TODAY IN HISTORY
TODAY IS SATURDAY, MAY 15, the 135th day of 2021. There are 230 days left in the year. TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT IN HISTORY: On this date in 1970, just after midnight, Phillip Lafayette Gibbs and James Earl Green, two Black students at Jackson State College in Mississippi, were killed as police opened fire during student protests. In 1602, English navigator Bartholomew Gosnold and his ship, the Concord, arrived at present-day Cape Cod, which he’s credited with naming. In 1918, U.S. airmail began service between Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and New York. In 1948, hours after declaring its independence, the new state of Israel was attacked by Transjordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. In 1954, the Fender Stratocaster guitar, created by Leo Fender, was officially released. In 1963, Weight Watchers was incorporated in New York. In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its unanimous In re Gault decision, ruled that juveniles accused of crimes were entitled to the same due process afforded adults. American realist painter Edward Hopper died in New York at age 84. In 1968, two days of tornado outbreaks began in 10 Midwestern and Southern states; twisters were blamed for 72 deaths, including 45 in Arkansas and 18 in Iowa. In 1972, Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace was shot and left paralyzed while campaigning for president in Laurel, Maryland, by Arthur H. Bremer, who served 35 years for attempted murder. In 1975, U.S. forces invaded the Cambodian island of Koh Tang and captured the American merchant ship Mayaguez, which had been seized by the Khmer Rouge. (All 39 crew members had already been released safely by Cambodia; some 40 U.S. servicemen were killed in connection with the operation.) In 1988, the Soviet Union began the process of withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan, more than eight years after Soviet forces entered the country. In 2000, by a 5-4 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court threw out a key provision of the 1994 Violence Against Women Act, saying that rape victims could not sue their attackers in federal court. In 2015, a jury sentenced Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to death for the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing that killed three and left more than 250 wounded. TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS: Actorsinger Anna Maria Alberghetti and counterculture icon Wavy Gravy are 85. Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is 84. Singer Lenny Welch is 83. Actor-singer Lainie Kazan and actor Gunilla Hutton are 79. Actor Chazz Palminteri is 75. Former Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and singer-songwriter Brian Eno are 73. Actor Nicholas Hammond (Film: “The Sound of Music”) is 71. Baseball Hall-of-Famer George Brett and musician-composer Mike Oldfield are 68. Actor Lee Horsley is 66. TV personality Giselle Fernández and rapper Grandmaster Melle Mel are 60. Actor Brenda Bakke is 58. Football Hall-of-Famer Emmitt Smith is 52. Actor Brad Rowe is 51. Actor David Charvet is 49. Actor Russell Hornsby and rock musician Ahmet Zappa are 47. Olympic gold medal gymnast Amy Chow and actor David Krumholtz are 43. Rock musician David Hartley (The War on Drugs) is 41. Actor Jamie-Lynn Sigler is 40. Actor Alexandra Breckenridge and rock musician Brad Shultz (Cage the Elephant) are 39. Rock musician Nick Perri is 37. Tennis player Andy Murray is 34.