Day: August 26, 2012

Updated August 26, 2012, 2:28 pm

On Aug. 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing women the right to vote, was declared in effect.

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On Aug. 26, 1906, Albert Sabin, the Polish-American doctor who developed the polio vaccine, was born. Following his death on March 3, 1993, his obituary appeared in The Times.

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On This Date

By The Associated Press

1847	Liberia was proclaimed an independent republic.
1910	Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje, Macedonia.
1939	Major league baseball was televised for the first time when experimental station W2XBS broadcast a doubleheader between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field.
1957	The Soviet Union announced that it had successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile.
1961	The Hockey Hall of Fame opened in Toronto.
1964	President Lyndon B. Johnson was nominated for a term of office in his own right at the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, N.J.
1974	Aviation pioneer Charles Lindbergh died at age 72.
1978	Cardinal Albino Luciani of Venice was elected the 264th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church and took the name John Paul I.
1986	In the so-called “preppie murder case,” 18-year-old Jennifer Levin was found strangled in New York’s Central Park. (Robert Chambers later pleaded guilty to manslaughter and served 15 years in prison.)
2003	Investigators concluded that NASA’s overconfident management and inattention to safety doomed the space shuttle Columbia as much as damage to the craft did.

Current Birthdays

By The Associated Press

Actress Melissa McCarthy (“Mike and Molly”) turns 42 years old today.

AP Photo/Chris Pizzello

Actor Chris Pine (“Star Trek”) turns 32 years old today.

AP Photo/Evan Agostini

1921	Ben Bradlee, Former Washington Post executive editor, turns 91
1933	Ben J. Wattenberg, Author, turns 79
1934	Tom Heinsohn, Basketball Hall of Famer, turns 78
1945	Tom Ridge, Former director of homeland security, turns 67
1946	Valerie Simpson, R&B singer (Ashford and Simpson), turns 66
1960	Branford Marsalis, Jazz saxophonist, turns 52
1965	Chris Burke, Actor (“Life Goes On”), turns 47
1969	Adrian Young, Rock musician (No Doubt), turns 43
1971	Thalia, Singer, actress, turns 41
1980	Macaulay Culkin, Actor (“Home Alone”), turns 32
1986	Cassie, R&B singer, turns 26
1993	Keke Palmer, Actress, turns 19

 

Historic Birthdays

Albert Sabin 8/26/1906 – 3/3/1993 Polish-born American microbiologist; developed oral polio vaccine. Go to obituary »

68	Robert Walpole 8/26/1676 – 3/18/1745 British prime minister (1721-42)
49	Johann Heinrich Lambert 8/26/1728 – 9/25/1777 Swiss mathematician, scientist and philosopher
69	Joseph-Michel Montgolfier 8/26/1740 – 6/26/1810 French inventor; helped build first hot-air balloon
50	Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier 8/26/1743 – 5/8/1794 French scientist
42	Albert 8/26/1819 – 12/14/1861 German-born prince consort of Queen Victoria
87	Lee De Forest 8/26/1873 – 6/30/1961 American inventor of the Audion vacuum tube
86	Jules Romains 8/26/1885 – 8/14/1972 French novelist, dramatist and poet
98	Jerome Hunsaker 8/26/1886 – 9/10/1984 American aeronautical engineer
81	Peggy Guggenheim 8/26/1898 – 12/23/1979 American art collector and patron
85	Maxwell Taylor 8/26/1901 – 4/19/1987 American army officer in World War II
81	Christopher Isherwood 8/26/1904 – 1/4/1986 English-born novelist and playwright

 

Updated August 25, 2012, 2:28 pm

On Aug. 25, 1944, Paris was liberated by Allied forces after four years of Nazi occupation.

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On Aug. 25, 1918, Leonard Bernstein, American conductor, composer and pianist, was born. Following his death on Oct. 14, 1990, his obituary appeared in The Times.

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On This Date

By The Associated Press

1718	Hundreds of French colonists arrived in Louisiana, with some of them settling in present-day New Orleans.
1825	Uruguay declared its independence from Brazil.
1875	Captain Matthew Webb became the first person to swim across the English Channel, traveling from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in 22 hours.
1916	The National Park Service was established within the Department of the Interior.
1921	The United States signed a peace treaty with Germany.
1950	President Harry S. Truman ordered the Army to seize control of the nation’s railroads to avert a strike.
1975	The album “Born to Run” by Bruce Springsteen was released.
1984	Author Truman Capote was found dead at age 59.
1985	Samantha Smith, the schoolgirl whose letter to Soviet leader Yuri V. Andropov resulted in her peace tour of the communist country, was killed with her father in an airplane crash in Maine.
1997	The tobacco industry agreed to an $11.3 billion settlement with the state of Florida.
1998	Former Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell died at age 90.
2003	Tennis champion Pete Sampras announced his retirement during a news conference at the U.S. Open in New York.
2009	South Korea’s first rocket blasted off into space.
2009	Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., died at age 77.

Current Birthdays

By The Associated Press

Actor Sean Connery turns 82 years old today.

AP Photo/Peter Kramer

Actress Blake Lively (“Gossip Girl”) turns 25 years old today.

AP Photo/Evan Agostini

1921	Monty Hall, Game show host (“Let’s Make a Deal”), turns 91
1931	Regis Philbin, Talk show, game show host, turns 81
1933	Wayne Shorter, Jazz saxophonist, turns 79
1933	Tom Skerritt, Actor (“Picket Fences”), turns 79
1941	Marshall Brickman, Filmmaker, turns 71
1946	Rollie Fingers, Baseball Hall of Famer, turns 66
1949	Gene Simmons, Rock musician (Kiss), turns 63
1951	Rob Halford, Rock singer (Judas Priest), turns 61
1954	Elvis Costello, Rock musician, turns 58
1958	Tim Burton, Director, turns 54
1961	Billy Ray Cyrus, Country singer, turns 51
1961	Ally Walker, Actress, turns 51
1964	Blair Underwood, Actor, turns 48
1966	Albert Belle, Baseball player, turns 46
1967	Jeff Tweedy, Rock singer (Wilco), turns 45
1968	Rachael Ray, TV chef, turns 44
1970	Claudia Schiffer, Model, turns 42
1981	Rachel Bilson, Actress (“The O.C.”), turns 31

 

Historic Birthdays

Leonard Bernstein 8/25/1918 – 10/14/1990 American conductor, composer and pianist.Go to obituary »

79	George Wallace 8/25/1919 – 9/13/1998 American four-time governor of Alabama and 1968 third-party candidate
60	Walt Kelly 8/25/1913 – 10/18/1973 American creator of the comic strip “Pogo”
81	Sir Hans Adolf Krebs 8/25/1900 – 11/22/1981 German-born English Nobel Prize-winning biochemist (1953)
84	Sean O’Kelly 8/25/1882 – 11/23/1966 Irish president (1945-59) and leader of the Sinn Fein Party
77	Arthur Hinsley 8/25/1865 – 3/17/1943 English Roman Catholic cardinal and archbishop of Westminster
45	Bill Nye 8/25/1850 – 2/22/1896 American journalist and humorist
40	Louis II (“mad king Ludwig”) 8/25/1845 – 6/13/1886 German king of Bavaria (1864-86)
64	Allan Pinkerton 8/25/1819 – 7/1/1884 Scottish-born American founder of the Pinkerton detective agency
53	Ivan lV 8/25/1530 – 3/18/1584 Russian tsar remembered as “Ivan the Terrible”

 

Updated August 24, 2012, 2:29 pm

 

On Aug. 24, 1992, Hurricane Andrew smashed into Florida, causing record damage; 55 deaths in Florida, Louisiana and the Bahamas were blamed on the storm.

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On Aug. 24, 1899, Jorge Luis Borges, the Argentinian writer of poems, essays and short stories, was born. Following his death on June 14, 1986, his obituary appeared in The Times.

Go to obituary » | Other birthdays »

 

On This Date

By The Associated Press

79	Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in volcanic ash. An estimated 20,000 people died.
1572	The slaughter of French Protestants at the hands of Catholics began in Paris.
1814	British forces invaded Washington, D.C., and set fire to the Capitol and the White House.
1857	The New York branch of the Ohio Life Insurance and Trust Co. failed, sparking the Panic of 1857.
1932	Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly nonstop across the United States, traveling from Los Angeles to Newark, N.J., in just over 19 hours.
1949	The North Atlantic Treaty went into effect.
1954	The Communist Control Act went into effect, virtually outlawing the Communist Party in the United States.
1968	France became the world’s fifth thermonuclear power as it exploded a hydrogen bomb in the South Pacific.
1970	A bomb planted by anti-war extremists exploded at the University of Wisconsin’s Army Math Research Center in Madison, killing a researcher.
1981	Mark David Chapman was sentenced in New York to 20 years to life in prison for the murder of rock musician John Lennon.
1989	Baseball Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti banned Pete Rose from the game for gambling.
2006	The International Astronomical Union declared that Pluto was no longer a planet, demoting it to the status of a “dwarf planet.”
2007	A judge in Inverness, Fla., sentenced John Evander Couey to death for kidnapping 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford, raping her and burying her alive.
2007	James Ford Seale, a reputed Ku Klux Klansman, was sentenced to three life terms for his role in the 1964 abduction and murder of two black teenagers in Mississippi.
2007	The NFL suspended Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick for his involvement in dogfighting.
2011	Steve Jobs resigned as CEO of Apple Inc.

Current Birthdays

By The Associated Press

Actor Rupert Grint (“Harry Potter” movies) turns 24 years old today.

AP Photo/Joel Ryan

Actress Marlee Matlin turns 47 years old today.

AP Photo/Evan Agostini

1934	Kenny Baker, Actor (R2D2 in “Star Wars”), turns 78
1942	Max Cleland, Former U.S. senator, D-Ga., turns 70
1947	Anne Archer, Actress, turns 65
1947	Joe Manchin, U.S. senator, D-W.Va., turns 65
1949	Joe Regalbuto, Actor (“Murphy Brown”), turns 63
1952	Bob Corker, U.S. senator, R-Tenn., turns 60
1952	Mike Shanahan, Football coach, turns 60
1955	Mike Huckabee, Former governor of Arkansas, turns 57
1956	Gerry Cooney, Boxer, turns 56
1957	Stephen Fry, Actor, turns 55
1958	Steve Guttenberg, Actor, turns 54
1960	Cal Ripken Jr., Baseball Hall of Famer, turns 52
1961	Jared Harris, Actor (“Mad Men”), turns 51
1962	Craig Kilborn, Talk show host, turns 50
1965	Reggie Miller, Basketball player, turns 47
1970	David Gregory, Broadcast journalist (“Meet the Press”), turns 42
1973	Dave Chappelle, Actor, comedian (“Chappelle’s Show”), turns 39
1981	Chad Michael Murray, Actor (“One Tree Hill”), turns 31

 

Historic Birthdays

Jorge Luis Borges 8/24/1899 – 6/14/1986 Argentine poet, essayist and short story writer.Go to obituary »

82	George Stubbs 8/24/1724 – 9/10/1806 English painter and draftsman
73	William Wilberforce 8/24/1759 – 7/29/1833 English politician and philanthropist
73	Sir Daniel Gooch 8/24/1816 – 10/15/1889 English railway pioneer and mechanical engineer
62	Charles Follen McKim 8/24/1847 – 9/14/1909 American architect
83	Sir Max Beerbohm 8/24/1872 – 5/20/1956 English caricaturist and writer
80	William Gibbs 8/24/1886 – 9/6/1967 American naval architect; designed the World War ll Liberty ships
90	Malcolm Cowley 8/24/1898 – 3/27/1989 American literary editor of The New Republic (1929-44)
76	Graham Sutherland 8/24/1903 – 2/17/1980 English Surrealistic painter
65	Rene Levesque 8/24/1922 – 11/1/1987 Canadian pro-independence premier of Quebec (1976-85)