Zack and Cody are 19 each. That’s the Sprouse twins, Dylan and Cole. They had the title roles in Disney Channel’s The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, later Suite Life on Deck. Dylan’s older. He’s named for the poet. Cole is younger. He’s named for Nat King Cole. The twins earned $40,000 an episode in 2010.
NASCAR’s Kurt Busch (#22) is 33 today. Jeff Gordon (#24) is 40.
Roger Clemens is 49.
If his birth certificate can be believed, Barack Hussein Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, 50 years ago today.
Lauren Tom is 50 today also. She was Lena St. Clair in The Joy Luck Club, Julie on Friends and does a lot of voiceover work, Futurama and King of the Hill (Minh and Connie Souphanousinphone), for example.
Mary Decker Slaney is 53 today. Among the best runners in the world, she was too young for the 1972 Olympics, injuries kept her from the 1976 games. (The U.S. did not compete in the 1980 Moscow Olympics.)
In Los Angeles in 1984 she fell and was injured in a collision with Zola Budd during 3000 meters final. This is from Sports Illustrated, August 24, 1984 (via Wikipedia). The photo was by Bob Thomas.
That last brutal kilometer would begin in about 300 meters, on the backstretch. Now, as Decker relaxed, gathering herself, the slight, pale, barefoot, 92-pound form of Budd again came even with her. Budd had been outside Decker’s right shoulder almost from the start, and Decker knew it. They had bumped elbows at 500 meters, a result of Budd’s wide-swinging arm action, and Decker had shot her a sharp look. Budd had sensed the slowing pace and didn’t like it. Her training and temperament combine to make her natural race one of constantly increasing pressure. She and her coach, Pieter Labuschagne, knew that she couldn’t kick with a fresh Decker or (Maricica) Puica. If she was to run her best in this Olympic final, the pace would have to go faster. So she passed Decker on the turn, just after, 1,600 meters. Decker felt her uncomfortably close. “She was cutting in on the turn, without being near passing,” Decker would say. By the end of the turn, Budd appeared to have enough margin to cut in without interfering with Decker’s stride, but instead she hung wide, on the outside of Lane 1, as they came into the stretch. Decker was near the rail, a yard behind Budd. Budd’s teammate, Wendy Sly, had come up to third, off Budd’s shoulder, and Puica was fourth, tucked in tight behind Decker, waiting. Decker sensed Budd drifting to the inside. “She tried to cut in without being, basically, ahead,” Decker would say. But Decker didn’t do what a seasoned middle-distance runner would have done. She didn’t reach out to Budd’s shoulder to let her know she was there, too close behind for Budd to move to the pole. Instead, Decker shortened her stride for a couple of steps. There was contact. Decker’s right thigh grazed Budd’s left foot. Budd took five more strides, slightly off balance. Trying to regain control, she swayed in slightly to the left. Decker’s right foot struck Budd’s left calf, low, just above the Achilles tendon. Budd’s left leg shot out, and she was near falling. But Decker was falling, tripped by that leg all askew. “To keep from pushing her, I fell,” she would say. She reached out after Budd, inadvertently tearing the number from her back and went headlong across the rail onto the infield.
Academy Award winner (adapted screenplay for Sling Blade), Billy Bob Thornton is 56. He was Mr. Angelina Jolie 2000-2003.
Potomac Valley Indigenous Persons running back John Riggins is 62 today. Best Riggins line among many, to Justice Sandra Day O’Connor “Loosen up, Sandy baby.”
Munch is 67 today. That’s actor Richard Belzer.
The Rocket, Maurice Richard was born on August 4th 90 years ago today. The hall of fame right wing played for the Montreal Canadiens, 1942-1960. He died in 2000.
And Louis Armstrong was born 110 years ago today. That should be enough to make it a holiday.