May 16
It’s Wear Purple for Peace Day and National Sea Monkey Day and National Bike to Work Day and Love a Tree Day
ON THIS DAY…
1532 Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro lands with a small band of soldiers on the northern coast of Peru
1532 Sir Thomas More resigns as Lord Chancellor of England
1568 Mary, Queen of Scots, flees to England just days after her defeat at Langside, Glasgow
1571 Johannes Kepler, by his own calculations, is conceived at 4:37AM
1763 The English lexicographer, author and wit Samuel Johnson first met his future biographer, James Boswell
1770 Marie Antoinette, at age 14, married the future King Louis XVI of France, who was 15
1791 James Boswells celebrated two-volume work, The Life of Samuel Johnson, was published
1791 Denmark becomes the first Western country to outlaw the slave trade
1836 27-year-old Edgar Allan Poe marries his 13-year-old cousin Virginia
1843 The first major wagon train heading for the Northwest sets out with one thousand pioneers from Elm Grove, MO on the Oregon Trail
1860 In Chicago, the Republican convention selected Abraham Lincoln as their presidential candidate
1861 Kentucky proclaimed its neutrality in the Civil War
1866 Charles Elmer Hires invented root beer
1868 President Andrew Johnson is acquitted during his impeachment trial, by one vote in the US Senate
1879 The Treaty of Gandamak between Russia and England set up the state of Afghanistan
1881 In Germany the first electric tram for the public started service
1886 The US Congress votes to replace the half-dime with a five-cent coin called the nickel
1888 Emile Berliner gave the first demonstration of flat disc recording and reproduction before the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, PA
1896 The US Supreme Court upheld the State of Louisiana Separate Car Act in Plessy vs. Ferguson; that decision allowed that as long as accommodation existed, segregation did not constitute discrimination, establishing the doctrine of “separate but equal”
1910 The US Congress authorizes the creation of the United States Bureau of Mines
1914 The American Horseshoe Pitchers Association (AHPA) was formed in Kansas City, KS
1918 The Sedition Act is passed by the US Congress, making criticism of the government a jailable offense
1920 Pope Benedict XV canonizes Joan of Arc as a saint
1927 The US Supreme Court ruled that bootleggers must pay income tax
1928 Walt Disney applies for a trademark for “Mickey Mouse,” for use in motion pictures
1929 The first Academy Awards are presented in Hollywood, CA
1931 The London United Tramways started London’s first trolleybus service; like trams, the trolleybus ran on electricity drawn from a “trolley” running along overhead lines
1939 The first US food stamps were issued
1943 “Skipping bombs” were used for the first and only time to breach three massive Ruhr Valley dams – the Eder, the Mohne and the Sorpe – that supplied water and hydroelectric power to Germany’s vital armament factories; the bombs were designed to bounce over anti-torpedo nets and explode at the base of the dams
1946The musical Annie Get Your Gun opened on Broadway starring Ethel Merman; the play closed in 1949 after 1,147 performances
1948 Chaim Weizmann is elected as the first President of Israel
1960 Theodore Maiman operates the first optical laser, at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, CA
1963 After 22 Earth orbits Gordon Cooper returned to Earth in Friendship Seven, ending Project Mercury
1965 Spaghetti-O’s were first sold in the US
1965 The musical The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd opened on Broadway
1967 The city of Jerusalem is returned to the nation of Israel
1971 US postage for a one-ounce first class stamp was increased from 6 to 8 cents
1975 Japanese mountaineer Junko Tabei becomes the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest
1985 Michael Jordan was named Rookie of the Year in the NBA
1988 US Surgeon General C. Everett Koop released a report declaring nicotine was addictive in ways similar to heroin and cocaine
1988 The US Supreme Court ruled that police can search discarded garbage without a search warrant
1991 Queen Elizabeth II became the first British monarch to address the US Congress
1992 The space shuttle Endeavour completed its maiden voyage with a safe landing in the California desert
1994 Scotland Yard for the first time approves a plan to allow some London police officers to openly carry firearms
1996 The US government announced a plan to pay debt-strapped home-owners up to 30% of their monthly mortgage payments thus easing the pressure on the countrys bleeding banks
1996 Chevron said it spilled as much as 17,000 gallons of oil into Pearl Harbor after a pipeline sprang a leak
1996 The US federal government set aside 3.9 million acres of land in California, Oregon and Washington state for the endangered marbled murrelet
1999 The 1956 Picasso painting, “Woman Nude Before Garden,” was slashed by a mental patient in Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum
2000 Veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas resigned from United Press International, a day after the wire service was sold to the parent firm of The Washington Times
2001 Former FBI agent Robert Hanssen was indicted on charges of spying for Moscow; Hanssen later pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage and was sentenced to life in prison without parole
2002 Pakistani police unearth remains of Daniel Pearl, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal newspaper, who was kidnapped in January and whose execution was recorded on a videotape
2005 A US Senate report detailing alleged misuse of the program said almost one third of the oil allocations granted under the United Nations’ 1996 to 2003 Iraqi Oil-for-Food program went to Russian parties or individuals
2005 The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that wine lovers may buy directly from out-of-state vineyards if those states allow direct shipments from in-state wineries
2005 Army Specialist Sabrina Harman was convicted at Fort Hood, Texas, of six of the seven charges she faced for her role in the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib; she was sentenced to six months in prison after testimony about her acts of kindness toward Iraqis before she became an Abu Ghraib guard
2005 The Kuwait Parliament extended political rights to women, but religious fundamentalists who opposed women’s suffrage succeeded in attaching a clause requiring future female politicians and voters to abide by Islamic law
2005 Sony Corp. unveiled three styles of its new PlayStation 3 video game machine
BORN:
1578 Sir Everard Digby, one of those involved in the abortive 1605 Gunpowder Plot to assassinate King James I of England and VI of Scotland and Members of the Parliament of England
1718 Maria Gaetana Agnesi, mathematician and philosopher who was the first woman in the Western world considered to be a mathematician
1763 Nicolas-Louis Vauquelin, chemist who discovered the elements chromium and beryllium
1801 William Henry Seward, 12th Governor of New York, Senator from New York and 24th US Secretary of State whose most famous achievement was buying Alaska at 2¢ an acre
1850 Johannes von Mikulicz-Radecki, surgeon whose innovations in operative technique for a wide variety of diseases helped develop modern surgery
1861 Irving Wightman Colburn, inventor and manufacturer whose process for fabricating continuous sheets of flat glass made the mass production of glass for windows possible
1905 Henry Fonda, Academy Award-winning actor (On Golden Pond, 12 Angry Men, The Grapes of Wrath, A Big Hand for the Little Lady, The Swarm)
1906 Margret Rey, co-author and illustrator of children’s books, the most famous of which are the Curious George series
1909 Margaret Sullavan, actress (Three Comrades, The Shop Around the Corner, The Shopworn Angel)
1913 Woody Herman, jazz clarinetist, alto and soprano saxophonist, singer, and big band leader
1916 Adriana Caselotti, actress-singer best remembered for her role of Snow White in Walt Disney’s first animated feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
1919 Liberace (Wladziu Valentino Liberace), entertainer and pianist
1921 Harry Carey Jr., character actor (Red River, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, Mister Roberts, The Rare Breed, Gremlins, Tombstone)
1928 Billy Martin, second baseman (1950-1961) and manager (1969-1988) in Major League Baseball who is best known as the manager of the New York Yankees, a position he held five different times
1934 Roy Kerr, mathematician who solved Einstein’s field equations of general relativity to describe rotating black holes, thus providing a major contribution to the field of astrophysics
1937 Yvonne Craig, actress (Batman, Mars Needs Women, It Happened at the World’s Fair, Gidget)
1946 Robert Fripp, guitarist, composer and a record producer, perhaps best known for being the guitarist for, and only constant member of King Crimson
1953 Pierce Brosnan, actor (Remington Steele, 5 James Bond films, Mars Attacks!, The Mirror Has Two Faces, Taffin)
1955 Olga Korbut, gymnast who won four gold medals and two silver medals at the Summer Olympics, in which she competed in 1972 and 1976 for the USSR team
1955 Hazel O’Connor, singer-songwriter and actress (Breaking Glass)
1955 Debra Winger, actress (Wonder Woman, Thank God It’s Friday, An Officer and a Gentleman, Terms of Endearment)
1959 Mare Winningham, two-time Emmy Award-winning actress (George Wallace, Amber Waves, Grey’s Anatomy, Turner & Hooch)
1961 Kevin McDonald, comedian-actor-writer (The Kids in the Hall, Lilo & Stitch, Epic Movie, Sky High, Galaxy Quest)
1965 Krist Novoselic, musician (Nirvana)
1966 Janet Jackson, singer-songwriter, record producer, dancer, and actress
1971 David Boreanaz, actor (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Bones, The Crow: Wicked Prayer, Mr. Fix It)
1973 Tori Spelling, “actress” (Beverly Hills, 90210, The House of Yes, Scream 2)
1986 Megan Fox, actress (Hope & Faith, Transformers, Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen)
DIED:
1703 Charles Perrault, author who laid foundations for a new literary genre, the fairy tale, and whose best known tales include Le Petit Chaperon rouge (Little Red Riding Hood), La Belle au bois dormant (Sleeping Beauty), Le Maître chat ou le Chat botté (Puss in Boots), Cendrillon ou la petite pantoufle de vair (Cinderella), La Barbe bleue (Bluebeard); Perrault’s most famous stories are still in print today and have been made into operas, ballets, plays, musicals, and films, both live-action and animation, dies at 75
1741 Jakob Chrisophe Le Blon, painter and engraver who invented the modern system of four-color printing, dies at 74
1845 Charles Chubb, inventor and entrepreneur, founder of the locksmith firm of Chubb & Son (now Chubb & Son PLC), which in the 20th century became a major corporation manufacturing and distributing locks, safes, alarms, fire extinguishers, security systems, surveillance equipment, and other products, dies at 66
1938 Joseph B. Strauss, civil engineer who was chief engineer for the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, dies at 68
1942 Bronislaw Malinowski, anthropologist one of the most important anthropologists of the 20th century who is widely recognized as the founder of social anthropology and principally associated with field studies of the peoples of Oceania, dies at 58
1947 Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, biochemist, who received (with Christiaan Eijkman) the 1929 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for discovery of essential nutrient factors, now known as vitamins, needed in animal diets to maintain health, dies at 85
1953 Django Reinhardt, one of the first prominent jazz musicians to be born in Europe, and one of the most renowned jazz guitarists of all time, dies at 43
1955 James Agee, screenwriter, journalist, poet, film critic and Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist (A Death in the Family, The African Queen, The Night of the Hunter), dies at 45
1956 H. B. Reese, inventor of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and founder of the H.B. Reese Candy Company, dies at 76
1957 Eliot Ness, Prohibition agent, famous for his efforts to enforce Prohibition in Chicago, IL as the leader of a legendary team of law enforcement agents nicknamed The Untouchables, dies at 54
1984 Andy Kaufman, comedic actor (Taxi, Heartbeeps, In God We Tru$t), dies of lung cancer at 35
1984 Irwin Shaw, playwright, screenwriter and novelist who was also a highly regarded short story author (Talk of the Town, Rich Man, Poor Man, Top of the Hill), dies at 71
1985 Margaret Hamilton, actress (The Wizard of Oz, A Slight Case of Murder, My Little Chickadee, Brewster McCloud), dies at 82
1990 Sammy Davis Jr., entertainer who could do it all – sing, dance, act, play multiple instruments, do impersonations, dies at 64
1990 Jim Henson, multiple Emmy Award-winning producer, director and performer (Muppet Babies, Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, The Jim Henson Hour), dies at 53
1994 Alfred Nier was a physicist who refined the mass spectrometric process to distinguish isotopes, dies at 82
1995 Raymond Arthur Lyttleton, mathematician and theoretical astronomer who researched stellar evolution and composition, dies at 84
1996 US Navy Admiral Jeremy “Mike” Boorda, the 25th Chief of Naval Operations who is celebrated for being the only CNO to have risen to the position from the enlisted ranks dies of an allegedly self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest at 56
2000 Bodacious the Bull, a crossbred Charbray bull who was infamous throughout the sport of rodeo, and was commonly referred to as The Worlds Most Dangerous Bull with only ten rides (by six different cowboys) completed on this bull in 135 attempts, dies at 12
2002 David Berg, Mad Magazine artist who began his The Lighter Side of comic strips for Mad Magazine in 1961 and continued for 365 subsequent issues, dies at 81