Monday, July 30, 2012

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS:

• Arnold Schwarzenegger (former Governor of California; actor, the Terminator movies, Predator, Twins, Total Recall, Kindergarten Cop, True Lies, Batman & Robin, Collateral Damage) (65)
• Delta Burke (actress, starred in TV's Designing Women) (56)
• Lisa Kudrow (Actress, Friends, The Comeback, The Opposite of Sex, Mad About You, Analyze This) (49)
• Laurence Fishburne (actor, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Apocalypse Now, Boyz N The Hood, What's Love Got To Do With It, The Matrix movies, Mystic Rive, Predators r) (51)
• Vivica A. Fox (actress, Independence Day, Soul Food, Why Do Fools Fall In Love, the Kill Bill movies, Booty Call, Batman & Robin) (48)
• Anita Hill (Law professor, accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during his 1991 Senate confirmation hearing for the U.S. Supreme Court (56)
• Hillary Swank (actress, won Oscars for Boys Don't Cry and Million Dollar Baby, Insomnia, The Reaping) (38)
• Hilary Swank (actress, Boys Don't Cry) (38)
• Buddy Guy (blues legend) (76)
• Paul Anka (singer-songwriter) (71)
• Tom Green (actor-comedian-talk show host; former husband of Drew Barrymore) (41)
• Christine Taylor (actress, the Brady Bunch movies, The Wedding Singer, Zoolander, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story; wife of Ben Stiller) (41)
• Sid Krofft (children's TV creator, H.R. Pufnstuf, Sigmund And The Sea Monsters, Land Of The Lost) (83)
• David Sanborn (composer and sax player) (67)
• Jeffrey Hammond (sometimes called Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond, former bassist for Jethro Tull) (66)
• Jaime Pressley (actress, My Name Is Earl) (35)
• Neal McCoy (country singer) (54)
• Edd "Kookie" Byrnes (actor and singer, "Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb") (79)
• Peter Bogdanovich (director, Paper Moon, The Last Picture Show, What's Up Doc, and actor, appeared in The Sopranos) (73)
• Christopher Nolan (director, Memento, Insomnia, Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Inception, The Dark Knight Rises) (42)
• Richard Linklater (director, Slacker, Dazed and Confused, Before Sunrise, School of Rock, Before Sunset, A Scanner Darkly) (52)
• Bud Selig (commissioner of Major League Baseball) (78)
• Jean Reno (actor, The Da Vinci Code, Mission: Impossible, Ronin, The Pink Panther movies) (64)
• Simon Baker (actor, The Mentalist, The Devil Wears Prada) (43)
• Ian Watkins (singer, Lostprophets) (35)
• Brad Hargreaves (drummer, Third Eye Blind) (41)

ON THIS DAY:

• 1729, the city ofBaltimore was founded inMaryland.
• 1768, Captain Cook set sail on his first voyage around the world.
• 1863 Automotive pioneer Henry Ford is born. He dies in 1947.
• 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued an Order Of Retaliation during the Civil War for the Union Army to shoot a rebel prisoner for every black prisoner shot by the Confederate Army.
• 1898 Corn Flakes are invented by Will Kellogg.
• 1900 An earthquake nearly destroysAcapulco,Mexico
• 1945, the cruiser U.S.S. Indianapolis, which had just delivered key components of the Hiroshima atomic bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian, was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. Only 316 out of 1,196 men survived the sinking and many hours in shark-infested waters.
• 1954, Elvis Presley made his professional first paid performance concert debut under his own name in Memphis, Tennessee's Overton Park, opening for Slim Whitman. . Presley had already appeared on stage as a member of the Blue Moon Boys.
• 1956, "In God We Trust" was authorized the national motto of theUnited States.
• 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Medicare bill into law, to provide limited health care for the elderly and disabled.
• 1966 "I Saw Her Again" by the Mamas & the Papas peaks at Number Five on the pop chart.
• 1966 "Wild Thing" by the Troggs hits Number One on the pop chart, where it stays for two weeks.
• 1966 Yesterday...And Today by the Beatles hits Number One on the album chart, where it stays for five weeks.
• 1970 The Rolling Stones announce that neither Allen Klein, ABKCO Records, nor any other company has any authority to negotiate contracts on their behalf. A lengthy legal battle ensues.
• 1973 "Over The Hills And Far Away" by Led Zeppelin peaks at Number 51 on the pop chart. That same day in the middle of a very successful U.S. tour, a performance at Madison Square Garden in New York City is shot for The Song Remains The Same. Meanwhile, the band becomes the victims of one of the largest cash thefts inNew York City when $180,000 is taken from the band's deposit box at the Drake Hotel and never recovered. The money is mostly cash receipts from the first of two nights atMadisonSquareGarden.
• 1974, under coercion from the Supreme Court, President Richard Nixon finally released the Watergate tapes. Meanwhile, the House Judiciary Committee voted 21-17 on the last of three charges to impeach him. Nixon resigned before he could be impeached by the full House and brought to trial before the Senate.
• 1975 Former Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa mysteriously disappears in suburbanDetroit,Michigan. Although presumed dead, his remains have never been found. Hoffa was declared legally dead in 1982.
• 1977 "I'm In You" by Peter Frampton peaks at Number Two on the pop chart, where it stays for three weeks.
• 1977 Kiss's album Love Gun peaks at Number Four on the chart.
• 1983 "Slipping Away" by Dave Edmunds peaks at Number 39 on the pop chart.
• 1983 "Stop! In The Name Of Love" by the Hollies (with Graham Nash back in the group), a cover of the Supremes song, peaks at Number 29 on the pop chart.
• 1984 Reggie Jackson hits his 494th home run of his career, passing the Yankees' Lou Gehrig and taking over 13th place on the all-time home run list.
• 1988 "Roll With It" by Steve Winwood hits Number One on the pop chart, where it stays for four
• 1991 Guns N' Roses lead singer Axl Rose throws a temper tantrum and threatens to cancel that night's concert at the Forum after anInglewood,California, police officer tickets the band's limousine driver. The police tear up the ticket, saying they want to prevent a melee.
• 1992 Superman creator Joe Shuster dies at age 78.
• 1994 "Crazy" by Aerosmith peaks at Number 17 on the pop chart.
• 1994 Voodoo Lounge by the Rolling Stones enters the album chart at its peak position of Number Two.
• 1996 Sublime's self-titled album is released.
• 1996 The Smashing Pumpkins top the list of 1996 MTV Video Music Award nominees, with eight nominations.
• 1998 The Smashing Pumpkins make their first appearance on CBS-TV's Late Show With David Letterman. The band performs outside the Ed Sullivan Theater following the show's taping.
• 1999 Linda Tripp, whose secretly recorded phone conversations with Monica Lewinsky led to the impeachment of President Clinton, is charged inMaryland with illegal wiretapping. Prosecutors later drop the charges.
• 1999 The Blair Witch Project opens in wide release. Costing only $60,000, it takes in more than $80 million in its first two weeks of release, making it the most profitable movie of all time.
• 2002 The Rising by Bruce Springsteen is released. To celebrate it, he appears on the Today show, Nightline, and UpClose.
• 2003 Sun Records founder Sam Phillips dies at age 80.
• 2003 The Rolling Stones headline the Molson Canadian Rocks For Toronto benefit concert at the city's Downsview Park. Also on the bill are Rush, the Guess Who, AC/DC, the Isley Brothers, Justin Timberlake, the Flaming Lips, Sass Jordan, Kathleen Edwards, Sam Roberts, and La Chicane. The hosts for the event are actors Dan Aykroyd and Jim Belushi.
• 2004 A fight breaks out between members of the bands Disturbed and Finch just as Finch is about to take the stage at the Rolling Rock Town Fair in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. The altercation apparently stems from derogatory comments that Finch guitarist Randy Strohmeyer made about Disturbed singer David Draiman the previous fall in MeanStreet magazine.
• 2006 30-year-old Andy Richardson is beaten in the mosh pit at Korn's Family Values show inAtlanta,Georgia. Two unidentified men attack him after he asks them to be careful around his pregnant girlfriend and a mentally challenged child accompanying them.Richardson is pronounced dead three days later.
• 2006 Guns N' Roses singer W. Axl Rose falls ill and is unable to complete the band's second show at Wembley Stadium in London, England. Rose leaves the stage and is replaced by former Skid Row vocalist Sebastian Bach for the last two songs, "Nightrain" and "ParadiseCity."