| The tremors that shook the Mississippi valley in southeast Missouri from December 16, 1811, through February 7, 1812, are among the most violent quakes ever to hit the North American continent in recorded history. Collectively known as the New Madrid earthquakes, these quakes affected more than 1 million square miles. Survivors reported that the earthquakes caused cracks to open in the earth's surface, the ground to roll in visible waves, and large areas of land to sink or rise. Damage was reported as far away as Charleston, South Carolina, and Washington, D.C. |
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| Henry Clay was perhaps the foremost legislator America ever produced. He served as Speaker of the House longer than any man in the 19th Century, transforming the office from a mere presiding function into one of enormous power and influence. This sour grapes quote reflects that he failed to become president. |  |
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| In 1882, Ryan agreed to face rising boxer John L. Sullivan for the championship. The fight was to be bare-kunckle under the London Prize Ring Rules in a 24 foot ring. Each side put up $2,500 winner-take-all. After nine rounds, Sullivan knocked Paddy Ryan out with a right handed punch which landed under Ryan's left ear. The fight had been conducted bare-kunckle under the London Prize Ring Rules. Historically the fight was the last time the championship would be won (as opposed to defended) in a bare kunckle fight. Ryan fought Sullivan on many occasions afterward, but never won. |
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| Gray's patent stated that the telautograph would allow "one to transmit his own handwriting to a distant point over a two-wire circuit." Gray was also famous for having submitted his patent application a few hours after Bell had submitted his application for the telephone. The telautograph was first publicly exhibited at the 1893 Chicago World's Columbian Exposition. Basically it transmited electrical impulses recorded by potentiometers to stepping motors attached to a pen, thus being able to reproduce a drawing or signature made by the sender at the receiver's station. |
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| Made by Keystone Studios and directed by Henry Lehrman, in it Chaplin plays a spectator at a 'baby-cart race' in California. The spectator keeps getting in the way of the camera and intefers with the race, causing great frustration to the public and participants. Chaplin's tramp character would go on to be one of the most beloved film icons in history. This was the first film in which Chaplin played his most famous character, The Tramp. With only a small number of exceptions, Chaplin would play only The Tramp on film until The Great Dictator (1940). |
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| In 1935, Monopoly was first marketed by Charles Darrow, with the symbol of Rich Uncle Pennybags. He had invented the game on March 7, 1933. A patent was issued for the game December 31,1935, assigned to Parker Brothers, Inc. The patent described a "Board Game Apparatus... intended primarily to provide a game of barter, thus involving trading and bargaining" in which "much of the interest in the game lies in trading and in striking shrewd bargains." |
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| "Felix the Cat" had a very humble beginning as a curious and mischievous little cat as first conceived by New Jersey cartoonist Otto Messmer. In no time at all he was more popular than movie stars and world leaders of the same era. His squat, black body and huge, wide eyes and grin were instantly recognizable worldwide. His first appearance was in a short film in the early 1900's called "Feline Follies." He saw a brief three-cartoon resurrection in 1936 by the Van Beuren Studios, but the glory of the old days had disappeared during the cat's short-lived stint in color and sound. |
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| It was not until 1936 that a Vice President's flag was made official with the issuance of Executive Order 7285. This flag was essentially that of the President with the colors reversed. As with the President's flag of the time, the eagle faced the fly (sinister) rather than the hoist, as in the U.S. coat of arms. |  |
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| Movie fans watched the world premiere of the Walt Disney animation, "Pinocchio", at the Center Theatre in Manhattan. The showing followed that of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" as Disney’s second feature-length film. |  |
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| Forward Jackie Robinson scored 20 points for UCLA in a losing cause, as the Trojans of USC beat the Bruins 43-41. This marked the 34th straight loss that UCLA had suffered to USC since 1932. |  |
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| On February 7, 1943, the federal government announced that shoe rationing was going into effect nationwide. However, beginning Tuesday, February 9, customers who could produce a particular coupon, No. 17, from their Sugar-Coffee-Shoe ration book were allowed to buy shoes — although their next pair could not be purchased until June 15. And manufacturers were only permitted to make shoes in “essential” colors: white, black, town brown, and Army russet and in styles which used little or no leather. |
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| Bing Crosby played a central role in American cultural and musical history. 1,700 recordings, 383 of those in the top 30, and of those, 41 hit No. 1. For 15 years (1934, 1937, 1940, 1943-1954) he was among the top 10 in box office draw, and for five of those years (1944-49) he was the largest in the world. He sang four Academy Award-winning songs - "Sweet Leilani" (1937), "White Christmas" (1942), "Swinging on a Star" (1944), "In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening" (1951) - and won an acting Oscar for Going My Way (1944). He also collected 23 gold and platinum records which is quite amazing considering gold and platinum records did not come into existence until 1958, after which Crosby was considered retired. |
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| This was written by Winston L. Moore, better known as Slim Willet. He performed the song in 1950 at Hardin Simmons University but could not get a famous record label to record it. Later, the song was heard and recorded by top artists like Ray Price (#5), Red Foley (#10) and Como. |  |
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| This was written in 1933 for the musical Roberta, starring Bob Hope. The lyrics were written by Otto Harbach and the music by Jerome Kern. In 1934, four different recordings charted: Paul Whiteman #1, Leo Reisman #3, Emil Coleman #4, and Ruth Etting #15. This version by The Platters is on the Hearts in Atlantis soundtrack. |  |
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| On December 4, 1958, Robert Timm and John Cook took off from McCarran Airfield in Las Vegas, Nevada, in a Cessna 172 and remained airborne for 64 days, 22 hours, 19 minutes and 5 seconds. They landed at McCarran on February 7, 1959. |  |
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| More than 3,000 fans jammed Kennedy Airport in New York as Beatlemania invaded the U.S. The Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr arrived for their first U.S. visit (including an appearance on "The Ed Sullivan Show"). The ‘Fab Four’ controlled the top spot on the pop music charts for the next 15 weeks and owned the top of the album charts for 10 weeks. |  |
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| After he became champion, Clay revealed that he was a member of the Nation of Islam (often called the Black Muslims at the time) and changed his name to Cassius X. He was soon given the name Muhammad Ali by the leader of the Nation, Elijah Muhammad, who revealed the name to Ali as "his true name," although only a few journalists (most notably Howard Cosell) accepted it at that time. |
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| In Shocking Blue's home country, this never made it to #1. After the success in the States, the song was re-released, but climbed no further that #3 in the Dutch Pop charts. In the US, both this and the Bananarama cover version reached #1, making it one of the few songs to do so. Strangely, in the UK both Shocking Blue and Bananarama reached #8 with "Venus" and both spent 13 weeks on the chart with the song. |  |
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| Blazing Saddles (1974) is one of Mel Brooks' funniest, most successful and most popular films. It is an unsubtle spoof or parody of all the cliches from the time-honored genre of westerns, similar to the comic attitude of numerous Marx Brothers films. Brooks' third feature film tagline blurb advertised: "Blazing Saddles...or never give a saga an even break!" |  |
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| A highly successful tour resulted in "Paul Simon In Concert: Live Rhymin," which featured several Simon And Garfunkel standards. This flurry of creativity in 1975 culminated in the chart-topping "Still Crazy After All These Years" which generated two Grammy Awards (Album Of The Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance). "50 Ways To Leave Your Lover," taken from the album, provided Simon with his first US number 1 single as a soloist, while "My Little Town" featured a tantalizing duet with Garfunkel. |
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| The first really large optical telescope to incorporate an altazimuth mount (and thus requiring constant computer control to operate), it is located on the slopes of Mount Pastukhov on the northern side of the Caucasus range, between the Black and Caspian Seas. The telescope uses an f/4 primary mirror (giving a 26-meter tube housed in a dome 58 meters high), with instruments located in an expansive prime-focus housing or at one of the Nasmyth foci on either side of the fork mount (one of the spectrographs has a collimator 2 meters across). |
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| "Too Hot" was the beginning of a nearly unprecedented string of top 10 pop and soul hits for the group that would make Kool & the Gang the top selling soul group of the 80s. Ladies Night was followed by the even bigger Celebration, the joyous title cut of which became the theme song of countless sports teams in the 80s and one of the most played songs of the past 25 years. |  |
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| In 1984, the first untethered spacewalks were made by Challenger astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert L. Stewart, each using a manned maneuvering unit (MMU), during the tenth flight of a Space Shuttle, mission 41-B, in orbit 150 nautical miles above the Earth. McCandless was the first to leave the cargo bay, becoming the first person to fly free, untethered in space. Stewart also flew the MMU. They maneuvered within the cargo bay, flew away from and back to the orbiter, made docking exercises, recharged the MMU nitrogen tanks, and collected engineering data. These MMU flights demonstrated capabilities needed in the planned retrieval of the Solar Max satellite on a later shuttle. |
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| "Sports Illustrated" released its annual swimsuit edition. It was the biggest regular edition in the magazine’s history, weighing in at 218 pages. Paulina Porizkova joined Cheryl Tiegs and Christie Brinkley as the only models to make the cover more than once. |  |
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| At the beginning of 1987, she had her fifth number one single with"Open Your Heart,"the third number one from True Blue alone. The title cut from the soundtrack of her third feature film, Who's That Girl?, was another chart-topping hit, although the film itself was another box-office bomb. |  |
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| As an adult, Bamm-Bamm became an auto mechanic, and eventually proposed to, and married, Pebbles. The two soon moved to Hollyrock (a fictional prehistoric version of Hollywood, California) so Bamm-Bamm could pursue his true goal of becoming a screenwriter. Eventually, the couple had twin children: Chip and Roxy (with Roxy possessing her father's noted strength). |  |
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| The interaction between the personalized character and the environment is purposed to encourage enthusiasm from the reader and to inspire the reader to repeatedly read the story book. Through repetition, the reader's learning of the desired behavioral patterns is enhanced. |
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1812 8.2 earthquake shakes New Madrid
MO; this is the last of Midwest quakes
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1839 Henry Clay declares in Senate "I had
rather be right than president"
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1882 Last bare knuckle champion John L Sullivan
KOs Paddy Ryan in Mississippi
More ...
1893 Elisha Gray's telautograph patented
More ...
1904 Baltimore catches fire (1500 buildings destroyed
in 80 blocks)
1914 Charlie Chaplin debuts "The Tramp"
in "Kid Auto Races at Venice"
More ...
1915 First wireless message sent from a moving
train to a station received
1935 Monopoly invented by Charles Darrow symbol
Rich Uncle Pennybags
More ...
1936 Three new "Felix the Cat" cartoons by Van
Beuren Studios
More ...
1936 President Franklin Roosevelt authorized a
flag for the office of vice president
More ...
1940 Disney's "Pinocchio" premieres
More ...
1941 Robinson's 20 points can't save UCLA
More ...
1943 Shoe rationing begins in US (may purchase
up to 3 more pairs in 1942)
More ...
1944 Bing Crosby records "Swinging on a Star"
for Decca Records
More ...
1949 New York Yankee Joe DiMaggio becomes first
$100,000/year baseball player
1953 "Don't Let the Stars Get in Your Eyes"
by Perry Como
More ...
1958 Dodgers officially become the Los Angeles
Dodgers, Inc
1959 "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" by The
Platters topped the charts
More ...
1959 Cessna lands in Las Vegas after 65 days without
landing (refuels in air)
More ...
1959 Dorothy Rigney sells White Sox to Bill Veeck
for a reported $27M
1964 Beatles land at Kennedy Airport
More ...
1964 Cassius Clay becomes a Muslim & adopts
the name Muhammad Ali
More ...
1970 "Venus" by Shocking Blue topped
the charts
More ...
1974 Mel Brooks' "Blazing Saddles" opens
in movie theaters
More ...
1976 "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" by
Paul Simon topped the charts
More ...
1976 World's largest telescope (600 cm) begins
operation in USSR
More ...
1979 Neptune becomes farthest planet from the
sun in our solar system (will remain that way for 20 years)
1981 "Celebration" by Kool & the
Gang topped the charts
More ...
1984 First untethered spacewalk
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1985 "New York, New York" became the
official anthem of New York NY
1985 "Sports Illustrated's" swimsuit edition hit
the newstands
More ...
1987 "Open Your Heart" by Madonna topped
the charts
More ...
1993 Pebbles Flintstone & Bamm Bamm Rubble
wed
More ...
1995 Larry Gunter and Tracie Williams received
a patent for a personalized interactive storybook
More ...