March 24

Birthdays:

1977 ~ Jessica Chastain, American actress.

1976 ~ Payton Manning, American football player.  He graduated from high school in New Orleans, Louisiana.

1951 ~ Tommy Hilfiger, American fashion designer.

1941 ~ Michael Masser (d. 2015), American ex-stockbroker who wrote hit romantic ballads.

1940 ~ Bob Mackie (né Robert Gordon Mackie), American fashion designer.

1930 ~ Steve McQueen (d. 1980), American actor.

1926 ~ Dario Fo, Italian writer and recipient of the 1997 Nobel Prize in Literature.

1924 ~ Norman Fell (d. 1998), American actor.

1919 ~ Lawrence Ferlinghetti, American author and poet.  He was a co-founder of the City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco.

1917 ~ John Kendrew (d. 1997), British molecular biologist and recipient of the 1962 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

1911 ~ Joseph Barbera (d. 2006), American animator and co-founder of Hanna-Barbera.

1909 ~ Clyde Barrow (d. 1934), American criminal, who along with his partner, Bonnie Parker (1910 ~ 1924), robbed banks throughout the South and Midwest until he was killed in a shoot-out in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.

1903 ~ Adolf Butenandt (d. 1995), German chemist and recipient of the 1939 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on sex hormones.  He was a member of the Nazi party and in accordance with government policy did not accept the award when it was granted.  Following World War II, however, he accepted the award.

1902 ~ Thomas E. Dewey (d. 1971), American politician who ran against Harry S Truman.  Newspapers erroneously reported that he had won the Presidential election.  He had also served as the 47^th Governor of New York state.  He died 6 days before his 69^th birthday.

1892 ~ Marston Morse (d. 1977), American mathematician.

1887 ~ Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle (d. 1933), American actor.

1886 ~ Edward Weston (d. 1958), American photographer.

1884 ~ Peter Debye (d. 1966), Dutch chemist and recipient of 1936 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

1874 ~ Harry Houdini (né Ehrich Weiss, d.1926), Hungarian-born American magician.

1862 ~ Frank Weston Benson (d. 1951), American painter.

1855 ~ Andrew Mellon (d. 1937), American banker, industrialist and financier.  He was the 49^th US Secretary of the Treasury and served under President Warren G. Harding.

1835 ~ Joseph Stefan (d. 1893), Austrian mathematician.

1834 ~ William Morris (d. 1896), English poet, artist and social reformer.

1828 ~ Horace Gray (d. 1902), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was nominated to the High Court by President Chester Arthur.  He served from December 1881 until his death in December 1902.

1809 ~ Joseph Liouville (d. 1882), French mathematician.

1693 ~ John Harrison (d. 1776), British carpenter and clockmaker.  He invented the Marine chronometer.  He died on his 83^rd birthday.

Events that Changed the World:

2015 ~ A GermanWings airplane carrying 150 passengers and crew crashed in the French Alps, after it reached its cruising altitude, killing all aboard.  There was speculation that the co-pilot deliberately caused the plane to crash in a massive mass murder-suicide.

1989 ~ The Exxon Valdez spilled over 240,000 barrels of petroleum after running aground in the Prince William Sound in Alaska.

1976 ~ Armed forced overthrew the government of Argentinean President Isabel Perón, which began a 7-year dictatorial period called the National Reorganization Process.  Since 2006, this has become a public holiday known as Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice.

1958 ~ Elvis Presley was drafted into the Army.

1944 ~ 76 American prisoners began to break out of Stalag Luft III.  Of the 76 escapees, 73 were ultimately captured.  Fifty of the men were executed.  This event was later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape.

1900 ~ Ground was broken in New York City for the underground Rapid Transit Railroad, linking Manhattan and Brooklyn.

1882 ~ Robert Koch reported his discovery of mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium that causes tuberculosis.

1854 ~ Venezuela abolished slavery.

1837 ~ Canada gave African-Canadian men the right to vote.

1829 ~ The Parliament of the United Kingdom passed the Roman Catholic Relief Act, which allowed Catholics to serve in Parliament.

1765 ~ The British Parliament passed the Quartering Act which required the American colonies to provide food and housing to British troops.

1721 ~ Johann Sebastian Bach dedicated six concertos to Christian Ludwig, margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt.  These concertos are now referred to as the Brandenburg Concertos.

1707 ~ The Acts of Union of 1707 was signed, officially uniting the Kingdoms of England and Scotland, thereby creating the Kingdom of Great Britain.

1603 ~ James VI of Scotland became King James I of England.

Good-Byes:

2010 ~ Robert Culp (b. 1930), American actor.

2002 ~ César Milstein (b. 1927), Argentine biochemist and recipient of the 1984 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

1993 ~ John Hersey (b. 1914), American author best known for his novels A Bell for Adono and The Wall.

1953 ~ Mary of Teck, Queen Consort to King George V of the United Kingdom (b. 1867).

1950 ~ James Rudolph Garfield (b. 1865), 23^rd United States Secretary of the Interior.  He served under President Theodore Roosevelt.  He was also the son of slain President James Garfield.

1915 ~ Margaret Lindsay Huggins (b. 1848), Irish astronomer.

1915 ~ Karol Olszewski (b. 1846), Polish chemist, mathematician and physicist.

1905 ~ Jules Verne (b. 1828), French science fiction writer.

1886 ~ Ward Hunt (b. 1810), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President Ulysses S. Grant.  He served from December 1872 until January 1882.

1885 ~ Jacob Thompson (b. 1810), 5^th United States Secretary of the Interior.  He served under President James Buchanan.

1882 ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (b. 1807), American poet.

1776 ~ John Harrison (b. 1693), British carpenter and clockmaker.  He invented the Marine chronometer.  He died on his 83^rd birthday.

1603 ~ Queen Elizabeth I of England (b. 1533).

1575 ~ Joseph ben Ephraim Karo (b. 1488), Spanish-Portuguese rabbi.

1455 ~ Pope Nicholas V (né Tommaso Parentucelli, b. 1397).  He was Pope from March 1447 until his death on this date 8 years later.

March 5

Birthdays:

1959 ~ Mike Byster, American mathematician.

1955 ~ Penn Jillette, American magician and comedian, best known for his work with Raymond Joseph Teller, in their routine known as Penn and Teller.

1948 ~ Jan van Beveren (d. 2011), Dutch-born soccer star who became a devoted coach in Texas.

1936 ~ Dean Stockwell, American actor.

1934 ~ Daniel Kahneman, Israeli economist and recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economics.  He is the author of Thinking Fast and Slow.

1934 ~ James Sikking, American actor.

1918 ~ James Tobin (d. 2002), American economist and recipient of the 1981 Nobel Prize in Economics.

1915 ~ Laurent Schwartz (d. 2002), French mathematician.

1908 ~ Sir Rex Harrison (d. 1990), English actor best known for his role of Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady.

1901 ~ Louis Kahn (d. 1974), American architect.

1898 ~ Zhou Enlai (d. 1976), 1^st Premier of the People’s Republic of China.

1871 ~ Rosa Luxemburg (d. 1919), Socialist revolutionary.

1817 ~ Angelo Genocchi (d. 1889), Italian mathematician.

1815 ~ John Wentworth (d. 1888), 19^th Mayor of Chicago.

1794 ~ Robert Cooper Grier (d. 1870), Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court.

1779 ~ Benjamin Gompertz (d. 1865), British mathematician and actuary.

1658 ~ Antoine Laumet de la Mothe, sieur de Cadillac (d. 1730), French explorer.  His explorations took him from eastern Canada to Louisiana and the Gulf of Mexico.

1575 ~ William Oughtred (d. 1660), English mathematician.

1512 ~ Gerardus Mercantor (d. 1594), Flemish mapmaker and mathematician.  He developed the Mercantor projection, a way of showing the earth on a flat sheet.

1326 ~ King Louis I of Hungary (d. 1382).

1324 ~ King David II of Scotland (d. 1371).

1133 ~ King Henry II of England (d. 1189).

Events that Changed the World:

2004 ~ Martha Stewart was found guilty of obstructing justice.

2003 ~ A Hamas suicide bomber set off a bomb on a bus in Haifa, Israel, killing 17 Israelis.

1960 ~ Cuban photographer, Alberto Korda (1928 ~ 2001), took his iconic photograph of Che Guevara.

1946 ~ Sir Winston Churchill coined the term “Iron Curtain”, which came to mean events in the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

1933 ~ During the Great Depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared a “bank holiday” and closed all US banks and froze all financial transactions.

1872 ~ George Westinghouse received a patent for the air break.

1836 ~ Samuel Colt made the first production-model of the .34 caliber revolver.

1770 ~ British soldiers opened fire on rioters and killed five people in the “Boston Massacre.”  This incident was the spark that ultimately led to the American Revolutionary War.

1766 ~ Antonio de Ulloa (1716 ~ 1795), the first Spanish governor of Louisiana, arrived in New Orleans.

1616 ~ Nicolaus Copernicus’s book, De Revolutionbus Orbium Coelestium (On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres) was banned by the Catholic Church.  This book was the first to state that the earth and all the planets rotated around the sun.

1496 ~ King Henry VII of England issued letters of patent to John Cabot authorizing him to explore unknown lands in the “New World.”

Good-Byes:

2015 ~ Albert Maysles (b. 1928), American filmmaker.  Albert, along with his brother David (1931 ~ 1987), transformed the documentary.  They are best known for the film, Grey Gardens.  He was 88 years old at the time of his death.

2013 ~ Hugo Rafael Frías Chávez (b. 1954), President of Venezuela from 1999 to 2013.

1982 ~ John Belushi (b. 1949), American actor and comedian.

1980 ~ Jay Silverheels (b. 1912), Canadian Mohawk actor, best known as Tonto, companion of the Lone Ranger on the television show of the same name.

1963 ~ Patsy Cline (b. 1932), American singer.  She was killed in a private plane crash.

1953 ~ Sergei Prokofiev (b. 1891), Russian composer.

1953 ~ Joseph Stalin (b. 1879), 3^rd leader and dictator of the Soviet Union.

1950 ~ Edgar Lee Masters (b. 1868), American poet, best known for his Spoon River Anthology.

1929 ~ David Dunbar Buick (b. 1854), Scottish-born American automotive executive and founder of the Buick company.

1927 ~ Franz Mertens (b. 1840), German mathematician.

1925 ~ Johan Jensen (d. 1859), Danish mathematician.

1827 ~ Pierre-Simon Laplace (b. 1749), French mathematician and astronomer.

1827 ~ Alessandro Volta (b. 1745), Italian physicist.

1534 ~ Antonio de Correggio (b. 1489), Italian painter.

254 ~ Pope Lucius I (b. 200).