Special Election Edition
1 All Saints Day
1871 Stephen Crane; 1942 Larry Flynt, Marcia Wallace; 1944 Keith Emerson; 1960 Fernando Valenzuela, 1960 Lyle Lovett.
• 1959: First NHL goalie to wear a hockey mask; his post pro-sports career as a chainsaw wielding maniac surprises few.
• 1971: Eisenhower dollar coin introduced; some blame it for sparking renewed interest in the 1950s and saddling us with Grease, Happy Days and Sha-Na-Na.
• 1989: Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) bans smoking on many flights; and you thought Swedes were depressed before!
2 1734 Daniel Boone; 1755 Marie Antoinette; 1906 Luchino Visconti; 1913 Burt Lancaster; 1914 Ray Walston; 1938 Patrick Buchanan; 1942 Shere Hite, Stefanie Powers; 1961 k.d. lang.
• 1947: Howard Hughes' "Spruce Goose" flies for first and only time.
• 1948: Dewey Defeats Truman!; no, wait.
• 1954: Strom Thurmond becomes the first senator elected by a (surprise) write-in vote; the surprise is that no one realized his supporters could write.
3 1922 Charles Bronson; 1933 Michael S. Dukakis; 1948 Lulu; 1949 Larry Holmes; 1952 Roseanne Barr; 1953 Dennis Miller; 1954 Adam Ant; 1959 Dolph Lundgren.
• 1868: Ulysses S. Grant wins presidential election over Horatio Seymour.
• 1896: William McKinley defeats William Jennings Bryan for President.
• 1900: First national automobile show opens at Madison Square Garden; also first instance of show-goer asking spokesmodel if she comes with the car.
• 1908: William Howard Taft defeats William Jennings Bryan for the presidency.
• 1936: Incumbent president Franklin Delano Roosevelt wins landslide victory over Alf Landon; Landon later gets his own TV show in which he plays a loveable alien puppet.
• 1988: Geraldo Rivera's nose is broken in a brawl with skinheads at a taping of his TV show.
1992: Bill Clinton elected U.S. President, defeating VP George H.W. Bush.
4 1879 Will Rogers; 1916 Walter Cronkite; 1918 Art Carney; 1962 Ralph Macchio.
• 1879: James & John Ritty patent the first cash register; ka-ching!
• 1952: Eisenhower elected President, beating Adlai Stevenson.
• 1954: Philadelphia A's move to Kansas City.
• 1980: Ronald Reagan is elected president by a landslide over incumbent Jimmy Carter.
5 1911 Roy Rogers; 1913 Vivien Leigh; 1931 Ike Turner; 1942 Art Garfunkel; 1943 Sam Shepard; 1947 Peter Noone; 1952 Bill Walton; 1963 Tatum O'Neal
• 1872: Susan B. Anthony fined $100 for trying to vote for Ulysses S. Grant; "$100!?!" she laughs, "He paid way more than that for my vote!"
• 1912: Woodrow Wilson beats ex-president Theodore Roosevelt and incumbent president William Howard Taft.
• 1940: FDR wins an unprecedented third term as president, beating Wendell Willkie.
• 1946: John F. Kennedy is elected to House of Representatives
• 1968: Richard Nixon beats sitting vice president Hubert Humphrey and "independent" George Wallace for the Presidency.
6 1854 John Phillip Sousa; 1931 Mike Nichols; 1946 Sally Field; 1948 Glenn Frey; 1970 Ethan Hawke.
• 1860: Abraham Lincoln elected president.
• 1861: Jefferson Davis is elected to a six-year term as President of the Confederate States of America.
• 1888: Benjamin Harrison beats incumbent President Grover Cleveland, 233 electoral votes to 168, although Cleveland received more popular votes.
• 1900: President William McKinley is re-elected, beating William Jennings Bryan; who must be kind of expecting it by now.
• 1906: Charles Evans Hughes elected Governor of New York over William Randolph Hearst; Charles Foster Kane is a distant third.
• 1928: Herbert Hoover beats Alfred E. Smith for the presidency.
• 1956: President Eisenhower re-elected, defeating Adlai Stevenson.
• 1962: Edward M. Kennedy is first elected Senator; drinks on him!
1984: President Reagan wins re-election in a landslide Walter Mondale.
7 1879 Leon Trotsky; 1913 Albert Camus; 1918 Billy Graham; 1922 Al Hirt; 1926 Joan Sutherland; 1943 Joni Mitchell; 1949 Judy Tenuda.
• 1805: Lewis & Clark reach Pacific Ocean; upon first sighting the pounding surf, they exclaim, "Dude, this is like totally awesome! You packed the boogie boards, right?"
• 1874: Cartoonist Thomas Nast first depicts elephant as Republican Party symbol.
• 1876: Presidential candidates Rutherford B. Hayes and Samuel Tilden both claim victory; it finally goes to Hayes because he has a middle initial.
• 1916: Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes first woman Representative.
• 1916: Woodrow Wilson re-elected President.
• 1929: New York's Museum of Modern Art opens; visitors agree that, "What this place really needs is a ridiculously tall, post-modern apartment tower above it."
• 1944: FDR wins fourth term as president, defeating Thomas E. Dewey.
• 1962: Richard Nixon "quits" politics after losing the race for governor of California, promising, "You won't have Nixon to kick around, anymore."
• 1967: LBJ signs a bill establishing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting; just in case somebody still wants to kick around Richard Nixon.
• 1972: Nixon is re-elected, defeating George McGovern.
• 1982: Liz Taylor's 7th divorce (John Warner R-VA)
8 1900 Margaret Mitchell; 1927 Patti Page; 1931 Morley Safer; 1947 Minnie Ripperton; 1949 Bonnie Raitt; 1954 Rickie Lee Jones.
• 1864: Abraham Lincoln elected to second term as President.
• 1892: Grover Cleveland elected President.
• 1904: President Theodore Roosevelt defeats Alton B. Parker.
• 1932: Franklin Delano Roosevelt elected President for first time.
• 1960: John F. Kennedy (narrowly) beats Richard Nixon and, in all probability, William Jennings Bryan.
• 1966: Ronald Reagan elected governor of California.
• 1988: George H.W. Bush beats Mike Dukakis for President.
9 1913 Hedy Lamarr; 1915 Sargent Shriver; 1918 Spiro Agnew; 1932 Carl Perkins; 1934 Carl Sagan; 1951 Lou Ferrigno.
• 1799: Napoleon becomes First Consul (i.e., dictator) of France.
• 1989: East Berlin opens its borders.
10 1483 Martin Luther; 1697 William Hogarth; 1889 Claude Rains; 1925 Richard Burton; 1935 Roy Scheider; 1956 Sinbad; 1959 MacKenzie Phillips.
• 1969: Sesame Street premieres.
• 1674: Dutch formally cede (at gunpoint) New Netherlands (New York) to the English.
• 1928: Hirohito enthroned as Emperor of Japan.
11 Veterans Day
1821 Fyodor Dostoyevsky; 1885 George S. Patton; 1896 Charles "Lucky" Luciano; 1904 Alger Hiss; 1922 Kurt Vonnegut Jr.; 1925 Jonathan Winters; 1962 Demi Moore; 1974 Leonardo DiCaprio.
• 1860: First Jewish wedding in Buenos Aires, Argentina; mazel tov! [in Spanish]
• 1921: President Warren G. Harding dedicates Tomb of Unknown Soldier; some believe the soldier isn't unknown but that Harding just forgot his name during the speech.
12 1840 Auguste Rodin; 1903 Jack Oakie; 1908 Harry Blackmun; 1922 Kim Hunter; 1929 Grace Kelly; 1934 Charles Manson; 1945 Al Michaels, Neil Young; 1961 Nadia Comaneci.
• 1910: First Movie stunt: man jumps into Hudson river from a burning balloon.
• 1933: First known photo of Loch Ness monster (or whatever) is taken (or fabricated, manufactured or something).
13 1850 Robert Louis Stevenson; 1947 Joe Mantegna; 1949 Whoopi Goldberg.
• 1789: Ben Franklin writes "Nothing is certain but death & taxes"; he dies the following April 17th, having deliberately filed his taxes a day late and a dollar short.
• 1969: Vice President Spiro Agnew accuses network TV news of bias & distortion; he believed news cameras make him "look fat."
• 1970: Spiro Agnew calls TV executives "impudent snobs"; hard to argue with, yes, but coming from him, not so powerful.
• 1979: Ronald Reagan announces his candidacy for President.
• 1982: Vietnam War Memorial dedicated in Washington, D.C.
14 1765 Robert Fulton; 1840 Claude Monet; 1861 Frederick Jackson Turner; 1900 Aaron Copland; 1909 Joseph McCarthy; 1919 Veronica Lake; 1929 McLean Stevenson; 1939 Wendy (née Walter) Carlos; 1948 Prince Charles.
• 1851: Moby Dick, by Herman Melville, published.
• 1889: Intrepid reporter Nellie Bly begins 72 day round-the-world trip.
• 1935: FDR proclaims the Philippine Islands a free commonwealth; a few years later, the Japanese proclaim otherwise.
15 1887 Georgia O'Keeffe; 1891 Erwin Rommel; 1929 Edward Asner; 1932 Petula Clark; 1940 Sam Waterston.
• 1806: By a remarkable coincidence, the first explorer to see Pike's Peak is Zebulon Pike.
• 1864: First U.S. mines school opens in basement of Columbia University; incoming freshmen's first class assignment, dig a basement under Columbia University.
• 1864: Sherman burns Atlanta; Lincoln sends congratulatory telegram, "Well done."
16 1889 George S. Kaufman; 1904 Eddie Condon; 1908 Burgess Meredith; 1916 Daws Butler; 1928 Clu Gulager; 1935 Elizabeth Drew; 1964 Dwight Gooden; 1970 Martha Plimpton.
• 1532: Pizarro seizes Incan emperor Atahualpa after victory at Cajamarca.
• 1776: Hessians capture Fort Washington, in Upper Manhattan; they are driven out only in 1987 by skyrocketing real estate prices.
17 1901 Lee Strasberg; 1904 Isamu Noguchi; 1925 Rock Hudson; 1930 Bob Mathias; 1937 Peter Cook; 1938 Gordon Lightfoot; 1942 Martin Scorsese; 1943 Lauren Hutton; 1944 Danny De Vito, Tom Seaver.
• 1869: Suez Canal opens.
• 1913: Panama Canal opens.
• 1973: President Nixon claims, "I'm not a crook."
18 1789 Louis-Jacques-Mande Daguerre; 1901 George Gallup; 1908 Imogene Coca; 1909 Johnny Mercer; 1923 Alan Shepard Jr., Ted Stevens; 1939 Brenda Vaccaro; 1941 David Hemmings; 1950 Graham Parker, Elizabeth Perkins; 1974 Chlöe Sevigny.
• 1865: Mark Twain publishes Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.
• 1980: Heaven's Gate premieres.
19 1831 James A. Garfield; 1905 Tommy Dorsey; 1917 Indira Gandhi; 1926 Jeane J. Kirkpatrick; 1933 Larry King; 1936 Dick Cavett; 1938 Ted Turner; 1939 Garrick Utley; 1941 Dan Haggerty; 1942 Calvin Klein; 1961 Meg Ryan; 1962 Jodie Foster.
• 1863: Lincoln delivers The Gettysburg Address.
• 1959: Ford cancels the Edsel.
20 1889 Edwin Hubble; 1900 Chester Gould; 1908 Alistair Cooke; 1917 Robert Byrd; 1923 Nadine Gordimer; 1925 Robert F. Kennedy; 1929 Dick Clark; 1932 Richard Dawson; 1939 Dick Smothers; 1940 Bob Einstein; 1942 Joseph Biden Jr.; 1946 Duane Allman; 1947 Joe Walsh; 1956 Bo Derek.
• 1888: William Bundy patents the timecard clock; making going to work a bigger drag than it already was.
21 1694 Voltaire; 1898 Rene Magritte; 1937 Marlo Thomas; 1945 Goldie Hawn; 1965 Björk.
• 1871: Moses Gale patents a cigar lighter.
• 1946: Harry Truman becomes first U.S. President to travel in a submerged submarine.
22 1890 Charles de Gaulle; 1898 Wiley Post; 1899 Hoagy Carmichael; 1921 Rodney Dangerfield; 1932 Robert Vaughn; 1940 Terry Gilliam; 1958 Jamie Lee Curtis; 1961 Mariel Hemingway.
• 1842: Mount St. Helens in Washington, erupts.
• 1906: International Radio Telecommunications Commission adopts "SOS" as call for help.
• 1963: JFK assassinated.
• 1977: Regular Concorde passenger service between NY & Europe takes off.
23 1859 Billy the Kid; 1887 Boris Karloff; 1888 Harpo Marx; 1945 Steve Landesberg.
• 1903: Enrico Caruso's U.S. debut.
• 1936: First issue of Life magazine.
24 1713 Father Junipero Serra; 1784 Zachary Taylor; 1864 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec; 1868 Scott Joplin; 1888 Dale Carnegie; 1925 William F. Buckley Jr.; 1942 Billy Connolly.
• 1947: Un-American Activities Committee finds "Hollywood 10" in contempt of congress because of their refusal to reveal whether they were communists; they are further miffed when the stars also refuse to give them autographs or be photographed with them.
• 1971: "DB" Cooper parachutes from a Northwest AL 727 with $200,000.
25 1914 Joe DiMaggio; 1920 Ricardo Montalban; 1935 Gloria Steinem; 1947 John Larroquette.
1960 Amy Grant, John F. Kennedy Jr.
• 1864: Confederate plot to burn down Manhattan fails when New Yorkers won't let would-be arsonist "borrow" a light.
26 1912 Eugene Ionesco; 1922 Charles M. Schulz; 1925 Linda Hunt; 1933 Robert Goulet; 1938 Rich Little, Tina Turner; 1945 John McVie.
• 1865: Alice in Wonderland published.
• 1973: President Nixon's personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, tells a federal court she accidentally caused part of 18-minute gap in a key Watergate tape.
27 1701 Anders Celsius; 1917 "Buffalo" Bob Smith; 1937 Gail Sheehy; 1940 Bruce Lee; 1941 Eddie Rabbitt; 1942 Jimi Hendrix.
• 1870: New York Times dubs baseball "The National Game"; rival New York Post accuses Times of being "in the tank" for baseball.
• 1895: Alfred Nobel establishes Nobel Prize; forcing Joseph Pulitzer to rename his prize after himself.
• 1970: George Harrison releases three-album set "All Things Must Pass"; a remarkable achievement that convinces other musicians that three at once is a couple too many.
28 1757 William Blake; 1936 Gary Hart; 1943 Randy Newman; 1949 Paul Shaffer; 1950 Ed Harris.
• 1948: Hopalong Cassidy premieres on TV.
29 1832 Louisa May Alcott; 1927 Vin Scully; 1933 John Mayall; 1944 Felix Cavaliere; 1949 Garry Shandling.
• 1961: Mercury rocket carries Enos the chimp into orbit; weeks later the first human astronaut slips on a leftover banana peel.
30 1667 Jonathan Swift; 1810 Oliver Winchester; 1835 Mark Twain; 1874 Sir Winston Churchill; 1912 Gordon Parks; 1923 Efrem Zimbalist Jr.; 1930 G. Gordon Liddy; 1931 Davey Jones; 1936 Abbie Hoffman; 1937 Paul Stookey; 1947 David Mamet; 1952 Mandy Patinkin; 1955 Billy Idol; 1962 Bo Jackson.
• 1907: Pike Place Market opens in Seattle.
• 1981: Porn star John Holmes is caught while a fugitive; the arresting officer refuses to say how he recognized him.