February 27

Birthdays:

1980 ~ Chelsea Clinton, daughter of President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

1958 ~ Nancy Laura Spungen (d. Oct. 12, 1978), girlfriend of Sid Vicious, whom he murdered.  She was 20 years old.

1958 ~ Maggie Hassan (née Margaret Wood), 81^st Governor of New Hampshire.  She assumed office in January 2017.

1951 ~ Lee Atwater (né Harvey LeRoy Atwater, d. Mar. 29, 1991), American politician and political consultant.  He served Presidents Ronald Reagan and George WH Bush.  He died about a month after his 40^th birthday of an aggressive form of brain tumor.

1950 ~ Julia Neuberger, Baroness Neuberger, English rabbi and political figure.

1942 ~ Robert Howard Grubbs, American chemist and recipient of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

1940 ~ Howard Hesseman, American actor.  He is best known for his role as Johnny Fever on WKPR in Cinncinati.

1934 ~ Ralph Nader, American activist and political figure.

1933 ~ Malcolm Wallop (d. Sept. 14, 2011), American rancher senator from Wyoming who pushed hard for missile defense.  He died at age 78.

1932 ~ Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor (d. Mar. 23, 2011), English-American actress.  She died of congestive heart failure about a month after her 79^th birthday.

1930 ~ Joanne Woodward, American actress and wife of Paul Newman.

1927 ~ Peter Whittle, New Zealander mathematician.

1926 ~ David Hunter Hubel (d. Sept. 22, 2013), Canadian neurophysiologist and recipient of the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 87.

1921 ~ Theodore Van Kirk (d. July 28, 2014), American navigator who guided the Enola Gay, the B-29 bomber that dropped the H-bomb on Hiroshima.  He died at age 93.

1919 ~ Johnny Pesky (né John Michael Pavveskovich, d. Aug. 13, 2012), American baseball player, manager and coach who spent much of his career with the Boston Red Sox.  He was known as Mr. Red Sox.  He died at age 93.

1917 ~ John Bowden Connally, Jr. (d. June 15, 1993), 61^st Secretary of the Treasury.  He served under President Richard Nixon from February 1971 until June 1972.  He was also the 55^th United States Secretary of the Navy under President John F. Kennedy from January 1961 until December 1961.  He has also served as the 39^th Governor of Texas and was in the motorcade when President Kennedy was killed.  He died at age 76.

1913 ~ Irwin Shaw (né Irwin Gilbert Shamforoff, d. May 16, 1984), American author.  He is best known for his books Rich Man, Poor Man and Beggarman, Thief.  He died of prostate cancer at age 71.

1913 ~ Paul Riocœur (d. May 20, 2005), French philosopher who taught in a POW camp during World War II.  He died at age 92.

1910 ~ Peter de Vries (d. Sept. 28, 1993), American novelist.  He died at age 83.

1903 ~ Joseph Ber Soloveitchik (d. Apr. 9, 1993), American rabbi and philosopher.  He died at age 90.

1903 ~ Hans Rohrback (d. Dec. 19, 1993), German mathematician.  He died at age 90.

1902 ~ John Steinbeck (b. Dec. 20, 1968), American novelist and recipient of the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He is best known his novels including The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, East of Eden, and The Red Pony.  He died of heart disease at age 66.

1899 ~ Charles Herbert Best (d. Mar. 31, 1978), Canadian medical student who co-discovered insulin.  He was born in Maine.  He died about a month after his 79^th birthday.

1897 ~ Marian Anderson (d. Apr. 8, 1993), African-American contralto.  She died at age 96 of congestive heart failure and complications of a stroke.

1892 ~ William Demarest (né Carl William Demarest, d. Dec. 27, 1983), American actor.  He is best known for playing Uncle Charlie on My Three Sons.  He died of prostate cancer at age 91.

1891 ~ David Sarnoff (d. Dec. 12, 1971), Russian-born American businessman and pioneer in radio and television.  He was the founder of RCA.  He also founded NBC.  He died at age 80.

1888 ~ Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Sr. (d. Oct. 30, 1965), American historian and author.  He died in Boston, Massachusetts at age 77.

1886 ~ Hugo Black (d. Sept. 25, 1971), Associate Justice on the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.  He served on the Court from August 1837 until his retirement on September 17, 1971.  He served on the court for 34 years.  He suffered a stroke 2 days after he retired and died shortly thereafter at age 83.

1881 ~ L. E. J. Brouwer (né Luitzen Egbertus Jan Brouwer, d. Dec. 2, 1966), Dutch mathematician.  He died at age 85.

1878 ~ Alvan Fuller (d. Apr. 30, 1958), 50^th Governor of Massachusetts.  He served as Governor from January 1925 until January 1929.  He died at age 80.

1869 ~ Alice Hamilton (d. Sept. 22, 1970), American academic and pioneer in toxicology research.  She was a leading expert in occupational health.  She was the first woman appointed to the faculty at Harvard University.  She died at age 101.

1852 ~ John McLane (d. Apr. 13, 1911), 50^th Governor of New Hampshire.  He was Governor from January 1905 until January 1907.  He was a furniture maker from Milford, New Hampshire.  He died at age 59.

1807 ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (d. Mar. 24, 1882), He was born in Portland, Maine.  He died in Cambridge, Massachusetts less than a month after his 75^th birthday.

272 ~ Constantine the Great (d. May 22, 337), Roman emperor.  Tradition holds that he was born on February 27.  He is believed to have died at age 65.

Events that Changed the World:

2010 ~ An 8.8 magnitude earthquake struck central Chile, killing over 500 people and injuring thousand more.  The quake initiated a tsunami which reached Hawaiian Islands.

2004 ~ The initial version of the report detailing sexual abuse by Catholic priests in the United States, was released.

1991 ~ United States President George H.W. Bush (b. 1924) declared that Kuwait was liberated as a result of the Gulf War.

1973 ~ The occupation of Wounded Knee, South Dakota began by the American Indian Movement.

1951 ~ The 22^nd Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, thereby limiting future American Presidents to only two terms in office.

1940 ~ Martin Kamen (1913 ~ 2002) and Sam Ruben (1913 ~ 1943) discovered carbon-14.

1933 ~ The Reichstag, Germany’s parliamentary building in Berlin was set on fire and burned to the ground.  The Nazi party used the fire to solidify its power and eliminated the communists as political rivals.

1922 ~ In the case of Leser v. Garnett, the United States Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the 19^th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which granted women the right to vote.

1900 ~ The British Labour Party, a political party, was founded.

1864 ~ The first Union Prisoners of War were sent to Andersonville, the Confederate prison in Andersonville, Georgia.

1844 ~ The Dominican Republic gained its independence from Haiti.

1801 ~ Washington, D.C. was placed under the jurisdiction of the US Congress in accordance with District of Columbia Organic Act of 1801.

1594 ~ Henry IV (1553 ~ 1610) was crowned King of France.

425 ~ The University of Constantinople was founded by Emperor Theodosius II (401 ~ 450).

Good-Byes:

2017 ~ William Liebenow (b. Jan. 18, 1920), American Navy skipper who rescued a stranded John F. Kennedy in 1943 during World War II.  As a Lieutenant in the Navy, he used the cover of darkness to take his patrol boat into enemy waters to rescue the crew of PT-109.  He died at age 97.

2015 ~ Leonard Nimoy (b. Mar. 26, 1931), American actor best known for his role as Mr. Spock from the Star Trek Series.  Although he initially was not keen on the role of Mr. Spock, he learned to love the alien.  He was born in Boston, Massachusetts.  He died about a month before his 84^th birthday.

2013 ~ Van Cliburn (né Harvey Lavan Cliburn, Jr., b. July 12, 1934), American pianist who became a Cold War hero.  He entered into, and won, the International Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958.  He was born in Shreveport, Louisiana.  He died at age 78.

2011 ~ Frank Buckles (né Wood Buckles, b. Feb. 1, 1901), the last surviving American veteran of World War I.  He died 26 days after his 110^th birthday.

2008 ~ William F. Buckley, Jr. (né William Francis Buckley, Jr., b. Nov. 24, 1925), American writer and founder of the National Review.  He died at age 82.

2003 ~ Fred Rogers (né Fred McFeely Rogers, b. Mar. 20, 1928), American minister and host to a children’s educational TV show.  He died of stomach cancer less than a month before his 75^th birthday.

1998 ~ J.T. Walsh (né James Thomas Patrick Walsh, b. Sept. 28, 1943), American actor.  He died of a heart attack at age 54.

1998 ~ George Herbert Hitchings (b. Apr. 18, 1905), American physician and recipient of the1988 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 92.

1993 ~ Lillian Diana Gish (b. Oct. 14, 1893), American silent film actress.  She was 99 years old at the time of her death.

1990 ~ Nahum Norbet Glatzer (b. Mar. 25, 1906), Jewish-American scholar.  He died about a month after his 86^th birthday.

1989 ~ Konrad Lorenz (b. Nov. 7, 1903), Austrian zoologist and recipient of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 85.

1985 ~ Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. (b. July 5, 1902), American diplomat and 1960 Vice Presidential nominee as Richard Nixon’s running mate.  He was a United States Senator from Massachusetts from January 1947 until January 1953.  He served as the 3^rd United States Ambassador to the United Nations.  He died in Beverly, Massachusetts at age 82.

1936 ~ Joshua Willis Alexander (b. Jan. 22, 1852), 2^nd United States Secretary of Commerce.  He served in the Woodrow Wilson administration from December 1919 until March 1921.  He died at age 84.

1936 ~ Ivan Pavlov (b. Sept. 25, 1949), Russian physiologist and recipient of the 1904 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He is best known for his studies in classical conditioned responses.  He died at age 86.

1915 ~ Nikolay Yakovlevich Sonin (b. Feb. 22, 1849), Russian mathematician.  He died 5 days after his 66^th birthday.

1905 ~ George Sewell Boutwell (b. Jan. 28, 1818), 28^th Secretary of the Treasury.  He served under President Ulysses S. Grant from March 1869 to March 1873.  Prior to his service in the Federal Government, he had served as the 20^th Governor of Massachusetts.  He died a month after 87^th birthday.

1902 ~ Breaker Morant (né Harry Morant, b. Dec. 9, 1864), Anglo-Australian soldier who allegedly participated in the summary execution of several Boer prisoners during the Second Boer War, as well as a witness to the executions.  His actions lead to a court-martial and he was executed for murder.  He was 37 years old.

1892 ~ Louis Vuitton (b. Aug. 4, 1821), French designer of leather goods, especially trunks and bags.  He is the founder of the House of Louis Vuitton.  He died at age 70.

1844 ~ Nicholas Biddle (b. Jan. 8, 1786), American banker and financier.  He died at age 58.

1659 ~ Henry Dunster (b. Nov. 26, 1609), English-American clergyman and academic.  He became the first President of Harvard College.  The date of his birth is not known, but he was baptized on November 26, 1609.  He died at age 49.

1425 ~ Vasily I of Moscow (b. Dec. 30, 1371).  He died at age 53.

1416 ~ Eleanor of Castile (b. 1363), Queen consort of Navarre.  She was the wife of Charles III of Navarre.  The exact date of her birth is not known, but she is believed to have been about 52 or 53 at the time of her death.

640 ~ Pepin the Elder (b. 580), Frankish politician.  The exact date of his birth is not known.

February 26

Birthdays:

1958 ~ Tim Kaine (né Timothy Michael Kaine), American politician and United States Senator from Virginia.  He is best known for being the Democratic Vice President nominee in the 2016 Presidential election.  He was the running mate of Hillary Clinton.

1954 ~ Recep Tayyio Erdoğan, 12^th President of Turkey.  He assumed office in August 2014.

1949 ~ Elizabeth George (née Susan Elizabeth George), American writer of mystery stories set in Great Britain.

1948 ~ Sharyn McCrumb, American author whose books focus on the folklore of Appalachia.

1946 ~ Ahmed Zewail (d. Aug. 2, 2016), Egyptian-born American chemist.  He was the recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.  He died at age 70.

1932 ~ Johnny Cash (né John Ray Cash, d. Sept. 12, 2003), American singer.  He died at age 71.

1931 ~ Robert Novak (d. Aug. 18, 2009), American journalist.  He died at age 78.

1928 ~ Ariel Sharon (né Ariel Scheinermann, d. Jan. 11, 2014), 11^th Prime Minister of Israel.  He was a retired General.  He had been a commander in the Israeli Army from its inception in 1948, thus he lead Israel in war and peace.  He suffered a massive stroke in January 2006 and remained in a coma for the rest of his life.  He died at age 85.

1928 ~ Fats Domino (né Antoine Dominique Domino, Jr., d. Oct. 24, 2017), African-American New Orleans pianist who shaped rock ‘n’ roll.  He died in Harvey, Louisiana at age 89.

1926 ~ James Alexander Green (d. Apr. 7, 2014), Scottish mathematician.  He died at age 88.

1920 ~ Tony Randall (né Aryeh Leonard Rosenberg, d. May 17, 2004), American actor.  He died at age 84.

1916 ~ Jackie Gleason (né John Herbert Gleason, d. June 24, 1987), American actor and musician.  He died of cancer at age 71.

1903 ~ Guilio Natta (d. May 2, 1979), Italian chemist and recipient of the 1963 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.  He died at age 76.

1887 ~ William Frawley (d. Mar. 3, 1966), American actor best known for his role as Fred Mertz on the I Love Lucy show.  He died 5 days after his 79^th birthday.

1882 ~ Husband E. Kimmel (né Husband Edward Kimmel, d. May 14, 1968), American admiral.  He died at age 86.

1866 ~ Herbert Henry Dow (d. Oct. 15, 1930), Canadian-American businessman and founder of the Dow Chemical Company.  He died at age 64.

1861 ~ Ferdinand I of Bulgaria (d. Sept. 10, 1948).  He was the Tsar of Bulgaria from October 1908 until October 1918.  He died at age 87.

1852 ~ John Harvey Kellogg (d. Dec. 14, 1943), American surgeon and vegetarian advocate.  He was from Battle Creek, Michigan and ran a sanitarium that focused on nutrition and exercise.  He, along with his brother Will (1860 ~ 1951), became known as the breakfast cereal, Kellogg’s Cornflakes.  He died at age 91.

1846 ~ William Frederick “Buffalo Bill” Cody (d. Jan. 10, 1917), American frontiersman and showman.  He died of kidney failure at age 70.

1829 ~ Levi Strauss (d. Sept. 26, 1902), German-born American clothing manufacturer.  He founded Levi Strauss & Company, the first company to manufacture denim blue jeans, which were worn by gold miners during the California Gold Rush.  He died at age 73.

1808 ~ Honoré-Victorin Daumier (d. Feb. 10, 1879), French artist, painter, illustrator and sculptor.  He died 16 days before his 71^st birthday.

1802 ~ Victor Marie Hugo (d. May 22, 1885), French novelist best known for his novels Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  He died at age 83.

1786 ~ François Arago (né Dominique François Jean Arago, d. Oct. 2, 1853), French mathematician.  He died at age 67.

1777 ~ Mateja Nenadović (d. Dec. 11, 1854), Serbian priest, historian and politician.  He is considered the 1^st Prime Minister of Serbia.  He died at age 77.

1564 ~ Christopher Marlowe (d. May 30, 1593), English playwright.  He was stabbed to death at age 29.  The exact date of his birth is unknown, but he was baptized on February 26.

1361 ~ Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia (d. Aug. 16, 1419), King of Bohemia.  He died at age 58.

Events that Changed the World:

2013 ~ A hot air balloon carrying tourist crashed near the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt.  Nineteen people were killed.

2008 ~The New York Philharmonic performed in Pyongyang, North Korea.  It was the first such an event to occur in North Korea.

1995 ~ The United Kingdom’s oldest investment banking institution, the Barings Bank, collapsed after a securities broker lost $1.4 Billion by speculating on the Singapore International Monetary Exchange using future contracts.

1993 ~ A truck bomb parked below the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City exploded, killing 6 people in injuring over 1000.

1980 ~ Egypt and Israel established full diplomatic relations.

1972 ~ The Buffalo Creek Flood in West Virginia caused a dam to burst, killing 125 people.

1971 ~ U.N. Secretary-General U Thant (1909 ~ 1974) signed a UN Proclamation of the establishing the vernal equinox as Earth Day.

1935 ~ Adolf Hitler (1889 ~ 1945) ordered the Luftwaffe to be reformed in violation of the Treaty of Versailles.

1929 ~ President Calvin Coolidge (1872 ~ 1933) signed an Executive Order establishing Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

1919 ~ President Woodrow Wilson (1856 ~ 1924) signed an Act of Congress establishing the Grand Canyon National Park.

1917 ~ The Original Dixieland Jazz Band recorded the first Jazz record.  The band originally called itself the Original Dixieland Jass Band.

1909 ~ The first successful color motion picture process, the Kinemacolor, was first shown to the general public at the Palace Theatre in London, England.

1815 ~ Napoleon Bonaparte (1769 ~ 1821) escaped from Elba.

1794 ~ The first Christiansborg Palace in Copenhagen, Denmark burned down.

1616 ~ Galileo Galileo (1564 ~ 1642) was banned by the Catholic Church from teaching or defending the view that the earth orbits the sun.

Good-Byes:

2017 ~ Ludvig Faddeev (b. Mar. 23, 1934), Russian mathematician.  He died less than a month before his 83^rd birthday.

2017 ~ Joseph Wapner (b. Nov. 15, 1919), American judge who presided over The People’s Court.  He was the first star of the reality television court.  His show ran from 1981 until 1992.  He died at age 97.

2015 ~ Earl Francis Lloyd (b. Apr. 3, 1928), American NBA player who broke the color barrier.  In 1950, he became the first African-American to play in the National Basketball Association.  He was drafted by the Washington Capitols.  He was 86 years old.

2013 ~ Thomas C. Griffin (b. July 10, 1916), American World War II navigator who helped steer the Doolittle Raid.  He died at age 96.

2011 ~ Eugene Fodor (b. Mar. 5, 1950), American violin virtuoso haunted by addiction.  He died of liver disease 7 days before his 61^st birthday.

2011 ~ Arnošt Lustig (b. Dec. 21, 1926), Czech novelist who recalled the horrors of the Holocaust.  He died at age 84.

2010 ~ Louis Fabian Bachrach, Jr. (b. Apr. 9, 1917), American photographer who put the powerful at ease.  He is best known for his photographs of celebrities, politicians and presidents.  He was born and died in Newton, Massachusetts.  He died at age 92.

1998 ~ Theodore Schultz (b. Apr. 30, 1902), American economist and recipient of the 1979 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences.  He died at age 95.

1994 ~ Avery Fisher (b. Mar. 4, 1906), American audio specialist.  He is best known for the design of the auditorium in the Lincoln Center cultural complex in Manhattan.  He died 6 days before his 88^th birthday.

1985 ~ Albert Turner Bharucha-Reid (né Albert Turner Reid, b. Nov. 13, 1927), American mathematician who worked on probability theory.  He died at age 57.

1985 ~ Tjalling Koopmans (b. Aug. 28, 1910), Dutch-American mathematician and recipient of the 1975 Nobel Prize in Economic Science.  He died in New Haven, Connecticut at age 74.

1969 ~ Levi Eshkol (né Levi Yitzhak Shkolnik, b. Oct. 25, 1895), Prime Minister of Israel.  He served as Prime Minister from June 1963 until his death in February 1969.  He died in office at age 73.

1931 ~ Otto Wallach (b. Mar. 27, 1847), German chemist and recipient of the 1910 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on alicyclic compounds.  He died a month before his 84^th birthday.

1903 ~ Richard Jordan Gatling (b. Sept. 12, 1818), American inventor who invented the Gatling gun, the first successful machine gun.  He died at age 84.

1839 ~ Sybil Ludington (b. Apr. 5, 1761), heroine of the American Revolutionary War.  At age 16, she rode her horse 40 miles throughout the night of April 22, 1777 to warn the militiamen that British troops were planning to attack Danbury, Connecticut.  She died at age 77.

1834 ~ Alois Senifelder (b. Nov. 6, 1771), Czech inventor of the lithography printing process.  He died at age 62.

1813 ~ Robert Livingston (b. Nov. 27, 1746), American politician and assisted in the negotiation of the Louisiana Purchase from France.  He was the 1^st US Secretary for Foreign Affairs.  He served in this position during the George Washington administration from October 1781 until June 1783.  He died at age 66.

1638~ Claude Gaspard Bachet de Méziriac (b. Oct. 9, 1581), French mathematician.  He died at age 56.

1603 ~ Maria of Austria (b. June 21, 1528), Holy Roman Empress and wife of Maximilian II.  She died at age 74.

1577 ~ King Erick XIV of Sweden (b. Dec. 13, 1533).  He died at age 43.

1548 ~ Lorenzine de’Medici (b. Mar. 23, 1514), Italian writer and politician.  He is best known for assassinating his cousin, Alessandro de’Medici.  He was subsequently murdered about a month before his 34^th birthday.

1275 ~ Margaret of England (b. Sept. 29, 1240).  She was the Queen consort of Scots.  She was the second child of King Henry III of England and Eleanor of Provence.  She died at age 34.