Today In History
Historical Events
1891 – People’s Bath, the first public bathhouse with showers, opens in New York City
1948 – Alger Hiss denies ever being a Communist agent
1964 – Boycott scores his first Test cricket century: 113 against Australia at The Oval
1989 – Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken plays in his 1,208th consecutive game and moves to 3rd place all-time behind NY Yankees’ Lou Gehrig and Boston Red Sox/NY Yankees’ Everett Scott
2008 – China wins its 33rd gold medal of the Beijing Olympics by defeating Singapore in the table tennis women’s team event, achieving its most successful Olympiad ever by winning all 10 singles and all 5 doubles matches
Famous Birthdays
1904 – Leopold Nowak, Austrian musicologist (International Bruckner Society; Mozart’s Requiem), and educator (Vienna University, 1932-73), born in Vienna, Austria (d. 1991)
1929 – Francis Gary Powers, American spy captured by the USSR after his U-2 spy was shot plane in 1959, born in Jenkins, Kentucky (d. 1977)
1955 – Kevin Welch, American country songwriter (“True Love Never Dies”), born in Long Beach, California
1960 – Johnny Bumphus, American boxer (WBA super lightweight title 1984), born in Tacoma, Washington (d. 2020)
1993 – Ederson [de Moraes], Brazilian football goalkeeper (Manchester City, Brazil), born in Osasco, Brazil
Famous Deaths
1785 – Jonathan Trumbull, American politician and statesman during the American Revolutionary wars, Governor of Connecticut (1769-84), dies at 74
1887 – Franz Commer, German composer, dies at 74
1914 – James Grierson, British general, dies of an aneurism at 55
1987 – Rudolf Hess, German Nazi official (Deputy Fuhrer who dramatically escaped to Britain in 1941, sentenced to life in Spandau Prison), commits suicide at 93
2014 – Caterina De Nave, New Zealand television producer (Shortland Street), dies of leukaemia at 67
Historical Events
1908 – Projection in Paris of the first animated cartoon, “Fantasmagorie,” created by Émile Cohl
1918 – Turkish troops overthrow Caucasus
1933 – MLB player Lou Gehrig plays his record 1,308th consecutive game
1944 – German field marshal Walter Model replaces Günther von Kluge in Normandy
1951 – Hurricane winds drive six ships ashore in Kingston, Jamaica
1959 – Columbia Records releases “Kind of Blue,” a studio album by American jazz trumpeter and composer Miles Davis, leading a sextet featuring saxophonist John Coltrane and pianist Bill Evans; the work is widely considered a masterpiece and is one of the most influential and best-selling albums of Davis’ long career
1978 – First successful crossing of the Atlantic by balloon is completed by Americans Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson, and Larry Newman aboard Double Eagle II
1986 – Rioting occurs at a DMC concert at the Long Beach Convention Center in California; 40 people are injured
Famous Birthdays
1876 – Eric Drummond, British politician and diplomat, 1st Secretary-General of League of Nations (1919-33), born in Fulford, England (d. 1951)
1885 – Kurt Hiller, German writer, born in Berlin (d. 1972)
1885 – Clara [G Meijer-] Wichmann, German anarchist and feminist (Wife and society), born in Hamburg, Germany (d. 1922)
1917 – Safa Khulusi, Iraqi writer and historian, born in Baghdad (d. 1995)
1920 – Maureen O’Hara [FitzSimons], Irish-American actress (Miracle on 34th Street; The Quiet Man; Only The Lonely), and singer, born in Ranelagh, County Dublin, Ireland (d. 2015)
1923 – Chaleo Yoovidhya, Thai co-creator of Red Bull energy drink, born in Phichit, Thailand (d. 2012)
1926 – Hakon Barfod, Norwegian sailor (Olympic gold 1948, 52), born in Oslo, Norway (d. 2013)
1933 – Kenny Sears, American NBA player (NY Knicks), born in Watsonville, California (d. 2017)
1951 – Robert Joy, Canadian actor (Big Shots, CSI), born in Montreal, Quebec
1969 – Christian Laettner, American NBA forward/center (Atlanta Hawks, Olympic gold 1992), born in Angola, New York
Famous Deaths
1777 – Giuseppe Scarlatti, Italian composer, dies at 54
1786 – Frederick the Great, King of Prussia (1740-86), dies at 74
1834 – Husein Gradaščević, Bosniak general, dies at 31
1914 – James Grierson, British general, dies of an aneurism at 55
1935 – Charlotte Perkins Gilman, American feminist, writer and lecturer for social reform, dies at 75
1961 – Carlos Salzedo, French-American piano prodigy, harpist, composer, educator (Curtis Institue; Juilliard), and new music advocate (co-founder of International Composers’ Guild), dies at 76
1979 – Vivian Vance [Jones], American stage and screen actress (I Love Lucy – “Ethel Mertz”; The Lucy Show – “Viv”), dies of cancer at 70
1987 – Charles Drummond de Andrade, Brazilian poet (Claro Enigma), dies at 84
2025 – Sheila R. Canby, American historian and curator of Islamic art (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2009-19), dies of complications of cancer at 76
2025 – Joe Hickerson, American folk music singer and archivist (Director of the Library of Congress American Folklife Center, 1963-98), dies at 89