July 4 Dateline

Birthdays

1790 - Colonel Sir George Everest CB FRS FRAS FRGS, British surveyor and geographer who served as Surveyor General of India from 1830 to 1843. He is best known for having Mount Everest, the highest mountain on Earth, named in his honour.

1804 - Nathaniel Hawthorne (born Nathaniel Hathorne), American novelist and short story writer, famous for The Scarlet Letter. His writings center on New England, and works featuring moral metaphors with an anti-Puritan inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the Romantic movement and, specifically, dark romanticism. His themes often focus on the inherent evil and sin of humanity, and often have moral messages and deep psychological complexity. His published works include novels, short stories, and a biography of his college friend Franklin Pierce, the 14th President of the United States.(Time, Life & Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Uploaded by Zane Education. Accessed July 4, 2016. The Scarlet Letter. Uploaded by YouTube Movies. Accessed July 4, 2017. Mojo Notes: The Scarlet Letter. Uploaded by WatchMojo.com. Accessed July 4, 2018)

1826 - Stephen C. Foster, American song composer, known as "father of American music" (Sharing "Beautiful Dreamer" (1864), with Leslie Guinn, baritone, and Gilbert Kalish, piano. It's an all-time favourite work by S. Foster, a song I've loved and sung since in my teens. Thank you, Stephen Foster. Uploaded by oppie47. Accessed July 4, 2015. Beautiful things always have a place in the heart.)   

1884 - Louis Burt Mayer (born Lazar Meir), American film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industry's most prestigious movie studio, accumulating the largest concentration of leading writers, directors and stars in Hollywood.

1900 - Louis Daniel Armstrong, nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", American jazz trumpeter, composer, vocalist, and actor. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades, from the 1920s to the 1960s, and different eras in the history of jazz. Armstrong was inducted into the Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2017.

1924 - Eva Marie Saint, American actress, best known for starring in Elia Kazan's On the Waterfront  and Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest; the former won her the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She received Golden Globe and BAFTA Award nominations for A Hatful of Rain and won a Primetime Emmy Award for the television miniseries People Like Us. Her film career also includes roles in Raintree County, Exodus, The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming, Grand Prix, Nothing in Common (1986), Because of Winn-Dixie, Superman Returns, and Winter's Tale.

1927 - Marvin Neil Simon, American playwright, screenwriter and author. He wrote numerous plays and movie screenplays, mostly adaptations of his plays. He has received more combined Oscar and Tony Award nominations than any other writer. His first produced play was Come Blow Your Horn (1961). It was followed by two more successes, Barefoot in the Park and The Odd Couple, winning a Tony Award for the latter. It made him a national celebrity and "the hottest new playwright on Broadway." His style ranged from farce to romantic comedy to more serious dramatic comedy. Overall, he garnered 17 Tony nominations and won three awards. In 1966, he had four successful productions running on Broadway at the same time, and in 1983 he became the only living playwright to have a New York theatre, the Neil Simon Theatre, named in his honor.

1927 - Gina Lollobrigida (born Luigina Lollobrigida), Italian actress and since retirement, photojournalist. She was one of the highest-profile European actresses of the 1950s and early 1960s, and an international sex symbol. In the 1970s, as a photojournalist, she achieved a scoop by gaining access to Fidel Castro for an exclusive interview.  She is an active supporter of the National Italian American Foundation (NIAF), receiving the NIAF Lifetime Achievement Award at the Foundation's Anniversary Gala in 2008. She sold her jewelry collection, and donated the nearly $5 million from the sale for stem cell therapy research benefit.

Lefties:
Actress Eva Marie Saint 

 

 

More birthdays and historical events today, 4 July - On This Day.

Historical Events

1776 - This day, 4TH OF JULY, the American Declaration of Independence prepared by U.S. statesman Thomas Jefferson, is signed and approved by John Hancock, the President of the Continental Congress of America. Delegates from the 12 colonies sign on August 2, making the U.S. the world's oldest existing republic. However, the treaty with Great Britain is not signed until another five years. 

1826 - On the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, its author and signatory, and John Adams, signatory, and second President of the U.S., both die of natural causes.

1865 - Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is published, 3 years to the day after the author began to make up his story for Alice Liddell on a rowing trip. Carroll's real name is Charles Dodgson.

1946 - The Philippines becomes independent for the first time in 400 years. It had been ruled by Spain, declared a republic in 1898, but largely remained in Spanish hands, followed by U.S. sovereignty, and briefly occupied by Japan.

1994 - The Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front takes control over the Rwandan capital, bringing more than three months of genocidal slaughter to an end. 




Resources:

1. Asiado, Tel. The World's Movers and Shapers. New Hampshire: Ore Mountain Publishing House (2005)

2. Britannica. www.britannica.com
3. Chambers Biographical Dictionary, 19th Ed. London: Chambers Harrap, 2011
4. Dateline. Sydney: Millennium House, (2006)
5. Grun, Bernard. The Timetables of History, New 3rd Revised Ed. Simon & Schuster/Touchstone (1991)
6. Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org



(c) June 2007. Updated July 4, 2023. Tel. Inspired Pen Web. All rights reserved.