January 10, 2011

250 years ago
1761

Died on this date
Edward Boscawen, 49. U.K. military officer and politician. Admiral of the Blue Boscawen joined the Royal Navy at the age of 12 in 1723, and served in various wars, earning the nicknames "Old Dreadnought" and "Wry-necked Dick." He became the Member of Parliament for Truro in 1742, but was seldom active as a politician because of his naval commitments. Admiral Boscawen was promoted to General of Marines, but died of typhoid fever.

220 years ago
1791

War
The Siege of Dunlap's Station began near Cincinnati during the Northwest Indian War.

150 years ago
1861

Americana
Florida became the third state to vote to secede from the Union as delegates to a state convention in Tallahassee voted 62-7 in favour of secession.

120 years ago
1891

Born on this date
Ann Shoemaker. U.S. actress. Miss Shoemaker was a character actress who appeared in plays, films, and television programs from 1926-1976. She played Sara Roosevelt, mother of Franklin D. Roosevelt, in the play (1958) and movie (1960) Sunrise at Campobello. Miss Shoemaker died on September 18, 1978 at the age of 87.

110 years ago
1901

Died on this date
James Robert Dickson, 68. U.K.-born Australian politician. Sir James, a native of Plymouth, England, moved to Australia in 1854 and worked in real estate. A Protectionist, he represented Enoggera (1873-1888) and Bulimba (1892-1901) in the Queensland Legislative Assembly, serving as Treasurer (1976-1879, 1883-1887) and Premier (1898-1899). Sir James was a leading proponent of Queensland joining the federation of Australia and was named Minister for Defence when the federation came into effect on January 1, 1901. However, he took ill at the ceremony, and died nine days later.

Oil
The first great Texas gusher was discovered in the Spindletop oil field near Beaumont.

70 years ago
1941

Died on this date
Frank Bridge, 61. U.K. composer. Mr. Bridge was a violist in string quartets who composed chamber and choral works, as well as works for piano and organ.

Joe Penner, 36. Austro-Hungarian-born U.S. comedian. Mr. Penner, born József Pintér, emigrated with his family at an early age. He was popular in vaudeville and on radio in the 1930s, known for using the catchphrase "Wanna buy a duck?" Mr. Penner was in Philadelphia starring in the stage show Yokel Boy when he died of a heart attack in his sleep.

War
Italian and German dive bombers attacked a British convoy off Sicily; the U.K. cruiser Southampton was sunk by British ships after sustaining severe damage. The Greek army captured Kleisoura Pass.

Economics and finance
The U.S.S.R. and Germany signed an agreement to run until August 1, 1942, under which Germany would receive food and raw materials in exchange for industrial equipment.

U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Lend-Lease bill was introduced into both houses of the United States Congress; opposition to Lend-Lease came from Senators Hiram Johnson (Democrat--California); Patrick McCarren (Democrat--Nevada); and Robert Taft (Republican--Ohio), and Representative Hamilton Fish (Republican--New York).

Diplomacy
Kenkicki Yoshizawa, head of the Japanese trade mission in the Netherlands East Indies, said that his country had no improper designs on Dutch colonies.

James N. Rosenberg, president of the Dominican Republic Settlement Association, announced that General Rafael Trujillo was donating 50,000 acres for European refugees.

Politics and government
The Democratic Party-controlled Missouri General Assembly refused to certify the election of Forrest C. Donnell (Republican) as the state's new Governor; official results had Mr. Donnell winning the election by 3,613 votes.

The U.S. Democratic National Committee's newly-appointed treasurer R.J. Reynolds, of the North Carolina tobacco family, testified before a U.S. Senate committee probing campaign financing that he had lent $300,000 to Democratic organizations.

Protest
Federal employees in Mexico protested against dismissals and the reported government intention to reform the civil service by banning strikes.

Medicine
Drs. Edwin W. Schultz and Hubert Loring of Stanford University announced extraction of the polio virus almost free of impurities and ready for examination.

60 years ago
1951

Died on this date
Sinclair Lewis, 65. U.S. author. Mr. Lewis was known for his criticism of capitalism and American society in novels such as Main Street (1920); Babbitt (1922); Arrowsmith (1925); Elmer Gantry (1927); Dodsworth (1929); and It Can't Happen Here (1935). He became the first American to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, winning in 1930 "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humour, new types of characters." Mr. Lewis reportedly drank himelf to death, four weeks before his 66th birthday.

Yoshio Nishina, 60. Japanese physicist. Mr. Nishina, "the founding father of modern physics research in Japan," became a staff member at the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (now RIKEN) in 1918, and established Nishina Laboratory at RIKEN in 1931, focusing on quantum mechanics, nuclear physics, cosmic rays, and high-energy proton beams. He led the Japanese atomic bomb project during World War II, but his laboratory was severely damaged,a nd U.S. occupation forces dismantled his cyclotron in November 1945. Mr. Nishina led a reorganized RIKEN before his death from liver cancer.

Antonio Bayer. Cuban journalist. Mr. Bayer was political editor of the Havana daily Tiempo, organ of the Socialist Revolutionary Movement. He was shot and killed by gunmen.

Aviation
A four-engine Avro Jetliner piloted by Donald Rogers set a speed record of 442 miles per hour on a flight from Chicago to New York.

Defense
U.S. Defense Secretary George Marshall asked Congress for a universal military service law under which all men would be drafted for 27 months' duty on reaching the age of 18.

Economics and finance
The U.S. administration of President Harry Truman dropped plans for a 30-day freeze on all prices and wages, but continued to consider selective price and wage curbs.

50 years ago
1961

Hit parade
#1 single in Norway (VG-lista): It's Now or Never--Elvis Presley (5th week at #1)

On television tonight
Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond, hosted by John Newland, on ABC
Tonight's episode: The Last Round, starring Charles Bronson, Felix Deebank, and Ronald Long



Alfred Hitchcock Presents, on NBC
Tonight's episode: Summer Shade, starring Julie Adams, James Franciscus, and Susan Gordon

Thriller, hosted by Boris Karloff, on NBC
Tonight's episode: The Poisoner, starring Murray Matheson, Sarah Marshall, and Brenda Forbes



Died on this date
Dashiell Hammett, 66. U.S. author and screenwriter. Mr. Hammett was one of the most prominent writers of hard-boiled detective fiction with novels such as The Maltese Falcon (1930) and The Thin Man (1934). He was a drunkard and a Communist who had a long relationship with writer Lillian Hellman, and served time in prison in the early 1950s after being convicted of contempt of court for refusing to identify other Communists while under oath. Mr. Hammett died of lung cancer.

Academia
The first desegregation in the American state of Georgia’s public education system occurred when two Negroes enrolled at the University of Georgia in Athens. Charlayne Hunter, 18, and Hamilton Holmes, 19, registered as students after U.S. Federal District Court orders had barred the university from further discrimination against Negro applicants and enjoined Governor Ernest Vandiver from cutting off state funds to the school. Shortly after the students’ enrollment, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously denied an appeal by state officials for a stay in integration pending appeal.

40 years ago
1971

On television tonight
Masterpiece Theatre, hosted by Alastair Cooke, on PBS
Tonight's episode: The First Churchills: The Chaste Nymph

This was the first broadcast of the long-running series.

Died on this date
Coco Chanel, 87. French fashion designer. Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel was credited in the post-World War I era with popularizing a sporty, casual chic as the feminine standard of style. She founded the House of Chanel in 1909, and launched Chanel No. 5 perfume in 1921. Miss Chanel had relationships with English aristocrats and Nazi officials. She acted as a Nazi spy during World War II, and was involved in a plan to ask British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, a friend of hers since the 1920s, about the possibility of peace negotiations between Britain and Germany. The plan failed, and Miss Chanel fled to Switzerland in 1945 to avoid prosecution as a Nazi collaborator. She eventually returned to France, and returned to her fashion design business, which she maintained until her death.

30 years ago
1981

Hit parade
#1 single in Italy (Hit Parade Italia): Anna Dai Capelli Rossi--I Ragazzi Dai Capelli Rossi (2nd week at #1)

#1 single in Flanders (Ultratop 50): Santa Maria--Roland Kaiser (2nd week at #1)

#1 single in Ireland: (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon

#1 single in the U.K. (New Musical Express): Imagine--John Lennon

#1 single in the U.K. (BMRB): Imagine--John Lennon

Netherlands Top 10 (De Nederlandse Top 40)
1 Lola (Live)--The Kinks
2 Santa Maria--Roland Kaiser
3 Celebration--Kool & The Gang
4 Baggy Trousers--Madness
5 Runaway Boys--Stray Cats
6 Happy Xmas (War is Over)--John & Yoko/The Plastic Ono Band with the Harlem Community Choir
7 Passion--Rod Stewart
8 Super Trouper--ABBA
9 Mama He's a Soldier Now--Saskia & Serge
10 (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon

Singles entering the chart were My Feet Won't Move by Fruitcake (#31); Are You Lonesome Tonight? by Elvis Presley (#34); Amoureux Solitaires/Dis Moi Que Tu M'aimes by Lio (#36); The Same Old Scene by Roxy Music (#37); and Runaround Sue by Racey (#39). The version of Are You Lonesome Tonight? was "a very special version from Las Vegas."

U.S.A. Top 10 (Billboard)
1 (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon (3rd week at #1)
2 Love on the Rocks--Neil Diamond
3 Guilty--Barbra Streisand (Duet with Barry Gibb)
4 The Tide is High--Blondie
5 Hungry Heart--Bruce Springsteen
6 Every Woman in the World--Air Supply
7 Passion--Rod Stewart
8 Tell it Like it Is--Heart
9 Lady--Kenny Rogers
10 More than I Can Say--Leo Sayer

Singles entering the chart were Toccata by Sky (#86); and Fly Away by Peter Allen (#88).

#1 single in the U.S.A. (Cash Box): (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon (3rd week at #1)

#1 single in the U.S.A. (Record World): (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon (3rd week at #1)

Vancouver's Top 10 (CFUN)
1 (Just Like) Starting Over--John Lennon (3rd week at #1)
2 Whip It--Devo
3 Passion--Rod Stewart
4 Hungry Heart--Bruce Springsteen
5 Ashes to Ashes--David Bowie
6 Switchin' to Glide--The Kings
7 More than I Can Say--Leo Sayer
8 Tell it Like it Is--Heart
9 The Tide is High--Blondie
10 Never be the Same--Christopher Cross

Singles entering the chart were Time is Time by Andy Gibb (#28); Miss Sun by Boz Scaggs (#29); and Need Your Loving Tonight by Queen (#30).

Died on this date Fawn M. Brodie, 65. U.S. historian. Professor Brodie was raised as a Mormon and eventually departed from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but wrote the first scholarly biography of Mormon founder Joseph Smith, No Man Knows My History (1945). She wrote four subsequent "psychobiographies," all of which incorporated Freudian psychology. The best known of Prof. Brodie's later works was Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History (1974), in which she asserted that Mr. Jefferson fathered a child by his slave Sally Hemings, a view now widely accepted. Prof. Brodie died of lung cancer, despite being a non-smoker.

War
Leftist guerrillas attacked San Salvador, setting off more than 20 explosions in 14 different locations in the city during a four-hour raid.

Iraq claimed to have won a five-day battle for a city in the oil-rich Iranian province of Khuzistan, destroying the major portion of an Iranian armoured division.

Diplomacy
The United States promised Iran $5.5 billion that would be paid on the day that the 52 remaining hostages were freed from the U.S. embassy in Tehran, where they had been held by militants since November 1979, and that Iran would probably recover more than 70% of its frozen assets within a few days of the hostages’ release.

Oil
Kuwait announced that it had raised the price of its crude oil by $4 per barrel, to $35.50 per barrel, retroactive to January 1. The United Arab Emirates, the U.S.A.’s 10th-largest supplier, raised its price to $35.56 per barrel, compared to Saudi Arabia’s $32 per barrel, the lowest price of the OPEC nations.

Hockey
NHL
Quebec 5 Montreal 5
Philadelphia 4 @ Toronto 4



CIAU
Saskatchewan 3 @ Alberta 6

25 years ago
1986

Died on this date
Jaroslav Seifert, 84. Czech journalist and poet. Mr. Seifert, a Communist, was awarded the 1984 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his poetry which endowed with freshness, and rich inventiveness provides a liberating image of the indomitable spirit and versatility of man."

Economics and finance
The United States Labor Department reported that the index of prices paid by producers for finished goods had risen 0.4% in December, but only 1.8% for 1985 as a whole.

20 years ago
1991

Hit parade
#1 single in Ireland (IRMA): The Christmas No 1--Zig and Zag (5th week at #1)

Diplomacy
United Nations Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar announced that he would leave for Baghdad in a last-ditch attempt to avoid war in the Persian Gulf.

U.S.S.R. President Mikhail Gorbachev told Lithuania that it must accept Soviet central authority.

Protest
In Lithuania, supporters of the Moscow government went on strike.

Weather
The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the British Meteorological Office reported that average global surface temperatures were higher in 1990 than in any year since records were first kept. The average temperature was 15.4 C in 1990. Some scientists argued that the findings provided evidence to back the theory of global warming caused by the greenhouse effect, while others argued that it could be simply the result of natural variations in global temperature.

Baseball
Three days after Pete Rose had been released from a U.S. federal prison camp after serving a five-month sentence for income tax evasion, a special committee of the Baseball Hall of Fame recommended that people on baseball’s permanently-ineligible list not be on the ballot, effectively barring Mr. Rose from consideration for membership in the Hall of Fame.