March 26
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Events on This Day
1885 - The first commercial moving-picture film was produced in Rochester, NY by Eastman Dry Plate and Film Company. The company became Eastman Kodak in 1892, founded by George Eastman. What does the word Kodak stand for? Nothing. One of the most widely recognized trademarks in the world was named because it had a unique sound that started with the letter K, and could be pronounced and spelled in almost any language.1917 - The Seattle Metropolitans, of the Pacific Coast League of Canada, defeated the Montreal Canadiens to become the first U.S. hockey team to win the Stanley Cup.
1920 - This Side of Paradise, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s first book, was published. It sold 20,000 copies within a week. The author, at 23 years of age, was the youngest novelist ever published by Charles Scribner’s Sons.
1936 - The first telescope with a 200-inch-diameter, reflecting mirror was shipped -- very, very carefully -- from Corning, New York to Mt. Palomar Observatory in California. The lens of the Hale telescope weighed 20 tons. It was dedicated at Mt. Palomar in 1948. The Hale scope remains one of the most widely-used scientific telescopes on the planet -- as it looks at other planets and beyond.
1937 - Joe DiMaggio said he’d take Ty Cobb’s advice and use a 36 or 37-ounce baseball bat instead of a 40-ounce stick during that season. The result? ‘Joltin’ Joe’ hit .346 during the season with 46 home runs -- the most he ever hit in a single year. In the words of Yankee broadcaster Mel Allen, “How about that!” During his 13-year career with the Yankees, DiMaggio connected for 2,214 hits, 361 homers, batted a .325 average, played in 1,736 total games and came to the plate to bat 6,821 times.
1941 - Jimmie Lunceford and his orchestra recorded the tune, Battle Axe, for Decca Records. Lunceford began with the Chickasaw Syncopaters, a 10-piece band, in the late 1920s. By 1934, he would add names like Sy Oliver, Willie Smith, Earl Caruthers, Joe Thomas, Al Norris, Moses Allen, and James Crawford to form orchestras that would entertain through the mid-1940s.
1945 - U.S. Generals Eisenhower, Bradley, and Patton started their attack on German forces at Remagen on the Rhine River.
1947 - FBI director J. Edgar Hoover warned the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) that communists had launched “a furtive attack on Hollywood” 12 years earlier.
1951 - The U.S. Air Force flag design was approved on this day. The flag included the coat of arms, 13 white stars and the Air Force seal on a blue background.
1953 - Dr. Jonas Salk announced a new vaccine -- to prevent poliomyelitis. Salk became a national hero, allaying the fear of polio with his vaccine. (It was approved in 1955.)
1956 - Red Buttons made his debut as a television actor in a presentation of Studio One called The Tale of St. Emergency on CBS television.
1956 - The Medic Alert Foundation was founded this day. Medic Alert is a life-saving identification system of bracelets or necklets for people with hidden medical conditions and allergies.
1958 - The RKO Pantages Theater, Los Angeles, was the scene of 30th Annual Academy Awards celebration. The show was hosted by Rosalind Russell, James Stewart, David Niven, Jack Lemmon, Bob Hope and Donald Duck (on film). There were several memorable films produced in 1957, but two blockbusters shot it out this night, The Bridge on the River Kwai and Sayonara. The Bridge on the River Kwai (Sam Spiegel, producer) took Oscars for Best Picture; Best Actor (Alec Guinness); Cinematography (Jack Hildyard); Director (David Lean); Film Editing (Peter Taylor); Scoring (Malcolm Arnold); and writing (Pierre Boulle, Carl Foreman, Michael Wilson). Meanwhile, Sayonara (William Goetz, producer) won for Best Supporting Actor (Red Buttons); Supporting Actress (Miyoshi Umeki); Art Direction (Ted Haworth); Set Decoration (Robert Priestley); and Sound Recording (George Groves). And, lest we forget, Joanne Woodward won the Best Actress Oscar for The Three Faces of Eve. The prize for Best Music/Song went to James Van Heusen (music), Sammy Cahn (lyrics) for All the Way (the classic Sinatra song)from The Joker Is Wild.
1960 - The University of Southern California (USC) captured the NCAA swimming title, becoming the first Pacific Coast school to do so.
1962 - The U.S. Supreme Court gave federal courts the power to order reapportionment of seats in state legislatures. The decision (Baker v. Carr) eventually led to the doctrine of “one man, one vote.”
1964 - Funny Girl debuted at the Winter Garden Theatre on Broadway in New York City. The musical featured a semi-biographical plot based on the life and career of comedian Fanny Brice and her stormy relationship with entrepreneur and gambler Nick Arnstein. Funny Girl was produced by Ray Stark, Brice’s son-in-law, and starred Barbra Streisand. The production was nominated for eight Tony Awards but, facing tough competition from Hello, Dolly!, it failed to win in any categories. The show was a big success, continuing through 1,348 performances (at the Winter Garden, Majestic and Broadway theatres), closing July 1, 1967.
1967 - The (21st annual) Tony Awards show was held at the at the Shubert Theatre, New York. Winners included The Homecoming (best Play); Cabaret (best Musical); Paul Rogers in Right You Are/The Wild Duck (best Actor Dramatic); Beryl Reid in The Killing of Sister George (best Actress Dramatic); Robert Preston in I Do! I Do! (best Actor Musical); and Barbara Harris in The Apple Tree (best Actress Musical).
1969 - Marcus Welby, M.D., a TV movie, was seen on ABC. Ratings showed the program to be so popular that it was turned into a long-running series starring Robert Young.
1971 - William Conrad starred as Cannon on CBS-TV. This also was a one-time TV event that became a popular series that year.
1972 - The Los Angeles Lakers broke a National Basketball Association record by winning 69 of 82 games.
1973 - Noel Coward, writer of some of the wittiest English songs of the 20th century, died in Jamaica at the age of 73. His most popular songs included I’ll See You Again, Mad About the Boy and Someday I’ll Find You. Coward was also a successful playwright, and among his creations for the stage were Private Lives, Blithe Spirit and Design for Living. These and several other of Coward’s plays were later made into movies.
1974 - David Essex received a gold record for the hit, Rock On. Though a million seller, Rock On never made it to number one on the pop-rock charts -- stalling at number five. It was on the charts for a total of 14 weeks. Essex (real name: David Cook) portrayed the role of Christ in the London production of Godspell. He starred in several British films in 1970.
1982 - Groundbreaking ceremonies took place in Washington, DC for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, a pair of 200-foot black granite walls bearing the names of 58,226 killed or missing in the war. Approximately 1300 of these listed are still missing (MIAs, POWs, and others).
1987 - The National Federation of High School Associations adopted the college distance three-point shot, with a perimeter of 21 feet from the center of the backboard.
1988 - It was another record record for Michael Jackson. His single Man in the Mirror gave Jackson his fourth consecutive Hot 100 #1 from the LP Bad.
1990 - Host Billy Crystal kept us smiling for the 62nd Annual Academy Awards, staged at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) members voted Driving Miss Daisy the Best Picture of 1989 (Richard D. Zanuck, Lili Fini Zanuck, producers). The Best Director Oscar was won by Oliver Stone for Born on the Fourth of July. Best Actor was Daniel Day-Lewis for My Left Foot and Best Actress was Jessica Tandy in Driving Miss Daisy (the 80-year-old actress was a favorite to win). Oscars for Actor and Actress in a Supporting Role went to Denzel Washington (Glory) and Brenda Fricker (My Left Foot), respectively. Best Music/Song winners were Alan Menken (music), Howard Ashman (lyrics) for Under the Sea from The Little Mermaid. You’re probably still humming this tune from that full-length animated film from Walt Disney Studios. Other popular 1989 films that were honored as nominees or winners include: Field of Dreams; Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade; Back to the Future Part II; Lethal Weapon II; Batman; Dead Poets Society; When Harry Met Sally; and Sex, Lies, and Videotape.
1991 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that criminal defendants whose coerced confessions were improperly used as evidence are not always entitled to new trials.
1994 - Superunknown, by Soundgarden, hit #1 for a week in the U.S. The songs on the album were: Let Me Drown, My Wave, Fell on Black Days, Mailman, Superunknown, Head Down, Black Hole Sun, Spoonman, Limo Wreck, The Day I Tried to Live, Kickstand, Fresh Tendrils, 4th of July, Half and Like Suicide.
1996 - Former U.S. Senator and Secretary of State Edmund Muskie died in Washington DC, two days shy of his 82nd birthday.
1997 - These films debuted in the U.S.: the animated Cats Don’t Dance, featuring the voices of Scott Bakula, Jasmine Guy Natalie Cole; and The Devil’s Own, starring Harrison Ford Brad Pitt Margaret Colin.
1997 - The bodies of 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate techno-religious cult were found inside a mansion in Rancho Santa Fe, California. The cult members had believed that by committing suicide en masse, they were shedding their earthly ‘containers’ to catch a ride on a spaceship trailing the Hale-Bopp Comet.
1998 - U.S. President Bill Clinton stood with President Nelson Mandela in a racially integrated South African parliament. Clinton saluteed the country that was “truly free at last.”
1999 - Movies opening in U.S. theatres: Doug’s 1st Movie, with the voices of Thomas Mchugh, Fred Newman, Constance Shulman and Chris Phillips; EDtv, starring Matthew Mcconaughey, Jenna Elfman, Woody Harrelson and Sally Kirkland; and The Mod Squad, starring Claire Danes, Omar Epps and Giovanni Ribisi.
1999 - Dr. Jack Kevorkian was convicted of second-degree murder and delivery of a controlled substance. ‘Doctor Death’, as he had come to be known, was found to have administered a lethal injection to Thomas Youk, an ailing man whose death was shown on "60 Minutes". It was the first time in five trials that the suicide doctor had been found guilty. Kevorkian, 70, was sentenced to 10-25 years in prison on April 14, 1999.
2000 - It was a beautiful evening at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles. And, inside, everything was beautiful, too, as the film, American Beauty, captured Best Picture (producers: Bruce Cohen and Dan Jinks) at the 72nd Annual Academy Awards presentation, hosted by comedian Billy Crystal. The picture, nominated in eight categories, received four more Oscars: Best Director (Sam Mendes), Best Actor (Kevin Spacey), Best Original Screen Play (Alan Ball), Best Cinematography (Conrad L. Hall). Although Hilary Swank received the award for Best Actress in Boys Don’t Cry, Annette Bening, nominated for her performance in American Beauty, was stunningly beautiful as the lady-in-waiting. Bening, who gave birth to her fourth child, a girl, sixteen days after this Oscar ceremony, congratulated her husband, Warren Beatty, who was presented with the Irving Thalberg Award for his career as a movie-maker. Another beauty, Angelina Jolie, received the Best Supporting Actress award for her role in Girl, Interrupted. Michael Caine gave the most beautiful acceptance speech of the night (Best Supporting Actor: The Cider House Rules). The film, a seven-time nominee, also won for Best Screenplay Adaptation (John Irving). The Matrix was also a big winner (Best Film Editing: Zach Staenberg, Best Sound: David E. Campbell, David Lee III, John T. Reitz, Gregg Rudloff; Best Sound Effects Editing: Dane A. Davis; Best Visual Effects: Steve Courtley, John Gaeta, Janek Sirrs, Jon Thum). The exquisite beauty of the costumes (Lindy Hemming) and makeup (Christine Blundell) in Topsy-Turvy earned the film two Oscars, while the statuette for Best Art Direction was presented to Rick Heinrichs and Peter Young for Sleepy Hollow. And, as always, Phil Collins made beautiful music. His You’ll Be in My Heart (Tarzan) captured the Oscar for Best Original Song.
2001 - A dorm fire at the Kyanguli Secondary School in Machakos in Kenya killed 64 youths. One of two doors was bolted shut and arson was suspected.
2002 - The U.S. Supreme Court upheld regulations that allow federal housing officials to evict an entire household from public housing if one member is arrested for drug violations.
2003 - Daniel Patrick Moynihan, former (1976-2000) Democratic Senator from New York, died at 76 years of age.
2004 - Jan Sterling, Hollywood film actress, died at 82 years of age.
2004 - New movies in U.S. theatres: Jersey Girl, starring Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Raquel Castro, Jason Biggs, George Carlin, Jason Lee, Liv Tyler, Matt Damon, Stephen Root, Jennifer Schwalbach Smith, Will Smith and Mike Starr; The Ladykillers, with Tom Hanks, Marlon Wayans, Irma P. Hall, George Wallace, Ryan Hurst, Jason Weaver and Steven Root; Mayor of the Sunset Strip, starring Rodney Bingenheimer, David Bowie, Gwen Stefani, Coldplay and Courtney Love; Ned Kelly, starring Heath Ledger and Orlando Bloom; Never Die Alone, with DMX, David Arquette, Michael Ealy, Reagan Preston-Gomez, Jennifer Sky, Paige Hurd, Rhoda Jordan, Keesha Sharp, Drew Sidora; and Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, featuring Matthew Lillard, Neil Fanning, Linda Cardellini, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Seth Green, Freddie Prinze, Jr., Alicia Silverstone, Peter Boyle, Nick Millard, Tim Blake Nelson and Pat O'Brien.
2004 - Jan Berry, pioneering California rock musician, died in Los Angeles, CA. He was 62 years old. Berry rode the wave of the surf music trend in the 1960s as one half of the popular duo Jan & Dean. His hit-making career with high school friend Dean Torrence came to a screeching halt in 1966 when Berry’s speeding Corvette hit a parked truck. He suffered severe brain damage that left him partially paralyzed and unable to talk.
2004 - Phoenix AZ Bishop Thomas O’Brien was sentenced to four years’ probation and 1,000 hours of community service for a deadly hit-and-run that claimed the life of pedestrian Jim Reed.
2005 - Former British prime minister (1976-1979) James Callaghan died on the eve of his 93rd birthday.
2006 - A strict smoking ban in enclosed public places took effect in Scotland. The country now serves as an example for others, in which researchers can study how a radical smoking ban changes a society and its drinking establishments.
2007 - The leaders of Northern Ireland’s major Protestant and Catholic parties, sitting side by side for the first time in history, announced an agreement to create a power-sharing administration.
2008 - 25 people were killed in China when fireworks that had been trucked to the Gobi Desert to be destroyed exploded as they were being dumped into a ditch.
2009 - The U.S. Internal Revenue Service announced a program designed to get taxpayers who had hidden money in offshore accounts to pay taxes on the funds. The I.R.S. promised not to file criminal charges against those voluntarily fessing up.
2010 - Movies opening in the U.S.: Hot Tub Time Machine, starring John Cusack, Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Duke, Crispin Glover, Lizzy Caplan, Chevy Chase, Sebastian Stan, Lyndsy Fonseca, Collette Wolfe, Charlie McDermott and Kellee Stewart; the animated and How to Train Your Dragon, featuring the voices of Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler, America Ferrara, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Craig Ferguson, Kristen Wiig and T.J. Miller.
2010 - Computer hacker Albert Gonzalez, member of a cybercrime ring that stole tens of millions of credit and debit card numbers, was sentenced in U.S. District Court to 20 years in prison. Gonzalez was living in Miami at the time of the crimes. He was arrested and subsequently indicted in New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts.
2011 - The documentary Dumbstruck opened in U.S. movie theatres. The documentary about the world of ventriloquism features Bob Ashman, Maria Ashman, Robert J. Ashman, Willie Brown, Barry Burdette and Dylan Burdette.
2011 - Some 200,000 people turned out in Germany’s largest cities protesting the use of nuclear power. This, as engineers battled to stabilize the tsunami-stricken nuclear power station in Fukushima.
2011 - Libyan rebels regained control of the eastern gateway city of Ajdabiya after international airstrikes crippled Moammar Gadhafi’s forces. It was the first major turnaround for an uprising had appeared to be on the verge of defeat.
2012 - Ontario’s highest court struck down a national law that outlawed brothels. The court did uphold a ban on street prostitution in a partial victory for those arguing Canada’s laws put sex workers in harm’s way.
2013 - President Barack Obama chose veteran agent Julia Pierson to be U.S. Secret Service director. Pierson was the first woman to lead that agency.
2014 - Pope Francis permanently removed German bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst from his Limburg diocese after his €31-million ($43-million) new residence caused an uproar among the faithful. Francis had temporarily expelled him in October pending a church inquiry.
2015 - Airlines rushed to change their rules to require a second crew member in the cockpit at all times. This, hours after French prosecutors suggested co-pilot Andreas Lubitz had barricaded himself alone at the controls of a German jetliner and crashed it on purpose.
2016 - Self-described democratic socialist Bernie Sanders breathed fresh life into his campaign for the White House with a clean sweep in caucuses in the western U.S. states. The Vermont senator won Alaska, Hawaii and Washington on this day.
2017 - Carrie Lam, a Beijing-backed civil servant, was chosen to be Hong Kong’s Chief Executive, replacing Leung Chun-ying. Carrie Lam was chosen from among several candidates by a 1,200-person ‘election committee’ that was stacked with pro-Beijing loyalists. Her election was a sign that tension between the semi-autonomous territory and the Chinese government would continue.
2017 - Russian police detained dozens of protesters across the country, including opposition leader Alexei Navalny. This, after thousands of police took to the streets to demonstrate against corruption and demand the resignation of PM Dmitry Medvedev. Riot police arrested more than 1,000 people in Moscow alone.
2018 - British Prime Minister Theresa May said 18 countries had announced that they were expelling more than 100 Russian intelligence officers. The U.S. announced the expulsion of 60 Russian diplomats. It was the largest Western expulsion of Russian diplomats since the Cold War and came in response to the nerve-agent poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the U.K.
2019 - A U.S. ban on bump stocks took effect. Bump stocks are attachments that allow semiautomatic weapons to fire rapidly like machine guns. (On March 2, 2020 the U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up an appeal challenging that federal ban.)
2019 - The Roman Catholic Diocese of Erie, Pennsylvania agreed to pay $2 million to a man who was sexually abused as a child by a priest who made him say confession after the assaults. Defrocked priest David Poulson was sentenced to 2 1/2 to 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to the sexual assault of one boy and attempted sexual assault of another.
2020 - COVID-19 news: 1)The Labor Department reported a record 3.8 million Americans had filed for first-time unemployment. Claims increased in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, with nine states reporting jumps of at least 100,000 from the prior week. 2) U.S. deaths passed 1,050. The number of coronavirus infections climbed above 70,000, surpassing the national tallies of China and Italy. The global death toll from the virus climbed past 23,000 as the number of infections surpassed 472,000. 3)New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said his state had become the nation’s epicenter of the pandemic. Cuomo said Congress’ $2 trillion stimulus bill had “failed to meet the governmental need.” 4)A lockdown of Austrian ski resorts that had become hotspots for the spread of the coronavirus in Europe was extended. Austria reported nearly 6,400 cases in its nine provinces.
2020 - The new U.S. Space Force launched its first national security satellite from Cape Canaveral. The billion-dollar satellite was the sixth of the U.S. military’s Advanced Extrememly High Frequency series.
2020 - Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was defiant in the face of a $15-million bounty by the U.S. to face drug trafficking charges. Maduro called Donald Trump a “racist cowboy”. He said he was ready to fight by whatever means necessary should the U.S. and neighboring Colombia dare to invade.
2021 - Movies scheduled to open in the U.S. (theatres and virtual) this day included: Nobody, starring Bob Odenkirk, Connie Nielsen and Christopher Lloyd; The Seventh Day, with Guy Pearce, Keith David and Stephen Lang; Shoplifters of the World, starring Helena Howard, Elena Kampouris anf James Bloor; Six Minutes to Midnight, starring James D’Arcy, Judi Dench and Jim Broadbent; and Things Don’t Stay Fixed, with William Gregory Lee, Tara Ochs and Brenda Bynum.
2021 - Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed a law banning transgender athletes from participating in girls’ sports. It was the third state to approve such a measure in 2021.
2021 - A linguist for the Department of Defense pleaded guilty to passing classified information about U.S. undercover operatives to an individual with ties to Hezbollah, the Lebanese terrorist organization. Mariam Taha Thompson (63) began sending the information after the U.S. killed Qassem Soleimani, a top Iranian military commander, in an airstrike in early 2020. (In June 2021 Thompson was sentenced to 23 years in prison.)
2021 - Dominion Voting Systems Corp filed a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit in Delaware against Fox News, accusing the right-wing network of trying to boost its ratings by falsely claiming Dominion rigged the 2020 U.S. presidential election against Donald Trump. (In Dec 2021 Fox lost an attempt to get the suit dismissed. Delaware court judge Eric Davis said Dominion had sufficiently alleged it was defamed by Fox News’ 2020 election coverage and the case should proceed toward trial.)
2021 - A survey by Spain’s Observatory for Drugs and Addiction found that Spaniards had cut back on alcohol -- and cut their binge-drinking in half -- during the COVID-19 pandemic.
2022 - Thousands of Russians marched through Prague, Czech Republic, waving the white-blue-white flag that had become a symbol of protests against Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
2022 - In western Ukraine two rocket strikes hit, while President Biden was traveling in Poland, not far from the Polish border. The strikes undercut earlier signals that Russia had narrowed its ambitions. “For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power,” Biden told a crowd in Warsaw after condemning the Russian president’s war in Ukraine.
2022 - Ukraine’s agriculture minister Mykola Solskyi said the country’s ability to export grains was getting worse by the day and would only improve if/when the war with Russia ended.
2023 - Massive crowds filled streets of Tel Aviv after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired his defense minister over his opposition to a planned judicial overhaul.
2023 - Elon Musk said Twitter was worth $20 billion, or less than half of what he paid for it. In an email sent to Twitter staff, Musk told employees they would receive stock grants based on a $20-billion valuation. Musk paid $44 billion to buy Twitter in 2022.
and more...
Birthdays on This Day March 26
1773 - Nathaniel Bowditch
astronomer, author: New American Practical Navigator; died Mar 16, 18381850 - Edward Bellamy
author: Looking Backward; died May 22, 18981859 - A.E. (Alfred Edward) Housman
British poet: A Shropshire Lad, Last Poems, More Poems, Collected Poems, Manuscript Poems; died Apr 30, 19361873 - Condé Nast
magazine publisher: founder of Conde Nast Publications, transformed Vogue magazine into premier fashion magazine; died Sep 19, 19421874 - Robert Frost
four-time Pulitzer prize-winning poet: Birches, Mending Wall, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening; read The Gift Outright at inauguration of John F. Kennedy; died Jan 29, 19631880 - Duncan Hines
author, traveler, cake-mix mogul; died Mar 15, 19591909 - Chips Rafferty (John William Goffage)
actor: The Desert Rats, The Sundowners, Wackiest Ship in the Army, Skullduggery; died May 27, 19711911 - Tennessee (Thomas Lanier) Williams
Pulitzer prize-winning playwright: A Streetcar Named Desire [1948], Cat on a Hot Tin Roof [1955]; The Glass Menagerie, Night of the Iguana, Summer and Smoke, The Rose Tattoo, Camino Real, Sweet Bird of Youth, Small Craft Warnings; died Feb 25, 19831914 - William C. Westmoreland
U.S. Army General: head of U.S. forces in Vietnam [1964-1968]; died July 18, 20051916 - Sterling Hayden (Sterling Relyea Walter)
actor: The Asphalt Jungle, Dr. Strangelove, The Godfather, 9 to 5, The Blue and the Gray; died May 23, 19861917 - Rufus Thomas
soul singer: Walking the Dog, Do the Funky Chicken, (Do The) Push And Pull, Part V, Do the Funky Penguin; died Dec 15, 2001
1919 - Strother Martin Jr.
actor: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Cool Hand Luke, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, McLintock!, Rooster Cogburn, Slap Shot, The Wild Bunch; died Aug 1, 19801921 - Joe Loco (Jose Esteves Jr.)
jazz musician, arranger: credited with introducing the mambo [Tenderly: 1951] and cha-cha-cha [1953] to the US; died Feb 18, 19881923 - Bob Elliott
comedian: duo: Bob & Ray; died Feb 2, 20161925 - Pierre Boulez
conductor: Pierre Boulez and his Ensemble Intercontemporain; played for Frank Zappa; died Jan 5, 20161930 - Sandra Day O’Connor
judge: first woman nominated and appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court [1981-2006]; died Dec 1, 20231931 - Leonard Nimoy
actor: Star Trek; director: Three Men and a Baby; died Feb 27, 20151932 - Dick Nolan
football: NY Giants; coach: New Orleans Saints; died Nov 11, 20071934 - Gino Cappelletti
football: 1st kicker to kick a field goal in the AFL: New England Patriots [1960]; AFL Player of Year [1964; Patriot’s radio network commentator; died May 12, 20221934 - Alan Arkin
actor: Catch-22, The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming; director: Little Murders, The Kominsky Method; died Jun 29, 20231937 - Wayne ‘The Wall’ Embry
Basketball Hall of Famer: Cincinnati Royals, Boston Celtics, Milwaukee Bucks; GM: Milwaukee Bucks: first African-American GM in major league sports1940 - Braulio Baeza
National Horse Racing Hall of Famer: jockey: first to go over $3 million in purses in one year; leading money winner in 1965, 1966 and 1975; Eclipse award-winner [1972, 1975]1940 - James Caan
actor: The Godfather, Rabbit Run, Brian’s Song, Dick Tracy, Rollerball, Alien Nation, For the Boys, Misery, Las Vegas; died Jul 6, 20221940 - Rod Lauren
singer: If I Had a Girl, LP: I’m Rod Lauren; died Jul 11, 20071940 - Nancy Pelosi
congresswoman: U.S. representative from California’s 12th congressional district; House Minority Leader [2003–2007; 2011–2019], Speaker of the House [2007-2011; 2019-2023]1942 - Erica Jong (Mann)
writer: Fear of Flying, Becoming Light, How to Save Your Own Life1943 - Bob Woodward
investigative reporter: Washington Post: Watergate [w/reporter Carl Bernstein]; author: All the President’s Men [w/Carl Bernstein], The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court [w/Scott Armstrong], The Agenda : Inside the Clinton White House1944 - Diana Ross (Diane Earle)
singer: group: The Supremes: I Hear a Symphony, Come See About Me; solo: Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, Theme from ‘Mahogany’, Love Hangover, You Keep Me Hangin’ On; actress: Lady Sings the Blues, Mahogany, The Wiz1946 - Johnny Crawford
actor: The Rifleman, The Mickey Mouse Club, El Dorado, The Shootist, The Gambler Returns: The Luck of the Draw; singer: Cindy’s Birthday, Rumors, Your Nose is Gonna Grow; bandleader: The Johnny Crawford Dance Orchestra; died Apr 29, 20211948 - Richard Tandy
musician: bass, keyboards: group: Electric Light Orchestra1948 - Steven Tyler (Tallarico)
musician: harmonica, piano, percussion; singer: founding member of group Aerosmith [best-selling American hard rock band of all time]: Dream On, Walk This Way, Dude [Looks Like a Lady], Angel, Love in an Elevator, Janie’s Got a Gun, What It Takes, I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing, Jaded, Crazy; more1949 - Vicki Lawrence
Emmy Award-winning actress: The Carol Burnett Show [1975-76]; Vicki!, Mama’s Family; singer: The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia1949 - Fran Sheehan
musician: bass: group: Boston: More than a Feeling, Long Time, Peace of Mind, Don’t Look Back, Man I’ll Never Be1950 - Teddy Pendergrass
singer: Two Hearts [w/Stephanie Mills], Hold Me [w/Whitney Houston], solo LPs: Teddy, Love Language, Workin’ It Back, Joy; died Jan 13, 20101950 - Martin Short
Emmy Award-winning actor, comedian: SCTV, The Show Formerly Known as the Martin Short Show; Saturday Night Live, The Three Amigos, Three Fugitives, Innerspace, Only Murders in the Building1950 - Ernest Lee Thomas
actor: Everybody Hates Chris, Crenshaw Blvd., The Watermelon Heist, Malcolm X, Kiss and Be Killed, Roots, A Piece of the Action1956 - Charly McClain
singer: Who's Cheatin’ Who, Paradise Tonight, Fly Into Love, Sentimental Ol’ You, Dancing Your Memory Away, With Just One Look in Your Eyes, Radio Heart1957 - Leeza Gibbons
TV hostess: Entertainment Tonight, George Schlatter’s Funny People; more1960 - Jennifer Grey
actress: Dirty Dancing, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Cotton Club; Joel Grey’s daughter1960 - Marcus Allen
Pro Football Hall of Fame running back: Kansas City Chiefs, LA Raiders: Super Bowl XVIII; Heisman Trophy Winner [1981]: holds record for number of games rushed 200 yards+ [5] for USC]; more1961 - Billy Warlock
actor: The Young and the Restless, Fatwa, Panic in the Skies!, Mr. Payback: An Interactive Movie, Honor Thy Father and Mother: The True Story of the Menendez Murders, Society, Baywatch1962 - Eric Allan Kramer
actor: Good Luck Charlie, The Hughleys, Two and a Half Men, Wizards of Waverly Place, Growing Pains, Cheers, Empty Nest, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, NewsRadio, JAG, Roseanne, Murder, She Wrote, Seinfeld, That ’70s Show, Ellen, Monk, Jack and Bobby, Phil of the Future, How I Met Your Mother, My Name Is Earl1962 - John Stockton
basketball [guard]: Gonzaga Univ; Utah Jazz1963 - Suzanne Sulley
singer: group: Human League: Don’t You Want Me, [Keep Feeling] Fascination, Mirror Man, The Lebanon, Life on Your Own1966 - Michael Imperioli
actor: The Sopranos, Lean on Me, Goodfellas, Clockers, Last Man Standing, Witness to the Mob, Hamlet, The End of Love1968 - Kenny Chesney
singer: Fall in Love, Me and You, She’s Got It All, That’s Why I’m Here, How Forever Feels, You Had Me From Hello, Don’t Happen Twice1968 - James Iha
musician: guitar: groups: The Smashing Pumpkins [co-founder], Tinted Windows, A Perfect Circle1968 - Shane Reynolds
baseball: [pitcher]: Univ of Texas; Houston Astros, Atlanta Braves, Arizona Diamondbacks1972 - Leslie Mann
actress: The Cable Guy, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Little Birds, Shorts, Drillbit Taylor, Knocked Up, Stealing Harvard, Big Daddy, George of the Jungle1973 - T. R. (Theodore Raymond) Knight
actor: Grey’s Anatomy, The Last Request, Max’s Words1973 - Larry Page
computer scientist, Internet entrepreneur: co-founder and CEO of search giant Google.com1974 - Michael Peca
hockey [center]: Vancouver Canucks, Buffalo Sabres, New York Islanders, Edmonton Oilers, Toronto Maple Leafs, Columbus Blue Jackets1976 - Amy Smart
actress: Varsity Blues, The Last Time I Committed Suicide, Starship Troopers, Strangeland, Felicity, Scrubs, The Andy Dick Show1978 - Sandra Romain
actress [2000-2012]: X-rated films: Euro Domination, Manhunters, Fashionistas Safado: The Challenge, Outnumbered 4, Fuck Slaves, Wedding Bells Gang Bang1981 - Floriana Lima
actress: Supergirl, Poor Paul, How I Met Your Mother, Ghost Whisperer, Melrose Place, House, In Plain Sight, Franklin & Bash, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, The Mob Doctor, Allegiance, The Family1985 - Jonathan Groff
actor: Broadway: Spring Awakening, Deathtrap, Red, Hair [2008], Prayer for My Enemy, The Singing Forrest; TV: Glee, Looking; film: C.O.G.; voice actor: Frozen1985 - Keira Knightley
actress: The Imitation Game, Pirates of the Caribbean series, Silk, Domino, Pride and Prejudice, King Arthur, Love Actually1989 - Von Miller
football [outside linebacker]: NFL: Denver Broncos [2011– ]: MVP of Broncos victory over Carolina Panthers in 2016 Super Bowl 501992 - Haley Ramm
actress: X-Men: The Last Stand, Without a Trace, Walking Tall: Lone Justice, Ben 10: Race Against Time, Into the Wild, Rubber, Yours, Mine and Ours, iCarly1994 - Paige VanZant
mixed martial artist, bare knuckle boxer, pro wrestler: won her UFC debut at the age of 20; is one of the youngest fighters to receive the Fight of the Night award
and still more...
Hit Music on This Day March 26
1952Wheel of Fortune (facts) - Kay Starr
Any Time (facts) - Eddie Fisher
1961
1970
1979
1988
1997
2006
2015
and even more...
Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end...
TWtD Calendar
