February 26 Dateline

Birthdays

1564 - Christopher Marlowe, English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. (baptised this day, although actual birth date is uncertain). He greatly influenced William Shakespeare, who was born in the same year as Marlowe and who rose to become the pre-eminent Elizabethan playwright after Marlowe's mysterious early death.  (Christopher Marlowe - Elizabethan Dramatist. Uploaded by Biography. Accessed Februay 26, 2015.)

1802 - Victor Marie Hugo, French writer, poet, dramatist of the Romantic movement. He's famous for the classic novels Les Miserables (1862) and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831). Hugo is considered to be one of the greatest and best-known French writers. (Victor Hugo: Biography... Uploaded by Way Back. Accessed February 26, 2017. Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert in Full. Uploaded by Potato Gel. Accessed February 26, 2018.)

1829 - Levi Strauss, German-American businessman, clothing designer. He founded the first company to manufacture blue jeans. Now known as simply "Levi's", his firm of Levi Strauss & Co. began in 1853 in San Francisco, California.

1879 - Frank Bridge, English composer, violist, conductor, and teacher. He was one of the most accomplished musicians of his day, known especially for his chamber music and songs. After a period in the Joachim Quartet (1906) he played with the English String Quartet until 1915. Although he composed in many genres, he was particularly successful in his smaller forms, such as the Phantasie Quartet for piano and strings (1910), four string quartets, and songs and piano pieces. His early works were Romantic in style. While he never abandoned Romanticism in later years, he moved toward atonality. He was widely respected as a teacher, and his pupils included Benjamin Britten. (Frank Bridge's Pensiero, interpreted by Timothy Ridout (Violin) and Frank Dupree (Piano). Uploaded by France Musique. Accessed February 26, 2020.)

1914 - Robert Alda (born Alfonso Giuseppe Giovanni Roberto D'Abruzzo), American theatrical and film actor, a singer, and a dancer. He was the father of actors Alan and Antony Alda. Robert Alda was featured in a number of Broadway productions, then he moved to Italy during the early 1960s. He appeared in many European films over the next two decades, occasionally returning to the U.S. for film appearances such as The Girl Who Knew Too Much.

1916 - Jackie Herbert Gleason, American actor, comedian, writer, composer, and conductor known affectionately as "The Great One." Developing a style and characters from growing up in Brooklyn, New York, he was known for his brash visual and verbal comedy, exemplified by his Ralph Kramden character in the TV series The Honeymooners. He developed high ratings The Jackie Gleason Show. Among his notable film roles were Minnesota Fats in 1961's The Hustler (co-starring with Paul Newman), and Buford T. Justice in the Smokey and the Bandit series. Gleason also enjoyed a prominent secondary music career, producing a series of best-selling "mood music" albums. His first album, Music for Lovers Only, still holds the record for the longest stay on the Billboard Top Ten Charts (153 weeks), and his first 10 albums sold over a million copies each. His output spans some 20-plus singles, nearly 60 long-playing record albums, and over 40 CDs.

1950 - Helen Elizabeth Clark, ONZ SSI PC, New Zealand politician who served as the 37th Prime Minister of New Zealand from 1999 to 2008, and was the Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme from 2009 to 2017. She was New Zealand's fifth-longest-serving prime minister, and the second woman to hold that office.

1953 - Michael Bolton (born Michael Bolotin), American singer and songwriter. Bolton originally performed in the hard rock and heavy metal genres from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, both on his early solo albums and those he recorded as the frontman of the band Blackjack. He became better known for his series of pop rock ballads, recorded after a stylistic change in the late 1980s. His achievements include selling more than 75 million records, recording eight top 10 albums and two number-one singles on the Billboard charts, as well as winning six American Music Awards and two Grammy Awards.

Leftie:
None known

More birthdays and historical events, February 26 - On This Day

Historical Events

1797 - The Bank of England issues the first £1 note.

1922 - Camille Saint-Saens's suite "Carnival of the Animals" is first performed, in Paris.



1987 - The Church of England synod says 'yes' to women priests. 

1952 - Winston Churchill announces that Britain has developed its own atomic bomb, making it the third nuclear power after the U.S. and U.S.S.R. 

1993 - The World Trade Centre in New York is bombed, killing five people, nevertheless, considered a minor event compared to the horrific Twin Tower collapse of 11 September 2011. 

1995 - The oldest investment banking firm in the U.K., Barings Bank, collapses after a securities broker, Nick Leeson, loses $1.4 billion by speculating on the Singapore international Monetary Exchange using future contracts.

1998 - A jury rejects a lawsuit by Texas cattlemen who claim Oprah Winfrey's televised comments about mid-cow disease have cause the beef market to plummet and cost millions of dollars.

Les Miserables Movie Trailer 2012

Video Credit:
"Les Miserables Official Movie Trailer 2012". Youtube uploaded by DanceOn. Accessed Feb 26, 2013.

Camille Saint-Saëns ♯The Carnival of the Animals (complete) / Le Carnaval des Animaux♯ . YouTube, Uploaded by Melody Classical. Accessed February 26, 2017.


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
 

 

 

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