Today In History

Today is Friday, March 17, the 76th day of 2017. There are 289 days left in the year. This is St. Patrick’s Day.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

› 1912: The Camp Fire Girls organization was incorporated in Washington, D.C., two years to the day after it was founded in Thetford, Vermont. (The group is now known as Camp Fire.)

ON THIS DATE

› 1776: The Revolutionary War Siege of Boston ended as British forces evacuated the city.

› 1906: President Theodore Roosevelt first likened crusading journalists to a man with “the muckrake in his hand” in a speech to the Gridiron Club in Washington.

› 1936: Pittsburgh’s Great St. Patrick’s Day Flood began.

› 1941: The National Gallery of Art opened in Washington, D.C.

› 1966: A U.S. Navy midget submarine located a missing hydrogen bomb which had fallen from a U.S. Air Force B-52 bomber into the Mediterranean off Spain. (It took several more weeks to actually recover the bomb.)

› 1969: Golda Meir became prime minister of Israel.

› 1992: In Illinois, Sen. Alan Dixon was defeated in his Democratic primary re-election bid by Carol Moseley-Braun, who went on to become the first black woman in the U.S. Senate.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

The former national chairwoman of the NAACP, Myrlie Evers-Williams, is 84. Former NASA astronaut Ken Mattingly is 81. Singer-songwriter Jim Weatherly is 74. Rock musician Harold Brown (War; Lowrider Band) is 71. Actor Patrick Duffy is 68. Actor Kurt Russell is 66. Country singer Susie Allanson is 65. Actress Lesley-Anne Down is 63. Actor Mark Boone Jr. is 62. Actor Rob Lowe is 53. Rock singer Billy Corgan is 50. Rock musician Van Conner (Screaming Trees) is 50. Actor Mathew St. Patrick is 49. Actor Yanic Truesdale is 48. Country singer Keifer Thompson (Thompson Square) is 44. Actress Marisa Coughlan is 43. Rapper Swifty (D12) is 42. Actress Natalie Zea is 42. Actress Brittany Daniel is 41. Reggaeton singer Nicky Jam is 36. Pop/ rock singer/songwriter Hozier is 27. Actress Eliza Hope Bennett is 25. Actor John Boyega is 25. Olympic gold medal swimmer Katie Ledecky is 20. Actor Flynn Morrison is 12.