May 5

The day is thine, the night also is thine: thou hast prepared the light and the sun. 

Psalm 74:16

is:

Better Hearing and Speech Month Better Sleep Month Fibromyalgia Education and Awareness Month Social Science Books Month Women's Health Care Month

Today is: American mainland attacked by the Japanese (1945) - A Japanese balloon bomb exploded at Gearhart Mountain, Oregon, killing a pregnant woman and 5 children who were picnicking. It was the only fatal attack of its kind during World War 11. Cinco de Mayo - Mexican independence day, commemorating the Battle of Puebla (1862) when the Mexican army defeated Napoleon Ill's French army. Mexican-Americans celebrate this day with a cultural festival featuring parades, dancing, and food.  First American astronaut in space ( l 961) - Alan Shepard, Jr. became the first American in space.  First perfect baseball game pitched (1904) Cy Young pitched the first perfect game.  First woman granted a U.S. patent Mary Kies received her patent in 1809. Party Party Day - An excuse to have a party once a month (when the day equals the month). Sponsor: Bonza Bottler Day. National Bad Guy Day - Al Capone went to prison in 1932; celebrate the imprisonment of all deserving bad guys. Sponsor: The Life of the Party.

Born on this Day

• 1352: Rupert, King of Germany
  

• 1800: French publisher and bookseller Louis Christophe Francois Hachette
  

• 1813: Danish theologian and philosopher Soren Kierkegaard
  

• 1815: French playwright and writer of farces Eugene Martin Labiche. He wrote some of the most popular comedies of the 19th century French stage.
  

• 1818: Political philosopher, founder and father of modern communism, Karl Marx in Prussia. He authored "Das Kapital."
  

• 1830: Hat maker John Stetson
  

• 1846: Henryk Sienkiwicz, author of ``Quo Vadis?'' and winner of the Nobel Literature prize in 1905, in Poland.
  

• 1867: Journalist and women's rights advocate Nellie Bly (Elizabeth Cochran Seaman) was born in Armstrong County, PA. She wrote about controversial topics such as: divorce, mental illness and poverty. Attempting to beat the fictional Phileas Fogg, she traveled around the world in 72 days. Her name became a synonym for female star reporter.
  

• 1869: The composer Hans Pfitzner was born.
  

• 1899: Radio actor Freeman Gosden, Amos of "Amos and Andy"
  

• 1900: Actor Spencer Tracy
  

• 19??: Deborah Schnelle (Sierra)
  

• 19??: Ojo Taylor (Undercover)
  

• 1913: Tyrone Power, U.S. star of film and stage. He was best known for his roles in the films ``Mark of Zorro'' and ``Witness for the Prosecution.''
  

• 1915: Actress Alice Faye (Leppert)
  

• 1916: Giani Zail Singh, seventh president of India from 1982-87.
  

• 1922: Actor Darren McGavin
  

• 1926: Actress Ann B. Davis
  

• 1927: Actress Pat Carroll
  

• 1934: AFL-CIO president John J. Sweeney
  

• 1934: Saxophonist Ace Cannon
  

• 1938: Country singer-musician Johnnie Taylor
  

• 1938: Country singer-musician Roni Stoneman
  

• 1938: Actor Michael Murphy
  

• 1940: Actor Lance Henriksen ("Millennium")
  

• 1942: Singer Tammy Wynette
  

• 1943: Comedian-actor Michael Palin
  

• 1944: Actor Jean-Pierre Leaud
  

• 1944: Actor John Rhys-Davies
  

• 1944: Actor Roger Rees
  

• 1948: Rock musician Bill Ward (Black Sabbath)
  

• 1957: Actor Richard E. Grant
  

• 1959: Actress Annette Bening
  

• 1959: Rock singer Ian McCullough (Echo and the Bunnymen)
  

• 1960: Actress Cathy Moriarty
  

• 1973: Actress Tina Yothers.
  

• 1980: Actress Danielle Fishel ("Boy Meets World")                       
     

Events in History on this day
  

• 0449: Death of St. Hilary of Arles
  

• 0614: Persians capture Jerusalem and seize the True Cross
  

• 0884: Death of Pope Marinus I
  

• 1045: Election of Pope Gregory VI
  

• 1180: Beginning of Gempei War (Japan)
  

• 1260: Death of St. Jutta
  

• 1260: Kublai unanimously elected KaKhan in succession to Mīngke
  

• 1292: Adolph of Nassau becomes King of Germany
  

• 1494: During his second voyage to the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus first sighted Jamaica.
  

• 1527: Rome besieged by Imperial Landsknechts
  

• 1572: Death of St. Pius V, Pope
  

• 1606: Death of Jean Nicot, who introduced tobacco to France
  

• 1617: Nicholas Hilliard named English royal artist
  

• 1646: Following his defeat at the battle of Naseby in the English Civil War, Charles I surrendered to a Scottish army at Newark.
  

• 1723: Johann Sebastian Bach signed his contract with the city council of Leipzig. This was the best job Bach ever had, cantor of the School of St. Thomas. But Bach was only the city council's third choice.
  

• 1705: Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, died. Emperor since 1658, he sought to regain political institutions and organize the army.
  

• 1760: Earl Ferrers, the last British peer to be executed, was hanged in London for murdering his steward.
  

• 1809: The first patent awarded to a woman went to Mary Kies of South Killingly, Connecticut, for the rights to a technique for weaving straw with silk and thread.
  

• 1821: Napoleon Bonaparte died in exile on the island of St. Helena.
  

• 1847: The American Medical Association was organized in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.1862: Mexican forces loyal to Benito Juarez defeated French troops sent by Napoleon the Third in the Battle of Puebla. General Ignacio Zaragoza's troops were outnumbered three to one as they battled the invading French army. They may have been outnumbered but they had the will to win.
  

• 1860: Giuseppe Garibaldi and his "Thousand Redshirts" sailed from Genoa to conquer Sicily and Naples.
  

• 1862: Mexican forces loyal to Benito Juarez defeated French troops sent by Napoleon III in the Battle of Puebla.
  

• 1862: In the American Civil War the Confederates, with 32,000 men under Longstreet, succeeded in blocking 40,000 Federal troops under Sumner at the battle of Williamsburg.
  

• 1864: The battle of the Wilderness started in the American Civil War. General Lee had just over 60,000 men against Grant's 100,000 men but the Confederates heavily defeated the Federal troops who lost over 17,000 men.
  

• 1891: Carnegie Hall (then named "Music Hall") had its opening night in New York City.
  

• 1892: Congress passed the Geary Chinese Exclusion Act, which required Chinese in the United States to be registered, or face deportation.
  

• 1893: The "Panic of 1893" hit the New York Stock Exchange. Various factors were blamed for the panic, including the bankruptcy of a major railroad and shrinking national gold reserves.
  

• 1900: "The Billboard," a magazine for the music and entertainment industries, began weekly publication after six years as a monthly. The name was later shortened to "Billboard.""
  

• 1904: Cy Young pitched the American League's first perfect game as the Boston Red Sox defeated the Philadelphia Athletics, 3-0. He became the first pitcher to throw a no-hitter in each league.
  

• 1912: The first issue of the Soviet Communist Party newspaper "Pravda" was published.
  

• 1925: Biology teacher John Scopes was arrested for teaching Darwin's theory of evolution in violation of Tennessee state laws.
  

• 1926: Author Sinclair Lewis turned down the Pulitzer Prize for his novel "Arrowsmith," telling the committee in a letter that "All prizes, like all titles, are dangerous."
  

• 1930: Mahatma Gandhi was arrested by the British in India after his campaign of disobedience.
  

• 1930: Amy Johnson began the first solo flight by a woman between England and Australia.
  

• 1936: Edward Ravenscroft of Glencoe, Illinois, received a patent for the screw-on bottle cap with the pour lip.
  

• 1936: Italian troops under Field Marshal Badoglio took Addis Ababa in Ethiopia (Abyssinia). On the same date in 1941, Emperor Haile Selassie reentered the capital after the country had been liberated.
  

• 1942: Sales of sugar resumed in the United States under a rationing program.
  

• 1942: A combined British military and naval force landed on Madagascar and by the afternoon the town of Diego Suarez was captured.
  

• 1945: In Austria, French politicians Reynaud and Daladier and former Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg, imprisoned by the Nazis, were released; Russian forces captured the town of Peenemunde where V1 and V2 rockets were launched; U.S. forces liberated Austria's Mauthausen concentration camp; poet Ezra Pound was arrested in Italy for treason.
  

• 1945: In the only fatal attack of its kind during World War Two, a Japanese balloon bomb exploded on Gearhart Mountain in Oregon, killing the pregnant wife of a minister and five children.
  

• 1950: The coronation of King Phumiphon of Siam took place and he assumed the title of Rama IX.
  

• 1955: West Germany became a sovereign state.
  

• 1955: The baseball musical "Damn Yankees" opened on Broadway.
  

• 1956: Jim Bailey became the first runner in the United States to break the four-minute mile. His time was 3:58.5 and it occurred in Los Angeles, California.
  

• 1961: Astronaut Alan B. Shepard became America's first man in space in a brief (15-minute), sub-orbital flight from Cape Canaveral.
  

• 1965: A cease-fire was signed between rebels and the military junta in the Dominican Republic civil war.
  

• 1979: Terrorists in El Salvador stormed the French, Venezuelan and Costa Rican embassies demanding the release of political prisoners.
  

• 1980: A siege at the Iranian Embassy in London ended as British commandos, the troops of the SAS, and police stormed the building killing four of the five gunmen who took over the building.
  

• 1981: Irish Republican Army hunger-striker Bobby Sands died at the Maze Prison in Northern Ireland in his 66th day without food.
  

• 1985: President Reagan kept a promise to West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl by leading a wreath-laying ceremony at the military cemetery in Bitburg.
  

• 1986: Leaders of the seven major industrial democracies, meeting in Tokyo, adopted a joint statement condemning terrorism.
  

• 1987: The congressional Iran-Contra hearings opened with former Air Force Major General Richard V. Secord the lead-off witness. The federal government began a yearlong amnesty program, offering citizenship to illegal aliens who met certain conditions.
  

• 1987: The federal government began a yearlong amnesty program, offering citizenship to illegal immigrants who met certain conditions.
  

• 1988: The Most Reverend Eugene Antonio Marino became the nation's first black Roman Catholic archbishop during an installation Mass in the Atlanta Civic Center. (However, Marino stepped down in July 1990 because of a two-year affair with Columbus resident Vicki Long.)
  

• 1989: A federal judge ordered sweeping changes in the FBI's promotion system, months after the judge found that the bureau had systematically discriminated against Hispanic employees in advancements and assignments.
  

• 1990: "Unbridled" won the 116th running of the Kentucky Derby.
  

• 1991: President Bush continued to experience an irregular heartbeat, one day after he was taken to Bethesda Naval Hospital because of fatigue and shortness of breath.
  

• 1991: New York's Carnegie Hall celebrated its centennial with an all-day, all-star concert.
  

• 1992: President Bush and Democrat Bill Clinton picked up primary victories in Indiana, North Carolina and the District of Columbia.
  

• 1993: The Bosnian Serb parliament began debating a UN peace plan for Bosnia (it rejected the plan the following day). UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali recommended creation of a tribunal to try those responsible for war crimes in former Yugoslavia.
  

• 1993: The music of Josef Suk enjoyed something of a resurgence. His latest appearance in the CD catalogue comes from Chandos, which has issued a collection of his music for solo piano. Margaret Fingerhut does the honors.
  

• 1993: Irving Howe, writer and intellectual who wrote ``World of Our Fathers,'' died.
  

• 1994: Singapore caned American teen-ager Michael Fay for vandalism, a day after the sentence was reduced from six lashes to four in response to an appeal by President Clinton, who considered the punishment too harsh.
  

• 1995: As rescue workers ended their search for bodies in the Oklahoma City bombing, President Clinton denounced self-styled anti-government militias, saying, "How dare you call yourselves patriots and heroes.""
  

• 1995: Powerful thunderstorms began tearing through North Texas, claiming two-dozen lives.
  

• 1995: Talks collapsed between the United States and Japan on averting a trade fight over automobiles.
  

• 1996: Israel and the Palestinians began the final stage of their peace talks in Taba, Egypt. The FBI released preliminary figures showing that serious crimes reported to police fell for the fourth straight year in 1995.
  

• 1996: The FBI released preliminary figures showing that serious crimes reported to police fell for the fourth straight year in 1995.
  

• 1996: King Juan Carlos swore in conservative leader Jose Maria Aznar as Spanish prime minister, opening a new era in Spanish politics after 13 years of Socialist rule.
  

• 1997: President Clinton arrived in Mexico for his first Latin American trip while in office.
  

• 1997: A jury in Jacksonville, Florida, found R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company was not responsible for the death of Jean Connor, a lifelong smoker.
  

• 1997: American Airlines' pilots ratified a contract, ending nearly three years of negotiations.
  

• 1998: An exasperated Secretary of State Madeleine Albright called on Israel to agree to hand over an additional 13 percent of the West Bank to the Palestinians, on top of the 27 percent already relinquished. (Israel, however, continued to balk at the proposal.)    
  

• 1999: President Clinton began a morale-boosting trip to Europe that included a visit to Ramstein Air Base in Germany, where he met the three American soldiers just released by Yugoslavia.
  

• 1999: The first Kosovo refugees brought to the United States, 453 of them, arrived at Fort Dix, New Jersey.
  

• 2000: President Clinton met at the White House with Japan's new prime minister, Yoshiro Mori. 
  

• 2000: The Labor Department reported the nation's unemployment rate had hit a 30-year low of three-point-nine percent in April 2000, with blacks and Hispanics recording the lowest jobless rates in history. 
  

• 2000: Reformers swept Iran's run-off elections, winning control of the legislature from conservatives for the first time since 1979 Islamic revolution. 
  
  
  

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