January 16
Today is
Nat'l Nothing Day in the U.S., "to provide Americans with one National day when they can just sit without celebrating, observing or honoring anything." [Good enough for me. It's day drinking and goofing off all day. Wait, that's what I do everyday! I'm a valueless lump (
you know who you are
), yay me!!
]
Also celebrated today in the U.S. is
Nat'l Religious Freedom Day.
Events
27 BC –
Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus is granted the title
Augustus by the Roman Senate, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire.
1362 – A
storm tide in the North Sea ravages the East coast of England and destroys the German city of
Rungholt on the island of Strand.
1412 – The
Medici family is appointed official banker of the
Papacy.
1547 – Ivan IV of Russia a.k.a.
Ivan the Terrible becomes Czar of Russia.
1605 – The first edition of
El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by
Miguel de Cervantes is published in Madrid, Spain.
1707 – The Scottish Parliament ratifies the
Act of Union, paving the way for the creation of Great Britain.
1786 – Virginia enacts the
Statute for Religious Freedom, authored by
Thomas Jefferson.
1847 –
John C. Frémont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.
1862 –
Hartley Colliery disaster: Two hundred and four men and boys killed in a mining disaster, prompted a change in UK law which henceforth required all collieries to have at least two independent means of escape.
1883 – The
Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the
United States Civil Service, is passed.
1909 –
Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the
magnetic South Pole.
1919 –
Temperance movement: The United States
ratifies the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, requiring
Prohibition in the United States one year after ratification.
1920 – The
League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, France.
1942 – Crash of
TWA Flight 3, killing all 22 aboard, including film star
Carole Lombard.
1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called
Führerbunker.
1964 –
Hello, Dolly! opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.
1969 – Soviet spacecraft
Soyuz 4 and
Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of manned spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a space walk.
1973 -
Bruce Springsteen appeared at
Villanova University, Philadelphia, to an audience of 25 people. Due to a strike at the time by Villanova's school newspaper The Villanovan, this concert went unadvertised, so this is probably the smallest crowd Bruce and
The E Street Band have ever played in front of.
1977 - One half of TV cop show "
Starsky & Hutch" (he was blonde Hutch),
David Soul went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with '
Don't Give Up On Us'. Also a No.1 in the US.
1979 – The
last Iranian Shah flees Iran with his family for good and relocates to Egypt.
1985 -
David Bowie's schizophrenic half-brother Terry Burnes killed himself after laying down on the railway lines at Coulsdon South station, London. He was killed instantly by a passing train. He was 47.
1988 -
Tina Turner gave herself a place in the record books when she performed in front of 182,000 people in Rio De Janeiro. The largest audience ever for a single artist.
1990 -
Ike Turner was convicted of driving under the influence of cocaine and being under the influence of cocaine [shocker, I know] and sentenced to a four year prison sentence in California.
1991 – Coalition Forces go to war with Iraq, beginning the
Gulf War.
1992 -
Eric Clapton recorded
his Unplugged session for MTV. The set, which included his current hit single '
Tears in Heaven' and a reworked acoustic version of '
Layla', earned six Grammy Awards for the album including Record of the Year.
1996 - Jamaican authorities opened fire on
Jimmy Buffett's seaplane,
The Hemisphere Dancer, mistaking it for a drug trafficker's plane.
U2 singer
Bono was also on the plane; neither singer was injured in the incident. The incident inspired Buffett to write a song called '
Jamaica Mistaica'.
2001 – US President Bill Clinton awards former President
Theodore Roosevelt a posthumous Medal of Honor for his service in the
Spanish–American War.
2003 – The
Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission
STS-107 which would be its final one.
Columbia would disintegrate 16 days later on re-entry.
2004 -
Michael Jackson appeared in court and pleaded not guilty to seven charges of child molestation. The singer, who arrived 21 minutes late, was told off by the Santa Barbara judge saying 'Mr. Jackson, you have started out on the wrong foot here, it is an insult to the court.'
Births
1821 – John C. Breckinridge (14th VPOTUS); 1878 – Harry Carey; 1900 – Edith Frank (Anne Frank's mother); 1901 – Frank Zamboni (yeah,
that Zamboni); 1908 – Ethel Merman♪ ♫; 1910 – Dizzy Dean; 1917 – Carl Karcher (founded Carl's Jr.); 1920 – Elliott Reid (
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes); 1932 – Dian Fossey; 1933 – Susan Sontag; 1934 – Bob Bogle♪ ♫(The Ventures); 1935 – A. J. Foyt
; 1936 – Michael White (producer
Monty Python And The Holy Grail); 1943 – Ronnie Milsap
; 1944 – Jim Stafford
; 1947 – Laura Schlessinger (
Dr. Laura); 1948 – John Carpenter (director, screenwriter, producer,
Halloween (1978), The Fog (1980), Escape from New York (1981), Starman, Assault on Precinct 13, Christine, Big Trouble in Little China); 1950 – Debbie Allen; 1950 – Robert Schimmel; 1959 – Sade♪ ♫; 1962 – Maxine Jones♪ ♫(En Vogue); 1965 - Jill Sobule♪ ♫(she kissed a girl); 1969 – Stevie Jackson♪ ♫(Belle & Sebastion); 1969 – Roy Jones Jr.
; 1971 –
Jonathan Mangum (white dude); 1974 – Kate Moss; 1979 – Aaliyah♪ ♫
Continued in next post