217th day of 2014, 148 remaining
Tides at the Golden Gate:
High: 8:23am/7:25pm Low: 1:25am/12:47pm
Sunrise: 6:17am Sunset: 8:14pm
Moonset: 1:09am Moonrise: 3:35pm 58% visible
Special Celebrations today include...
- Homeland Thanksgiving Day - Croatia
- Independence Day - Burkina Faso
- National Children's Day - Tuvalu
- Santo Domingo Foundation Day - Dominican Republic
- Transfiguration - San Salvador del Mundo - El Salvador
- Virgen de las Nieves - Peru
- Sister`s Day – USA
- National Night Out
- National Oyster Day
- National Underwear Day
On this day in...
1833 - The village of Chicago was incorporated. The population was approximately 250.
1861 - The U.S. federal government levied its first income tax. The tax was 3% of all incomes over $800. The wartime measure was rescinded in 1872.
1864 - During the U.S. Civil War, Union forces led by Admiral David G. Farragut were led into Mobile Bay, Alabama.
1884 - On Bedloe's Island in New York Harbor, the cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty was laid.
1914 - The electric traffic lights were installed in Cleveland, Ohio.
1921 - The first play-by-play broadcast of a baseball game was done by Harold Arlin. KDKA Radio in Pittsburgh, PA described the action between the Pirates and Philadelphia.
1921 - The cartoon "On the Road to Moscow", by Rollin Kirby, was published in the "New York World". It was the first cartoon to win a Pulitzer Prize.
1923 - Henry Sullivan became the first American to swim across the English Channel.
1924 - In the New York "Daily News" debuted the comic strip "Little Orphan Annie," by Harold Gray.
1944 - Polish insurgents liberated a German labor camp in Warsaw. 348 Jewish prisoners were freed.
1953 - During the Korean conflict prisoners were exchanged at Panmunjom. The exchange was labeled Operation Big Switch.
1960 - For the first time two major league baseball clubs traded managers. Detroit traded Jimmy Dykes for Cleveland's Joe Gordon.
1963 - The Limited Test Ban Treaty was signed by the United States, Britain, and the Soviet Union. The treaty banned nuclear tests in space, underwater, and in the atmosphere.
1964 - U.S. aircraft bombed North Vietnam after North Vietnamese boats attacked U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.
1969 - The Mariner 7, a U.S. space probe, passed by Mars. Photographs and scientific data were sent back to Earth.
1974 - U.S. President Nixon said that he expected to be impeached. Nixon had ordered the investigation into the Watergate break-in to stop.
1974 - "Tank McNamara", the comic strip, premiered in 75 newspapers.
1981 - The U.S. federal government started firing striking air traffic controllers.
1984 - Toronto’s Cliff Johnson set a major league baseball record by hitting the 19th pinch-hit home run in his career.
1986 - It was revealed that artist Andrew Wyeth had secretly created 240 drawings and paintings of his neighbor. The works of Helga Testorf had been created over a 15-year period.
1989 - In Honduras, five Central American presidents began meeting to discuss the timetable for the dismantling of the Nicaraguan Contra bases.
1990 - U.S. President George H.W. Bush angrily denounced the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.
1991 - An investigation was formally launched by Democratic congressional leaders to find out if the release of American hostages was delayed until after the Reagan-Bush presidential election.
1991 - Iraq admitted to misleading U.N. inspectors about secret biological weapons.
1992 - Federal civil rights charges were filed against four Los Angeles police officers. The officers had been acquitted on California State charges. Two of the officers were convicted and jailed on violation of civil rights charges.
1998 - Iraqi President Saddam Hussein began not cooperating with U.N. weapons inspectors.
1998 - Marie Noe of Philadelphia, PA was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, accused of smothering eight of her children to death between 1949 and 1968. Noe later received 20 years' probation.
1999 - Music written by Johann Sebastian Bach was found in the Ukraine. The music was thought to have been destroyed over 50 years ago during World War II. The material was found in the musical estate of Carl Phillipp Emanuel Bach, who was on of J.S. Bach's children.
1999 - Mark McGwire (St. Louis Cardinals) hit his 500th career homerun. He also set a record for the fewest at-bats to hit the 500 homerun mark.
2002 - The U.S. closed its consulate in Karachi, Pakistan. The consulate was closed after local authorities removed large concrete blocks and reopened the road in front of the building to normal traffic.
2011 - NASA announced that its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter had captured photographic evidence of possible liquid water on Mars during warm seasons.
2011 - Juno was launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on a mission to Jupiter. It was the first solar-powered spacecraft to go to Jupiter.
Birthday celebrants today include (or included)...
- Guy DeMaupassant 1850
- Conrad Aiken 1889
- Andrew Alford 1904
- John Huston 1906
- Robert Taylor 1911
- David Brian 1914
- Jeri Southern 1926
- Richie Ginterh 1930
- Neil A. Armstrong 1930
- Vern Gosdin 1934
- Cammie King 1934
- John Saxon 1935
- Zakes Mokae 1935
- Damita Jo 1940
- Bobby Braddock 1940
- Rick Huxley (Dave Clark Five) 1942
- Sammi Smith 1943
- Jimmy Webb 1946
- Erika Slezak 1946
- Loni Anderson 1946
- Greg Leskiw (Guess Who) 1947
- Rick Derringer 1947
- Holly Palance 1950
- Samantha Sang 1953
- Maureen McCormick 1956
- Pat Smear (Foo Fighters) 1959
- Pete Burns (Dead Or Alive) 1959
- Mark O'Connor 1961
- Tawney Kitaen 1961
- Patrick Ewing 1962
- Adam Yauch (M.C.A. of the Beastie Boys) 1964
- Jonathon Silverman 1966
- Terri Clark 1968
- Brendon Ryan Barrett 1986
