June 8
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Events on This Day
1783 - Iceland’s Laki volcano blew its top and continued to spew lava for eight more months. This, one of the most violent of volcanic eruptions, killed 9,350 people and caused a famine which lasted until 1790.1786 - Commercial ice cream was advertised for the first time. It was for sale at City Tavern in New York City.
1808 - The Phoenix, the largest ocean-going steamboat in the world, left New York Harbor for Philadelphia, PA. It was the first ocean voyage ever taken by a steamboat. John Stevens built the mammoth boat.
1859 - Peter O’Reilly and Patrick McLaughlin discovered the Comstock Lode near Virginia City, Nevada. Just how did it come to be known as the Comstock Lode, you ask? It was named after prospector Henry T. P. Comstock, who came upon O’Reilly and McLaughlin (in Six-Mile Canyon, near present-day Virginia City). The pair were in a state of near-panic as the spring in which they were digging revealed more and more yellow metal. Comstock claimed the spring was on his property. Apparently to avoid a brouhaha, O’Reilly and McLaughlin allowed Comstock and his partner, Manny Penrod, a share in the claim and together they proceeded to work the site. Their first efforts to mine the gold, however, were frustrated by great quantities of thick, bluish sludge coming from the spring. The sludge turned out to be silver, assayed at over $2,000 a ton (in 1859 dollars). The miners had made the greatest silver strike in American history.
1869 - Ives W. McGaffey of Chicago, IL received a U.S. patent for the suction vacuum cleaner. “You can be sure, if it’s McGaffey!”
1872 - A little-remembered piece of history happened on this day: The U.S. Congress authorized the penny postal card.
1927 - Paul Whiteman and his orchestra recorded When Day is Done on Victor Records. Listen to a CD version of the hits of the great bandleader and you’ll hear Henry Busse featured on the trumpet.
1939 - King George VI and Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain arrive in Washington, DC. They were the first British sovereigns to visit the United States.
1940 - The British aircraft carrier Glorious and the destroyers Ardent and Acasta were sunk by the German battle-cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau in the Arctic near Norway. More than 1,500 men were lost on the three English ships.
1942 - The comic soap opera Clara, Lu, ’n Em was revived on CBS radio (the original show began in 1931 on NBC). Clara, Lu, ’n Em were together again for just a short while before vanishing into radio oblivion.
1947 - Lassie debuted on ABC radio. It was a 15-minute show about an extraordinary dog. Lassie’s barking on the radio was provided by the star of the movie Lassie Come Home, a collie named Pal. Animal imitator Earl Keen provided the whines and other dog noises. The announcer was Charles Lyon; Marvin Miller and Betty Arnold played Lassie’s owners. The sponsor was Red Heart dog food.
1948 - Mr. Television, Milton Berle was the first host of Texaco Star Theater. Others hosted the show during the summer, but Berle made the cut, becoming the permanent emcee, staying in the spotlight for another eighteen years. The format of Texaco Star Theater included the four Texaco Service Men singing the Texaco jingle which then worked into a musical introduction of Uncle Miltie. He would come on stage at this point, dressed in some outlandish costume. And the show went on...
1950 - The Boston Red Sox defeated the St. Louis Browns, 29-4, as Sox fans saw Al Zarilla of Boston hit four doubles in the game.
1951 - Paul Bobel, Werner Braune, Erich Naumann, Otto Ohlendorf, Oswald Pohl, W. Schallenmair & Otto Schmidt, the last Nazi war criminals, were hanged by U.S. officials at Landsberg Fortress (prison).
1953 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that restaurants, theaters, stores, etc. in Washington, DC could not refuse service to blacks.
1959 - The X-15 rocket plane made its first (unpowered) flight. It was the first winged aircraft to fly Mach 4, 5, & 6 and to operate at altitudes above 30,500 m (100,000 ft).
1961 - A major-league baseball record was set. Four Milwaukee Braves batters hit consecutive home runs in the seventh inning of a game against the Cincinnati Reds. Eddie Mathews and Hank Aaron hit back-to-back homers off Jim Maloney. Then, Joe Adcock and Frank Thomas greeted reliever Marshall Bridges with two more round-the-bases blasts.
1965 - Pepsi-Cola and Frito-Lay, Inc. announced their plan to merge the beverage company with the snack foods company -- to form PepsiCo, Inc. The merger was approved on June 8 by the shareholders of both companies. PepsiCo became a multi-billion-dollar company.
1968 - LA Dodger pitcher Don Drysdale’s major-league streak of scoreless innings pitched, was stopped at 58-2/3 as Howie Bedell, of the Philadelphia Phillies, hit a sacrifice fly in the fifth inning. The Dodgers did go on to beat the Phillies 5-3 that day. The Drysdale record stood until 1987, when it was broken by Orel Hersheiser, also of the Dodgers (at that time).
1968 - The funeral service for slain U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy was held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, New York City in the morning. Later in the day, a funeral train carried RFK’s body to Washington from New York. Burial at Arlington National Cemetery was at 10:30 that night (the only burial at Arlington held at night).
1968 - James Earl Ray, the suspected assassin of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was captured in London, U.K. British immigration authorities had stopped Ray as he attempted to board a plane bound for Brussels, Belgium.
1969 - Yankee Stadium in New York City was sold out as Number 7, Mickey Mantle, formally retired from baseball.
1969 - NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle announced that a single-league schedule would replace the separate NFL and AFL schedules in 1970.
1973 - Johnny Unitas signed a two-year contract to play out his football career with the San Diego Chargers. Unitas had quarterbacked the Baltimore Colts for 16 NFL seasons in some of the most exciting pro football ever seen.
1980 - The (34th annual) Tony Awards show was held at the at the Mark Hellinger Theatre, New York. Winners included Children of a Lesser God (best Play); Evita (best Musical); Morning’s at Seven (best Reproduction [Play or Musical]); John Rubinstein in Children of a Lesser God (best Actor Play); Phyllis Frelich in Children of a Lesser God (best Actress Play); Jim Dale in Barnum (best Actor Musical); and Patti LuPone in Evita (best Actress Musical).
1982 - On his visit to England, Ronald Reagan went horseback riding with Queen Elizabeth II, lunched with Prime Minister Thatcher, and became the first U.S. President to address the British Parliament.
1985 - Jockey Eddie Maple rode Creme Fraiche to victory in the Belmont Stakes, marking the fourth consecutive winner for trainer Woody Stephens. The win marked the highest number of successive Belmont wins since R.W. Walden captured his fifth Belmont Stakes win in 1882.
1988 - All Nippon Airways announced that painting eyeballs on its Jets cut bird collisions by 20 percent. Update April 2000: All Nippon Airways will remove the eyeballs that had been painted on the engines of their aircraft in an unsuccessful attempt to deter birds. All Nippon Airways Co. has decided to remove the eyeball markings, which proved useless in preventing birds from flying into the engines and causing damage. The circular markings were modelled on the eyeball-like scarecrow balloons that are used to scare birds in Japanese ricefields. They had been painted onto the rotating part of the engines on 100 aircraft since 1985, but the average of 300 annual bird-involved accidents did not reduce over this time.
1991 - Jockey Jerry Bailey, aboard Preakness winner Hansel, won the Belmont Stakes.
1993 - Republican businessman Richard Riordan defeated Democrat Michael Woo to to succeed long-term Mayor Tom Bradley. Riordan was the first Republican mayor of Los Angeles since 1961.
1995 - U.S. Marines rescued Captain Scott O’Grady. His F16C fighter jet had been shot down by Bosnian Serbs on June 2.
1996 - Editor’s Note dueled with Skip Away down the stretch, then pulled away in the final sixteenth to win the 128th Belmont Stakes.
1998 - Actor Charlton Heston formally assumed the presidency of the National Rifle Association. He vowed to use his star power to communicate the message that NRA members are regular, all-American folk. “At least that’s a skill I have, and my public face is useful, too,” Heston said.
1998 - Wells Fargo and Norwest Corporation announced a merger valued at over $30 billion to form the 6th-7th largest bank in the U.S.
2000 - Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Jeff MacNelly died in Baltimore, Maryland. He was 52 years old. MacNelly was widely know for his comic strip, Shoe, which features a gang of wisecracking birds who run a newspaper called The Treetop Tattler.
2001 - Movies debuting in the U.S.: Evolution, with David Duchovny, Julianne Moore, Orlando Jones and Seann William Scott; and Swordfish, starring John Travolta, Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Don Cheadle, Vinnie Jones, Sam Shepard, Camryn Grimes and Zach Grenier.
2001 - British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Labor Party swept to a second term, winning re-election by a large margin.
2002 - Lennox Lewis showed the bully who was boss. Using a masterful left jab and landing his right hand at will, Lewis battered a befuddled Mike Tyson before stopping him with a crashing right hand in the eighth round to hold on to his heavyweight boxing titles.
2002 - Serena Williams won the French Open tennis tournament, defeating her older sister, Venus, 7-5, 6-3.
2002 - 70-1 shot Sarava captured the 134th running of the Belmont Stakes. Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner War Emblem finished eighth.
2003 - The (57th annual) Tony Awards show was held at the at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. Winners included Take Me Out (best Play); Hairspray (best Musical); Long Day’s Journey into Night (best Play Revival); Nine (best Musical Revival); Brian Dennehy in Long Day’s Journey into Night (best Actor Play); Vanessa Redgrave in Long Day’s Journey into Night (best Actress Play); Harvey Fierstein in Hairspray (best Actor Musical); and Marissa Jaret Winokur in Hairspray (best Actress Musical).
2003 - Annika Sorenstam won the LPGA Championship. It was her fifth major golf title.
2003 - George Foreman was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
2004 - Two volcanoes in separate parts of Indonesia shot forth plumes of smoke and showers of stones, killing two hikers and forcing the evacuation of 5,000 villagers.
2006 - Pollution in Hong Kong was reported to be worse than Los Angeles, the most polluted city in the U.S., and had claimed nearly 2,000 lives a year.
2007 - New movies in U.S. theatres: Hostel: Part II, withg Jay Hernandez, Lauren German, Heather Matarazzo, Bijou Phillips, Vera Jordanova, Roger Bart and Richard Burgi; Ocean’s Thirteen, starring George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Andy Garcia, Don Cheadle, Bernie Mac, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Eddie Jemison, Shaobo Qin, Carl Reiner, Elliott Gould, Ellen Barkin, Al Pacino and David Paymer; and Surf’s Up, with Jeff Bridges, Shia LaBeouf, Zooey Deschanel, James Woods, Jane Krakowski, Jon Heder, Mario Cantone, Brian Benben and Michael McKean.
2007 - European investigator Dick Marty reported that the U.S. CIA ran secret prisons in Poland and Romania from 2003 to 2005 to interrogate detainees caught in the ‘war on terror’.
2007 - The Royal Navy’s largest and most powerful attack submarine, the nuclear-powered HMS Astute, was given a royal launch by HRH The Duchess of Cornwall.
2008 - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez urged Colombian Farc rebels to lay down their weapons, free dozens of hostages and end their decades-long armed struggle.
2010 - The 41-Year-Old Virgin Who Knocked Up Sarah Marshall and Felt Superbad About It opened in the U.S. The comedy stars Bryan Callen, Noureen DeWulf, Mircea Monroe, Stephen Kramer Glickman, Austin Michael Scott, Steven Sims, Chris Spencer, Randall Park and Frank Maharajh.
2010 - France opened up its online gaming market, granting licenses to 11 operators just before the start of the soccer World Cup in South Africa. Online betting on horses, sport and poker was legalized.
2011 - Meredith Vieira ended her 5-year run as co-host of the Today show. Vieira said she was giving up TV to spend more time with her husband, who suffered from multiple sclerosis. Vieira was replaced on Today by Ann Curry.
2012 - Motion pictures debuting in the U.S.: The animated Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted, featuring the voices of Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer, Jada Pinkett Smith, with Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce and Logan Marshall-Green; Prometheus, starring Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba and Guy Pearce; Bel Ami, with Robert Pattinson, Christina Ricci, Uma Thurman, Natalia Tena, Kristin Scott Thomas and Holliday Grainger; Lola Versus, starring Greta Gerwig, Joel Kinnaman, Bill Pullman, Debra Winger, Zoe Lister Jones and Hamish Linklater; and Safety Not Guaranteed, with Aubrey Plaza, Lauren Carlos, Basil Harris, Mary Lynn Rajskub and Jake M. Johnson.
2012 - Pentagon statistics revealed some 154 suicides for active-duty troops in the first 155 days of 2012. The number far outdistanced the U.S. forces killed in action in Afghanistan, by about 50 percent.
2012 - Before you fire up that brilliant new Web site that’s sure to make you a fortune, check this out: In Britain six men were handed jail sentences for running a site, Confidential Access, that earned millions of pounds by selling fake documents and coaching fraudsters in how to conduct successful scams. Two masterminds ran the site from villas in Alicante in Spain while associates in Britain created fake documents including bank statements, pay slips, driving licenses and bills.
2013 - Some 80,000 emergency personnel in Germany, including firefighters and soldiers, worked aggressively to contain the most dramatic floods in Germany in a decade. Twenty people had died in the floods across central Europe.
2014 - Israeli and Palestinian presidents joined in an unprecedented prayer meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican. The Pope said he hoped the gesture would “re-create a desire, a possibility” of eventually starting a “new journey” toward peace in the Middle East.
2015 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the president, rather than Congress, has authority to decide policy on matters of sovereignty, such as the U.S. stance on the status of Jerusalem. The court was called on to rule on the matter after U.S. lawmakers passed a law allowing the passports of Jerusalem-born U.S. citizens to record their birthplace as ‘Jerusalem, Israel’ -- not just ‘Jerusalem’, as every president since the Truman era had insisted on.
2016 - Ohio’s Governor John Kasich signed a bill legalizing medical marijuana. Kasich’s signature made Ohio the 25th state to legalize a comprehensive medical marijuana program.
2016 - The French government released a smartphone emergency alert app intended to send warnings to the public in the event of a bombing, shooting or other disaster.
2017 - Former FBI Director James Comey testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee. Comey accused the Donald Trump of lies and defamation. Comey testified under oath that he did not trust the POTUS to tell the truth, explaining that he kept memos of every encounter he had with Trump because of a “gut feeling” that he would someday have to defend both himself and the FBI.
2017 - The GOP-led House of Representatives approved sweeping legislation to undo much of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, which had restricted risky bank practices.
2018 - Motion pictures debuting in the U.S. included: Hereditary, with Toni Collette, Gabriel Byrne and Alex Wolff; Hotel Artemis, starring Jodie Foster, Sofia Boutella and Dave Bautista; Ocean’s 8, with Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett and Anne Hathaway; 2036 Origin Unknown, with Katee Sackhoff, Steven Cree and Julie Cox; 211, starring Nicolas Cage, Sophie Skelton and Michael Rainey Jr.; Half the Picture, with Rosanna Arquette, Jamie Babbit and Emily Best; Hearts Beat Loud, starring Nick Offerman, Kiersey Clemons and Ted Danson; and Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, with Joanne Rogers, McColm Cephas Jr. and François Scarborough Clemmons.
2018 - The board of the Central Arizona Project, a major electricity consumer that supplies water to a large swath of Arizona, voted to sign a 20-year agreement to buy power from a solar project. The CAP board also agreed to a five-year power deal with the Salt River Project for electricity from a variety of sources. The moves ignored an appeal by the U.S. Interior Department to buy more power from a Navajo Generating Station coal plant -- just to keep it open.
2018 - California officials reported that a dozen of the wind-driven blazes that swept northern California’s wine country in the fall of 2017 were sparked by PG&E-owned power lines. The firestorm was the deadliest in state history (to that time), killing 46 people. The fires exploded when trees and branches came into contact with Pacific Gas and Electric power lines and wind gusts of up to 70 mph pushed flames through dry grass and woodlands faster than firefighters could respond. An earlier investigation found that PG&E’s failure to clear or trim trees near power lines had caused three wildfires in Butte and Nevada counties.
2018 - The San Francisco Warriors beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 108-85 in Cleveland to sweep the championship series and win their third NBA title in four seasons.
2019 - Thousands of people took to the streets in Venice, Italy calling for a ban on large cruise ships. This, following a collision between the massive MSC Opera and a tourist boat.
2019 - India’s annual monsoon, which delivers about 70 percent of the country’s rainfall, arrived on the coast of southern Kerala state -- a week later than usual. Monsoons are the lifeline of India’s $2.5 trillion economy. It spurs farm output and boosts rural spending on items ranging from gold to cars, motorcycles and refrigerators.
2020 - New York’s legislature created the crime of ‘aggravated strangulation.’ The Eric Garner Anti-Chokehold Act criminalized the harmful use of a chokehold by a police officer. “Almost six years ago, we heard Eric Garner tell police ‘I can’t breathe’ as he was put into a chokehold by an NYPD officer. His words now speak from the grave as we deal with the police killing of George Floyd under nearly identical circumstances. Hundreds of unarmed black men and women have been killed at the hands of police officers before and between these two tragedies. In 2015 I introduced this bill to outlaw chokeholds statewide, and I am proud to see it taken up today as we pass legislation to reform our criminal justice system. This is an important step forward, but it will not be the last. We must work to change the way that police officers interact with communities of color, or we will continue to see these killings occur," Assemblymember Walter T. Mosley said.
2020 - France’s interior minister Christophe Castaner said police would no longer conduct chokeholds that were blamed for multiple cases of asphyxiation. He prompted new criticism after George Floyd’s death. Several hundred people took a knee in front of a memorial to the abolition of slavery in the city of Nantes. Ships from Nantes are estimated to have taken some 550,000 black slaves to the colonies, according to the city’s Slavery Abolition Memorial.
2020 - South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa said that he was worried about fast rising coronavirus infections. More than half of South Africa’s more than 48,000 confirmed cases had been recorded in just the previous two weeks.
2021 - A U.S. Senate report examining the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol concluded that missed intelligence, poor planning and multiple layers of bureaucracy made the violent siege possible.
2021 - A 1933 Double Eagle gold coin sold for $19.5 million at auction in New York, setting a world record price for any coin. The coin was sold by Fashion mogul Stuart Weitzman.
2021 - Google bowed to pressure from rivals to let them compete for free to be the default search engines on Android devices in Europe, widening a pledge to European Union antitrust regulators.
2021 - National Geographic announced it was officially recognizing the Southern Ocean as the world’s fifth ocean. Also known as the Antarctic Ocean, it comprises the southernmost waters of the world ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude.
2022 - The House passed gun legislation that would raise the age limit for purchasing a semiautomatic rifle to 21 and ban the sale of magazines with a capacity of more than 15 rounds. The vote was 223 to 204, falling mostly along party lines. (The legislation fizzled in the Senate.)
2023 - British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak met with U.S. President Joe Biden at the White House. The pair announced economic partnership, an investigation of the dangers of Artificial Intelligence, and the re-stating of their long-term support for Ukraine.
2023 - Prosecutors filed a 37-count indictment against former POTUS Donald Trump, for unlawful retention of defense information, for storing dozens of classified documents at his Florida resort, and obstruction of justice.
and more...
Birthdays on This Day June 8
1810 - Robert Schumann
composer: Symphonic Etudes, Fantasia in C Major, Concerto in A Minor; died July 29, 18561847 - Ida McKinley (Saxton)
First Lady: wife of 25th U.S. President, William McKinley; died May 26, 19071867 - Frank Lloyd Wright
architect: Pennsylvania’s Falling Water, NYC’s Guggenheim Museum; “No house should be on any hill or on anything, it should be of the hill, belonging to it ...”; died Apr 9, 19591909 - Robert Carson
actor: Herbie Rides Again, The Buccaneer, Footsteps in the Night, The Ten Commandments, Three Sailors and a Girl, Murder Without Tears; died June 2, 19791917 - George Wallace
actor: Minority Report, Nurse Betty, Bicentennial Man, Forces of Nature, Meet Wally Sparks, Multiplicity, In the Heat of the Night: Who Was Geli Bendl?, Star Trek: The Next Generation; died Jul 22, 20051917 - Byron (Whizzer) White
football: Univ. of Colorado All-American [1937], NFL: Pittsburgh Steelers; associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court [1962-1993]; died Apr 15, 20021918 - Robert Preston (Meservey)
actor: Victor Victoria, The Music Man, How the West was Won, Mame, Semi-Tough; died Mar 21, 19871921 - Alexis (Gladys) Smith
actress: The Age of Innocence, The Young Philadelphians, Rhapsody in Blue; died June 9, 19931923 - George Kirby
comedian, impressionist: The George Kirby Show, ABC Comedy Hour; died Sep 30, 19951924 - Sheldon Allman
actor: The Man with the Power, Miles to Go Before I Sleep, In Cold Blood, The Sons of Katie Elder, Hud, Inside the Mafia; singing voice of Mister Ed, the talking horse; composer of cartoon theme song: George of the Jungle; died Jan 22, 20021925 - Barbara Bush (Pierce)
First Lady: wife of 41st President of the U.S., George Bush; mother of 43rd U.S. President George W. Bush and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; died Apr 17, 20181925 - Delmer Ennis
baseball: Philadelphia Phillies, SL Cardinals, Cincinnati Reds, Chicago White Sox; died Feb 8, 19961927 - Jerry Stiller
comedian: Stiller and (Anne) Meara; actor: Seinfeld, The King of Queens, Hairspray, Tattingers, The Paul Lynde Show; father of actor Ben Stiller; died May 11, 20201931 - Dana Wynter (Dagmar Winter)
actress: Airport, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Sink the Bismarck; died May 5, 20111933 - Joan Rivers (Joan Alexandra Molinsky)
comedienne; author: Bouncing Back: I’ve Survived Everything... and I Mean Everything ...and You Can Too!; TV host: The Tonight Show, The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers; “Can we talk?”; died Sep 4, 20141936 - James Darren (Ercolani)
singer: Goodbye Cruel World, Her Royal Majesty; actor: The Guns of Navarone, Because They’re Young, Gidget; host: Time Tunnel1939 - Herb Adderley
Pro Football Hall of Famer [cornerback]: Michigan State Univ; NFL: Green Bay Packers, Dallas Cowboys; died Oct 30, 20201939 - Bernie Casey
actor: Roots: The Next Generation, The Bay City Blues, In the Mouth of Madness, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Rent-A-Cop, I’m Gonna Git You Sucka, Backfire, Revenge of the Nerds, Never Say Never Again, Sharky’s Machine, The Martian Chronicles series; football player; died Sep 19, 20171940 - Nancy Sinatra
singer: These Boots Are Made For Walkin’, Sugar Town, Somethin’ Stupid [w/pop, Frank], Jackson [w/Lee Hazelwood]; actress: The Wild Angels, Speedway1941 - Clarence ‘Fuzzy’ Haskins
singer: group: Parliament-Funkadelic: One Nation Under a Groove, Atomic Dog, Flashlight, Maggot Brain1942 - Chuck Negron
singer: group: Three Dog Night: Joy to the World, Black and White, One, Easy to Be Hard, Eli’s Coming, Mama Told Me Not to Come, An Old Fashioned Love Song, Shambala1943 - Colin Baker
actor: 6th Doctor Who [1984-1986], The Brothers [1974–1976], The Asylum, The Harpist, The Mild Bunch1943 - Willie Davenport
Olympic Gold Medalist: 110 meter hurdles [1968], bronze medalist [1976]; National Track & Field Hall of Famer: 60-yard hurdles champion [1966, 1967, 1969, 1970, 1971]; died Jun 17, 20021944 - Mark (Henry) Belanger
baseball: shortstop: Baltimore Orioles [World Series: 1969, 1970, 1971, 1979/all-star:1976], LA Dodgers; died Oct 6, 19981944 - Don Grady (Agrati)
actor: My Three Sons, Mickey Mouse Club; died Jun 27, 20121944 - Boz (William) Scaggs
musician, singer: Lowdown, Lido Shuffle, Miss Sun, Look What You’ve Done to Me; songwriter: Silk Degrees, Middle Man; more1947 - Mick Box
musician: guitar, songwriter: group: Uriah Heep: Gypsy, Salisbury, July Morning, Easy Livin’1947 - Sara Paretsky
writer: Burn Marks, Killing Orders1950 - Kathy Baker
Emmy Award-winning actress: Picket Fences [1992-1993, 1994-1995, 1995-1996]; Edward Scissorhands, Mad Dog and Glory, The Right Stuff, The Cider House Rules, Boston Public, Jesse Stone film series1950 - Sônia Braga
actress: Kiss of the Spider Woman, The Rookie, Angel Eyes, A Will of Their Own, American Family: Journey of Dreams, An Invisible Sign, Lope, The Wine of Summer1951 - Bonnie Tyler
singer: Total Eclipse of the Heart, It’s a Heartache1955 - Sir Timothy Berners-Lee
computer scientist, co-developer of the World Wide Web, head of the World Wide Web Consortium [oversees its continued development]1955 - Griffin Dunne
actor: The Android Affair, Quiz Show, Love Matters, Straight Talk, Big Blue, Amazon Women on the Moon, Johnny Dangerously, An American Werewolf in London, The Other Side of the Mountain; producer: Head Over Heels, Running on Empty, White Palace, Joe’s Apartment1955 - James Sylvers
musician: keyboards; singer: group: The Sylvers: Wish That I Could Talk to You, Through the Love in My Heart, Stay Away from Me, Can You Handle It, Boogie Fever, Cotton Candy, Hot Line1957 - Scott Adams
cartoonist: Dilbert1958 - Keenan Ivory Wayans
Emmy Award-winning producer: In Living Color [1990]; actor, writer, director: In Living Color, A Low Down Dirty Shame, I’m Gonna Git You Sucka, Hollywood Shuffle; actor: For Love and Honor1960 - Mick ‘Red’ Hucknall
singer: group: Simply Red: Money’s Too Tight to Mention, Holding Back the Years, The Right Thing1962 - Nick Rhodes (Bates)
musician: keyboards: group: Duran Duran: Planet Earth, Hungry like the Wolf, Save a Prayer, Rio, Is There Something I Should Know, Union of the Snake, Wild Boys1965 - Frank Grillo
actor: Warrior, The Grey, End of Watch, The Purge: Anarchy, The Purge: Election Year, Battery Park, For the People, The Shield, Blind Justice, The Kill Point, The Gates, Kingdom, Zero Dark Thirty, Prison Break1965 - Neil Mitchell
musician: keyboards: group: Wet Wet Wet: Love Is All Around, Angel Eyes, Goodnight Girl, With a Little Help From My Friends, Sweet Surrender1965 - Robert Pilatus
performer, lip-syncer: group: Milli Vanilli: Girl You Know It’s True, Blame It on the Rain; died Apr 2, 19981966 - Julianna Margulies
actress: The Good Wife, ER, The Newton Boys, What's Cooking?, The Mists of Avalon1966 - Doris Pearson
singer: group: Five Star: The Love You Bring to Me, Some Kind of Magic, Surely, I Give You Give1967 - Dan Futterman
actor: Judging Amy, The Fisher King, Big Girls Don't Cry... They Get Even, Another World, Shooting Fish, Urbania1968 - Dave Mlicki
baseball [pitcher]: Oklahoma State Univ; Cleveland Indians, NY Mets, LA Dodgers, Detroit Tigers, Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers1968 - Rob Ray
hockey: Buffalo Sabres, Ottawa Senators1969 - David Sutcliffe
actor: Gilmore Girls, Drop Dead Diva, The Wish List, Lie to Me, On Strike for Christmas, Mega Cyclone, Cracked1970 - Gabrielle Giffords
politician: Democratic member of U.S. House of Representatives [Arizona’s 8th district: 2007-2012]; shot & wounded in attempted assassination Jan 8, 2011 near Tucson1970 - Kelli Williams
actress: The Practice, Lie to Me, Zapped Again!, Switched at Birth1971 - Mark Feuerstein
actor: Royal Pains, Loving, Practical Magic, What Women Want, Good Morning, Miami, Defiance, Knucklehead, Love Shack, In Your Eyes1971 - Tom Nutten
football: Western Michigan Univ; NFL: Buffalo Bills, SL Rams1971 - Troy Vincent
football [cornerback]: Univ of Wisconsin; NFL: Miami Dolphins, Philadelphia Eagles, Buffalo Bills
1972 - David Sloan
football [tight end]: Univ of New Mexico; NFL: Detroit Lions, NO Saints1973 - Bryan Muir
hockey: Edmonton Oilers, NJ Devils, Chicago Blackhawks, Calgary Flames, TB Lightning, Colorado Avalanche, LA Kings1975 - Bryan McCabe
hockey: NY Islanders, Vancouver Canucks, Chicago Blackhawks, Toronto Maple Leafs1975 - Matt Perisho
baseball [pitcher]: Anaheim Angels, Texas Rangers, Detroit Tigers, Florida Marlins1975 - Jeff Saturday
football [center]: Univ of North Carolina; NFL: Indianapolis Colts1976 - Eion Bailey
actor: Band of Brothers, Fight Club, Center Stage, Mindhunters, Sexual Life, Covert Affairs, Once Upon a Time1976 - Lindsay Davenport
tennis champ: fourth player since computer rankings began [1977] to simultaneously hold world No. 1 ranking in both singles and doubles [joining Martina Navratilova, Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, Martina Hingis]1977 - Kanye West
multi-Grammy-winning rapper: Brown Sugar, Breakdown, Through the Wire, Jesus Walks, All Falls Down, Talk About Our Love1978 - Maria Menounos
TV personality, reporter, professional wrestler, correspondent: Today, Access Hollywood; WWE [World Wrestling Entertainment] ambassador; co-created AfterBuzz TV podcast series; podcast host: Conversations with Maria Menounos1981 - Sara Watkins
singer, songwriter, fiddler: group: Nickel Creek: LPs: Nickel Creek, This Side, Why Should the Fire Die?; solo LPs: Sara Watkins, Sun Midnight Sun1982 - Nadia Petrova
Russian tennis pro1983 - Kim Clijsters
tennis pro: former world #1 in both singles and doubles [41 WTA singles titles, 11 WTA doubles titles]1983 - Mamoru Miyano
actor: voice actor: Steins;Gate, Ouran High School Host Club, Vampire Knight, Death Note, Soul Eater, Wolf’s Rain, Ajin: Demi-Human, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Tokyo Ghoul, Free!, Mobile Suit Gundam 001983 - Kim Stolz
model, TV personality: correspondent for MTV News; video jockey & host for The Freshmen; executive: Citigroup, Bank of America1984 - Torrey Devitto
actress: Chicago Med, Chicago P.D., Chicago Fire, Pretty Little Liars, I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer, Beautiful People, The Vampire Diaries, One Tree Hill, Army Wives2004 - EmiSunshine (Emilie Sunshine Hamilton)
musician: guitarist, ukulele; songwriter, singer: LPs: Strong as the Tall Pine; Wide River to Cross; Black Sunday ’35; American Dream; Ragged Dreams; Family Wars; Universe; Diamonds; Sideshow
and still more...
Hit Music on This Day June 8
1949Riders in the Sky (facts) - Vaughn Monroe
Again (facts) - Doris Day
1958
1967
1976
1985
1994
2003
2012
2021
and even more...
Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end...
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