May 15
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May 15
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Today is: Cape Cod Discovery Day - In 1602, the English navigator Bartholomew Gosnold discovered Cape Cod. Sponsor: Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce. |
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Born on this Day
1856: American newspaperman and author Lyman Frank Baum was
born in Chittenango, New York. His most famous book is "The Wonderful Wizard of
Oz".
1859: Pierre Curie, French chemist and physicist. Together
with his wife, Marie, he worked on magnetism and radioactivity.
1905: Actor Joseph Cotten. Notable in the films
"Citizen Kane," "The Third Man" and "Portrait of Jennie."
1909: James Mason, British film actor, born. Among his
best-known films were "Odd Man Out," "The Desert Fox" and
"Lolita."
1918: Country singer Eddy Arnold
1936: Actress Anna Maria Alberghetti
1910: Actress Constance Cummings
1911: Novelist and critic Max Frisch. Frisch was one of
Europe's leading post-World War II literary figures.
1918: Singer Eddy Arnold
1923: Photographer Richard Avedon
1926: Playwright Anthony Shaffer ("Sleuth")
1926: Playwright Peter Shaffer ("Equus;"
"Amadeus")
1930: Artist Jasper Johns
1936: Playwright Paul Zindel
1936: Actress-singer Anna Maria Alberghetti
1936: Counterculture icon Wavy Gravy
1937: Singer Trini Lopez
1937: Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
1938: Singer Lenny Welch
1939: Bettilu (Watson) Bower - my
mother
1940: Actress-singer Lainie Kazan
1942: Country singer K.T. Oslin
1948: Singer-songwriter Brian Eno
1951: Actor Chazz Palminteri
1953: Baseball player George Brett
1955: Actor Lee Horsley
1970: Singer-rapper Prince Be (PM Dawn)
1972: Actor David Charvet ("Melrose Place")
1974: Rock musician Ahmet Zappa
1978: Olymic gold-medal gymnast Amy Chow
0756: Abd al-Rahman proclaimed Emir of Cordoba
1004: Henry II, the last Saxon ruler of Germany, was
crowned king of Lombardy following the defeat of Arduin of Ivrea. The city of Pavia rioted
at the news.
1043: Death of St. Hallvard
1092; Kidnapping of Bertrada de Montfort by Philip I, King
of France
1174: Death of Nur-ed-Din
1213: John "Lackland", King of England, submits
to the Pope
1464: HEXHAM (Final victory of York over Lancaster in the
Wars of the Roses in England)
1501: Ottaviano Petrucci of Venice founded the first
modern-style music publishing house. By producing the first book of music made from
movable type.
1547: Charles V gives Saxony to Maurice (of Saxony)
1559: The Bishops of England summoned to take the Oath of
Supremacy
1567: Mary, Queen of Scots, married James Hepburn, Earl of
Bothwell, at Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh just three months after the assassination of her
former husband, King Henry.
1591: Murder of Dimitri Ivanovitch, son of Czar Ivan IV
1602: Cape Cod was discovered by English navigator
Bartholomew Gosnold.
1614: Treaty of St. Menehould
1618: Johannes Kepler discovers his harmonics law
1641: Triennial Act
1718: James Puckle, a London lawyer, patented the world's
first machine gun.
1800: King George III escaped assassination twice. Once a
bullet meant for him killed another man, and another time when he went to the theater two
bullets missed his head. Unshaken, he told the performers to continue … and later
fell asleep.
1847: Daniel O'Connell, Irish Catholic leader known as
"The Liberator," died in Italy. By his win in an 1828 election in County Clare,
he forced the British government to accept Roman Catholics in parliament.
1858: Alexander Borodin won his doctorate in chemistry.
His dissertation was "On the Analogy of Arsenic with Phosphoric Acid."
1860: Giuseppe Garibaldi with 1,000 volunteers heavily
defeated the superior Neapolitan army under General Landi at the Battle of Calatafimi.
1862: The U.S. Agriculture Bureau became a separate entity
by an act "to establish a Department of Agriculture."
1886: Emily Dickinson, U.S. poet, died in Amherst,
Massachusetts. She wrote at least 800 poems, all but five of which remained unpublished
until after her death.
1911: The Supreme Court ordered the dissolution of
Standard Oil Company, ruling it was in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
1916: In Italy, Austrian troops took Asiago during an
attack on the Italian front along the Trentino.
1918: The first regular Air Mail service was established
from Washington, D.C., to New York City.
1920: Igor Stravinsky, famous, successful and acclaimed
for "Firebird" and "Rite of Spring", left that composing style behind
on this day, when "Pulcinella" premiered in Paris. Based on melodies by Baroque
composers, "Pulcinella" had sharp lines and witty orchestration.
1926: The New York Rangers became the newest franchise to
be awarded by the National Hockey League. Two years later, the Rangers won their first
Stanley Cup.
1928: The Australian Flying Doctor service was inaugurated
by Dr. Vincent Welsh at Australian Inland Mission, Cloncurry, Queensland.
1930: Ellen Church, the first airline stewardess, went on
duty aboard a United Airlines flight between San Francisco and Cheyenne, Wyoming.
1934: Karlis Ulmanis seized dictatorial power in a coup in
Latvia.
1936: Amy Johnson arrived in Croydon, England, after a
record-breaking return flight from South Africa taking just four days, 16 hours.
1940: The Dutch army surrendered to Nazi Germany.
1940: Nylon stockings went on general sale for the first
time in the United States.
1941: Joe DiMaggio began his record 56-game hitting streak
by singling off Chicago White Sox pitcher Ed Smith in a game played at Yankee Stadium.
(Yankees lost 13-1.)
1941: Britain's first jet-propelled aircraft, the
Gloster-Whittle E.28/39, flew for the first time.
1942: Gasoline rationing went into effect in 17 states,
limiting sales to three gallons a week for non-essential vehicles.
1948: Hours after declaring its independence, the new
state of Israel was attacked by Transjordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.
1953: World heavyweight champion, Rocky Marciano,
collected his 44th pro boxing victory, knocking out former champ, Jersey Joe Walcott, at
Chicago Stadium in two minutes, 25 seconds of the first round.
1955: The Vienna Treaty, signed by Britain, France, the
United States and the Soviet Union, restored Austria's independence. 1957 - Britain
dropped its first hydrogen bomb on Christmas Island in the Pacific.
1957: Britain dropped its first hydrogen bomb on Christmas
Island in the Pacific.
1962: After five years on "Wagon Train," Robert
Horton let his contract expire and left the popular television series. Robert Fuller
replaced Horton as the trail scout who rode with wagon master, Chris Hale.
1963: US astronaut L. Gordon Cooper blasted off aboard
"Faith Seven" on the final mission of the Project Mercury space program.
1969: Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas resigned amid a
controversy over his past legal fees.
1970: President Nixon appointed America's first two female
generals: Colonels Elizabeth Hoisington and Anna Mae Mays.
1970: Phillip Lafayette Gibbs and James Earl Green, two
black students at Jackson State University in Mississippi, were killed when police opened
fire during student protests.
1972: George C. Wallace was shot by Arthur Bremer and left
paralyzed while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination in Laurel,
Maryland.
1978: Sir Robert Menzies, long-serving Australian prime
minister, died. He was Liberal prime minister from 1939 to 1941 and then from 1949 to
1966.
1983: Israel and Jordan reached agreement on the text of a
U.S.-sponsored accord under which Israel would withdraw its troops from Lebanon as soon as
Syria and the PLO agreed to withdraw their forces.
1984: President Reagan hosted a formal welcoming ceremony
at the White House for Mexican President Miguel de la Madrid before the two leaders began
discussions on Central America and other issues.
1986: Searchers on Oregon's Mount Hood found two teen-age
survivors of a hiking expedition that became trapped in a whiteout blizzard. Nine other
climbers died.
1987: President Reagan told a gathering of out-of-town
reporters at the White House he did not consider himself "mortally wounded" by
the Iran-Contra affair. (The president got to relive his radio-announcer days when he
complied with a reporter's request to read a promo for Nashville station WSM.)
1987: Rita Hayworth, American film actress and dancer,
died. Best known for her roles in "Blood and Sand" and "Gilda."
1988: The Soviet Union began the process of withdrawing
its troops from Afghanistan, more than eight years after Soviet forces had entered the
country.
1989: Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev arrived in
Beijing for the first Sino-Soviet summit in 30 years, a visit overshadowed by
pro-democracy demonstrations led by Chinese students.
1990: Congressional leaders and Bush administration
officials began a bipartisan summit on the fiscal 1991 budget and its deficit.
1990: "Portrait of Doctor Gachet" by Vincent Van
Gogh sold for $82.5 million at Christies in New York smashing the previous world record
for price paid of $53.9 million.
1991: President Bush took Britain's Queen Elizabeth II to
a baseball game between the Baltimore Orioles and the Oakland Athletics. She left after
two innings; the A's won, 6-3.
1991: Edith Cresson, a Socialist and former trade
minister, became the first woman prime minister of France.
1992: A judge in Los Angeles ordered police officer
Laurence Powell retried on a charge of excessive force in the beating of Rodney King
(however, the charge was eventually dropped).
1992: Opposition Popular Front forces in Azerbaijan swept
President Ayaz Mutalibov from power only a day after parliament reinstated him.
1993: French police rescued six schoolgirls and a teacher
after a 46-hour hostage drama at a Paris suburban school, shooting to death a man with 16
sticks of dynamite strapped to his body.
1993: Bosnian Serbs began voting in a two-day referendum
that overwhelmingly rejected a UN-backed peace plan.
1993: "Prairie Bayou" won the Preakness.
1994: Supreme Court nominee Stephen G. Breyer arrived in
Washington to spend the night at the White House, while Republicans joined Democrats in
predicting swift Senate confirmation.
1995: Dow Corning Corporation filed for Chapter 11
bankruptcy protection, citing potentially astronomical expenses from liability lawsuits.
1995: China conducted an underground nuclear test just
days after it had agreed to an extension of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
1996: Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole announced
he was leaving the Senate after 27 years to challenge President Clinton full-time.
1996: Right-wing leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee became
India's first Hindu nationalist prime minister after his Bharatiya Janata Party emerged as
the largest single party in a hung parliament.
1997: Space shuttle "Atlantis" blasted off on a
mission to deliver urgently needed repair equipment and a fresh American astronaut to
Russia's orbiting "Mir" station.
1997: Attorney General Janet Reno requested the death
penalty for Unabomber suspect Theodore Kaczynski. (However, under an arrangement in which
he admitted his guilt, Kaczynski later agreed to be sentenced to life in prison without
possibility of parole.
1998: Trapped in blazing shopping malls, hundreds of
looters burned to death in rioting that laid smoking waste to Indonesia's capital,
Jakarta.
1999: Russian President Boris Yeltsin triumphed over his
Communist foes, surviving an impeachment vote in the Russian parliament.
1999: Charismatic won the Preakness, finishing 1½ lengths
ahead of Menifee.
2000: : By a five-to-four vote, the US Supreme Court threw out a key provision of the 1994 Violence Against Women Act, saying that rape victims could not sue their attackers in federal court.
2000: George W. Bush proposed letting Americans invest Social Security taxes in the stock market, appealing for support from the millions of people who have thrived in a booming market. Presidential rival Al Gore condemned the idea as a dangerous gamble that would turn the solemn obligations of the 65-year-old retirement plan into "a system of winners and losers."
2000: More than two decades after a study in rats prompted scientists to link saccharin to human cancer, the federal government
dropped the artificial sweetener from its list of cancer-causing chemicals.
2000: United Press International was sold to the parent company of The Washington Times.
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