January 6, 2020

Born on this date
Happy Birthday, Sherlock Holmes!

480 years ago
1540

Married on this date
King Henry VIII of England married his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves.

460 years ago
1560

Religion
Giovanni Angelo Medici was installed as Roman Catholic Pope Pius IV, 12 days after his election. He succeeded Paul IV, who had died in August 1559.

275 years ago
1745

Born on this date
Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier. French inventor and aviator. Mr. Montgolfier and his brother Joseph-Michel co-invented the hot air balloon in 1782, and conducted the first powered ascent. They also invented a process to manufacture transparent paper. Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier died on August 2, 1799 at the age of 54.

150 years ago
1870

Born on this date
Gustav Bauer. Chancellor of Germany, 1919-1920. Mr. Bauer, leader of the Social Democratic Party, succeeded Philipp Scheidemann as Chancellor and held the office for 219 days until his government was forced to resign. He was succeeded as Chancellor by Hermann Müller. Mr. Bauer died on September 16, 1944 at the age of 74.

Music
The Musikverein in Vienna was inaugurated.

140 years ago
1880

Born on this date
Tom Mix. U.S. actor. Mr. Mix was a skilled horseman before he became the first star of Western movies. He appeared in 291 films from 1909-1935, almost all of them silent Westerns through 1929. Mr. Mix was killed in a highway accident at the age of 60 on October 12, 1940.

120 years ago
1900

Born on this date
Maria. Queen consort of Yugoslavia, 1922-1934. Marija Karađorđević, a native of Germany and the daughter of King Ferdinand I of Romania, married King Alexander I in 1922, and was queen consort until his assassination in 1934. Their son was the last King of Yugoslavia, reigning as King Peter I from 1934-1945. Queen mother Maria moved to England in 1941, and died in London on June 22, 1961 at the age of 61. She was stripped of her Yugoslavian citizenship in 1947, but was officially rehabilitated in 2014.

War
Having already besieged the fortress at Ladysmith, Boer forces attacked it, but were driven back by British defenders.

Journalism
The first issue of the newspaper The Freeman appeared in Saint John, New Brunswick.

110 years ago
1910

Born on this date
Kid Chocolate. Cuban boxer. Kid Chocolate, whose real name was Eligio Sardiñas Montalvo, compiled a record of 136-10-6 in a professional career from 1927-1938. He was world junior lightweight champion from 1931-1933, and held New York State Athletic Commission recognition as world featherweight champion from 1932-1934, while losing a 15-round split decision to Tony Canzoneri in a bout for the world lightweight title in 1931. Kid Chocolate enjoyed the night life in New York during his career, and contracted syphilis. He retired to Cuba, and lived a quiet life there until his death on August 8, 1988 at the age of 78. Kid Choclate was inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame in 1991.

Yiannis Papaioannou. Greek composer and teacher. Mr. Papaioannou had a long career as a music teacher, who wrote five symphonies and other orchestral, chamber, instrumental, and vocal works. He died on May 19, 1989 at the age of 79.

Wright Morris. U.S. writer and photographer. Mr. Morris twice won the National Book Award, for The Field of Vision (1956) and Plains Song: For Female Voices (1980). His books The Inhabitants (1946) and The Home Place (1948) combined photographs and fiction in a genre which Mr. Morris called "photo-text." Mr. Morris’s 33 books didn’t sell well, making him a much-honoured but little-read writer. He died on April 25, 1998 at the age of 88.

100 years ago
1920

Born on this date
Early Wynn. U.S. baseball pitcher and sportscaster. Mr. Wynn played with the Washington Nationals (1939, 1941-1944, 1946-1948); Cleveland Indians (1949-1957, 1963); and Chicago White Sox (1958-1962), compiling a record of 300-244 with an earned run average of 3.54 in 691 games, batting .214 with 17 home runs and 173 runs in 796 games. He tied for the American League lead in wins in 1954 (23), and led the league in 1959 (22); led the league in strikeouts in 1957 (184) and 1958 (1979); and in earned run average in 1950 (3.20). Mr. Wynn was known for his willingness to throw brushback pitches at hitters or knock them down. Gout forced him into retirement as a player, and he served as pitching coach with the Indians (1964-1966) and Minnesota Twins (1967-1969), and as a radio broadcaster with the Toronto Blue Jays (1977-1981) and Chicago White Sox (1982-1983). Mr. Wynn was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1972, and died on April 4, 1999 at the age of 79, after heart complications and a stroke.

90 years ago
1930

Transportation
The first diesel-powered automobile trip was completed, from Indianapolis to New York City.

80 years ago
1940

Diplomacy
The Dutch government of Prime Minister Dirk Jan de Geer announced that there could be no negotiation regarding the Netherlands' neutrality.

Cuban presidential candidate General Fulgencio Batista urged his nation to maintain strict neutrality in international affairs.

Addressing the National Conference of the United Palestine Appeal in Washington, New York, New York Governor Herbert Lehman said that Palestine must become a refuge for the estimated 3 million Jews in Poland.

Economics and finance
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt said that protectionist international trade tendencies would have to be abolished in the interest of postwar peace.

Japan was reportedly seeking a most-favored-nation treaty with the United State upon the expiration of the current trade pact on January 26, 1940.

Because of World War II, the New Zealand government of Prime Minister Michael Savage announced the postponement of a $25-million steel plant at Onekaka.

Business
The United States Justice Department granted the Bata Shoe Company a 20-day extension to terminate the employment of 62 Czech nationals illegally in the United States.

Scandal
Newark, New Jersey Mayor Meyer Ellenstein and six others were acquitted on charges of conspiracy in city purchases of meadowlands.

75 years ago
1945

Hit parade
#1 single in the U.S.A. (Billboard): Don't Fence Me In--Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters with Vic Schoen and his Orchestra (Best Seller--3rd week at #1; Juke Box--4th week at #1)

Married on this date
Future President of the United States George Bush married Barbara Pierce in Rye, New York, while he was home on leave from the United States Navy.

War
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered his annual State of the Union address to Congress, in which he asked Congress for passage of a National Service Act to ensure full production for the country's war effort. He also asked for legislation to make use of 4 million men who had been classified as 4-F by the Selective Service administration; an amendment to the Selective Service Act providing for the induction of nurses; and universal military training after the war to preserve peace. The U.S. Selective Service announced that men aged up to 38 who, without consent, left jobs for which they had been deferred, would be inducted into the armed services. U.S. forces extended the front line against the German bulge in Belgium to 25 miles. Hungarian sources reported that German troops had penetrated 12-15 miles into Soviet positions northwest of Budapest. ELAS forces in Greece had reportedly left Athens the previous day, and there was no fighting on this day.

Diplomacy
Egyptian officials reported that King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia had agreed to participate with other Muslim states in a pan-Arab federation.

Business
U.S. Director of War Mobilization and Reconversion James Byrnes submitted an affidavit for the Chicago court fight over the U.S. Army's seizure of Montgomery Ward & Company in which he said that the firm's conduct, "if allowed to continue, will seriously interfere with the successful prosecution of the war." The Army had seized control of Montgomery Ward's Chicago and Detroit plants because of the company's refusal to obey National War Labor Board orders.

70 years ago
1950

Died on this date
Isaiah Bowman, 71. Canadian-born U.S. geographer. Dr. Bowman, a native of Berlin (now Kitchener), Ontario, moved to Michigan as an infant with his family. He graduated from Harvard University, taught at Yale University, and became the first director of the American Geographical Society (1915-1935). He served as an adviser on national boundaries at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and became a director of the Council on Foreign Relations in 1921. Dr. Bowman was President of Johns Hopkins University (1935-1948), taking time out during World War II to participate in the Dumbarton Oaks Conference (1944) and the founding conference of the United Nations in San Francisco (1945). Dr. Bowman was known for his anti-Semitism; when U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him to lead a search for appropriate places to settle European Jewish refugees, Dr. Bowman's team looked on five continents, but ignored the United States. He fired a promising Jewish historian in 1939, and imposed a quota on the admission of Jews to Johns Hopkins in the 1940s. When he was asked to investigate the status of geography at Harvard, Dr. Bowman, apparently motivated by dislike for the department's only tenured professor, criticized the department, which had a negative effect on the field throughout the United States.

War
The United Nations Commission for India and Pakistan named General H.H. Angle of Canada to succeed Gen. Maurice Delvoie of Belgium as chief military observer of the Kashmir truce.

Diplomacy
The Organization of American States Council in Washington launched an investigation of a dispute between Haiti and the Dominican Republic as each country accused the other of harbouring revolutionaries attempting to overthrow the other's government.

Defense
The North Atlantic Council in Washington formally approved a secret defense plan for Western Europe, clearing the way for the release of $1 billion in U.S. aid to Europe under the Military Assistance Program.

Politics and government
United Nations Trusteeship Council President Roger Garreau urged the UN to abandon its efforts to internationalize Jerusalem and restrict its role to protecting religious shrines in the city.

U.S. Senate Internal Security subcommittee Chairman Patrick McCarran (Democrat--Nevada) charged that the displaced persons law had permitted the immigration of "persons who will become ready recruits in subversive organizations."

Journalism
The Czechoslovakian government expelled four Western correspondents, including two Americans, for writing reports critical of events in the country.

Economics and finance
U.S. President Harry Truman presented his annual Economic Report to Congress, claiming that the nation had overcome its post-World War II economic difficulties, and calling for a 7% increase in production and employment.

60 years ago
1960

Born on this date
Happy Birthday, Sheila Hellevang and Johanna Wegner!

Died on this date
Edward Orrick McDonnell, 68. U.S. military officer. Lieutenant Commander McConnell served with the U.S. Navy during the U.S. occupation of Veracruz in 1914, earning the Medal of Honor for maintaining a signal station while under heavy enemy fire. On March 10, 1919, he became the first man to fly a plane off a battleship when he flew a Sopwith Camel off the USS Texas. Lt. Cdr. McDonnell was one of the 34 people killed in the explosion of National Airlines Flight 2511.

Crime
National Airlines Flight 2511 a Douglas DC-6 en route from New York City to Miami, was destroyed in mid-air over North Carolina by a bomb, killing all 34 people on board. Various theories abound, but the crime remains officially unsolved.

Politics and government
The Associations Law went into force in Iraq, allowing registration of political parties.

50 years ago
1970

Hit parade
#1 single in Sweden (Kvällstoppen): Sugar, Sugar--The Archies

#1 single in Switzerland (Swiss Hitparade): Venus--The Shocking Blue

Space
On the second day of a four-day conference on lunar science in Houston, Dr. Robert Pepin of the University of Minnesota told the 800 scientists in attendance that an unknown component, perhaps the radioactive decay product of a now-extinct "big nuclei" element which had disappeared some time after the Earth was formed, may be responsible for the amount of krypton discovered in meteorites and, to a lesser degree, in moon rocks brought back by Apollo 11. Dr. Pepin favoured the proposal that the mystery component was formed in an exploding star billions of years ago elsewhere in the Milky Way, and that the shock waves from the explosion pushed fine dust particles across light years to reach our solar system. According to Dr. Pepin's model, the maverick meteorites and perhaps the moon's surface picked up some of the mysterious component, which over eons decomposed into the special varieties of krypton which had been causing the puzzle.

Crime
1,200 pages of transcripts and logs compiled by FBI of conversations among reputed Mafia leaders were made public at the opening session of the trial of Angelo "Gyp" De Carlo in U.S. federal court in Newark. The tapes disclosed boasts by Mafiosi of dealings with politicians and law enforcement officials.

Scandal
Kansas City Chiefs’ quarterback Len Dawson, who was preparing to lead his team into the Super Bowl against the Minnesota Vikings in New Orleans five days hence, was reported to be linked to a U.S. federal investigation of gambling improprieties in Detroit. He was eventually cleared of any charges.

Boxing
Australia's Johnny Famechon (55-4-6) retained his World Boxing Council featherweight title with a knockout of Fighting Harada (55-7) at 1:09 of the 14th round at Metropolitan Gym in Tokyo. Mr. Famechon had won a 15-round decision over Mr. Harada in a title defense on July 28, 1969 in Sydney. For Mr. Harada, who had been the World Boxing Association flyweight champion from October 1962-January 1963 and WBA and WBC bantamweight champion from May 1965-February 1968, this was his last fight.



Heavyweight contender George Foreman improved his record to 14-0 with 12 knockouts with a 4-round knockout of Charley Polite (11-15-3) at Sam Houston Coliseum in Houston.

40 years ago
1980

Hit parade
#1 single in New Zealand (RIANZ): Jezebel--Jon Stevens (6th week at #1)

#1 single in Switzerland: Todesengel--Frank Duval (3rd week at #1)

World events
Afghan President Babrak Karmal reportedly released 2,000 political prisoners. The United Nations reported that 15,000 Afghan refugees had fled to Pakistan in the last two weeks of December 1979, bringing to 402,000 the number of Afghan refugees in Pakistan.

Protest
Three days of domestic unrest in Tabriz, Iran concluded with at least 43 deaths.

Defense
U.S. Defense Secretary Harold Brown began several days of talks with Chinese military officials.

Politics and government
Indira Gandhi led her Congess-I Party to an overwhelming victory in India’s parliamentary elections, taking 351 of 542 seats. Although Congress-I won nearly 70% of the seats, they took just 42% of the vote. A division of opposition votes among the Janata (32 seats), Lok Dal (41 seats), and Congress (13 seats) Parties was held responsible for Mrs. Gandhi’s victory. Mrs. Gandhi’s son Sanjay, who had been blamed for many of the excesses of Mrs. Gandhi’s emergency rule in the late 1970s, won a seat. During the campaign, Mrs. Gandhi had stressed the need to cut inflation and restore law and order within India and called for recognition of the new Vietnamese-backed Heng Samrin government in Cambodia, and closer relations with Third World countries. It was expected that she would crack down on hoarders of sugar and kerosene, important commodities in India.

Football
NFL
AFC Championship
Houston 13 @ Pittsburgh 27



NFC Championship
Los Angeles 9 @ Tampa Bay 0



30 years ago
1990

Hit parade
#1 single in Australia (Australian Music Report): Love Shack--The B-52's (3rd week at #1)

#1 single in Italy (FIMI): Lambada--Kaoma (15th week at #1)

#1 single in Spain (PROMUSICAE): That's What I Like--Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers

#1 single in Flanders (Ultratop 50): Another Day in Paradise--Phil Collins (3rd week at #1)

#1 single in France (SNEP): Hélène--Roch Voisine (5th week at #1)

#1 single in the U.K. (CIN): Do They Know it's Christmas?--Band Aid II (3rd week at #1)

Netherlands Top 10 (De Nederlandse Top 40)
1 All Around the World--Lisa Stansfield
2 Homely Girl--UB40
3 Lily was Here--David A. Stewart and featuring Candy Dulfer
4 Dançando Lambada--Kaoma
5 Another Day in Paradise--Phil Collins
6 Sit and Wait--Sydney Youngblood
7 Don't Know Much--Linda Ronstadt featuring Aaron Neville
8 Eleni--Cees Tol & Thomas Tol
9 Listen to Your Heart--Roxette
10 Got to Get--Rob 'n' Raz featuring Leila K

Singles entering the chart were Me So Horny by the 2 Live Crew (#22); Words by the Christians (#23); Everlasting Love by U2 (#26); and The Miracle by Queen (#30).

U.S.A. Top 10 (Billboard)
1 Another Day in Paradise--Phil Collins (4th week at #1)
2 Rhythm Nation--Janet Jackson
3 Don't Know Much--Linda Ronstadt (featuring Aaron Neville)
4 Pump Up the Jam--Technotronic featuring Felly
5 With Every Beat of My Heart--Taylor Dayne
6 How am I Supposed to Live Without You--Michael Bolton
7 This One's for the Children--New Kids on the Block
8 Just Like Jesse James--Cher
9 We Didn't Start the Fire--Billy Joel
10 Everything--Jody Watley

Singles entering the chart were All or Nothing by Milli Vanilli (#51); Going Home by Kenny G (#71); Sometimes She Cries by Warrant (#81); No Myth by Michael Penn (#85); and Black Velvet by Alannah Myles (#86).

#1 single in the U.S.A. (Cash Box): Another Day in Paradise--Phil Collins (4th week at #1)

#1 single in Canada (RPM): Another Day in Paradise--Phil Collins (4th week at #1)

Died on this date
Pavel Alekseyevich Čerenkov, 85. U.S.S.R. physicist. Dr. Cherenkov shared the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physics with Ilya Frank and Igor Tamm "for the discovery and the interpretation of the Cherenkov effect."

Ian Charleson, 40. U.K. actor. Mr. Charleson was known for his co-starring roles in the movies Chariots of Fire (1981) and Gandhi (1982). He was a sodomite and died of AIDS.

Personal
This blogger was one of those in attendance at the CPR Stockholders of Edmonton Sherlock Holmes birthday dinner at the Faculty Club.

Diplomacy
Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze, visiting Romania, said that the U.S.S.R. would support any kind of political system that emerged in Romania.

Football
NFL
AFC Divisional Playoff
Buffalo 30 @ Cleveland 34



NFC Divisional Playoff
Minnesota 13 @ San Francisco 41



Hockey
NHL
Los Angeles 4 @ Toronto 7

25 years ago
1995

Hit parade
#1 single in Sweden (Topplistan): Stay Another Day--East 17

#1 single in Ireland (IRMA): Love Me for a Reason--Boyzone (2nd week at #1)

Died on this date
Joe Slovo, 68. Lithuanian-born South African politician. Mr. Slovo, who moved to South Africa with his family at the age of 8, was a Jewish atheist who joined the South African Communist Party in 1942, and was general secretary of the SACP from 1984-1991. He served as Minister of Housing in the government of President Nelson Mandela from April 1994 until his death.

Personal
This blogger was one of those in attendance at the CPR Stockholders of Edmonton Sherlock Holmes birthday dinner at Chandler's Tea Shoppe.

Terrorism
A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila led to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack.

Economics and finance
The United States Labor Department reported that the unemployment rate was 5.4% in December 1994, down 0.2% from November, and the lowest level since July 1990. The economy had added 3.5 million jobs in 1994, 256,000 new jobs in December.

20 years ago
2000

Died on this date
Don Martin, 68. U.S. cartoonist. Mr. Martin joined Mad magazine in 1956, and eventually was rewarded with his own department in the magazine and became known as "Mad’s Maddest Artist." He was known for using unusual words in his cartoons to represent sound effects, e.g., "Kloon!;" "Sploidoing!;" "Shpritz!" In the late 1980s he had a falling out with Mad over royalties and jumped to Cracked magazine, spending six years there. Mr. Martin died of cancer.

Abominations
As hundreds of Cuban Americans in Miami protested, U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno backed the decision of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to return six-year-old Elian Gonzalez to his father in Cuba.

Crime
A mother and son were charged with trying to smuggle 10 teenage Chinese girls into the United States. Their van was stopped in Wallaceburg, Ontario on its way to Detroit.

Politics and government
At a debate in Durham, New Hampshire among Republican Party candidates for the 2000 U.S. presidential nomination, Texas Governor George W. Bush pledged to cut taxes if elected, and also argued that Senator John McCain’s plan to do away with so-called "soft money" in campaigns would "hurt Republicans."