» » This day from the past, December 9th, is the 343rd day of the year (344th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 22 days remaining until the end of the year. → 1608 - John Milton born, (poet: Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, Samson Agonistes; civil rights activist; dies Nov 8, 1674). → 1755 - First post office in Canada opens in Halifax, mainly for military communications, along with subsidized direct mail to Great Britain and New York by ship; in 1788, regular mail packets begin from Halifax; origin of Cunard Line. → 1757 - Famine in New France causes the inhabitants to butcher their horses; due to a poor harvest and the thievery of Intendant François Bigot, Québec, Québec. → 1775 - American Revolutionary War: British troops lose the Battle of Great Bridge, and leave Virginia soon afterward. → 1783 - The first executions at London’s Newgate Prison took place. → 1788 - George Washington sold his race horse, ‘Magnolia’, to Colonel Henry Lee. Washington reportedly got 5,000 acres of Kentucky farmland in the trade. → 1793 - The first daily newspaper in New York City was founded by Noah Webster. The American Minerva was published for the first time this day. How long Webster stayed awake at night to come up with Minerva is anyone’s guess. → 1835 - San Antonio is captured by The Republic of Texas. → 1848 - Joel Chandler Harris born, (author: Uncle Remus and Brer Rabbit stories; dies Jul 3, 1908). → 1851 - First Young Mens Christian Association in North America (Montréal). → 1854 - The Charge of the Light Brigade by Alfred Lord Tennyson is published. On this day, The Examiner prints Alfred Lord Tennysons poem The Charge of the Light Brigade, which commemorates the courage of 600 British soldiers charging a heavily defended position during the Battle of Balaklava, in the Crimea, just six weeks earlier. Tennyson had been named poet laureate in 1850 by Queen Victoria. → 1875 - The Massachusetts Rifle Association, Americas Oldest Active Gun Club, is founded. → 1879 - First automatic telephone switching system patented. → 1884 - Levant Richardson of Chicago, IL received his patent for the ball- bearing roller skate. His teeth chattered all the way to the post office box, downtown. The pavement was kind of rough on those early skates... → 1886 - Clarence Birdseye born, (inventor: process to deep-freeze foods; one of the founders of General Foods Corp.; dies Oct 8, 1956). → 1888 - Herman Hollerith, inventor of one of the first computing devices and precursor to IBM, installs a computing device at the US War Department. → 1897 - Hermione Gingold born, English-American actress and singer (d. 1987). → 1898 - Emmett Kelly born, (clown: Ringling Bros.: hobo, Weary Willie; dies Mar 28, 1979). → 1902 - Margaret Hamilton (actress: The Wizard of Oz, The Anderson Tapes, Brewster McCloud; Maxwell House commercials; dies May 16, 1985). → 1907 - The U.S. Post Office in Wilmington, Delaware offered Christmas Seals for sale for the very first time. Contributions for the original seals, designed by Emily P. Bissell, helped in the fight against tuberculosis. A hospital in Wilmington is named in honor of Bissell. → 1909 - Douglas Fairbanks Jr. born, (actor: Ghost Story, Gunga Din, The Prisoner of Zenda, Accused, Catherine the Great, Scarlet Dawn; TV host: Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Presents; dies May 7, 2000). → 1910 - Explosion rocks West Canadian Collieries Bellevue coal mine at 1900 hrs; 30 miners die, Bellevue, Alberta. → 1910 - British author Rudyard Kipling writes a letter to encourage the people of Medicine Hat to keep their citys colorful name, Medicine Hat, Alberta. → 1911 - A mine explosion near Briceville, Tennessee, kills 84 miners despite rescue efforts led by the United States Bureau of Mines. → 1911 - (William) Broderick Crawford born, (actor: Ransom Money, Dark Forces, The Oscar, Last of the Comanche’s, Born Yesterday, All the King’s Men, Highway Patrol, King of Diamonds, The Interns; dies Apr 26, 1986). → 1916 - Kirk Douglas (Isadore Demsky/Issur Danielovitch) born, (actor: Greedy, The Secret, Oscar, Queenie, Tough Guys, The Final Countdown, The Chosen, A Gunfight, There was a Crooked Man, The Arrangement, The Brotherhood, In Harm’s Way, Seven Days in May, Spartacus, Lonely are the Brave, Paths of Glory, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Lust for Life, Ulysses, Young Man with a Horn, Champion, The Bad and the Beautiful; father of actor Mike Douglas). → 1917 - World War I - Jerusalem surrenders to British troops. On the morning of this day in 1917, after Turkish troops move out of the region after only a single day s fighting, officials of the Holy City of Jerusalem offer the keys to the city to encroaching British troops. → 1922 - Redd Foxx (John Elroy Sanford) born, (comedian: Sanford and Son, The Royal Family, Redd Foxx, The Redd Foxx Show, Harlem Nights, Norman, Is that You?, Cotton Comes to Harlem; dies Oct 11, 1991). → 1924 - WRIGLEYS gum was trademark registered. → 1926 - The U.S. Golf Association legalized steel-shaft golf clubs. Many of the new clubs are still wrapped around tree trunks, put there by angry golfers who couldn’t make them work any better than the clubs made with hickory sticks. → 1928 - Dick Van Patten born, (actor: Eight is Enough, When Things Were Rotten, WIOU, The Partners, The New Dick Van Dyke Show, Mama, A Dangerous Place, Spaceballs, Westworld, Superdad, Son of Blob). → 1934 - Because of ground conditions, the New York Giants football team preferred to wear basketball sneakers, as they defeated the Chicago Bears, 30-13, for the NFL championship. → 1940 - The Longines Watch Company signed for the first FM radio advertising contract -- with experimental station W2XOR in New York City. The ads ran for 26 weeks and promoted the Longines time signals. → 1940 - World War II: Operation Compass – British and Indian troops under the command of Major-General Richard OConnor attack Italian forces near Sidi Barrani in Egypt. → 1941 - World War II: The Republic of China, Cuba, Guatemala, and the Philippine Commonwealth, declare war on Germany and Japan. → 1941 - World War II: The American 19th Bombardment Group attacks Japanese ships off the coast of Vigan, Luzon. → 1941 - World War II - British Special Operations Executive (SOE) opens Camp-X (STS - Special Training School - 103) as a special school for spies and special operatives, mostly Canadians or Americans; SOE also operates Hydra station, to handle top-secret British transatlantic radio intelligence; closes in 1943; James Bond author Ian Fleming was one of the graduates, Whitby, Ontario. → 1943 - World War II - Canadian troops cross Moro River; push through San Leonardo towards Ortona; open bloody new campaign, Moro River, Italy. → 1946 - The Subsequent Nuremberg trials begin with the Doctors trial, prosecuting physicians and officers alleged to be involved in Nazi human experimentation and mass murder under the guise of euthanasia. → 1953 - Frank Sinatra recorded Young at Heart. The song was turned down by Nat ‘King’ Cole and other artists, believe it or not. It became a top hit in the U.S. in March of 1954. → 1953 - Montréal Canadiens (with 106) and Toronto Maple Leafs (with 98) amass 204 penalty minutes in an NHL game, Montréal, Quebec. → 1953 - Red Scare: General Electric announces that all communist employees will be discharged from the company. → 1954 - Toronto Maple Leafs and Montreal had a bench clearing brawl that resulted in 15 misconducts and 36 penalties in all. The 36 penalties set a new NHL record, breaking the old mark of 35 set in 1931. (The current mark is 84 penalties in one game). → 1956 - Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 810, a Canadair North Star, crashes near Hope, British Columbia, Canada, killing all 62 people on board. → 1957 - Donny Osmond born, (singer: Go Away Little Girl, Puppy Love; [w/sister, Marie]: I’m Leaving It All Up to You; group: Osmond Brothers: One Bad Apple; TV host: Donny and Marie; actor: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat). → 1958 - The John Birch Society is founded in the United States. → 1960 - Sperry Rand Corporation of St. Paul, MN unveiled a new computer, known as Univac 1107. The electronic wizard employed what was known as thin-film memory. → 1960 - The first episode of ‘Coronation Street’, the worlds longest-running television soap opera, is broadcast in the United Kingdom on ITV. → 1961 - Big Bad John by Jimmy Dean topped the charts. → 1962 - The Petrified Forest National Park is established in Arizona. → 1962 - Chart Toppers - ‘Big Girls Don’t Cry’ - The 4 Seasons; ‘Return to Sender’ - Elvis Presley; ‘Bobby’s Girl’ - Marcie Blane; ‘Don’t Let Me Cross Over’ - Carl Butler & Pearl (Dee Jones). → 1965 - Vietnam War - Newspaper reports on bombing over North Vietnam. An article in the New York Times asserts that the U.S. bombing campaign has neither destabilized North Vietnams economy nor appreciably reduced the flow of its forces into South Vietnam. → 1965 - Canadian-born film producer Harry Saltzman and his partner Cubby Broccoli host the World premiere of their new James Bond movie, ‘Thunderball’, starring Sean Connery, in Tokyo; the picture will gross $141.2 million worldwide. → 1965 - A Charlie Brown Christmas, first in a series of Peanuts television specials, debuts on CBS. → 1967 - Daydream Believer by the Monkees topped the charts. → 1967 - Jim Morrison, arrested on stage for disturbing the peace. The singer had been mistaken for a fan backstage by a security guard, and in the resulting altercation, he was maced. → 1968 - Douglas Engelbart gave what became known as The Mother of All Demos, publicly debuting the computer mouse, hypertext, and the bit-mapped graphical user interface using the oN-Line System (NLS). → 1972 - Elton Johns Crocodile Rock was released. → 1972 - I Am Woman by Helen Reddy tops the U.S. pop charts. → 1972 - Keith Moon, Rod Stewart and Roger Daltrey opened the rock opera Tommy in london. The show featuring Tommy, Pinball Wizard and other tunes, was so hot that tickets sold for $50 and up. → 1972 - Martin Hartwell found alive 32 days after his bush plane crashed in the Arctic; 3 passengers dies in crash; Hartwell had eaten human flesh to stay alive. NWT → 1974 - George Harrison released his first album on his Dark Horse label, entitled Dark Horse. → 1977 - Executive jet crashes in Labrador, Newfoundland killing eight, including four executives of Churchill Falls Corporation. → 1979 - The eradication of the smallpox virus is certified, making smallpox the first and to date only human disease driven to extinction. → 1983 - Pacino stars in Scarface. The actor Al Pacino stars as a Cuban refugee who becomes a Miami crime boss in Scarface, which opens in theaters on this day in 1983. → 1984 - The Jackson’s Victory Tour came to a close at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles after 55 performances in 19 cities. The production was reported to be the world’s greatest rock extravaganza and one of the most problematic. The Jackson brothers received about $50 million during the five-month tour of the U.S. before some 2.5 million fans. → 1989 - We Didnt Start the Fire by Billy Joel topped the charts. → 1992 - Separation of Charles and Diana announced. British Prime Minister John Major announces the formal separation of Charles, Prince of Wales and heir to the British throne, and his wife, Princess Diana. Major explained that the royal couple were separating amicably. The report came after several years of speculation by the tabloid press that the marriage was in peril, citing evidence that Diana and Charles spent vacations apart and official visits in separate rooms. (The couple’s divorce became final Aug. 28, 1996.) → 1993 - A five-day repair job Hubble Space Telescope finished. → 1993 - At Princeton University in New Jersey, scientists produced a controlled fusion reaction equivalent to 3 million watts. → 1995 - The Beatles’ Anthology 1 was #1 in the U.S. The double CD contained 60 Beatles songs and was the their sixteenth number-one album. It also set a record for the longest time span for a run of number-one albums: 31 years and 10 months between Meet the Beatles and Anthology 1. → 2003 - In Australia, thieves broke into a home and stole two 300-year-old etchings by Rembrandt. The 4-by-4-inch etchings, a self-portrait and a depiction of the artists mother, were valued around $518,000. → Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end...Ω
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 11:29:47 +0000
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