March 17

St. Patrick’s Day

Birthdays:

1972 ~ Mia Hamm (née Mariel Margaret Hamm-Garciaoarra), American soccer player.

1969 ~ Alexander McQueen (né Lee Alexander McQueen, d. Feb. 11, 2010), English fashion designer who embraced audacity.  He committed suicide at age 40 on the eve of his mother’s funeral.  She had died 9 days earlier.

1964 ~ Rob Lowe (né Robert Hepler Lowe), American actor.

1962 ~ Kalpana Chawla (d. Feb. 1, 2003), Indian-born astronaut.  She was aboard the ill-fated Space Shuttle Columbia and was killed at age 40 when the shuttle exploded upon returning to earth.

1961 ~ Dana Reeve (né Dana Charles Morosini, b. Mar. 6, 2006), wife and widow of Christopher Reeve and activist for medical health.  She died of lung cancer 11 days before her 45^th birthday

1959 ~ Danny Ainge (né Daniel Ray Ainge), American basketball player who had a long career with the Boston Celtics.

1955 ~ Gary Alan Sinise, American actor.

1954 ~ Lesley-Anne Down, English actress, best known for her portrayal of Cinderella.

1951 ~ Kurt Vogel Russell, American actor.

1949 ~ Patrick Duffy, American actor best known for his roll as Bobby Ewing on the television drama Dallas.

1945 ~ Valery Senderov (d. Nov. 12, 2014), Russian dissident and mathematician.  He was known for his advocacy against state-sponsored anti-Semitism.  He died at age 69.

1945 ~ Michael Vincent Hayden, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.  He served under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.  He served as the Director from May 2006 until February 2009.

1940 ~ Mark Wells White, Jr. (d. Aug. 5, 2017), 43^rd Governor of Texas.  He was governor from 1983 until 1987.  He died of a heart attack at age 77.

1938 ~ Rudolf Nureyev (d. Jan. 6, 1993), Russian-born dancer and choreographer.  He died at age 54.

1920 ~ Donald Frederick Hornig (d. Jan 21, 2013), American scientist who babysat the first atom bomb.  He was an explosives expert and developed the firing unit that triggered the bomb’s detonation.  He died in Providence, Rhode Island at age 92.

1917 ~ Bernard Leon Barker (d. June 5, 2009), Cuban-born CIA agent who was a Watergate burglar.  He died at age 92.

1919 ~ Nat King Cole (né Nathaniel Adams Coles, d. Feb. 15, 1965), American singer and musician.  He died of lung cancer at age 45.

1881 ~ Walter Rudolf Hess (d. Aug. 12, 1973), Swiss physiologist and recipient of the 1949 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for mapping areas of the brain that control internal organs.  He died of heart failure at age 92.

1866 ~ Pierce Butler (d. Nov. 16, 1939), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President Warren Harding.  He served on the Court from December 1922 until his death at age 73 in November 1939.

1834 ~ Gottlieb Wilhelm Daimler (d. Mar. 6, 1900), German businessman and founder of the Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft automobile company.  He was a pioneer in the internal-combustion engineer and automobile development.  He died 11 days before his 66^th birthday.

1777 ~ Roger Brooke Taney (d. Oct. 12, 1864), 5^th Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was appointed to the High Court by President Andrew Jackson.  He is best known for presiding over the Court when the Dred Scott decision was rendered.  He served on the Court from March 1936 until his death at age 87 on October 12, 1864.  Prior to serving on the Supreme Court, he served as the 11^th United States Attorney General under President Jackson from July 1831 until November 1833, when he became the 12^th United States Secretary of the Treasury.  He served in that position from September 1833 until June 1834.

1764 ~ William Pinkney (d. Feb. 25, 1822), 7^th United States Attorney General.  He served under James Madison from December 1811 until February 1814.  He died 3 weeks before his 58^th birthday.

1665 ~ Élizabeth Jacquet de La Guerre (d. June 27, 1729), French musician and composer.  She died at age 64.

1473 ~ King James IV of Scotland (d. Sept. 9, 1513).  He died in the Battle of Flodden.  He died at age 40.

Events that Changed the World:

2013 ~ The largest meteorite that NASA observed, since observing the moon in 2005, hit the moon.

2008 ~ David Paterson (b. 1954) became governor of New York State after Eliot Spitzer (b. 1959) resigned after a scandal involving a high-end prostitute.

1992 ~ The Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aries, Argentina was attacked with a suicide car bomb, killing 29 and injuring over 240 others.

1970 ~ The United States Army charged 14 officers with suppressing information relating to the My Lai Massacre.

1969 ~ Golda Meir (1898 ~ 1978) became the first female Prime Minister of Israel.

1959 ~ The 14^th Dalai Lama (b. 1939) fled Tibet and went to India.

1950 ~ Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley announced the creation of the element 98, which they named Californium.

1942 ~ The first Jews from the Lvóv Ghetto were gassed at the Belzec concentration camp, in what is now eastern Poland.

1941 ~ The National Gallery of Art was officially opened by President Franklin Roosevelt (1882 ~ 1945).

1776 ~ During the American Revolutionary War, British forces left Boston, Massachusetts, ending the Siege of Boston, after George Washington (1732 ~ 1799) and Henry Knox (1750 ~ 1806) placed artillery in positions that overlooked the city.

1762 ~ Irish soldiers in the British army held the first St. Patrick’s Day Parade in New York City.

1337 ~ Edward, the Black Prince (1330 ~ 1376), was made Duke of Cornwall, the first Duchy in England.

Good-Byes:

2017 ~ Sir Derek Walcott (b. Jan. 23, 1930), West Indies writer and recipient of the 1992 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died at age 87.

2016 ~ Meir Dagan (b. Jan. 30, 1945), Israeli military officer and Director of Mossad from 2002 until 2011.  He died of cancer at age 71.

2015 ~ Guido Zappa (b. Dec. 7, 1915), Italian mathematician.  He was 99 years old.

2014 ~ L’Wren Scott (née Laura Bambrough, b. Apr. 28, 1964), the American fashion designer who styled the stars.  She was Mick Jagger’s long-time girlfriend.  She committed suicide at age 49.

2014 ~ Rachel “Bunny” Mellon (née Rachel Lowe Lambert Lloyd Mellon, b. Aug. 9, 1910), American heiress who designed the Rose Garden at the White House.  She died at age 103.

2012 ~ John Demjanjuk (né Ivan Mykolaiovych Demjanjuk, b. Apr. 3, 1920), Ukrainian-American convicted Nazi war criminal who managed to escape detection for many years.  He was convicted of murdering many Jews while a guard a concentration camps during World War II.  He was ultimately convicted of war crimes in 2011.  He died 17 days before his 92^nd birthday.

2007 ~ John Warner Backus (b. Dec. 3, 1924), American mathematician and computer scientist.  He died at age 82.

2006 ~ Oleg Cassini (né Oleg Cassini Loiewski, b. Apr. 11, 1913), American fashion designed who designed many of the clothes Jackie Kennedy wore while in the White House.  He died from complications of an aneurism less than three weeks before his 93^rd birthday.

2005 ~ Gary Bertini (b. May 1, 1927), Israeli conductor.  He died at age 77.

2003 ~ Su Buqing (b. Sept. 23, 1902), Chinese mathematician.  He died at age 100.

1993 ~ Helen Hayes (née Helen Hayes Brown, b. Oct. 10, 1900), American stage actress.  She was known as the First Lady of American Theater.  She died at age 92.

1983 ~ Haldan Keffer Hartline (b. Dec. 22, 1903), American physiologist and recipient of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 79.

1974 ~ Louis Kahn (né Itze-Leib Schmuilowsky, b. Mar. 5, 1901), Russian-American architect.  He was born in Russia and the calendar in use at the time was the Julian calendar, so his birthday is sometimes noted as February 20^th.  He died of a heart attack shortly after his 73^rd birthday.

1962 ~ Wilhelm Johann Eugen Baschke (b. Sept. 13, 1885), Austrian-German mathematician.  He died at age 76.

1961 ~ Susanna Madora Salter (d. Mar. 2, 1860), United States politician and activist.  She was elected mayor of Argonia, Kansas, thereby becoming the first woman elected to any political office in the United States.  She died 15 days after her 101^st birthday.

1956 ~ Irene Joliot-Curie (b. Sept. 12, 1897), French physicist and recipient of the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.  She was the daughter of Pierre and Marie Curie.  She died at age 58 of leukemia.

1937 ~ Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain (b. Oct. 16, 1863), English politician and recipient of the 1925 Nobel Peace Prize.  He was the half brother of British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain.  He died at age 73.

1866 ~ Menachem Mendel Schneerson (b. Sept. 9, 1789), Polish rabbi.  He was the 3^rd Rebbe of the Chabad Lubavitch movement.  He died at age 77.

1853 ~ Christian Doppler (b. Nov. 29, 1803), Austrian physicist and mathematician.  He is best known for his principle known as the Doppler effect, that the observed frequency of a wave depends upon the relative speed of the source and the observer.  He died at age 49 of pulmonary disease.

1849 ~ King William II of the Netherlands (b. Dec. 6, 1792).  He died at age 56.

1846 ~ Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel (b. July 22, 1784), German mathematician.  He died at age 61.

1782 ~ Daniel Bernoulli (b. Feb. 8, 1700), Dutch-Swiss mathematician and physicist.  He died at age 82.

1040 ~ Harold I, King of England (b. 1016).  He was known as Harold Harefoot because he was fleet of foot.  The actual date of his birth is unknown.

460 ~ St. Patrick (b. 387), Patron saint of Ireland.  This is the date sometimes ascribed to his death.  The actual dates of his birth and death are unknown.

180 ~ Marcus Aurelius (b. Apr. 26, 121), this is the traditional date ascribed to the birth if this Roman emperor.  He died about the age of 58