December 20 Dateline

Birthdays

1868 - Harvey Firestone, American industrialist, first to manufacture pneumatic tires, Founder of Firestone Tire and Rubber Company.

1890 - Jaroslav Heyrovsky, Czech chemist. Discovered Polarography. 1959 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, the first Czech national to win the award. (MLA style: Jaroslav Heyrovsky – Biographical. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Media AB 2018. Thu. 20 Dec 2018.)

1894 - Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, KT, AK, CH, QC, FAA, FRS, Australian politician who twice served as Prime Minister of Australia, in office from 1939 to 1941 and again from 1949 to 1966. He played a central role in the creation of the Liberal Party of Australia, defining its policies and its broad outreach. He is Australia's longest-serving prime minister, serving over 18 years in total.

1952 - Jenny Ann Agutter, British actress. She began her career as a child actress in 1964, appearing in East of Sudan, Star!, and two adaptations of The Railway Children—the BBC's 1968 television serial and the 1970 film version. She starred in the critically acclaimed film Walkabout and the TV film The Snow Goose (both 1971), for which she won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama.

1969 - Alain de Botton, FRSL Swiss-born British philosopher and author. His books discuss contemporary subjects and themes, emphasizing philosophy's relevance to everyday life. He published Essays in Love in 1993, which went on to sell two million copies. Other bestsellers include How Proust Can Change Your Life, Status Anxiety and The Architecture of Happiness. Alain de Botton co-founded The School of Life and Living Architecture. In 2015, he was awarded "The Fellowship of Schopenhauer", an annual writers' award from the Melbourne Writers Festival. Quote: "Work finally begins when the fear of doing nothing exceeds the fear of doing it badly." - Alain de Botton. (How Proust Can Change Your Life. YouTube, uploaded by Big Think. Accessed December 20, 2014.)

Lefties:
None known 

More birthdays and historical events, December 20 - On This Day

Historical Events

1803 - France turns over New Orleans to the U.S. as part of the Louisiana Purchase, by which America bought a fifth of their entire country from French ownership for 27.25 million dollars, roughly three cents an acre. For what is worth, the reason the French were willing to sell the land is because Napoleon was fighting Great Britain and needed money desperately.

1860 - The U.S. state of South Carolina secedes, setting the course for the American Civil War.

1892 - The pneumatic car tyre is patented in Syracuse, New York, by Alexander Brown and George Stillman.

1928 - Ernest Bloch's symphonic poem America is first performed in New York City. 

1957 - Elvis Presley, at the height of his fame, receives a draft notice ordering him to join the U.S. Army for two years. 

1979 - In an effort to save car manufacturer Chrysler from bankruptcy, the U.S. Congress intervenes by approving a $1.2 billion loan deal. At a news conference in 1980, then U.S. President Jimmy Carter justified the Government's involvement as necessary "to avoid the loss of hundreds of thousands of American jobs."

1987 - In the Philippines, the Dona Paz ferry sinks after colliding with an oil tanker, with death of more than 4,300 passengers and crew.

1994 - The sudden devaluation of the Mexican peso causes a currency crisis that ripples throughout the region known as the "tequila effect."



Resources:

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

2. Brtiannica. 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 December 20, 2023. Tel. Inspired Pen Web. All rights reserved.