January 27

Birthdays

1979 ~ Rosamund Mary Ellen Pike, British actress.

1965 ~ Alan Cumming, Scottish actor.

1964 ~ Bridget Fonda, American actress.

1956 ~ Mimi Rogers, American actress and first wife of Tom Cruise.

1955 ~ John G. Roberts, 17^th Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President George W. Bush.  He assumed the Office in September 2005.

1948 ~ Mikhail Baryshnilov, Russian ballet dancer.

1944 ~ Mairéad Corrigan, Irish activist and recipient of the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize.

1940 ~ James Oliver Cromwell, American actor best known for his supporting role in the 1995 movie, Babe.

1936 ~ Samuel C.C. Ting, American physicist and recipient of the 1976 Nobel Prize in Physics.

1933 ~ Jerry Buss (né Gerald Hatten Buss, d. Feb. 18, 2013), American businessman and basketball owner who made the Los Angeles Lakers into winners.  He died of kidney failure 22 days after his 80^th birthday.

1931 ~ Mordecai Richler (d. July 3, 2001), Canadian Jewish writer.  He died at age 70.

1930 ~ Bobby Blue Bland (né Robert Calvin Brooks, d. June 23, 2013), African-American blues singer who was as smooth as Sinatra.  He developed a sound that mixed with gospel and R&B.  He died at age 83.

1924 ~ Sabu Dastagir (d. Dec. 2, 1963), Indian actor.  He is best known for his role in the 1937 film Elephant Boy.  He died at age 39 of a heart attack.

1921 ~ Donna Reed (née Donna Belle Mullenger, d. Jan. 14, 1986), American actress.  She died of pancreatic cancer 13 days before her 65^th birthday.

1912 ~ Francis Rogallo (d. Sept. 1, 2009), American aeronautic engineer who invented hang gliding.  He died at age 92.

1908 ~ William Randolph Hearst, Jr. (d. May 14, 1993), American newspaper magnate.  He died at age 85.

1903 ~ Sir John Carew Eccles (d. May 2, 1997), Australian neuropsychologist and recipient of the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 94.

1900 ~ Hyman Rickover (né Chaim Godalia Rockover, d. July 8, 1986), American admiral.  He was born in Poland.  He is known as the Father of the Nuclear Navy.  He died at age 86.

1885 ~ Jerome David Kern (d. Nov. 11, 1945), American composer.  He died of a cerebral hemorrhage at age 60.

1859 ~ Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany (d. June 4, 1941).  He was the grandson of British Queen Victoria.  He had abdicated the throne in 1918 and fled to the Netherlands where he lived until his death at age 82.

1850 ~ Edward John Smith (d. Apr. 15, 1912), English captain of the RMS Titanic.  He went down with the ship.  He was 62 years old.

1850 ~ Samuel Gompers (d. Dec. 13, 1924), English-born American labor leader.  He was the founder of the American Federation of Labor.  He died at age 74 in San Antonio, Texas.

1832 ~ Lewis Carroll (né Charles Dodgson, b. Jan. 14, 1898), English writer and mathematician, best known for his children’s book, Alice in Wonderland.  He died 13 days before his 66^th birthday.

1795 ~ Eli Whitney Blake (d. Aug. 18, 1886), American engineer and inventor of the Mortise lock.  He was the nephew of inventor Eli Whitney.  He died at age 91.

1775 ~ Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (d. Aug. 20, 1854), German philosopher.  He died at age 79.

1756 ~ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (d. Dec. 5, 1791) Austrian composer.  He died at age 35.

1708 ~ Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia (d. Mar. 4, 1728).  She died at age 20 following complications of childbirth.

Events that Changed the World:

2006 ~ Western Union discontinued its telegram services.

1996 ~ Germany observed International Holocaust Remembrance Day for the first time.

1984 ~ Michael Jackson suffered second degree burns on his head while filming a Pepsi commercial.

1980 ~ Through cooperation between the United States and Canada, 6 American diplomats who had secretly escaped the embassy in Iran when the Iranians stormed the American Embassy, were returned to the United States.  This was known as the Canadian Caper and in 2012 was the subject of the fictionalized movie, Argo.

1973 ~ The Paris Peace Accords officially ended the Vietnam War.

1967 ~ A fire during the test of the Apollo 1 spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida killed astronauts Gus Grissom (1926 ~ 1967), Edward White (1930 ~ 1967) and Roger Chaffee (1935 ~ 1967).

1951 ~ Nuclear testing began at the Nevada Test Site when a 1-kiloton bomb was dropped on Frenchman Flat.

1945 ~ The Red Army liberated the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, which had been built by Nazi Germany in Poland.

1888 ~ The National Geographic Society was founded.  The first issue of its trademark magazine would be published in September 1888.

1880 ~ Thomas Edison (1847 ~ 1931) received a patent for the incandescent lamp.

1825 ~ The United State Congress approved Indian Territory, thereby clearing the way for forced relocation of the Eastern Indians on the infamous Trail of Tears.

1785 ~ The University of Georgia, which was the first public university in the United States, was founded.

1606 ~ The trial of Guy Fawkes (d. 1606) and others in the Gunpowder Plot began.  The conspirators would be found guilty and would be executed on January 31.

1343 ~ Pope Clement VI (1291 ~ 1352) issued the papal bull Unigenitus, which justified the power of the Pope and the use of indulgences.  It would take nearly 200 years before any clergy protested this, when Martin Luther (1483 ~ 1546) broke with the Catholic Church.

1186 ~ Henry VI (1165 ~ 1197), son and heir of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I (1122 ~ 1190), married Constance of Sicily (1154 ~ 1198).

447 ~ The Walls of Constantinople were severely damaged by an earthquake.  Much of the wall was destroyed, including 57 of its towers.

Good-byes:

2017 ~ Brunhilde Pomsel (b. Jan. 11, 1911), the German secretary who kept her Nazi past secret.  She was the private secretary to Joseph Goebbels and last surviving eyewitness to the Nazi power scheme but did not speak about her role in the War until after she was 100.  She died 16 days after her 106^th birthday

2016 ~ Artur Fischer (b. Dec. 31, 1919), German prolific inventor who created a DYI essential.  He had more patents than Thomas Edison.  He died a month after his 96^th birthday

2015 ~ Yves Chauvin (b. Oct. 10, 1930), French chemist and recipient of the 2005 Nobel Prize for Chemistry.  He died at age 84.

2015 ~ Charles Townes (b. July 28, 1915), American physicist and recipient of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics.  He was 99 years old at the time of his death.

2014 ~ Peter “Pete” Seeger (b. May 3, 1919), American folk singer, musician and composer who championed social change.  He died at age 94.

2013 ~ Stanley Abram Karnow (b. Feb. 4, 1925), American reporter who mastered the story of Vietnam.  He died 8 days before his 88^th birthday.

2012 ~ Kevin Hagan White (b. Sept. 25, 1929), American politician and 51^st Mayor of Boston, Massachusetts.

2010 ~ Howard Zinn (b. Aug. 24, 1922), American historian who championed the masses.  He was a political science professor at Boston University and it was his book, A People’s History, that made him famous.

2010 ~ J. D. Salinger (né Jerome David Salinger, b. Jan. 1, 1919), American reclusive writer best know for his coming-of-age novel, The Catcher in the Rye.  He died 26 days after his 91^st birthday.

2009 ~ John Updike (b. Mar. 18, 1932), American novelist who captured the inner life of Middle America.  He died at age 76.

2004 ~ Jack Harold Paar (b. May 1, 1918), American television show host.  He died at age 85.

1995 ~ Raphael M. Robinson (b. Nov. 2, 1911), American mathematician.  He died at age 83.

1993 ~ André the Giant (né André René Roussimov, b. May 19, 1946), French professional wrestler and actor.  He stood 7 feet, 4 inches.  He was best known for his role as Fezzik in The Princess Bride.  He died of congestive heart failure at age 46.

1973 ~ William Nolde (b. Aug. 8, 1929), last American combat casualty of the Vietnam War.  He died the day the Peace Accords were being signed in Paris ending the conflict.  He was 43 years old.

1972 ~ Mahalia Jackson (b. Oct. 26, 1911), African-American singer.  She was born in New Orleans, Louisiana.  She died from heart failure and complications of diabetes at age 60.

1972 ~ Richard Courant (b. Jan. 8, 1888), German-born American mathematician.  The Courant Institute of Mathematical Science in New York City was named in his honor.  He died 19 days after his 84^th birthday.

1967 ~ Astronauts killed in the Apollo I disaster:

• 1967 ~ Roger Chaffee (b. Feb. 15, 1935), American astronaut and crewmember of the ill-fated Apollo I, which caught fire during a test of the spacecraft.  He died 18 days before his 32^nd birthday.

• 1967 ~ Edward White (b. 1930), American astronaut and crewmember of the ill-fated Apollo I, which caught fire during a test of the spacecraft.  He was 36 years old.

• 1967 ~ Virgil “Gus” Grisson (b. Apr. 3, 1926), American astronaut and crewmember of the ill-fated Apollo I, which caught fire during a test of the spacecraft.  He was 40 at the time of his death.

1940 ~ Isaac Babel (b. July 13, 1894), Jewish-Ukrainian writer.  He was executed as a spy at age 45.

1922 ~ Nellie Bly (née Elizabeth Jane Cochrane, b. May 5, 1864), American journalist.  She is best known for her record-breaking trip around the world and for her exposé into the treatment received by patients in mental institutions.  She died of pneumonia at age 57.

1921 ~ Justiniano Borgoño (b. Sept. 5, 1836), President of Peru.  He served as President for 4 months, from April 1894 until August 1984.  He died at age 84.

1910 ~ Thomas Crapper (b. Sept. 28, 1836), English plumber and inventor of the ballcock in the modern toilet.  The exact date of his birth is unknown, but he was baptized on September 28, 1836.  He died at age 73.

1901 ~ Giuseppe Verdi (b. Oct. 9, 1813), Italian composer.  He died at age 87.

1860 ~ János Bolyai (b. Dec. 15, 1802), Hungarian mathematician.  He died at age 57.

1851 ~ John James Audubon (né Jean Rabin, b. Apr. 26, 1789), American ornithologist and painter.  He identified 25 new species of birds.  He died at age 65..

1731 ~ Bartolomeo Cristofori (b. May 4, 1655), Italian musical instrument maker and inventor of the piano.  He died at age 75.

1547 ~ Anne of Bohemia and Hungary (b. July 23, 1503).  She died at age 43.

1311 ~ Külüg Khan (b. Aug. 4, 1282), Chinese Emperor of Yuan.  He died at age 29.

847 ~ Pope Sergius II.  He was Pope from January 1844 until his death 3 years later.  The date of his birth is not known.

672 ~ Pope Vitalian.  He was Pope from July 657 until his death in January 672.  The exact date of his birth is not known, but he is believed to have been about 72 at the time of his death.