on stage of a heart attack at 63
1991 Michael Pertwee, screenwriter, elder brother of Jon and uncle of Sean (Digby, the Biggest Dog in the World, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, The Mouse on the Moon), dies at 74
1996 Arnold Neustadter, inventor of the Rolodex, dies at 85
1998 Linda McCartney, photographer, musician, and animal rights activist, dies at 56
2007 Kitty Carlisle, singer, actress, TV panelist, and spokeswoman for the arts (To Tell the Truth, A Night at the Opera, Six Degrees of Separation), dies at 96