Wednesday, July 20, 2022

July 20

Birthdays:

 

1996 ~ Ben Simmons (né Benjamin David Simmons), Australian-born professional basketball player.  He played basketball for LSU before entering the NBA draft.  He was born in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

 

1980 ~ Gisele Bündchen (née Gisele Caroline Bündchen), Brazilian model.  She married football player Tom Brady.

 

1973 ~ Omar Epps (né Omar Hashim Epps), African-American actor and rapper.  He was born in Brooklyn, New York.

 

1971 ~ Sandra Oh (née Sandra Miji Oh), Canadian actress.  She was born in Nepean, Ottawa, Canada.

 

1967 ~ Reed Diamond (né Reed Edward Diamond), American actor.  He is best known for his role as Detective Mike Kellerman from the television drama Homicide: Life on the Street.  He was born in Brooklyn, New York.

 

1964 ~ Chris Cornell (né Christopher John Boyle; d. May 18, 2017), American Soundgarden frontman who pioneered the grunge sound.  He was born in Seattle, Washington.  He died by suicide at age 52 in Detroit, Michigan.

 

1953 ~ Thomas Friedman (né Thomas Loren Friedman), American journalist and author.  He was born in St. Louis Park, Minnesota.

 

1947 ~ Gerd Binnig, German physicist and recipient of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physics for inventing the scanning tunneling microscope.  He was born in Frankfurt, Germany.

 

1947 ~ Carlos Santana (né Carlos Humberto Santana Barragán), Mexican-American musician and guitarist.  He was born in Autlián, Jalisco, Mexico.

 

1945 ~ Kim Carnes, American musician.  She was born in Los Angeles, California.

 

1944 ~ Paul Violi (né Paul Randolph Violi; d. Apr. 2, 2011), American poet.  He was born in Brooklyn, New York.  He died of cancer at age 66 in Cortlandt Manor, New York.

 

1939 ~ Judy Chicago (née Judith Sylvia Cohen), American artist.  She was born in Chicago, Illinois.

 

1938 ~ Natalie Wood (née Natasha Nikoleavna Zakkharenko; d. Nov. 29, 1981), American actress.  She died in a mysterious boating accident.  Ostensibly she drowned at age 43, however, in 2012, an investigation into her death was reopened.  Her husband, Richard Wagner, was considered as a “person of interest.”  She was born in San Francisco, California.  She died in the ocean off Santa Catalina Island, California.

 

1938 ~ Diana Rigg (née Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg; d. Sept. 10, 2020), English actress.  She is best known for her role as Emma Peel in The Avengers.  She died of lung cancer in London, England at age 82.

 

1933 ~ Cormac McCarthy (né Charles Joseph McCarthy, Jr.), American author.  He was born in Providence, Rhode Island.

 

1932 ~ Nam June Paik (d. Jan. 29, 2006), South Korean artist.  He is considered the founder of video art.  He was born in Seoul, South Korea.  He died at age 73 in Miami, Florida.

 

1930 ~ Chuck Daly (né Charles Jerome Daly; d. May 9, 2009), NBA baseball coach for the Detroit Pistons and coach of the 1992 United States Olympic “Dream Team.”  He was born in Kane, Pennsylvania.  He died of pancreatic cancer at age 78 in Jupiter, Florida.

 

1929 ~ Mike Ilitch, Sr. (né Michael Ilitch; d. Feb. 10, 2017), American entrepreneur who founded the Little Caesars pizza chain and relentlessly promoted Detroit.  He was born and died in Detroit, Michigan.  He died at age 87.

 

1924 ~ Thomas Berger (né Thomas Louis Berger; d. July 13, 2014), American author, best known for his novel, Little Big Man.  He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio.  He died 7 days before his 90th birthday in Nyack, New York.

 

1922 ~ Alan Boyd (né Alan Stephenson Boyd; d. Oct. 18, 2020), 1st United States Secretary of Transportation.  He served in this position, which was created under the Lyndon Johnson administration, from January 1967 until January 1969.  He was born in Jacksonville, Florida.  He died at age 98 in Seattle, Washington.

 

1920 ~ Elliot Richardson (né Elliot Lee Richardson; d. Dec. 31, 1999), 23rd United States Secretary of Commerce.  He served in this position under the Ford Administration from February 1976 until January 1977.  He had previously served in the Nixon Administration in several positions, including the 69th United States Attorney General from May 1973 until October 1973; the 11th United States Secretary of Defense from January 1973 until May 1973; and the 9th United States Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare from June 1970 until January 1973.  He had previously served as the 52ndAttorney General for the State of Massachusetts from January 1967 until Januar7 1969.  He was born and died in Boston, Massachusetts.  He died of a cerebral hemorrhage at age 79.

 

1919 ~ Sir Edmund Hillary (né Edmund Percival Hillary; d. Jan. 11, 2008), New Zealand mountaineer and explorer.  He led the first expedition known to have reached the top of Mt. Everest.  He was born and died in Auckland, New Zealand.  He died at age 88.

 

1897 ~ Tadeusz Reichstein (d. Aug. 1, 1996), Polish chemist and recipient of the 1950 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died 2 weeks after his 99th birthday in Basel, Switzerland.

 

1895 ~ László Moholy-Nagy (né László Weisz; d. Nov. 24, 1946), Hungarian painter, sculptor and photographer.  He died of leukemia at age 51 in Chicago, Illinois.

 

1894 ~ Wiley Blount Rutledge, Jr. (d. Sept. 10, 1949), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was nominated to the High Court by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.  He replaced James F. Byrnes on the Court.  He was succeeded by Sherman Minton.  He served on the Court from February 1943 until his death 17 months later.  He was born in Cloverport, Kentucky.  He is known for his impassioned defenses of civil liberties.  He died while on vacation in York, Maine.  He suffered a stroke while driving and died 2 weeks later.  He was 55 years old.

 

1890 ~ Julie Vinter Hansen (née Julie Marie Vinter Hansen; d. July 27, 1960), Danish astronomer.  She was born in Copenhagen, Denmark.  She died of heart failure 7 days after her 70th birthday.

 

1882 ~ Olga Hahn-Neurath (née Olga Hahn; d. July 20, 1937), Austrian mathematician.  She was born in Vienna, Austria.  She died of a lung infection on her 55th birthday in The Hague, Netherlands.

 

1876 ~ Otto Blumenthal (né Ludwig Otto Blumenthal, d. Nov. 12, 1944), German mathematician.  He died in the Theresienstadt concentration camp at age 68.

 

1868 ~ Miron Cristea (d. Mar. 6, 1939), Romanian cleric and Prime Minister of Romania.  He served as Prime Minister from February 1938 until his death at age 70 a year later in Cannes, France.

 

1864 ~ Erik Alex Karlfeldt (d. Apr. 8, 1931), Swedish poet and recipient of the 1931 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He was awarded the Nobel Prize posthumously.  He was the first person to be awarded a Nobel Prize after his death.  He died at age 66 in Stockholm, Sweden.

 

1852 ~ Theo Heemskerk (né Theodorus Heemskerk; d. June 12, 1932), Dutch lawyer and politician.  He served as the Prime Minister of the Netherlands from February 1908 until August 1913.  He was born in Amsterdam, Netherlands.  He died at age 79 in Utrecht, Netherlands.

 

1849 ~ Robert Anderson Van Wyck (d. Nov. 14, 1918), Mayor of New York City.  He was the first Mayor of New York after the consolidation of the 5 boroughs into the City of Greater New York in 1898.  He was Mayor from January 1898 through December 1901.  He was born in New York, New York.  He died at age 69 in Paris, France.

 

1847 ~ Max Liebermann (d. Feb. 8, 1935), German painter.  He was a leading Impressionist painter in Germany.  He was born and died in Berlin, Germany.  He died at age 87.

 

1822 ~ Gregor Mendel (né Gregor Johann Mendel; d. Jan. 6, 1884), Austrian botanist and monk who theorized on the basic laws of genetics and heredity.  He was born in a region that is now part of the Czech Republic.  He died at age 61.

 

1519 ~ Pope Innocent IX (né Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti; d. Dec. 30, 1591).  He was Pope from October 1591 until his death 2 months later.  He died at age 72.

 

1346 ~ Margaret, Countess of Pembroke (d. 1361), British noblewoman.  She was the first wife of John Hastings, 2nd Earl of Pembroke.  She was also known as Margaret of Windsor.  She was of the House of Plantagenet.  She was the daughter of Edward III, King of England and Philippa of Hainault.  The exact date of her death is not known, but she is believed to have been about 15 years old at the time of her death.

 

1304 ~ Petrarch (né Francesco Petrarca; d. July 19, 1734), Italian scholar and poet.  He died 1 day before his 70thbirthday.

 

356 BCE ~ Alexander the Great (d. June 10, 323 BCE), the traditional date ascribed to his birth.  He died at age 32.

 

Events that Changed the World:

 

2021 ~ Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos (b. 1964) and his crew flew the New Shepard spacecraft over 66 miles over Texas, the altitude that most experts consider the boundary of space.  It was the company’s maiden voyage people aboard.  The flight, which lasted 10-minutes, accelerated at 3 times the speed of sound.  The passengers included Bezos, his brother, Mark; and 18-year-old Dutch teenager and Wally Funk (b. 1939), a female pilot who trained with NASA male astronauts in the 1960s.

 

2017 ~ O.J. Simpson (b. 1947) was granted parole after serving 9 years of a 33-sentence for armed robbery.

 

2015 ~ The United States and Cuba resumed full diplomatic relations for the first time in over 50 years.

 

2012 ~ During a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, a gunman opened fire in a movie theater killing 12 people and injuring over 70 others.  The shooter was ultimately captured, tried, and sentenced to life in prison.

 

2005 ~ Canada legalized same-sex marriages.

 

1997 ~ The fully restored USS Constitution (Old Ironsides) celebrated its 200th birthday.  It was set sail for the first time in over 115 years.

 

1992 ~ Václav Havel (1936 ~ 2011) resigned as president of Czechoslovakia.

 

1989 ~ Burma’s ruling junta put opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi (b. 1945) under house arrest.  She remained under house arrest until November 2010.  In 1991, she was the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

 

1976 ~ Viking 1 successfully landed on Mars.

 

1969 ~ Apollo 11 made the first human-crewed landing on the Moon and astronauts Neil Armstrong (1930 ~ 2012) and Buzz Aldrin (né Edwin Eugene Aldrin, Jr., b. 1930) became the first humans to walk on the moon’s surface.  Their moonwalk occurred several hours after the modular landed, thus was actually on July 21.

 

1968 ~ The first Special Olympics was held at Soldier’s Field in Chicago.

 

1960 ~ Sirimavo Bandaranaike (1916 ~ 2000), was elected as the Prime Minister of Ceylon (now known as Sri Lanka).  By her election, she became the first modern-world female head of state.

 

1951 ~ Jordan’s King Abdullah I (1882 ~ 1951) was assassinated in Jerusalem by a Palestinian while attending Friday services.

 

1949 ~ Israel and Syria signed a truce ending their 19-month war.

 

1940 ~ California opened its first freeway, the Arroyo Seco Parkway, which connected Los Angeles with Pasadena.

 

1906 ~In Finland, the women were granted the right to vote.  Finland was the first country in Europe to grant this right to women.

 

1903 ~ The Ford Motor Company shipped its first car.

 

70 ~ The traditional date in which Titus, son of the Roman emperor, Vaspasian, stormed the Fortress of Antonia north of the Temple Mount during the Siege of Jerusalem.

 

Good-Byes:

 

2019 ~ Liane Russell (née Liane Brauch; d. Aug. 27, 1923), Austrian-born American geneticist who flagged the risks of radiation.  Her research in mammalian genetics provided the basis for understanding the chromosomic basis for sex determination in mammals and the effects of radiation, drugs, fuels and waste on mice.  Her family left Austria in March 1938 to escape from the Holocaust.  She was born in Vienna, Austria and died at age 95 in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

 

2017 ~ Chester Bennington (né Chester Charles Bennington; b. Mar. 20, 1976), American rock singer who struggled with is demons.  He was the frontman for the band Linkin Park.  He was born in Phoenix, Arizona.  He died by suicide at age 41 in Palo Verdes Estates, California.

 

2017 ~ Kenneth Jay Lane (b. Apr. 22, 1932), American jewelry designer who specialized in fabulous fakes.  He was born in Detroit, Michigan.  He died at age 85 in New York, New York.

 

2015 ~ Theodore Bikel (né Theodore Meir Bikel; b. May 2, 1924), Austrian singer and actor.  He was named after Theodor Herzl, who was also born on May 2.  He was born in Vienna, Austria.  He died at age 91 in Westwood, California.

 

2015 ~ Louis Lenart (né Layos Lenovitz; b. Apr. 24, 1921), Hungarian-born American fighter pilot who saved Tel Aviv during the 1948 war.  He died in Israel at age 94.

 

2013 ~ John Casablancas (b. Dec. 12, 1942), modeling agent who ushered in the era of the supermodel.  He was the founder of the Elite Model Management.  He was born in New York, New York.  He died at age 70 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil where he was receiving cancer treatment.

 

2013 ~ Helen Thomas (née Helen Amelia Thomas; b. Aug. 4, 1920), American feisty journalist who broke barriers at the White House.  She was a White House correspondent for many years.  Her career took a downspin after she made anti-Semitic remarks when she was 89 years old.  She was born in Winchester, Kentucky.  She died only 2 weeks before her 93rd birthday in Washington, D.C.

 

2011 ~ Lucian Freud (né Lucian Michael Freud; b. Dec. 8, 1922), German-English artist and grandson of Sigmund Freud.  He was the painter who put the brutal truth into the modern portrait.  He was born in Berlin, Germany.  He died at age 88 in London, England.

 

2007 ~ Tammy Faye Bakker Messner (née Tammy Faye LaValley; b. Mar. 7, 1942), American televangelist.  She was married to Jim Bakker before his sex scandal.  She was born in International Falls, Minnesota.  She died of colon cancer at age 65 in Loch Lloyd, Missouri.

 

2007 ~ Kai Siegbahn (b. Apr. 20, 1918), Swedish physicist and recipient of the 1981 Nobel Prize in Physics.  He died at age 89.

 

1993 ~ Vince Foster (né Vincent Walker Foster, Jr.; b. Jan. 15, 1945), Deputy White House Counsel in the Bill Clinton Administration.  He was born in Hope, Arkansas.  He died of a gunshot wound at age 48 under some mysterious circumstances, but ultimately his death was ruled a suicide.  He died in Fort Marcy Park, Fairfax County, Virginia.

 

1985 ~ Bruno de Finetti (b. June 13, 1906), Austrian-Italian mathematician.  He was born in Innsbruck, Austria.  He died at age 79 in Rome, Italy.

 

1984 ~ Jim Fixx (né James Fuller Fixx; b. Apr. 23, 1932), American runner and fitness author.  He was born in New York, New York.  He died of a heart attack while jogging in Hardwick, Vermont.  He was 52 years old.

 

1973 ~ Bruce Lee (né Lee Jun-fan; b. Nov. 27, 1940), American actor and martial arts performer.  He was born in San Francisco, California.  He died of a cerebral edema at age 32, possibly the result of a reaction to a prescribed pain medication, in British Hong Kong.

 

1971 ~ Amanda Clement (b. Mar. 20, 1888), American professional baseball player and umpire.  She was the first woman to be a paid referee for a baseball game.  She was born in Hudson, Dakota Territory.  She died at age 83 in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

 

1951 ~ Abdullah I, King of Jordon (b. Feb. 1882), was assassinated by a Palestinian while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem.  He was the ruler of Jordan from May 1946 until his assassination at age 69 on this date 5 years later.  The exact date of his birth is unknown.

 

1945 ~ Paul Valéry (né Ambroise Paul Toussaint Jules Valéry; b. Oct. 30, 1871), French poet.  He died at age 73 in Paris, France.

 

1937 ~ Olga Hahn-Neurath (née Olga Hahn; b. July 20, 1882), Austrian mathematician.  She was born in Vienna, Austria.  She died of a lung infection on her 55th birthday in The Hague, Netherlands.

 

1937 ~ Guglielmo Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi (né Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi; b. Apr. 25, 1874), Italian physicist and inventor of the wireless telegraph and radio.  He was the recipient of the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics.  He was born in Bologna, Kingdom of Italy.  He died at age 63 in Rome, Kingdom of Italy.

 

1927 ~ Ferdinand I, King of Romania (b. Aug. 24, 1865).  He was reigned o from October 1914 until his death on this date 13 years later.  He was married to Princess Marie of Edinburgh.  He was of the House of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen.  He was the son of Leopold, Prince of Hohenzollern and Infanta Antónia of Portugal.  He died in Sinaia, Romania about a month before his 62nd birthday.

 

1923 ~ Pancho Villa (né José Doroteo Arango Arámbula; b. June 5, 1878), Mexican revolutionary.  He was assassinated at age 45.

 

1922 ~ Andrey Markov (b. June 14, 1856), Russian mathematician.  He died at age 66 in Petrograd, Soviet Union.

 

1911 ~ Hermann Schubert (né Hermann Cäsar Hannibal Schubert; b. May 22, 1848), German mathematician.  He was born in Potsdam, Germany.  He died at age 63 in Hamburg, Germany.

 

1903 ~ Pope Leo XIII (né Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci; b. Mar. 2, 1810).  He was Pope from February 1878 until his death in July 1903.  He died at age 93.

 

1888 ~ Paul Langerhans (b. July 25, 1847), German pathologist.  He studied the pancreas.   The Isle of Landerhans in the pancreas is named after him.  He was born in Berlin, Germany.  He died of renal failure 5 days before his 41st birthday.

 

1866 ~ Bernhard Riemann (né Georg Friedrich Bernhard Rienmann, b. Sept. 17, 1826), German mathematician.  He died at age 39 of tuberculosis.

 

1454 ~ John II, King of Castile and León (b. Mar. 6, 1405).  He ruled Castile and León from December 1406 until his death nearly 48 years later.  He was married twice.  His first wife was Maria of Aragon.  His second wife was Isabella of Portugal.  He was of the House of Trastámara.  He was the son of Henry III, King of Castile and Catherine of Lancaster.  He died at age 49.

 

1405 ~ Alexander Stewart, Earl of Buchan (b. 1343), Scottish prince.  He was married to Euphemia of Ross.  He was of the House of Stewart.  He was the third surviving son of Robert II, King of Scotland and Elizabeth Mure.  The date of his birth is not known.

 

1031 ~ Robert II, King of France (b. Mar. 27, 972).  He ruled from December 987 until his death in July 1031.  He was known as Robert the Pius.  He was married three times.  He first wife was Rozala of Italy.  After the marriage was annulled, he married Bertha of Burgundy.  After that marriage was annulled, he married Constance of Arles, and they remained married until his death.  He was of the House of Capet.  He was the son of Hugh Capet and Adelaide of Aquitaine.  He died at age 59.

 

985 ~ Antipope Boniface VII (né Franco Ferrucci, b. 930).  The date of his birth is unknown.


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