TODAY IN HISTORY
TODAY IS SATURDAY, DEC. 4,
the 338th day of 2021. There are 27 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY:
On this date in 1942, during World War II, U.S. bombers struck the Italian mainland for the first time with a raid on Naples. President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the dismantling of the Works Progress Administration, which had been created to provide jobs during the Depression. In 1783, Gen. George Washington bade farewell to his Continental Army officers at Fraunces Tavern in New York. In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson left Washington on a trip to France to attend the Versailles Peace Conference. In 1954, the first Burger King stand was opened in Miami by James McLamore and David Edgerton. In 1965, the United States launched Gemini 7 with Air Force Lt. Col. Frank Borman and Navy Cmdr. James A. Lovell aboard on a two-week mission. (While Gemini 7 was in orbit, its sister ship, Gemini 6A, was launched on Dec. 15 on a one-day mission; the two spacecraft were able to rendezvous within a foot of each other.) In 1967, actor-comedian Bert Lahr, who played the Cowardly Lion in “The Wizard of Oz,” died in New York at age 72. In 1980, the bodies of four American churchwomen slain in El Salvador two days earlier were unearthed. (Five Salvadoran national guardsmen were later convicted of murdering nuns Ita Ford, Maura Clarke and Dorothy Kazel, and lay worker Jean Donovan.) In 1986, both houses of Congress moved to establish special committees to conduct their own investigations of the Iran-Contra affair. In 2000, in a pair of legal setbacks for Al Gore, a Florida state judge refused to overturn George W. Bush’s certified victory in Florida and the U.S. Supreme Court set aside a ruling that had allowed manual recounts. In 2018, long lines of people wound through the Capitol Rotunda to view the casket of former President George H.W. Bush; former Sen. Bob Dole steadied himself out of his wheelchair to salute his old friend and one-time rival. TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS: Game show host Wink Martindale is 88. Pop singer Freddy Cannon is 85. Actor-producer Max Baer Jr. is 84. Musician Terry Woods (The Pogues) is 74. Rock singer Southside Johnny Lyon is 73. Actor Jeff Bridges is 72. Rock musician Gary Rossington (Lynyrd Skynyrd; the Rossington Collins Band) and actor Patricia Wettig are 70. Actor Tony Todd is 67. Jazz singer Cassandra Wilson and country musician Brian Prout (Diamond Rio) are 66. Rock musician Bob Griffin (formerly with The BoDeans) is 62. Rock singer Vinnie Dombroski (Sponge) is 59. Actors Marisa Tomei and Chelsea Noble are 57. Actor-comedian Fred Armisen is 55. Rapper Jay-Z is 52. Actor Kevin Sussman is 51. Actor-model Tyra Banks is 48. Country singer Lila McCann is 40. Actor Lindsay Felton is 37. Actor Orlando Brown is 34.