Birthdays: St. Thomas Moore, Eubie Blake, Sinclair Lewis, Larry "Buster" Crabbe, Laura Ingalls Wilder writer of Little House on the Prairie, Gay Talese, animator Jim Tyer, James Spader is 63, Chris Rock is 58, Eddie Izzard is 61, Ashton Kutcher is 45
1882- John L. Sullivan defeated top boxer Paddy Ryan in a ferocious bareknuckle brawl in Gulfport Mississippi. There were no official boxing championship belts yet, but John L. Sullivan boldly declared himself the Champion of the World. The title stuck. He’d travel from town to town, building his legend: "I’m John L. Sullivan and I can lick any man in the house!!” and he always did.
1900- In Barcelona a new young talent named Pablo Picasso had his first show.
1910- The Town of Hollywood was absorbed into the growing City of Los Angeles.
1939, Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep was published. Chandler was a 51-year-old ex-oil company executive who had taken up writing at the age of 45, after being fired for alcohol-soaked absenteeism. Over the previous five years he had published enough crime stories in the pulp magazines to survive, but this was his first novel, the first of seven featuring the inimitable detective Philip Marlowe.
1940- Disney's second animated feature "Pinocchio" opened at the Central Theater in Manhattan. It cost a staggering $2.6 million to make.
1960- JFK PARTYS WITH THE RATPACK-Before he created the Peace Corps and Camelot, presidential candidate John Kennedy needed to relax and raise some hell. So in total secret he helicoptered down to Las Vegas and spent this night at the Sands Hotel with Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop and his brother in law, actor Peter Lawford. These men were famous for their all-night Rat Pack parties, heavy drinking, girls, poker and more. Sinatra introduced Kennedy to a party girl named Judith Cambell Exner, who would claim JFK as a lover at the same time as she was sleeping with Sam Momo Giancana, the head of the Chicago Mafia. In the wee hours of dawn, Kennedy slipped away to continue his race for the White House.
1964- THE BRITISH ROCK INVASION BEGAN. Thousands of screaming fans welcomed THE BEATLES to New York for their first U.S. Tour. The last music out of England to be taken seriously by Americans was The Lambeth Walk, now the UK announced itself as a powerhouse of rock & roll. For a Brit to do Rock & Roll in America was as audacious as an American reciting Shakespeare in Stratford, but the welcome for the Beatles was so overwhelming that other bands like The Rolling Stones, The Who, and Herman’s Hermits soon followed.
Local New York disc jockeys Cousin Brucie and Murray the K wiggled to the front of the crowds and got a national audience by following the young musicians around. The crowds of teenagers were so excited they mobbed a Rolls Royce in front of the Warwick Hotel where the Beatles were staying just because they figured a Rolls Royce would be something they drove in. They actually used taxicabs.
1964- The GI Joe action figure born. In 1974 it got the Kung-Fu Grip.
1974- Mel Brook’s classic comedy “Blazing Saddles” opened in theaters.
2014- The Lego Movie premiered. Directed by Chris Miller and Phil Lord.
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