This day in history
Today is Tuesday, March 12, the 72nd day of 2024. There are 294 days left in the year.
Birthdays: Diplomat, and civil rights activist Andrew Young is
92. Actor Barbara Feldon is 91. Actor-singer Liza Minnelli is 78. Senator Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, is
77. Singer-songwriter James Taylor is 76. Author Carl Hiaasen is 71. Former MLB All-Star Darryl Strawberry is 62. Senator Tammy Duckworth, Democrat of Illinois, is 56. CNN reporter Jake Tapper is 55. Rock musician Graham Coxon is 55. Actor Jaimie Alexander is 40.
► In 1912, Mill owners in Lawrence ended what was known as “Bread and Roses’’ strike, restoring much of the pay cuts to their low wage workers after congressional hearings exposed brutal working conditions in the factories.
► In 1980, a Chicago jury found John Wayne Gacy Jr. guilty of the murders of 33 men and boys. (The next day, Gacy was sentenced to death; he was executed in May 1994.)
► In 2009, disgraced financier Bernard Madoff pleaded guilty in N.Y. to pulling off perhaps the biggest swindle in Wall Street history; he was sentenced to 150 years behind bars. (Madoff died in prison in April 2021.)
► In 2012, Greece implemented the biggest debt writedown in history, swapping the bulk of its privately held bonds with new ones worth less than half their original value.
► In 2017, a bus plowed into people taking part in an early morning street festival in Haiti, killing at least 34 of them.
►In 2020, as the coronavirus crisis deepened in the United States, the stock market had its biggest drop since the Black Monday crash of 1987, the NCAA canceled its basketball tournaments after earlier planning to play in empty arenas, and the NHL joined the NBA in suspending play. Also, the Boston Marathon was postponed for the first time in its history.
► In 2022, Russian forces pounding the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol shelled a mosque that was sheltering more than 80 people, including children.
► Last year, “Everything, Everywhere All at Once” won seven Oscars, including best picture and three of the four acting awards.