On This Day In History
Birthdates which occurred on March 09:
1454 Amerigo Vespucci explorer
1564 David Fabricius Essen Germany, astronomer (discovered variable star)
1568 Aloysius "Luigi" van Gonzaga Italian prince/Jesuit/saint
1758 Franz Joseph Gall German/French physician (frenology)
1791 George Hayward US, surgeon, 1st to use ether
1814 Taras Shevchenko Ukraine, national poet/painter/professor of Kiev
1824 Leland Stanford (Governor/Senator)/found Stanford University
1839 Felix Huston Robertson Brigadier General (Confederate Army),died in 1928
1839 Modest P Mussorgsky Russian composer (Boris Godunov)
1881 Enver Pasja Turkish General/politician
1885 Ringgold "Ring" Lardner baseball player
1890 Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov Soviet foreign minister (UN)
1902 Will Greer Frankfort IN, actor (Grandpa Walton-The Waltons)
1912 Alan David Melville polymath
1918 Mickey [Frank Morrison] Spillane Brooklyn NY, mystery writer (I the Jury)
1920 Carl Betz Pittsburgh PA, actor (Alex Stone-Donna Reed Show)
1923 André Courréges France, fashion designer (introduced the miniskirt)
1923 James Buckley (Senator-Republican-NY)
1926 Irene Papas Corinth Greece, actress (Moses The Lawgiver)
1930 Ornette Coleman, jazz saxophonist.
1933 Lloyd Price Kenner LA, singer (Lawdy Miss Clawdy, Misty, Just Because, Come to Me)
1934 Yuri Gagarin Russia, cosmonaut, 1st man into space (aboard Vostok 1)
1936 Glenda Jackson Birkenhead Cheshire England, actress (Hopscotch, Touch of Class)
1936 Marty Ingels Brooklyn NY, comedian (I'm Dickens He's Fenster)
1936 Mickey Gilley Ferriday LA, country singer (Urban Cowboy)
1940 Raul Julia San Juan Puerto Rico, actor (Addams Family, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Eyes of Laura Mars)
1942 John Cale Welsh/US bassist/violinist/singer (Velvet Underground)
1942 Mark Lindsay Eugene OR, rocker (Paul Revere & the Raiders)
1943 Bobby Fischer US, world chess champion (1972-75)
1945 Ray Royer rocker (Procol Harum-Whiter Shade of Pale)
1945 Robin Trower London England, rocker (Procol Harum-Whiter Shade of Pale)
1955 Teo Fabi formula-1 Indy-car racer (rookie of year-1983)
1959 Barbie doll (Mattel)
1964 Phil Housley St Paul MN, NHL defenseman (New Jersey Devils, Team USA Olympics-98)
1970 Melissa Rathburn-Nealy US soldier (Iraqi POW)
1972 Sara Nicole Williams Miss Washington-USA (1997)
Deaths which occurred on March 09:
1620 Aegidius Albertinus German writer (Lucifer's Kingdom), dies at 59
1706 Johann Pachelbel (52), German organist, composer, died.
1913 Eberhard Nestle German biblical scholar, dies at 61
1962 Dr Howard Engstrom Boston MA, a designer of Univac computer dies at 59
1965 Anthon van der Horst Dutch organist/composer, dies at 65
1969 Richard Crane actor (Surfside 6), dies at 50
1974 Earl W Sutherland Jr US pharmacologist (Nobel 1971), dies at 58
1988 Kurt Georg Kiesinger West German chancellor (1966-69), dies at 83
1989 Robert Mapplethorpe US photographer, dies at 42
1992 Menachim Begin Israeli prime minister (1977-1983, Nobel 1979), dies at 79
1993 Bob Crosby swing-era bandleader (Bobcats), dies of cancer at 79
1994 Fernando Rey Spanish actor (French Connection), dies of cancer at 76
1994 Lawrence E Spivak journalist (Meet the Press), dies at 93
1995 Ian Ballantine publisher, dies of heart attack at 79
1996 Comedian George Burns dies in Beverly Hills, Calif., just weeks after turning 100
1997 Terry Nation writer (Dr Who, Blake 7) at 66
Reported: MISSING in ACTION
1966 COLLINS WILLARD M.---QUINCY IL.
[KIA AT CRASH SITE 3 RECOV]
1966 FOSTER ROBERT E.---LOCKPORT NY.
[KIA AT CRASH SITE 3 RECOV]
1966 PETERSON DELBERT R.---MAPLE PLAIN MN.
[NO TRACE SUBJ 3 RECOV]
1967 GRAENING BRUCE A.---KENMORE OH.
1967 PUTNAM CHARLES L.---KEY WEST FL.
[REMAINS RETURNED NOV 3 1988]
1969 REX ROBERT F.---ODEBOLT IA.
1969 TINSLEY COY R.---CLEVELAND TN.
[11/05/69 RELEASED]
1969 WALTERS TIM L.---SOUTH BEND IN.
[REMAINS IDENTIFIED 08/11/99]
1970 COTTEN LARRY W.---NASHVILLE TN.
1970 PARCELS REX L. JR.---BERKELEY CA.
1970 ROBINSON EDWARD---KANSAS CITY MO.
1970 SCHOEPPNER LEONARD J.---CANTON OH.
1970 TERLA LOTHAR G.---SCRANTON PA.
POW / MIA Data & Bios supplied by
the P.O.W. NETWORK. Skidmore, MO. USA.
On this day...
1452 Pope Nicolaas I crowns Frederik III Roman Catholic-German emperor
1496 Jews are expelled from Carintha Austria
1497 Nicolaus Copernicus 1st recorded astronomical observation,
1562 Kissing in public banned in Naples (punishable by death)
1617 Sweden & Russia sign Peace of Stolbowa
1697 Czar Peter the Great begins tour of West-Europe
1721 English Chancellor Exchequer John Aislabie confined in London Tower
1741 English fleet under Admiral Ogle begins assault on Cartagena
1745 Bells for 1st American carillon shipped from England to Boston
1788 Connecticut becomes the 5th state.
1796 Napoleon Bonaparte marries Josephine de Beauharnais
1798 Dr George Balfour becomes 1st naval surgeon in the US navy
1820 James Monroe's daughter Maria marries in the White House
1822 Charles M Graham of New York patents artificial teeth
1839 Prussian government limits work week for children to 51 hours
1841 US Supreme Court rules Negroes are free (Amistad Incident)
1842 Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Nabucco" premieres in Milan
1844 Giuseppe Verdi's opera "Hernani" premieres in Venice
1858 Albert Potts of Philadelphia patents the street mailbox
1860 1st Japanese ambassador arrives in San Francisco en route to Washington DC
1861 First hostile act of the Civil War occurred when Star of the West fires on Sumter, S.C.
1861 Confederate currency authorized-$50, $100, $500, $1,000
1862 "Monitor" (Union) & "Merrimack" (Rebel) battle in Hampton Roads
1864 Ulysses S Grant is appointed commander of Union Army
1889 Battle at Gallabat (Metema); Mahdi's beat Abyssinian emperor John IV
1889 Kansas passes 1st general antitrust law in US
1893 Congo cannibals killed 1000s of Arabs (Lunch!)
1897 Indian fans start calling the team Indians (in 1915 becomes official)
1904 Brandon's Lester Patrick becomes 1st hockey defenseman to score a goal
1907 Indiana enactes the nation’s 1st involuntary sterilization law based on eugenics. Intended "to prevent procreation of confirmed criminals, idiots, imbeciles, and rapists."
1914 US Senator Albert Fall (Teapot Dome) demands "Cubanisation of Mexico"
1916 General Fransisco "Pancho" Villa leads Mexican band raid on Columbus NM (17 killed)
1918 Russian Bolshevik Party becomes the Communist Party
1918 Ukrainian mobs massacre Jews of Seredino Buda
1932 Eamon De Valera becomes President of Ireland
1932 Former Chinese emperor Henry Pu-Yi installed as head of Manchuria
1933 Congress is called into special session by FDR, & began its "100 days"
1936 Babe Ruth turns down Reds to make a comeback as a player
1942 Construction of the Alaska Highway began
1943 Greek Jews of Salonika are transported to Nazi extermination camps
1945 334 US B-29 Superfortresses attack Tokyo with 120,000 fire bomb
1945 Japanese proclaim the "independence" of Indo-China
1946 Ted Williams is offered $500,000 to play in Mexican League, he refuses
1950 Willie Sutton robs Manufacturers Bank of $64,000 in New York NY (Cause that's where they keep the money)
1953 Josef Stalin buried in Moscow
1954 1st local color TV commercial WNBT-TV (WNBC-TV) New York NY (Castro Decorators)
1954 Edward R Murrow criticizes Senator Joseph McCarthy (See it Now)
1956 Archbishop Makarios of Cyprus arrested & exiled to Seychelles
1957 8.1 earthquake shakes Andreanof Islands, Alaska
1959 1st known radar contact is made with Venus
1959 Barbie, the popular girls' doll, debuted, over 800 million sold
1961 1st animal returned from space, dog named Blackie aboard Sputnik 9
1962 Egyptian President Nasser declares Gaza belongs to Palestinians
1962 US advisors in South-Vietnam join the fight
1964 1st Ford Mustang produced
1964 Supreme Court issues New York Times vs Sullivan decision, public officials must prove malice to claim libel & recover damages
1967 Svetlana Allilueva, Stalin's daughter, defected to the West
1974 Last Japanese soldier, a guerrilla operating in Philippines, surrenders, 29 years after World War II ended
1976 1st female cadets accepted to West Point Military Academy
1977 Admiral Stansfield Turner, USN (Ret), becomes 12th director of CIA replacing acting director Knoche
1977 Hanafi Moslems invade 3 buildings in Washington DC, siege ended March 11th
1979 Bowie Kuhn orders baseball to give equal access to female reporters
1979 France performs nuclear test at Muruora Island
1980 Flemish/Walloon battles in Belgium, 40 injured
1981 Dan Rather becomes primary anchorman of CBS-TV News (Courage!)
1986 NASA announces searchers found remains of Challenger astronauts
1986 Soviet probe Vega 2 flies by Halley's Comet at 8,030 km
1987 Chrysler Corp offered to buy American Motors Corp for $1 billion
1989 Senate rejects Bush's nomination of John Tower as Defense Secretary
1990 Dr Antonia Novello sworn-in as 1st hispanic/female US surgeon general
1993 Rodney King in court says he thinks he heard cops yell racial slurs
1994 IRA launch 1st of 3 mortar attacks on London's Heathrow Airport
1999 Energy Secretary Bill Richardson fires Wen Ho Lee, a Los Alamos weapons designer, who was under suspicion of handing nuclear secrets to China in 1988.
2002 Jamil Abdullah al-Amin, aka H. Rap Brown (58), was convicted by an Atlanta jury for the murder of a sheriff’s deputy on Mar 16, 2000. he was sentenced to life in prison on Mar 13.
2004 In Chad 2 days of fighting broke out as the army battled Islamic terrorists near a remote village on the country's western border with Niger, killing 43 terrorists of a group suspected of links with al-Qaida.
Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"
Belize : Baron Bliss Day
Ukraine : Taras Shevchenko (Ukrainian poet) Day (1814)
World : Amerigo Vespucci Day (1451)
New Mexico : Arbor Day (Friday)
US : Federal Employees Recognition Week (Day )
US : Iditarod Race Week (Day )
US : Aardvark Week (Day 4)
American Woman's History month
Religious Observances
Anglican, Roman Catholic : Commemoration of Gregory, bishop of Nyssa
Roman Catholic : Memorial of St Frances of Rome, patron of motorists, housewives
Religious History
1839 Birth of Phoebe Palmer Knapp, American Methodist hymnwriter. She published more than 500 hymn tunes during her lifetime; her most famous melody comprises the tune to Fanny Crosby's hymn, "Blessed Assurance."
1843 Scottish clergyman Robert Murray McCheyne wrote in a letter: 'You will never find Jesus so precious as when the world is one vast howling wilderness. Then he is like a rose blooming in the midst of the desolation, a rock rising above the storm.'
1930 Pioneer linguist Frank Laubach wrote in a letter: 'It seems to me...that the very Bible cannot be read as a substitute for meeting God soul to soul and face to face.'
1931 The World Radio Missionary Fellowship (WRMF) was incorporated in Lima, Ohio, by co_founders Clarence W. Jones and Reuben Larson. Today, this interdenominational mission agency broadcasts the Gospel in 15 languages to South America and throughout Europe.
1965 Three white Unitarian ministers, including the Rev. James J. Reeb, were attacked with clubs on the streets of Selma, Alabama, while participating in a civil rights demonstration. Reeb later died in a Birmingham, Alabama hospital.
Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.
Thought for the day :
"If you always postpone pleasure you will never have it."
1862 "Monitor" (Union) & "Merrimack" (Rebel) battle in Hampton Roads 
From Baxter New Era, January 18, 1906
SAW BIG NAVAL BATTLE
There is one man in the home who witnessed the sea fight in Hampton Roads, Virginia, between the "Monitor" and the confederate iron-clad ram, "Merrimac." This veteran is Mr. E. A. Goodwin, who served in the Ninety-ninth New York volunteers of New York city. He witnessed what he calls two of the most important events that occurred between March, 1861, and the surrender of Lee - the inauguration of President Lincoln and the battle already referred to.
His regiment landed at Fortress Monroe about the 1st of June, 1861. On the 8th day of March, 1862, the members of the regiment saw a huge flat boat, with a French room, and this object proved to be the terrible Merrimac. Shortly afterward, the regiment was ordered under arms, in light marching order, to go to Newport News, eight miles distant; but before they arrived there, they heard the roar of guns, and met sailors who had escaped from the wrecked and sunken frigate "Cumberland" (wooden) and also from the frigate "Congress," which had been run ashore and set on fire, the Merrimac having practically destroyed both vessels.
The sailors were on their way to the fort, and made the soldiers acquainted with the news of the disaster that had overtaken them. The brave officers and crew of the Cumberland did not surrender; but on the contrary, and the gun crews worked the guns until the water was knee-deep on the gun deck. Then they jumped overboard, and while many were drowned, others succeeded in swimming ashore, leaving old glory still flying at the mast-head when the Cumberland went down as a result of the ramming she received from the hands of the Merrimac.
While the crews were swimming ashore, the confederates put out small boats, filled with sailors, to capture them, but the Yankee sharpshooters on shore began picking the confederates off, and they withdrew. The Merrimac then returned to Norfolk, Va. We felt sure that the fight would be renewed in the morning, but we did not feel much alarmed for we had heard about the Monitor. I was informed that she had left New York in tow of a transport, on Thursday, March 6, 1862, and would be on hand next morning.
She arrived as was scheduled, and went alongside the frigate Minnesota, where she received her ammunition. (The Minnesota had started out the day before to take part in the battle, but had run aground and was helpless, there being a report to the effect that she had been run aground by the pilot who was suspected of being a confederate.)
THE MONSTER APPEARS
On Sunday morning the Merrimac came steaming down from Norfolk, as important as if she were the "biggest thing" out; and she was in the way of an ironclad vessel. Accompanying her came several steamers, whose decks were crowded with spectators who wanted to see the Yankees whipped and taken in as prisoners. When the Merrimac came near the Minnesota she saw something slip out from behind the frigate, and its appearance amazed the Merrimac's officers and crew and the spectators.
This "something" was the little Monitor, which the confederates called a "Yankee raft with a cheese box on it." In a few minutes the battle between the first two iron-clads in the world was on fast and furious. The Monitor circled around the Merrimac, seeking a vulnerable spot, giving shot after shot. The Merrimac did all she could to blow her antagonist out of the water, but her efforts were futile, the most serious thing that occurred being the wounding of Lieutenant Worden, commander of the Monitor, who was hit by a steel splinter as he was looking through a narrow slot in a conning tower. After the fight had been in progress two hours, the commander of the Merrimac decided to run down the "little whiffet" that was causing him so much trouble, and he started for the Monitor under a full speed of steam, and crowded upon her for a short distance, but was unable to make her acquainted with the bottom of the sea. As the Merrimac slid off the Monitior it caused the former to rock and, while she was rocking, the "whiffet" sent a ball into her below the armor that made a hole as large as a hogshead. "Then," says Mr. Goodwin, "you ought to have seen it "turn tail" and skidaddle back to Norfolk."
The soldiers of Mr. Goodwin's regiment, who lined the shore, for miles from the scene of action, filled the air with loud huzzas. The advance of McClellan's army caused Norfolk to be evacuated by the confederates, and they removed all the armament of the Merrimac and started her for Richmond, but she ran aground and was set on fire and burned to the waters edge. Mr. Goodwin saw her burning and, as he says, "I witnessed the beginning and ending of the career of the Merrimac."
M. D. NAGLE Twelfth Iowa Cavalry
