Today is the birthday
… of Bob Strauss, the politico and diplomat. Ambassador Strauss is 89. Once upon a time NewMexiKen’s boss was Bob Strauss Jr.
… of John LeCarre. The author is 76.
… of Peter Max. The artist is 70.
… of John Lithgow. He’s 62. He’s become somewhat a buffoon on TV in the sitcoms and commercials. Makes it hard to remember that he’s twice been nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar — Terms of Endearment and The World According to Garp.
… of Jeannie C. Riley, singer of the hit “Harper Valley P.T.A.” She, too, is 62.
… of Jennifer Holliday. The Tony Award winner is 47.
… of Evander Holyfield, 45.
… of one-time first daughter Amy Carter. Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter’s little girl is 40.
Robert Reed was born on this date in 1932. A fine actor but one who will always be remembered most as the dad on The Brady Bunch. Reed’s best TV role was as Kenneth Preston, son in the excellent early 1960s father-son lawyer drama The Defenders. His father was played by E. G. Marshall. Reed died in 1992.
Winston Hubert McIntosh was born on this date in 1944. A founding member of The Wailers, Peter Tosh also was an international solo star and songwriter. He was shot and killed along with five others by a friend during an argument on September 11, 1987.
226 years ago today the British army surrendered to the Americans and French at Yorktown, Virginia, in effect ending the War for American Independence.
In early October, some 17,000 American and French troops led by Generals George Washington and Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau surrounded British-occupied Yorktown. Off the coast, French Admiral François de Grasse strategically positioned his naval fleet to control access to the town via the Chesapeake Bay and the York River.
The Franco-American siege exhausted the British army’s supplies of food and ammunition. With no hope for escape, Cornwallis agreed to the terms of Washington’s Articles of Capitulation, signing the document at Moore House on October 19. Hours after the surrender, the general’s defeated troops marched out of Yorktown to the tune “The World Turned Upside Down.”
Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown effectively ended the Revolutionary War. Lacking the financial resources to raise a new army, the British government appealed to the Americans for peace. Almost two years later, on September 3, 1783, the signing of the Treaty of Paris brought the war to an end.
[Source: Library of Congress]