Dwight Eisenhower – Time Rewind

On This Day April 7

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On This Day March 28

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Celebrity Birthdays

1944 – Actor Ken Howard (“1776,” “The White Shadow,” “Clear and Present Danger,” “Crossing Jordan”) (d. 2016)

1948 – Oscar, Golden Globe and Emmy-winning actress Dianne Wiest (“Hannah and Her Sisters,” “Parenthood,” “The Lost Boys,” “Bullets Over Broadway,” “In Treatment,” “Law & Order”)

1955 – Grammy-winning country singer and actress Reba McEntire, who starred in her own sitcom, “Reba,” from 2001-07

1970 – Actor Vince Vaughn (“Swingers,” “Wedding Crashers,” “The Break-Up,” “The Internship,” “True Detective”)

1981 – Actress Julia Stiles (“Save the Last Dance,” “10 Things I Hate About You,” “The Bourne Ultimatum,” “Dexter”)

1986 – Grammy and Golden Globe-winning pop superstar and actress Lady Gaga, born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta

History Highlights

1834 – The U.S. Congress censures President Andrew Jackson over his refusal to turn over documents regarding his dealings with the Bank of the United States.

1881 – The Greatest Show on Earth is born when P.T. Barnum and James Bailey merge their circus troupes.

1915 – The first American is killed during World War I, before the U.S. had even entered the conflict. Leon Thrasher, a 31-year-old mining engineer from Massachusetts, drowns when a German U-boat (submarine) torpedoes the British steamship RMS Falaba off the coast of England. The vessel was on its way from Liverpool to West Africa when the Germans attacked. The sinking is reported by American media as the “Thrasher Incident.”

1969 – Dwight Eisenhower, the 34th president of the United States and one of the most highly decorated American generals of World War II, dies at the age of 78.

1979 – The worst commercial nuclear accident in U.S. history takes place at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, PA. A mechanical failure in the Unit 2 reactor, compounded by human error, forces thousands to evacuate and triggers a public backlash against the nuclear power industry.

1984 – Baltimore Colts owner Robert Irsay outrages fans and local officials when he moves the NFL franchise to Indianapolis in the middle of the night with no public announcement.

Musical Milestones

1958 – Composer William Christopher “W.C.” Handy, regarded as the “Father of the Blues,” dies in New York City.

1964 – “She Loves You,” by The Beatles, tops the U.S. pop chart. It is the second of three consecutive singles that keep The Beatles at No. 1 from the beginning of February through the beginning of May of that year.

1970 – “Bridge over Troubled Water,” by Simon & Garfunkel, sits at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

1981 – Kim Carnes delivers new music to the Billboard singles chart in the form of “Bette Davis Eyes,” which reaches No. 1 that May and holds there for nine weeks.

1981 – “Rapture,” by Blondie featuring Debbie Harry, becomes the first rap song to reach No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. The track, off the band’s “Autoamerican” album, claims the top spot for two weeks.

1987 – Club Nouveau’s cover of the Bill Withers soul classic, “Lean On Me, ” wraps up two weeks as a No. 1 single.

1992 – Vanessa Williams rules the singles chart for five weeks beginning this day with “Save the Best for Last.”

1998 – Will Smith wraps up a three-week run on top of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Gettin’ Jiggy wit It.”

2001 – Sean Combs, the Grammy-winning artist formerly known as both Puffy and Puff Daddy, tells MTV that he now wants to be known as P. Diddy. In August 2005, he changes his stage name to simply Diddy.

2009 – “Right Round,” by Flo Rida featuring Kesha, tops the pop chart.

On This Day January 19

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Celebrity Birthdays

1807 – U.S. Civil War Confederate General Robert E. Lee (d. 1870)

1809 – Poet Edgar Allen Poe (“The Tell-Tale Heart,” “The Raven”) (d. 1849)

1923 – Emmy and Golden Globe-winning actress Jean Stapleton, best known for her role as Edith Bunker in TV’s “All in the Family” (d. 2013)

1930 – Golden Globe-winning actress Tippi Hedren (“The Birds,” “Marnie”)

1939 – Rock and Roll and Country Music Hall of Famer Phil Everly of The Everly Brothers (d. 2014)

1942 – Tony Award-winning actor and singer Michael Crawford (“Phantom of the Opera”)

1943 – Rock legend Janis Joplin (d. 1970)

1946 – Grammy-winning singer, actress and Country Music Hall of Famer Dolly Parton

1947 – Emmy-winning TV chef Paula Deen

History Highlights

1825 – Ezra Daggett and Thomas Kensett secure a patent for the tin can as a means of preserving food. Consequently, this is known as National Tin Can Day.

1937 – Millionaire Howard Hughes sets a transcontinental air record, flying his H-1 Racer from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey in just under 7.5 hours. Hughes breaks the record he set a year earlier by about two hours. He averaged 332 miles an hour during the 2,490-mile flight.

1955 – Dwight Eisenhower becomes the first U.S. president to allow a filmed news conference to be used on television and in movie newsreels. The 33-minute conference was cut to 28-1/2 minutes to fit TV formats.

1983 – Klaus Barbie, the Nazi Gestapo chief of Lyons, France during the German occupation, is arrested in Bolivia for his crimes against humanity. As chief of Nazi Germany’s secret police in occupied France, Barbie (a.k.a. “The Butcher of Lyons”) sent thousands of French Jews and Resistance members to their deaths in concentration camps, while torturing, abusing, or executing many others.

Musical Milestones

1959 – The Platters serve up the hottest single on this day with “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes,” which holds the top spot for three weeks.

1967 – The Beatles begin recording “A Day In The Life” at Abbey Road Studios in London. According to John Lennon, the inspiration for the song came largely from Tara Browne, the heir to the Guinness fortune, who was killed in a London car crash a year earlier.

1971 – Tracks from The Beatles’ “The White Album,” including “Helter Skelter,” are played in a California courtroom to determine if any songs could have influenced Charles Manson and his followers to murder actress Sharon Tate and four others in a 1969 killing spree.

1974 – Al Wilson’s “Show And Tell” is No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

1980 – Pink Floyd’s concept album, “The Wall,” begins a 15-week run at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart and goes on to sell more than 8 million copies.

1993 – Members of Fleetwood Mac reunite to perform at U.S. President Bill Clinton’s Inaugural Ball. The band’s hit, “Don’t Stop,” had been the theme of his presidential campaign.

1994 – Elton John, John Lennon, The Band, The Grateful Dead, Duane Eddy, Willie Dixon, Bob Marley, Johnny Otis, and Rod Stewart are inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York. Stewart is stranded in Los Angeles and unable to attend because of the massive earthquake that had struck two days earlier.

On This Day October 21

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Celebrity Birthdays

1917 – Legendary jazz trumpeter-composer Dizzy Gillespie, who helped develop the “bebop” music style (d. 1993)

1924 – Actress Joyce Randolph, who played Trixie Norton in the 1950s sitcom “The Honeymooners”

1928 – Baseball Hall of Famer Whitey Ford, who was a star pitcher for the New York Yankees

1942 – Judith Sheindlin, better known as TV’s “Judge Judy”

1956 – Actress-author Carrie Fisher, who played Princess Leia in the “Star Wars” movie trilogy and wrote “Postcards From the Edge” (d. 2016)

1959 – Actor Ken Watanabe (“The Last Samurai,” “Batman Begins,” “Inception,” “Godzilla”)

1980 – Socialite and reality TV star Kim Kardashian (“Keeping Up With The Kardashians”)

History Highlights

1879 – Thomas Edison throws the switch on his newly invented incandescent lamp, which burns for nearly 14 hours.

1921 – President Warren Harding delivers a speech in Alabama condemning lynchings that were being committed primarily by white supremacists against African Americans in the Deep South. Harding is the first U.S. president to address the controversial subject.

1941 – Nazi troops massacre thousands of men, women and children across Yugoslavia in retaliation for that country’s rejection of an alliance with Germany.

1959 – The distinctive and world-renowned Guggenheim Museum opens in New York City. Designed by acclaimed architect Frank Lloyd Wright, the museum houses one of the world’s top collections of contemporary art.

1959 – President Dwight Eisenhower signs an executive order transferring renowned rocket engineer Wernher von Braun and his team from the U.S. Army to the newly created National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Von Braun, who masterminded America’s space program, developed the lethal V-2 rocket for Nazi Germany during World War II, and had been a member of the Nazi Party and an SS officer.

1967 – In Washington, D.C., thousands of Vietnam War protesters stage a peaceful rally at the Lincoln Memorial before attempting to storm the Pentagon. Police arrest 250 of the demonstrators.

2014 – South African Oscar Pistorius, the first double amputee runner to compete at the Olympics, is sentenced to five years in prison after being found guilty of culpable homicide (manslaughter) in the 2013 death of his girlfriend, 29-year-old Reeva Steenkamp. His sentence is later doubled by a higher court.

Musical Milestones

1958 – Rock and roll legend Buddy Holly’s last recording session takes place in a New York City studio. Among the songs he records is “It Doesn’t Matter Anymore,” which was written by Paul Anka and becomes a No. 13 hit following Holly’s death in a February 1959 plane crash.

1967 – Lulu begins a five-week run at No. 1 on the singles chart with the theme from the movie “To Sir With Love,” starring Sidney Poitier.

1972 – Curtis Mayfield begins four weeks on top of the Billboard album chart with the soundtrack to the movie “Super Fly.” Sales of the album, which contains the hits “Freddy’s Dead” and “Super Fly,” go on to surpass the movie’s box office performance.

1973 – “Angie” begins a week as a No. 1 single for The Rolling Stones. The track is from the band’s “Goats Head Soup” album and becomes their seventh U.S. chart-topper.

1989 – Janet Jackson’s “Miss You Much” is mid-way through a four-week domination of the Billboard Hot 100.

1995 – Mariah Carey holds on to the top spot on the pop chart for a fourth week with “Fantasy.” The track remains there for another four weeks.

2000 – “Come on Over Baby (All I Want Is You)” becomes the third No. 1 single of Christina Aguilera’s music career. This track stays on top for four weeks.

2000 – Radiohead’s fourth album, “Kid A,” debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart.

2006 – Justin Timberlake’s “SexyBack” marks its seventh and final week at No. 1 on the singles chart. The track captures a Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording in 2007.