Category: Birthdays

Today is the birthday

… of George Martin. The man who produced The Beatles’ records is 85.

… of Dabney Coleman. Franklin M. Hart Jr. is 79 (that’s the boss in Nine To Five).

… of Bobby Hull. The hockey hall-of-famer is 72.

… of Stephen Stills. The rock and roll hall-of-famer is 66.

… of John Paul Jones. No, not the Navy guy. The Led Zeppelin guy. He’s 65.

… of Victoria Principal. Pamela Barnes Ewing (Dallas) is 61.

… of Mel Gibson. He is 55.

… of Danica McKellar, 36. You know, Winnie from The Wonder Years.

… of Eli Manning, 30. Enjoying his birthday with no playoff games to worry about.

J(ohn) R(onald) R(euel) Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, on this date in 1892. Tolkien is best known for his fantasy novels The Hobbit (1937) and The Lord of the Rings trilogy (1954-1955).

Joseph de Veuster was born on this date in 1840. Known as Father Damien, the Belgian priest spent the last 16 years of his life ministering to the leper colony on Molokai.

“This is my work in the world. Sooner or later I shall become a leper, but may it not be until I have exhausted my capabilities for good.”

With King Kamehameha, Damien’s statue is one of the two chosen by Hawaii to be displayed in Statuary Hall in the nation’s Capitol.

Source: Hawaii State Government: Father Damien

Lucretia Mott was born on January 3rd in 1793.

Inspired by a father who encouraged his daughters to be useful and a mother who was active in business affairs, Lucretia Mott worked as a tireless advocate for the oppressed while also raising six children. Over the course of her lifetime, Mott actively participated in many of the reform movements of the day including abolition, temperance, and pacifism. She also played a vital role in organizing the 1848 Women’s Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, which launched the woman suffrage movement in America.

Today in History: Library of Congress

This is Ms. Mott’s complete New York Times obituary from 1880:

Lucretia Mott died last evening at her residence, near Philadelphia, in her eighty-eighth year. Mrs. Mott, whose name was probably as widely known as that of any other public woman in this or the preceding generation, was born in the old whaling town of Nantucket on the 3d of January, 1793. Her maiden name was Coffin. When 11 years old, her parents removed to Boston, where she went to school, finishing her education at a young ladies’ boarding school in Dutchess County, N.Y., in which, when only 15 years old, she became a teacher. In 1809 she rejoined her parents, who had removed to Philadelphia, and in 1811, two years later, was married to James Mott. She was then in her nineteenth year. Her husband went into partnership with her father, Mr. Coffin, and Mrs. Mott again turned her attention to educational matters. In 1817 she took charge of a school in Philadelphia, and in 1818 began to preach. She made extended pilgrimages through New-England, Pennsylvania, Maryland and parts of Virginia advocating Quaker principles and waging at the same time a vigorous warfare against the evils of intemperance and slavery. In the division of the Society of Friends in 1827 she adhered to the Hicksites. Mrs. Mott took a prominent part in organizing the American Anti-Slavery Society in Philadelphia in 1833, and was a delegate to the famous World’s Anti-Slavery Convention in London in 1840, where, in company with other female delegates, she was refused admission on account of her sex. She was also prominent in the original Woman’s Rights Convention held at Seneca Falls, N.Y., in 1848, over which her husband, James Mott, presided. During the last 30 years she has been conspicuous in such gatherings and in annual meetings of the Society of Friends. Among her published works are “Sermons to Medical Students” and “A Discourse on Women.”

The last day of the year is the birthday

… of Anthony Hopkins. The Oscar winner is 73. Hopkins has been nominated for Best Actor three times, winning for The Silence of the Lambs. He was also nominated as Best Supporting Actor for Amistad.

… of Tim Considine. Spin of “Spin and Marty” is 70. Considine was also the oldest of “My Three Sons” and played the soldier slapped by General Patton in the film Patton.

… of Sarah Miles. The Oscar nominee (best actress for Ryan’s Daughter) is 69.

… of Ben Kingsley. The Oscar winner is 67. He won Best Actor for his portrayal of Gandhi. He was also nominated for Best Actor for House of Sand and Fog and twice for Best Supporting Actor.

… of Diane Von Furstenberg. The fashion designer is 64.

… of Tim Matheson. Animal House’s “Otter,” better known recently as Vice President John Hoynes on “West Wing,” is 63.

… of Donna Summer. The Bad Girl is 62.

… of Bebe Neuwirth. Lilith is 52. Ms. Neuwirth won the Emmy twice for this role on Cheers.

… of Val Kilmer. He’s 51.

… of Gong Li. The actress is 45. So is author Nicholas Sparks.

Henry John Deutschendorf Jr. was born in Roswell, New Mexico, on this date in 1943. His grandmother gave him a guitar while he lived in Tucson and eventually he became John Denver. Denver died in 1997 when his experimental plane crashed into Monterey Bay.

George C. Marshall was born on this date in 1880.

Few Americans in the twentieth century have left a greater legacy to world peace than George C. Marshall (1880-1959). As chief of staff of the United States Army during World War II, it fell to Marshall to raise, train, and equip an army of several million men. It was Marshall who selected the officer corps and it was Marshall who played a leading role in planning military operations on a global scale. In the end, it was Marshall whom British Prime Minister Winston Churchill hailed as “the true organizer of victory.”

Yet history will associate Marshall foremost as the author of the Marshall Plan. The idea of extending billions of American dollars for European economic recovery was not his alone. He was only one of many Western leaders who realized the tragic consequences of doing nothing for those war-shattered countries in which basic living conditions were deplorable and still deteriorating two years after the end of the fighting. But Marshall, more than anyone else, led the way. In an address at Harvard University on June 5, 1947, Marshall, in his capacity as secretary of state, articulated the general principles of the Marshall Plan.

National Portrait Gallery

Marshall won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.

Henri Matisse was born on this date in 1869. With Picasso, Matisse is considered the pinnacle of 20th century painting.

The WebMuseum has details of the life and works of Matisse including several examples.

Matisse died in 1954.

. . . is the birthday

… of Russ Tamblyn. Riff, “a Jet to his dying day,” is 76.

… of Sandy Koufax. The most dominant pitcher in the game in the early 1960s, the man who threw four no-hitters including a perfect game is 75.

… of Noel Paul Stookey. Paul of Peter, Paul & Mary is 73.

… of James Burrows. The director of “Taxi,” “Cheers” and “Will and Grace” is 70.

… of Fred Ward. The actor (Gus Grissom in The Right Stuff and Earl Bassett in the greatest movie ever, Tremors) is 68.

… of Monkees Michael Nesmith (68) and Davy Jones (65).

… of Patti Smith. Punk rock’s poet laureate is 64. An excerpt from a longer profile at The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor:

She worked at Scribner’s bookstore in Manhattan, a job that she adored. They were required to read the New York Times Book Review, and she loved that people there “took book clerks seriously”. At the store she read a lot of French poetry and biographies of poets and painters. Outside the store, she spent time at the St Mark’s Poetry Project, and also wrote articles for Rolling Stone magazine.

She had some friends who’d moved to New York City before her, and she was supposed to stay with them for a while. She showed up at their apartment looking for them. But it turns out that they didn’t live there any more, and instead of finding them she stumbled across a sleeping art student, Robert Mapplethorpe, a man who would go on to become a famous photographer. But at the time, Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe were each just 20 years old, and they became lovers and roommates — inseparable young cash-strapped companions living out bohemian dreams in New York City. They rented the smallest room at the Hotel Chelsea, so they could reside in a place famous for housing writers and artists like Dylan Thomas, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, and Simone de Beauvoir.

… of Meredith Viera and of Matt Lauer. The Today show hosts are 57 and 53.

… of Tracey Ullman. She’s 51.

… of Eldrick Woods. Tiger is 35.

… of LeBron James. He’s 26 today.

The Genius Among Geniuses, Alfred Einstein, was born on December 30, 1880.

And a genius of another kind, Bo Diddley was born on this date in 1928. (He died in 2008.)

Music historian Robert Palmer has described Bo Diddley as “one of the most original and fertile rhythmic intelligences of our time.” He will forever be known as the creator of the “Bo Diddley beat,” one of the cornerstone rhythms of rock and roll. He employed it in his namesake song, “Bo Diddley,” as well as other primal rockers like “Mona.” This distinctive African-based rhythm pattern (which goes bomp bomp bomp bomp-bomp) was picked up from Diddley by other artists and has been a distinctive and recurring element in rock and roll through the decades.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Mary Tyler Moore was born in Brooklyn, 74 years ago today.

On The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Moore played Mary Richards, a 30-something single woman “making it on her own” in 1970s Minneapolis. MTM first pitched her character to CBS as a young divorcee, but CBS executives believed her role as Laura Petrie was so firmly etched in the public mind that viewers would think she had divorced Dick Van Dyke (and that the American public would not find a divorced woman likable), so Richards was rewritten as a woman who had moved to the big city after ending a long affair. Richards landed a job working in the news department of fictional WJM-TV, where Moore’s all-American spunk played off against the gruff boss Lou Grant (Ed Asner), world-weary writer Murray Slaughter (Gavin MacLeod) and pompous anchorman Ted Baxter (Ted Knight). In early seasons, her all-male work environment was counterbalanced by a primarily female home life, where again her character contrasted with her ditzy landlady Phyllis Lindstrom (Cloris Leachman) and her New York-born neighbor and best friend, Rhoda Morgenstern (Valerie Harper).

The Encyclopedia of Television

Angelina Jolie’s dad is 72. That would be four-time Oscar nominee, one-time winner, Jon Voight. Voight won his Oscar for Coming Home, as did co-star Jane Fonda. The film had eight nominations, three wins.

Marianne Faithfull is 64. Faithfull is a descendant of Count Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the 19th century author and source of the term “masochism.” Her signature song, As Tears Go By, was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.

Mayday Malone is 63. That’s Sam, Ted Danson.

Paula Poundstone is 51 today.

Two-time Oscar nominee Jude Law is 38.

The 17th president, Andrew Johnson, was born on this date in 1808. From the obituary in The New York Times in 1875:

The history this man leaves is a rare one. His career was remarkable, even in this country; it would have been quite impossible in any other. It presents the spectacle of a man who never went to school cession of posts of civil responsibility to the highest office in the land, and evincing his continued hold upon the popular heart by a subsequent election to the Senate in the teeth of a bitter personal and political opposition.

Charles Goodyear was born 210 years ago today. He is not related to Goodyear the company, despite being the first inventor/industrialist to make rubber suitable for modern use — before him rubber was more like what we call rubber cement.

The great discovery came in the winter of 1839. Goodyear was using sulphur in his experiments now. Although Goodyear himself has left the details in doubt, the most persistent story is that one February day he wandered into Woburn’s general store to show off his latest gum-and-sulphur formula. Snickers rose from the cracker-barrel forum, and the usually mild-mannered little inventor got excited, waved his sticky fistful of gum in the air. It flew from his fingers and landed on the sizzling-hot potbellied stove.

When he bent to scrape it off, he found that instead of melting like molasses, it had charred like leather. And around the charred area was a dry, springy brown rim — “gum elastic” still, but so remarkably altered that it was virtually a new substance. He had made weatherproof rubber.

This discovery is often cited as one of history’s most celebrated “accidents.” Goodyear stoutly denied that. Like Newton’s falling apple, he maintained, the hot stove incident held meaning only for the man “whose mind was prepared to draw an inference.” That meant, he added simply, the one who had “applied himself most perseveringly to the subject.”

Goodyear || History

And today is the birthday of Donna, great friend, doting mother and grandmother and aunt, highly regarded federal executive and American Indian leader. And this year she made posole. Like I said a year ago, she aces that and she’ll be perfect. She did and she is. Happy Birthday, Donna!

Stan Lee (Stanley Martin Lieber), the creator of “Spider-Man” and “The Incredible Hulk” is 88.

Martin Milner, the senior police officer on “Adam-12” is 79.

Nichelle Nichols, Lieutenant (ultimately Commander) Uhura of “Star Trek” is 78. Nichols sang with Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton before acting.

Six-time Oscar nominee Maggie Smith is 76. She’s won twice — leading for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and supporting for California Suite. No Oscars for her most famous role though, Professor Minerva McGonagall in Harry Potter.

Five-time Oscar nominee Denzel Washington is 56 today. He’s won twice — leading for Training Day and supporting for Glory.

Earl Kenneth Hines was born on December 28, 1903.

A brilliant keyboard virtuoso, Earl “Fatha” Hines was one of the first great piano soloists in jazz, and one of the very few musicians who could hold his own with Louis Armstrong. His so-called ‘trumpet’ style used doubled octaves in the right hand to produce a clear melodic line that stood out over the sound of a whole band, but he also had a magnificent technical command of the entire range of the keyboard.

Earl Hines at All About Jazz

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was born in Staunton, Virginia, on this date in 1856. After graduating from Princeton in 1879, Wilson studied law at the University of Virginia for one year. He received a Ph.D. in political science from Johns Hopkins University in 1886. Wilson remains the only American president to have earned a doctoral degree.

Wilson served on the faculties of Bryn Mawr College and Wesleyan University before joining the Princeton faculty as professor of jurisprudence and political economy in 1890. He became President of Princeton in 1902. His commentary on contemporary political matters led to his election as Governor of New Jersey in 1910 and as President in 1912. Wilson was the second of three sitting American Presidents to win the Nobel Prize for Peace. (Theodore Roosevelt was the first, Barack Obama the third.)

Today is the birthday

… of Scotty Moore. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee is 79.

Scotty Moore served as Elvis Presley’s guitarist from 1954 to 1958, widely regarded as Presley’s golden years. Moore was a participant in the historic early sessions at Sun Recording Studio that mark the birth of rock and roll. It was on Monday, July 5th, 1954, that Presley, Moore and bassist Bill Black broke into bluesman Arthur Cruddup’s “That’s All Right” in a freewheeling style that brought together country and blues. They took a similarly approach to bluegrass legend Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon of Kentucky.” With these spontaneous breakthroughs, conceived in the most innocent and intuitive way, both sides of Elvis Presley’s legendary first single—and the first new strains of rock and roll—were in the can. Notably, the single (Sun 209) was credited to “Elvis Presley, Scotty and Bill.”

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

… of John Amos. Adm. Percy Fitzwallace (West Wing), Toby (Kunta Kinte as adult) and J.J.’s father (Good Times) is 71.

… of Cokie Roberts. The daughter of Hale and Lindy Boggs is 67.

… of Gerard Depardieu. The actor who has played more famous characters than even Charlton Heston (Cyrano De Bergerac, Jean de Florette, Christopher Columbus, Honoré de Balzac, Le Comte de Monte Cristo, Porthos, Auguste Rodin, Franco, Danton) is 62.

… of rhythm guitarist David Knopfler. The other Knopfler is 58. With his brother Mark (lead guitar), John Illsley (bass) and drummer Pick Withers, they formed Dire Straits in 1977. And 120 million albums later . . .

Sarah Vowell, an Okie from Muskogee, is 41 today.

Her essay collection Take the Cannoli: Stories from the New World (2000) starts with a piece called “Shooting Dad,” which begins: “If you were passing by the house where I grew up during my teenage years and it happened to be before Election Day, you wouldn’t have needed to come inside to see that it was a house divided. You could have looked at the Democratic campaign poster in the upstairs window and the Republican one in the downstairs window and seen our home for the Civil War battleground it was. I’m not saying who was the Democrat or who was the Republican — my father or I — but I will tell you that I have never subscribed to Guns & Ammo, that I did not plaster the family vehicle with National Rifle Association stickers, and that hunter’s orange was never my color.”

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

Marlene Dietrich was born on this date in 1901. Miss Dietrich was nominated for an Oscar for best actress for the 1930 film Morocco.

Today is the birthday of Carroll Spinney; he’s 77. For more than 40 years, Spinney has been one of the most recognized performers on television. He’s won five Emmys and a National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Lifetime Achievement Award.

Carroll Spinney is the puppeteer who plays Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch.

Abdul “Duke” Fakir is 75 today. He is the only surviving member of the Four Tops. The quartet performed together for 43 years (1954-1997) without a change in personnel. (Lawrence Payton died in 1997.)

“The Four Tops deserve to be recognized both for their achievements and their longevity. On the latter count, the group performed for over four decades together without a single change in personnel – a record of constancy that is mind-boggling in the notoriously changeable world of popular music. As for their accomplishments, the Four Tops cut some of Motown’s most memorable singles during the label’s creative zenith, including “Baby I Need Your Loving,” “I Can’t Help Myself,” “It’s the Same Old Song,” “Reach Out I’ll Be There,” “Standing in the Shadows of Love” and “Bernadette.” The Four Tops’ greatest records were recorded at Motown with the in-house songwriting and production team of Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland between 1964 and 1967.

The foursome arrived at Motown in 1963 as seasoned veterans, having already logged nearly a decade in show business. The Detroit-based vocal group – consisting of lead vocalist Levi Stubbs, first tenor Abdul “Duke” Fakir, second tenor Lawrence Payton and baritone Renaldo “Obie” Benson – began singing together as the Four Aims soon after graduating high school in 1954. …

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Phil Spector is 74. He’s doing 19-to-life for the murder of actress Lana Clarkson. In 2008 I reported that Spector was 68. He’s gotten six years older in just two years. I’m guessing he had to give his real age in prison.

Phil Spector is among the greatest producers of rock and roll, and some would passionately argue that he is the greatest ever. His ambitious approach to the art of record production helped redefine and revitalize rock and roll during its early-Sixties slump. On a string of classic records released between 1961 and 1966 on his Philles label, he elevated the monaural 45 rpm single to an art form. “Little symphonies for the kiddies,” he called them, and they were indeed dramatic pop records possessed of a grandeur and intimacy theretofore uncommon in rock and roll.

Phil Spector

You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling (Righteous Brothers)
River Deep – Mountain High (Ike and Tina Turner)
Be My Baby (Ronettes)
Da Doo Ron Ron (Crystals)
Spanish Harlem (Ben E. King)
He’s a Rebel (Crystals)

Carlton Fisk is 63.

Baseball’s most durable catcher with 24 years behind the plate, Carlton Pudge Fisk caught more games (2,226) than any player in history. The 11-time All-Star hit 376 career home runs, including a record-setting 351 as a catcher, since bested by Mike Piazza. His most memorable home run came in Game Six of the 1975 World Series – a 12th inning blast off the left field foul pole at Fenway Park – giving his Red Sox a 7-6 win over Cincinnati. His tremendous pride and work ethic were respected by both teammates as well as the opposition.

National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

Ozzie Smith is 56.

Known as “The Wizard of Oz,” Ozzie Smith combined athletic ability with acrobatic skill to become one of the game’s great defensive shortstops. In 19 seasons with the Padres and Cardinals, the 13-time Gold Glove Award winner set major league shortstop records for assists, double plays and total chances. He would develop into an offensive weapon, finishing with over 2,400 hits and 500 stolen bases. His ninth-inning home run won the fifth game of the 1985 National League Championship Series.

National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

David Sedaris is 54 today. The Writer’s Almanac tells of Sedaris’s debut on NPR’S Morning Edition 18 years ago:

The eight-minute monologue made him famous. Suddenly his phone started to ring. He said: “I was very, very surprised. … I’ve always thought that the definition of a good life was being asleep when Morning Edition was on. I never listened to the show, so I never had a concept of anyone else listening to it, I suppose.”

IF YOU’VE NEVER HEARD THIS, IT IS AN ABSOLUTE MUST!

Mao Tse-tung was born on December 26th in 1893.

Melvil Dewey was born on December 10th in 1851. You know — Dewey, as in Dewey decimal system.

Read Dewey’s obituary in 1931 from The New York Times.

Elsewhere, Kenneth Branagh is 50.

And Susan Dey of “The Partridge Family” is 58.

Emily Dickinson was born on December 10th in 1830.

This from a lengthy piece about Dickinson at The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor:

Emily Dickinson is one of the most-speculated-about writers in history — in popular myth, she was a virginal recluse who dressed all in white and then wrote passionate poems that were so unlike anything being written at the time. Relatively little is known about her life, and biographers often try to use clues in her poems to guess about her habits, personality, and sexuality.

I taste a liquor never brewed
by Emily Dickinson

I taste a liquor never brewed –
From Tankards scooped in Pearl –
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air – am I –
And Debauchee of Dew –
Reeling – thro’ endless summer days –
From inns of molten Blue –

When “Landlords” turn the drunken Bee
Out of the Foxglove’s door –
When Butterflies – renounce their “drams” –
I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats –
And Saints – to windows run –
To see the Tippler
Leaning against the – Sun!

Today is the birthday

… of Kirk Douglas. The three-time Oscar nominee is 94. NewMexiKen’s favorite Douglas performance is in Lonely Are the Brave. “Filmed on location in New Mexico, Lonely are the Brave was adapted by Dalton Trumbo from Edward Abbey’s novel Brave Cowboy.”

… of Judi Dench. The six-time Oscar nominee, one-time winner, is 76.

… of Beau Bridges. Jeff’s big brother is 69. No Oscars for Beau, but he has three wins from 10 Emmy nominations.

… of Dick Butkus, 68. The Butkus Award is given each year to the best college linebacker, so I guess that tells you what kind of a linebacker Butkus was.

… of Tom Kite. He’s 61.

… of John Malkovich. The two-time Oscar nominee is 57.

… of Donny Osmond, 53. Fifty. Three.

… of Felicity Huffman. The Oscar nominee and Desperate Housewife is 48.

… of Jakob Dylan, son of Bob. Jakob is 41 today. He’s the youngest of his dad’s four children with first wife Sara Lownds, the Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands.

The screenwriter and novelist Dalton Trumbo was born in Montrose, Colorado, 105 years ago today. Trumbo was nominated for three writing Oscars, winning twice, for Roman Holiday and The Brave One. Because he was blacklisted for refusing to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee, both Oscars were awarded to fronts. The records were changed only years later after Otto Preminger and Kirk Douglas fought the blacklisting and credited Trumbo’s screenwriting for Exodus and Spartacus respectively. Trumbo’s novel Johnny Got His Gun is a classic that everyone should read.

The famed circus clown Emmett Kelly was born on December 9, 1898. Kelly was known for his character Weary Willie, in makeup as a bum sweeping up. His was a revolutionary character; clowns always appeared in white face before Kelly. He was a star performer with Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus when I was a kid. And he was celebrity enough that he could appear on the popular TV show “What’s My Line?” The video is fun when Kelly first appears.

Grace Hopper was born in New York City 104 years ago today.

She began tinkering around with machines when she was seven years old, dismantling several alarm clocks around the house to see how they worked. She studied math and physics in college, and eventually got a Ph.D. in mathematics from Yale.

Then World War II broke out, and Hopper wanted to serve her country. Her father had been an admiral in the Navy, so she applied to a division of the Navy called WAVES, which stood for Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service. They turned her down at first[;] they said she was too old at 35, and that she didn’t weigh enough, at 105 pounds. But she wouldn’t give up, and they eventually accepted her. With her math skills, she was assigned to work on a machine that might help calculate the trajectory of bombs and rockets.

Hopper learned how to program that early computing machine, and wrote the first instruction manual for its use. And she went on to help write an early computer language known as COBOL — “Common Business-Oriented Language.” She remained in the Navy, and eventually she became the first woman ever promoted to rear admiral.

The Writers Almanac from American Public Media (2006)

Clarence Birdseye was born on this date in 1886. Birdseye, fishing with Inuit in the Arctic, observed that fish flash frozen at Arctic temperatures, when thawed, tasted much better and fresher than fish frozen at higher temperatures, as was being done commercially. That is, Birdseye came up with the approach that made frozen food acceptable. The company he founded eventually became General Foods.

Wow, since I last posted birthdays for this date, David Carradine (1936-2009) and James MacArthur (1937-2010) have died. Both were 72.

It’s still the birthday

… of Flutist James Galway. He’s 71.

… of Jerry Butler. His precious love is 67.

… of Gregg Allman. Not such a ramblin’ man now that he’s 63.

As the principal architects of Southern rock, the Allman Brothers Band forged this new musical offshoot from elements of blues, jazz, soul, R&B and rock and roll. Along with the Grateful Dead and Cream, they help advance rock as a medium for improvisation. Their kind of jamming required a level of technical virtuosity and musical literacy that was relatively new to rock & roll, which had theretofore largely been a song-oriented medium. The original guitarists in the Allman Brothers Band – Duane Allman and Dickey Betts – broke that barrier with soaring, extended solos. Combined with organist Gregg Allman’s gruff, soulful vocals and Hammond B3 organ, plus the forceful, syncopated drive of a rhythm section that included two drummers, the Allman Brothers Band were a blues-rocking powerhouse from their beginnings in 1969.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

… of Bill Bryson. The humor writer is 59. Not much funny about that.

… of Kim Basinger. Might take her more than 9½ weeks now that she’s 57.

… of Teri Hatcher. She’s desperate at 46.

… of Sinead O’Connor. Nothing compares 2 her at 44.

Sammy Davis Jr. was born 84 years ago today.

The showman was born in a Harlem tenement, grew up in vaudeville from the age of 3 and never went to school. His talents as a mime, comedian, trumpet player, drummer, pianist and vibraphonist as well as singer and dancer were shaped from his childhood and made him one of the nation’s first black performers to gain mainstream acclaim.

With heavy jewelry around his neck and on his fingers, and clad in a snug jumpsuit or tuxedo, the short, slim showman with a broken nose, defiant jaw and big, crooked smile had a rakish charm that energized stages for decades. He sold out leading nightclubs and concert halls, won personal triumphs in such Broadway musicals as ”Mr. Wonderful” (1956) and ”Golden Boy” (1964), illumined movies and television and made scores of hit recordings with such signature songs as ”What Kind of Fool Am I?,” ”Candy Man,” ”Mr. Bojangles” and ”I’ve Gotta Be Me.”

New York Times obituary, 1990

Elzie Crisler Segar was born on this date in 1894. In 1919 he created a comic strip called Thimble Theater featuring the characters Olive Oyl, Castor Oyl and Horace Hamgravy. In 1929 he added a character called Popeye. Segar died in 1938. Popeye is still around.

Eli Whitney was born on December 8th in 1765. His invention that removed seeds from short staple cotton made him famous in history and caused the civil war. He was also an innovator in the use of interchangeable parts for mass manufacturing. As he was attempting, unsuccessfully, to mass produce firearms for the U.S. Army he also invented cost accounting.

Jeanette Rankin cast the sole vote in Congress against the U.S. declaration of war on Japan on this date in 1941. She had also voted against entry into World War I. When elected in 1916, Rankin was the first woman member of the U.S. House of Representatives. She was not re-elected in 1918, after voting against entry in the First World War, but was returned to Congress for one term in 1940. Jeanette Rankin was a social worker and a lobbyist for peace and women’s rights. She died just before her 93rd birthday in 1973. She is one of the two Montanans honored in The National Statuary Hall Collection of the U.S. Capitol.

Today is the birthday

… of Eli Wallach. Tuco is 95. “Hey Blondie, do you know what you are? You’re a stinking son of a….” [Theme starts.]

Wallach has more than 150 acting credits lidsted on IMDb.

… of Ellen Burstyn. Alice is 78. Ms. Burstyn has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress five times, winning for Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore in 1975. She was also nominated for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for The Last Picture Show.

… of Johnny Bench. The Hall of Fame catcher is 63.

… of Larry Bird. The Basketball Hall of Famer is 54.

… of T.O., Terrell Owens. He’s 37, and doing well for my fantasy team.

Richard Warren Sears was born December 7, 1863, in Stewartville, Minnesota. In 1886, seeking to make some extra money, he took a number of watches on consignment and sold them all to fellow railroad stations agents. Within six months he quit the railroad and formed the R.W. Sears Watch Company, a mail-order business. He joined with watch repairman Alvah C. Roebuck the next year. Sears, Roebuck and Co. moved to Chicago in 1893.

Willa Cather was born in Back Creek Valley, Virginia, on this date in 1873. The following is from her New York TImes obituary in 1947.

One of the most distinguished of American novelists, Willa Sibert Cather wrote a dozen or more novels that will be long remembered for their exquisite economy and charm of manner. Her talent had its nourishment and inspiration in the American scene, the Middle West in particular, and her sensitive and patient understanding of that section of the country formed the basis of her work.

Much of her writing was conceived in something of an attitude of placid reminiscence. This was notably true of such early novels as “My Antonia” and “O Pioneers!” in which she told with minute detail of homestead life on the slowly conquered prairies.

Perhaps her most famous book was “A Lost Lady,” published in 1923. In it Miss Cather’s talents were said to have reached their full maturity. It is the story of the Middle West in the age of railway-building, of the charming wife of Captain Forrester, a retired contractor, and her hospitable and open-handed household as seen through the eyes of an adoring boy. The climax of the book, with the disintegration of the Forrester household and the slow coarsening of his wife, is considered a masterpiece of vivid, haunting prose.

Another of her famous books is “Death Comes for the Archbishop,” 1927, in which she tells in the form of a chronicle a simple story of two saints of the Southwest. Her novel, “One of Ours,” won the Pulitzer Prize in 1922.

Today is the birthday

… of Dave Brubeck. Dave’s taken five for 90 years.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwNrmYRiX_o

… of Tom Hulce. The actor who played Mozart in Amadeus is 57. (The film came out in 1984.) Hulce got an Oscar nomination for that performance. He shows up from time-to-time, but the only other role that comes to mind is as Larry Kroger in Animal House.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ciFTP_KRy4

… of Steven Wright. He’s 55.

• All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand.
• If at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.
• How do you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?
• Boycott shampoo! Demand the REAL poo!
• Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.
• A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me, I’m afraid of widths.
• A friend of mine once sent me a post card with a picture of the entire planet Earth taken from space. On the back it said, “Wish you were here.”
• I bought some batteries, but they weren’t included.
• If you shoot at mimes, should you use a silencer?
• What’s another word for Thesaurus?
• If toast always lands butter-side down, and cats always land on their feet, what happens if you strap toast on the back of a cat and drop it?

… of Judd Apatow. The director is 43.

One of America’s great lyricists, Ira Gershwin was born on this date in 1896.

Summertime
And the livin’ is easy,
Fish are jumpin’
And the cotton is high.
Oh yo’ daddy’s rich
An’ yo’ ma is good lookin’
So hush, little baby,
Don’t you cry.

[with Dubose Heyward]

*****

You’ve made my life so glamorous
You can’t blame me for feeling amorous.
Oh! ‘S wonderful! ‘S marvelous!
That you should care for me!

‘S wonderful! ‘S marvelous!
That you should care for me!
‘S awful nice! ‘S paradise!
‘S what I love to see!

*****

The way you wear your hat,
The way you sip your tea,
The mem’ry of all that —
No, no! They can’t take that away from me!

The way your smile just beams,
The way you sing off key,
The way you haunt my dreams —
No, no! They can’t take that away from me!

Alfred Joyce Kilmer was born on December 6th in 1886. He published his most famous poem in 1914.

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

John Singleton Mosby, the Gray Ghost, was born on this date in 1833. A Virginian, Mosby sided with his state during the secession. He organized a partisan ranger company, the 43rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry, also known as Mosby’s Rangers or Mosby’s Raiders, and conducted what Union leaders considered to be guerilla raids in northern Virginia, from the Shenandoah Valley to the Potomac River. After the war, Mosby became politically aligned and friendly with Republican President Grant, was a successful lawyer, and entertained a young George S. Patton with Civil War stories. He lived until 1916.

That’s Kunstler’s painting Fairfax Raid, depicting Mosby’s daring saunter behind enemy lines on March 9, 1863. That morning he captured Union General Edwin H. Stoughton. According to a story reported in Wikipedia, “Mosby found Stoughton in bed and roused him with a slap to his rear. Upon being so rudely awakened the general shouted, ‘Do you know who I am?’ Mosby quickly replied, ‘Do you know Mosby, general?’ ‘Yes! Have you got the rascal?’ ‘No, but he has got you!” His group also captured 30 or more sentries without firing a shot.”

You can’t drive two miles in the Fairfax-Manassas, Virginia, area without seeing this or that Mosby shopping center, neighborhood, school and so on.

Jeff Bridges is 61 today.

Marisa Tomei is 46.

Gilbert Stuart was born on this date in 1755.

Because he portrayed virtually all the notable men and women of the Federal period in the United States, Gilbert Stuart was declared the “Father of American Portraiture” by his contemporaries. Born in Rhode Island, the artist trained and worked in London, England, and Dublin, Ireland, from 1775 to 1793. He then returned to America with the specific intention of painting President Washington’s portrait.

Stuart resided in New York (1793-1795); Philadelphia (1795-1803), where he did his first portrait of George Washington; and the new capital at Washington, D.C. (1803-1805). In 1805 he settled in Boston and painted the Gibbs-Coolidge Set, the only surviving depiction of all five first presidents. Before his death at seventy-two, Stuart also taught many followers. A charming conversationalist, Stuart entertained his sitters during long hours of posing to sustain the fresh spontaneity of their expressions. To emphasize facial characterization, he eliminated unnecessary accessories and preferred dark, neutral backgrounds and simple, bust- or half-length formats.

Stuart often was irritatingly slow in completing commissions, in spite of his swift, bravura brushwork. Though he inevitably commanded high prices, Stuart lived on the verge of bankruptcy throughout his career because of his extravagant lifestyle and inept business dealings. In London, for instance, he had owned a carriage, an unheard-of presumption for a commoner. And Stuart’s years in Ireland, both coming and going, had been ploys to escape debtors’ prison.

National Gallery of Art

Andy Williams is 83. Williams headlined at Caesar’s Palace when it opened in 1966. That is, he was once a very big star.

Ozzy Osbourne is 62.

Daryl Hannah is 50 today. So is Julianne Moore. Together they have four Oscar nominations, two for leading actress and two for supporting actress. All are Moore’s, of course.

Brendan Fraser is 42.

George B. McClellan was born on this date in 1826. McClellan was the commander of Union forces in the east during much of the first two years of the War of the Rebellion. He loved to organize and feared to fight. McClellan was the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for President in 1864, receiving 21 to Lincoln’s 212 electoral votes. For his unabashed hubris, McClellan rates right up there as one of the great asses of American history.

Jozef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski was born on this date in 1857. Born in the Ukraine of Polish descent, Joseph Conrad learned English in the British merchant marine in his twenties. He began writing in the 1890s and published his first novel, Almayer’s Folly, in 1895. Lord Jim (1900) and Heart of Darkness (1902) are his most famous works.

In 1890, he captained a steamboat into the Congo, which was then the Belgian Congo, controlled by King Leopold II. He saw horrible atrocities there. People had been forced into slave labor camps, where many of them were abused and killed. He called it “the vilest scramble for loot that ever disfigured the history of the human conscience.”

He went back to England, settled in Kent, and never worked as a sailor again. He wrote adventure stories, and 10 years after returning from the Congo, he wrote Heart of Darkness (1902). It’s about a man’s journey down a river into the middle of Africa and about a powerful and mysterious trading agent named Kurtz. Kurtz has established himself as a god among the natives, surrounding his trading post with severed heads on stakes.

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

And Happy Birthday, David, good friend and esteemed colleague.

I’d rather not mention the birthdays today because I’d have to include Britney Spears. (She’s 29.)

Bette Midler is 65 and Sarah Silverman is 40.

John Densmore, the drummer of The Doors, is 66.

Dianne, the oldest of the Lennon Sisters, is 71.

And so is Lee Trevino.

Madame Tussaud was born Anna Maria Grosholtz in Strasbourg, France, on the first of December in 1761. She was 16 when she created her first wax figure — Voltaire. In her memoirs she claimed she searched through the bodies during the French Revolution to find prominent citizens, retrieved the guillotined heads and made death masks. Madame Tussaud opened her first museum, in London in 1835.

Samuel Langhorne Clemens (1835), Dick Clark (1929) and Sandra Oh (1970) were all born on November 30th.

And it’s not a national holiday!

Seriously?!

It’s also the birthday

… of Efrem Zimbalist Jr. Inspector Lewis Erskine and Stuart Bailey is 92.

… of Robert Guillaume, 83.

… of G. Gordon Liddy, 80. If the good die young, Liddy will live forever.

… of movie director Ridley Scott. He’s 73. Three nominations for the best director Oscar. Can you name the films?

… of David Mamet. The playwright is 63. Two Oscar nomintations for writing, Wag the Dog and The Verdict.

… of Mandy Patinkin. “Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

… of Billy Idol, 55.

… of Bo Jackson, 48.

… of Ben Stiller. He’s 45.

Oliver Winchester was born 200 years ago today. A clothing manufacturer, Winchester bought a small failing division of Smith & Wesson in 1850, the division that made a rudimentary repeating rifle. In 1860, an engineer working for Winchester, Benjamin Tyler Henry, developed the first successful repeating rifle. It was improved upon and became known as the Winchester in 1866.

And Winston Churchill was born on this date in 1874.

Churchillian quotes:

“A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.”

“A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.”

“He has all of the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.”

“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.”

“I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.”

“Ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put.”

Vin Scully is 83 today. Scully started broadcasting Dodger games in Brooklyn in 1950.

John Mayall is 77. He should be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for his influence alone — Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, Mick Taylor, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie among those once in the Bluesbreakers.

That’s Mayall in 2004 in the photo and with Clapton for his 70th birthday the year before. Crank it up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwGL5LDb4u8

Diane Ladd is 75. Ladd has appeared in more than 100 films and television programs and has been nominated for the best supporting actress Oscar three times including her portrayal of Flo in Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore and in a film with her daughter Laura Dern, Rambling Rose.

Garry Shandling is 61.

Joel Coen, the Joel of the Coen Brothers, is 56. (Ethan was 53 in September.) Films by the brothers include O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Raising Arizona, The Hudsucker Proxy, Miller’s Crossing, Blood Simple, The Man Who Wasn’t There, No Country for Old Men, Barton Fink, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, Burn After Reading, and A Serious Man. Wonder what they’ve done with True Grit.

Rahm Emanuel is 51.

Don Cheadle is 46. Cheadle was, of course, nominated for the best actor Oscar for his performance in Hotel Rwanda.

Mariano Rivera is 41 today. He can’t pitch forever, right?

C.S. Lewis was born on this date in 1898. He’s the author of the seven-volume children’s series The Chronicles of Narnia.

Louisa May Alcott was born on this date in 1832.

“Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents,” grumbled Jo, lying on the rug.

“It’s so dreadful to be poor!” sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress.

“I don’t think it’s fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all,” added little Amy, with an injured sniff.

“We’ve got Father and Mother, and each other,” said Beth contentedly from her corner.

The four young faces on which the firelight shone brightened at the cheerful words.

The Library of Congress’s Today in History has a lot about Alcott.

The first Army-Navy football game was 120 years ago today. Navy won 24-0.

Today is the birthday

… of Oscar Robertson, 72.

Whenever basketball discussions turn to naming the greatest player in history, Oscar Robertson’s name is always prominently mentioned. Red Auerbach, who coached a slew of Hall of Famers with the Boston Celtics, rates Robertson as the best, most versatile player he has ever seen. Most other basketball experts would agree: the “Big O” could do it all. He was an unstoppable offensive player; one who could score from every spot on the court and in any manner he saw fit. Robertson’s offensive prowess changed the point guard stereotype from simply a passer and “floor general” to a scorer and offensive weapon. Robertson truly had a presence on the court.

A three-time All-State selection at Indianapolis’ Crispus Attucks High School, the “Big O” was heavily recruited and opted to remain close to home at the University of Cincinnati. Robertson’s collegiate career (1957-60) was historic: he established 19 school and 14 NCAA records and led the Bearcats to a 79-9 record and two straight NCAA tournament third place finishes in 1959 and 1960. A three-time College Player of the Year and national scoring leader at Cincinnati, Robertson scored 2,973 points (33.8 ppg), placing him seventh all-time in NCAA history.

Basketball Hall of Fame

… of Pete Best, 69. Best was the orginal drummer in The Beatles, fired in 1962 to be replaced by Ringo Starr.

… of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Donald ”Duck” Dunn, 69.

The group came together in the early Sixties at Stax Records, a studio and record store on East McLemore Avenue in Memphis. By 1962, guitarist Steve Cropper, organist Booker T. Jones and bassist Lewis Steinberg were established session musicians at Stax. They were joined on a recording date … by drummer Al Jackson, with whom Steinberg had played in the house band at Memphis’ Plantation Inn. It was during some down time at the Riley session that this lineup recorded the classic Sixties soul instrumental “Green Onions.” The definitive version of Booker T. and the MGs (which stood for “Memphis Group”) was completed in 1963, when bassist Donald “Duck” Dunn – a former schoolmate and bandmate of Cropper’s who’d been touring with the Mar-Keys, another Stax backup group – replaced Steinberg. This lineup lent instrumental fire and uncluttered rhythmic support to countless soul classics. Particularly fruitful was their relationship with Stax’s biggest star, Otis Redding. In addition to playing on virtually all of his records, the band backed him at his legendary performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 (along with the Mar-Kays) ….

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum

… of Stanley Livingston, 60. He was Chip, the original third son on My Three Sons. Later Stanley’s brother Barry Livingston played an even younger son (when oldest brother Mike played by Tim Considine left the show).

… of Arundhati Roy, 49.

… of Katherine Heigl, 32.

… of Sarah Hyland. She’s Haley on Modern Family and she’s 20 today.

Also born on November 24th —

Junipero Serra (1713-1784)

“A priest in the Franciscan order of the Catholic Church, Junipero Serra was a driving force in the Spanish conquest and colonization of what is now the state of California.” (PBS – THE WEST)

Zachary Taylor (1784-1850)

Northerners and Southerners disputed sharply whether the territories wrested from Mexico should be opened to slavery, and some Southerners even threatened secession. Standing firm, Zachary Taylor was prepared to hold the Union together by armed force rather than by compromise.

Born in Virginia in 1784, he was taken as an infant to Kentucky and raised on a plantation. He was a career officer in the Army, but his talk was most often of cotton raising. His home was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and he owned a plantation in Mississippi.

But Taylor did not defend slavery or southern sectionalism; 40 years in the Army made him a strong nationalist.
(The White House)

Taylor’s early death probably delayed New Mexico’s entry into the Union by 62 years. It’s also interesting to compare this Virginian career Army officer’s thinking about the Union to another’s, that is, Robert E. Lee.

Cass Gilbert (1859-1934)

He went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to study architecture, he traveled through Europe to see the great buildings there, and then he worked at a firm in New York. But he went back to Minnesota to start his own business. At first, business was slow — his first major piece of architecture was his mother’s house in St. Paul — and he sold watercolor paintings to supplement his earnings as an architect. But after he was invited to design the Minnesota State Capitol, he started getting commissions, and he went on to design many prominent buildings like the U.S. Custom House, the St. Louis Art Museum and its Public Library, the United States Supreme Court building, and the Woolworth Building in New York City, which was 792 feet tall, making it, at that time, the tallest building in the world.

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901)

Rosa La Rouge – À Montrouge (1886-87). Click to view larger version.

Scott Joplin (1868-1917)

The great Ragtime composer left no sound recordings, but he did make several piano rolls. It’s interesting to hear his tempo.

Dale Carnegie (1888-1955)

“Many people think that if they were only in some other place, or had some other job, they would be happy. Well, that is doubtful. So get as much happiness out of what you are doing as you can and don’t put off being happy until some future date.”

“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”

Carlo Lorenzini (1826-1890)

As C. Collodi, he wrote a timeless story about a wooden boy named Pinocchio, whose nose grew with every lie and whose most ardent wish was to become “a real boy.”

Destiny Hope Cyrus is 18 today. You can call her Miley — or Hannah Montana.

Bruce Hornsby is 56.

Henry McCarty was — possibly — born in New York City on November 23, 1859. With his mother and brother he moved west — Indiana, Kansas, New Mexico. Mrs. McCarty married a man named William Antrim in Santa Fe. After she died in Silver City in 1874, the boy got into minor trouble, escaped jail to Arizona Territory, and used the name William Antrim. His size and age led to “Kid” or “Kid” Antrim. Arrested for shooting and killing a blacksmith who was beating him in 1877, the Kid escaped back to New Mexico and assumed the name William H. Bonney.

As far as his actual crimes went, there wasn’t much to make Billy the Kid stand out from other outlaws of his day. But he has endured as a mythical figure, partly because The Authentic Life of Billy the Kid made him famous, and partly because he was such a memorable personality. He charmed just about everyone — Frank Coe, who joined in the Lincoln County feud but was generally a respectable citizen, described the young outlaw: “He was about seventeen, 5ft 8in, weight 138lbs and stood straight as an Indian, fine looking lad as ever I met. He was a lady’s man and the Mexican girls were all crazy about him. He spoke their language well. He was a fine dancer, could go all their gaits and was one of them. He was a wonder, you would have been proud to know him.”

Last summer, New Mexico’s outgoing Governor, Bill Richardson, announced that he was considering a posthumous pardon for Billy the Kid, in light of a promised pardon during the Kid’s lifetime by then-governor Lew Wallace, which Wallace did not follow through on. The descendents of Pat Garrett, the sheriff who shot Billy the Kid, protested in honor of their relative.

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

… of U.S. Senator Robert Byrd. The West Virginian is 93. Senator Byrd is dead, you say. You don’t know much about senators, I say. (Byrd’s name at birth was Cornelius Calvin Sale Jr. He was raised by an aunt and uncle who renamed him.)

… of Nobel laureate Nadine Gordimer, “who through her magnificent epic writing has — in the words of Alfred Nobel — been of very great benefit to humanity.” She’s 87.

For 60 years she has contributed short stories to The New Yorker magazine. She’s a big fan of the short story form — where, she says, “contact is more like the flash of fireflies, in and out, now here, now there, in darkness. Short-story writers see by the light of the flash; theirs is the only thing one can be sure of — the present moment.”

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

… of best supporting actress Oscar-winner Estelle Parsons. She won the award for “Bonnie and Clyde” and was nominated again the following year for “Rachel, Rachel.” She’s 83.

… of actor and “Family Feud” host Richard Dawson. He’s 78.

… of Don DeLillo. The winner of the National Book Award for fiction is 74 today. He won for White Noise and was also nominated for Underworld.

… of comedian Dick Smothers. The straight man of the duo is 72.

… of Vice President Joe Biden. He’s 68.

… of Veronica Hamel of Hill Street Blues. She’s 67.

… of journalist Judy Woodruff. She’s 64.

… of Joe Walsh of The Eagles. He’s 63. Life’s been good to him so far.

I have a mansion forget the price
Ain’t never been there they tell me it’s nice
I live in hotels tear out the walls
I have accountants pay for it all

They say I’m crazy but I have a good time
I’m just looking for clues at the scene of the crime
Life’s been good to me so far

… of Richard Masur. He was the neighbor/boyfriend on On Day At a Time. He’s 62 today.

… of Bo Derek. She’s now five 10s and a 4.

… of Sean Young. Ms. Young won the Razzie for worst actress AND worst supporting actress for “A Kiss Before Dying” (she played twins). She’s been nominated for the award five other times. She’s 51.

Robert F. Kennedy might have been 85 today. He was assassinated at age 42.

Astronomer Edwin Hubble was born on this date in 1889.

During the past 100 years, astronomers have discovered quasars, pulsars, black holes and planets orbiting distant suns. But all these pale next to the discoveries Edwin Hubble made in a few remarkable years in the 1920s. At the time, most of his colleagues believed the Milky Way galaxy, a swirling collection of stars a few hundred thousand light-years across, made up the entire cosmos. But peering deep into space from the chilly summit of Mount Wilson, in Southern California, Hubble realized that the Milky Way is just one of millions of galaxies that dot an incomparably larger setting.

Hubble went on to trump even that achievement by showing that this galaxy-studded cosmos is expanding — inflating majestically like an unimaginably gigantic balloon — a finding that prompted Albert Einstein to acknowledge and retract what he called “the greatest blunder of my life.” Hubble did nothing less, in short, than invent the idea of the universe and then provide the first evidence for the Big Bang theory, which describes the birth and evolution of the universe. He discovered the cosmos, and in doing so founded the science of cosmology.

Source: TIME 100: Edwin Hubble

Kenesaw Mountain Landis was born on this date in 1866. His name, misspelled, came from the place and battle in Georgia (Kennesaw Mountain) where his father fought and lost a leg for the Union. Landis was appointed Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1905 — and continued to serve for the first few months after he became the first Commissioner of Baseball in 1920. He was commissioner for 24 years.

It was Landis that cleaned up the gambling that had led to the Black Sox scandal. It was also Landis who kept baseball segregated. That dam broke only after his death in November 1944. Like many, Landis held the job far too long — long enough to go from savior to obstacle.