Thursday, July 29, 2010


TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS:

Geddy Lee (singer-bassist, Rush) (57)
John Sykes (singer-guitarist, Thin Lizzy, Whitesnake, Blue Murder) (51)
Patti Scialfa (singer-guitarist, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band; married to Springsteen) (57)
Allison Mack (actress, Smallville's Chloe) (28)
Wil Wheaton (actor, Stand By Me, Star Trek: The Next Generation's Wesley Crusher) (38)
Tony Sirico (actor, The Sopranos' Paulie Walnuts) (68)
Stephen Dorff actor, Blade, Cold Creek Manor, World Trade Center) (37)
Marilyn Quayle (wife of former Vice President Dan Quayle) (61)

ON THIS DAY:

 

1914 The first transcontinental phone link is made, between New York City and San Francisco.
1921 The members of Germany's National Socialist (Nazi) Party select Adolf Hitler as their president.
1938 Former ABC News anchor Peter Jennings is born. He dies in 2005.
1958 President Eisenhower signs the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating NASA.
1972 "School's Out" by Alice Cooper peaks at Number Seven on the pop chart, where it stays for two weeks. That same day, School's Out peaks at Number Two on the album chart, where it stays for three weeks.
1976 In New York City, the killer later known as "Son of Sam" shoots one person to death and seriously wounds another in the first of a series of attacks.
1981 Britain's Prince Charles marries Lady Diana Spencer in an elaborate ceremony televised worldwide from St. Paul's Cathedral in London.
1994 Anti-abortion activist Paul Hill shoots and kills Dr. John Bayard Britton and Britton's bodyguard, James H. Barrett, outside the Ladies Center clinic in Pensacola, Florida. Hill is later convicted and sentenced to death.
1997 Actors Jim Carrey and Lauren Holly divorce.
1998 President Clinton reaches an agreement with Kenneth Starr to provide grand jury testimony via closed-circuit television in the Monica Lewinsky case.
1999 Day trader Mark O. Barton, apparently upset over stock losses, opens fire in two Atlanta brokerage offices, killing nine people and wounding 13 before shooting himself to death. Authorities say he also killed his wife and two children.
2000 Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston are married. They later divorce.
2002 In a posting on the band's official website, singer-guitarist Paul Stanley writes that Kiss has reconsidered its decision to stop touring, which led to a lengthy farewell tour that began in 2000.
2004 Ozzy Osbourne passes the $50 million mark in merchandise sales.
2004 Everclear frontman Art Alexakis appears on CNN to explain why he's serving as a elected delegate from his home district of Portland, Oregon, at the Democratic convention.
2004 Velvet Revolver's debut album, Contraband, is certified platinum for sales of over one million copies.
2006 Korn resurrects its Family Values tour after a five-year hiatus, kicking off the trek in Antioch, Tennessee with a line-up featuring Deftones, 10 Years, Stone Sour, Flyleaf and others.
2008 System of a Down guitarist Daron Malakian and drummer John Dolmayan introduce their new band, Scars On Broadway, with the release of its self-titled debut album.
2008 White Stripes and Raconteurs singer/guitarist Jack White announces that he is teaming up with Alicia Keys to record the theme song to the new James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace, the first duet ever recorded in the 46-year history of the series.