November 15

Birthdays:

1957 ~ Kevin Eubanks, American musician.

1952 ~ Randy Savage (né Randy Mario Poffo, d. May 20, 2011), American show-off who took wrestling mainstream.  He died of a heart attack while driving, which caused a car crash.  He was 58 at the time of his death.

1951 ~ Beverly D’Angelo, American actress.

1947 ~ William “Bill” Richardson, American politician and 9^th United States Secretary of Energy.  He served during the Bill Clinton administration from August 1996 until January 2001.  He subsequently went on to become the 30^th Governor of New Mexico, where he served from January 2003 until January 2011.

1941 ~ Heathcote Williams (né John Henley Heathcote-Williams, d. July 1, 2017), British writer who embraced the counterculture.  He was a poet, actor and playwright.  He died at age 75.

1940 ~ Sam Waterston, American actor.

1935 ~ Nera White (d. Apr. 13, 2016), American farm girl who became a basketball sensation.  She died at age 80.

1932 ~ Petula Clark, British singer.

1930 ~ J.G. Ballard (né James Graham Ballard, d. Apr. 19, 2009), British novelist.  He died at age 78.

1929 ~ Ed Asner, American actor, best known for his role as Lou Grant on the Mary Tyler Moore Show.

1925 ~ Howard Baker, Jr. (d. June 26, 2014), American senator from Tennessee who skewered President Nixon over Watergate.  He was the 12^th White House Chief of Staff.  He served under President Ronald Reagan in that Office from July 2001 until February 2005.  He died at age 88.

1919 ~ Joseph Wapner (d. Feb. 26, 2017), 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.

1907 ~ Claus von Stauffenberg (d. July 21, 1944), German leader of a failed plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler.  He was executed by firing squad at age 36.

1906 ~ Curtis LeMay (d. Oct. 1, 1990), General in the United States Air Force.  He served in World War II.  He died at age 83.

1895 ~ Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna (d. July 17, 1918).  She was the eldest daughter of Tsar Nicholas II.  She was 22 at the time of her assassination by the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution.

1895 ~ Bella Rosenfeld (d. Sept. 2, 1944), Russian-born wife of Marc Chagall (1887 ~ 1985), and subject of many of his paintings.  She died of a viral infection at age 49.

1891 ~ Erwin Rommel (d. Oct. 14, 1944), Nazi German field marshal known as The Desert Fox.  He committed suicide at age 52.

1891 ~ W. Averell Harriman (né William Averell Harriman, d. July 26, 1986), 11^th Secretary of Commerce.  He served under President Harry S Truman from October 1946 through April 1948.  He then became the Governor of New York, where he served in Office from January 1955 through December 1958.  He died at age 94.

1887 ~ Marianne Moore (d. Feb. 5, 1972), American poet.  She died at age 84.

1887 ~ Georgia O’Keeffe (d. Mar. 6, 1986), American artist.  She was married to photographer Alfred Stieglitz.  She died at age 98.

1882 ~ Felix Frankfurter (d. Feb. 22, 1965), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President Franklin Roosevelt.  He served on the Court from January 1939 until August 1962.  He died at age 82.

1881 ~ Franklin Pierce Adams (d. Mar. 23, 1960), American journalist.  He died at age 78.

1874 ~ Schack August Steenberg Krogh (d. Sept. 13, 1949), recipient of the 1920 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in the discovery of the mechanism of the regulation of capillaries in skeletal muscles.  He died at age 74.

1873 ~ Sara Josephine Baker (d. Feb. 22, 1945), American physician best known for her role in promoting public health.  She died at age 71.

1862 ~ Gerhard Johann Robert Hauptmann (d. June 6, 1946), German dramatist and novelist.  He was the recipient of the 1912 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died at age 83.

1849 ~ Mary E. Byrd (d. July 13, 1934), American astronomer and college professor.  She was the director of the observatory at Smith College in Massachusetts.  She died of a cerebral hemorrhage at age 84.

1793 ~ Michel Chasles (d. Dec. 18, 1880), French mathematician.  He died about a month after his 87^th birthday.

1738 ~ William Herschel (né Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel, d. Aug. 25, 1822), German-born astronomer and mathematician.  He died at age 83.

1708 ~ William Pitt, 1^st Earl of Chatham (d. May 11, 1778), Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.  He was known William Pitt, the Elder, as his son of the same name was later Prime Minister of Great Britain.  He served in office during the reign of King George II, from July 1766 until October 1768.  He died at age 69.

1688 ~ Louis Bertrand Castel (d. Jan. 11, 1757), French Jesuit priest and mathematician.  He died at age 68.

1511 ~ Johannes Secundus (d. Sept. 25, 1536), Dutch poet.  He died at age 24.

1397 ~ Pope Nicholas V (né Tommaso Parentucelli, d. Mar. 24, 1455).  He was Pope from March 1447 until his death on this date 8 years later.  He was 57 at the time of his death.

1316 ~ King John I of France (d. Nov. 20, 1316).  His father had died before he was born, thus he became king upon his birth.  He died, however, 5 days after his birth.

Events that Changed the World:

2003 ~ Bombings began in Istanbul, in which two cars bombs targeting two synagogues exploded.  Twenty-five people were killed and over 300 people were injured.  Subsequent bombings continued five days later.

1990 ~ The Communist People’s Republic of Bulgaria was disestablished.  A new republican government was instituted.

1985 ~ A research assistant at the University of Michigan was injured when a package addressed to a professor from the Unabomber exploded.

1979 ~ A package later linked to be from Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski (b. 1942), began smoking in the cargo of a plane destine to fly from Chicago to Washington, D.C.  The plane was forced to make an emergency landing and there were no fatalities.

1971 ~ Intel release the first commercial single-chip microprocessor.

1969 ~ Dave Thomas opened his first Wendy’s hamburger store in Columbus, Ohio.

1959 ~ Four members of the Herbert Clutter Family were murdered at their farmhouse in rural Kansas.  The account of the murder later became the best-selling novel, In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote.

1943 ~ During the Holocaust, Nazi leaders ordered that gypsies be transported to concentration camps.

1942 ~ The Battle of Guadalcanal during World War II ended in a decisive Allied victory.

1939 ~ The corner stone for the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C., was laid.

1935 ~ Manuel L. Quezon (1878 ~ 1944) was inaugurated as the 2^nd President of the Philippines.  He served in that office from November 15, 1935 until his death on August 1, 1944.

1926 ~ The NBC radio network opened with 24 stations.

1920 ~ The League of Nations Assembly met in Geneva, Switzerland and held its first meeting.

1864 ~ Union General William Tecumseh Sherman (1820 ~ 1891) burned Atlanta, Georgia and began his March to the Sea during the American Civil War.

1806 ~ While on an expedition, Lieutenant Zebulon Pike (1770 ~ 1813) spied a distant mountain peak in the Colorado foothills.  It was later named Pikes Peak in his honor.

1791 ~ Georgetown University, the first Catholic college in the United States, opened.

1777 ~ A draft of the Articles of Confederation was approved by the United States Congress.

1533 ~ Francisco Pizarro is said to have arrived in Cuzco, the capital of the Incan Empire on this date.

Good-Byes:

2015 ~ P.F. Sloan (né Philip Gary Schlein, b. Sept. 18, 1945), American troubled pop rock singer who wrote a ‘60s protest anthem, the Eve of Destruction.  He was 70 years old.

2013 ~ T.J. Jemison (né Theodore Judson Jemison, b. Aug. 1, 1918), African-American minister and civil rights activist.  He died in Baton Rouge, Louisiana at age 95.

2012 ~ Bernard Lansky (b. Mar. 10, 1927), American tailor who lived in Memphis, Tennessee and who clothed Rock ‘n Roll royalty, starting with Elvis Presley.  He died at age 85.

1998 ~ Stokely Carmichael (b. June 29, 1941), Trinadadian-American civil rights activist.  He died of prostate cancer at age 57.

1996 ~ Alger Hiss (b. Nov. 11, 1904), American government official who was accused of being a Soviet spy.  He died 4 days after his 92^nd birthday.

1994 ~ Elizabeth George Speare (b. Nov. 21, 1908), American author.  She died 6 days before her 86^th birthday.

1978 ~ Margaret Mead (b. Dec. 16, 1901), American anthropologist.  She died a month before her 77^th birthday.

1959 ~ Charles Thomson Rees Wilson (b. Feb. 14, 1869), Scottish physicist and recipient of the 1927 Nobel Prize in Physics.  He died at age 90.

1954 ~ Lionel Barrymore (né Lionel Herbert Blyth, b. Apr. 28, 1878), American actor.  He was a member of the theatrical Barrymore family.  He died of a heart attack at age 76.

1951 ~ Frank Weston Benson (b. Mar. 24, 1862), American painter.  He was born and died in Salem, Massachusetts.  He died at age 89.

1922 ~ Petros Protopapadakis (b. 1854), Greek politician and mathematician.  He was the Greek Prime Minister in 1922, but was overthrown in a military coup.  He was executed in the coup.

1919 ~ Alfred Werner (b. Dec. 12, 1866), German chemist and recipient of the 1913 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.  He died 27 days before his 53^rd birthday.

1916 ~ Henryk Sienkeiwicz (b. May 5, 1846), Polish author and recipient of the 1905 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died at age 70.

1908 ~ Empress Dowager Cixi (b. Nov. 29, 1835), Chinese ruler.  She effectively controlled the Chinese government in the late Qing Dynasty from 1861 until her death in 1908.  She died 14 days before her 73^rd birthday.

1839 ~ William Murdoch (b. Aug. 21, 1754), Scottish engineer and inventor.  He created gas lighting.  He died at age 85.

1787 ~ Christoph Gluck (b. July 2, 1714), German composer.  He died at age 73.

1706 ~ 6^th Dalai Lama (né Tsangyang Gyatso, b. Mar. 1, 1683).  He died at age 23.

1630 ~ Johannes Kepler (b. Dec. 27, 1571), German astronomer and mathematician.  He died at age 58.

1594 ~ Sir Martin Frobisher (b. 1539), English explorer.  The exact date of his birth is unknown, but he is believed to have been between 55 and 59 at the time of his death.

1553 ~ Lucrezia de’Medici (b. Aug. 4,  1470), Italian noblewoman.  The exact date of her death is not known, but it is believed she died sometime between November 10 and 15, 1553.  She was 83 years old.

1280 ~ Albertus Magnus (b. 1193 between 1206), German theologian, bishop and philosopher.  The exact date of his birth is unknown.