Sunday, July 19, 2020

Today is Sunday, July 19, the 201st day of 2020. There are 165 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On July 19, 1993, President Bill Clinton announced a policy allowing homosexuals to serve in the military under a compromise dubbed “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t pursue.”

On this date:

In 1812, during the War of 1812, the First Battle of Sackets Harbor in Lake Ontario resulted in an American victory as U.S. naval forces repelled a British attack.

In 1943, Allied air forces raided Rome during World War II, the same day Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini met in Feltre in northern Italy.

In 1944, the Democratic national convention convened in Chicago with the nomination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt considered a certainty.

In 1961, TWA became the first airline to begin showing regularly scheduled in-flight movies as it presented “By Love Possessed” to first-class passengers on a flight from New York to Los Angeles. In 1969, Apollo 11 and its astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins, went into orbit around the moon.

In 1980, the Moscow Summer Olympics began, minus dozens of nations that were boycotting the games because of the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan.

In 1985, Christa Mcauliffe of New Hampshire was chosen to be the first schoolteacher to ride aboard the space shuttle. (Mcauliffe and six other crew members died when the Challenger exploded shortly after liftoff in January 1986.)

In 1989, 111 people were killed when United Air Lines Flight 232, a DC10 which suffered the uncontained failure of its tail engine and the loss of hydraulic systems, crashed while making an emergency landing at Sioux City, Iowa; 185 other people survived.

In 1990, baseball’s alltime hits leader, Pete Rose, was sentenced in Cincinnati to five months in prison for tax evasion. In 2006, prosecutors reported that Chicago police beat, kicked, shocked or otherwise tortured scores of Black suspects from the 1970s to the early 1990s to try to extract confessions from them.

In 2014, a New York City police officer (Daniel Pantaleo) involved in the arrest of Eric Garner, who died in custody two days earlier after being placed in an apparent chokehold, was stripped of his gun and badge and placed on desk duty. (Pantaleo was fired in August 2019.) Actor James Garner, 86, died in Los Angeles.

In 2016, Republicans meeting in Cleveland nominated Donald Trump as their presidential standard-bearer; in brief videotaped remarks, Trump thanked the delegates, saying: “This is a movement, but we have to go all the way.”

Ten years ago: The Agriculture Department pressured Shirley Sherrod, an administrator in Georgia, to resign after a conservative website posted video it claimed showed her making racist remarks. (After reviewing the entire video, the White House ended up apologizing to Sherrod.) A train slammed into another at a station north of Calcutta, India, killing at least 63 people. Australian David Warren, who’d invented the “black box” flight data recorder, died in Melbourne at age

85.

Five years ago: Saying they felt a “deep sense of ethical responsibility for a past tragedy,” executives from Japan’s Mitsubishi Materials Corp. offered an unprecedented apology to a 94-year-old former U.S. prisoner of war for using American POWS as forced labor during World War II; James Murphy of Santa Maria, California, accepted the apology during a solemn ceremony hosted by the Museum of Tolerance at the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. One year ago: Dutch actor Rutger Hauer, who was known for menacing roles in “Blade Runner” and other films, died at his home in the Netherlands at the age of 75. Iran seized a British-flagged oil tanker and briefly detained a second in the Strait of Hormuz, increasing tensions in the strategic waterway.

Today’s Birthdays: Actress Helen Gallagher is

94. Country singer Sue Thompson is 94. Singer

Vikki Carr is 80. Blues singer-musician Little Freddie King is 80. Country singer-musician Commander Cody is 76. Actor George Dzundza is 75. Rock singer-musician Alan Gorrie (Average White Band) is 74. International Tennis Hall of Famer Ilie Nastase is 74. Rock musician Brian May is 73. Rock musician Bernie Leadon is

73. Actress Beverly Archer is 72. Movie director Abel Ferrara is 69. Actor Peter Barton is 64. Rock musician Kevin Haskins (Love and Rockets; Bauhaus) is 60. Movie director Atom Egoyan is 60. Actor Campbell Scott is 59. Actor Anthony Edwards is

58. Country singer Kelly Shiver is 57. Actress Clea Lewis is 55. Percusssionist Evelyn Glennie is 55. Country musician Jeremy Patterson is 50. Classical singer Urs Buhler (Il Divo) is 49. Actor Andrew Kavovit is 49. Rock musician Jason Mcgerr (Death Cab for Cutie) is 46. Actor Benedict Cumberbatch is 44. Actress Erin Cummings is 43. TV chef Marcela Valladolid is 42. Actor Chris Sullivan (“This is Us”) is 40. Actor Jared Padalecki is 38. Actor Trai Byers is 37. Actress Kaitlin Doubleday (“Nashville”) is 36. Actor/comedian Dustin Ybarra is 34. Actor Steven Anthony Lawrence is 30.

Monday, July 20, 2020

Today is Monday, July 20, the 202nd day of 2020. There are 164 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On July 20, 1969, astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon after reaching the surface in their Apollo 11 lunar module.

On this date:

In 1923, Mexican revolutionary leader Pancho Villa was assassinated by gunmen in Parral.

In 1944, an attempt by a group of German officials to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a bomb failed as the explosion only wounded the Nazi leader. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was nominated for a fourth term of office at the Democratic convention in Chicago.

In 1951, Jordan’s King Abdullah I was assassinated in Jerusalem by a Palestinian gunman who was shot dead on the spot by security.

In 1960, a pair of Polaris missiles were fired from the submerged USS George Washington off Cape Canaveral, Fla., at a target more than 1,100 miles away.

In 1965, the Bob Dylan single “Like a Rolling Stone” was released by Columbia Records.

In 1968, the first International Special Olympics Summer Games, organized by Eunice Kennedy Shriver, were held at Soldier Field in Chicago.

In 1976, America’s Viking 1 robot spacecraft made a successful, first-ever landing on Mars.

In 1977, a flash flood hit Johnstown, Pennsylvania, killing more than 80 people and causing $350 million worth of damage. The U.N. Security Council voted to admit Vietnam to the world body.

In 1990, Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, one of the court’s most liberal voices, announced he was stepping down.

In 1993, White House deputy counsel Vincent Foster Jr., 48, was found shot to death in a park near Washington, D.C.; his death was ruled a suicide. In 2007, President George W. Bush signed an executive order prohibiting cruel and inhuman treatment, including humiliation or denigration of religious beliefs, in the detention and interrogation of terrorism suspects.

In 2012, gunman James Holmes opened fire inside a crowded movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, during a midnight showing of “The Dark Knight Rises,” killing 12 people and wounding 70 others. (Holmes was later convicted of murder and attempted murder, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.)

Ten years ago: The Senate Judiciary Committee voted almost totally along party lines, 13-6, to approve Elena Kagan to be the Supreme Court’s fourth female justice. Actress Lindsay Lohan began a 14-day jail sentence — reduced from 90 due to overcrowding — for violating probation in 2007 drug case.

Five years ago: The United States and Cuba restored full diplomatic relations after more than five decades of frosty relations rooted in the Cold War. The U.N. Security Council unanimously endorsed a landmark deal to rein in Iran’s nuclear program. Banks in Greece finally reopened after being closed for three weeks. Zach Johnson won the British Open. Songwriter Wayne Carson, 72, died in Nashville, Tennessee. “Archie” cartoonist Tom Moore, 86, died in El Paso, Texas. One year ago: Americans marked the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing; Buzz Aldrin, the second man to set foot on the moon, showed Vice President Mike Pence the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center where the historic flight began. A heat wave that spread from Texas to Maine canceled festivals, horse races and other events. Today’s Birthdays: Actress-singer Sally Ann Howes is 90. Author Cormac Mccarthy is 87. Former Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, D-MD., is 84. Actress Diana Rigg is 82. Artist Judy Chicago is

81. Rock musician John Lodge (The Moody Blues) is 77. Country singer T.G. Sheppard is 76. Singer Kim Carnes is 75. Rock musician Carlos Santana is 73. Rock musician Jay Jay French (Twisted Sister) is 68. Rock musician Paul Cook (The Sex Pistols, Man Raze) is 64. Actress Donna Dixon is

63. Rock musician Mick Mcneil (Simple Minds) is

62. Country singer Radney Foster is 61. Actor Frank Whaley is 57. Actor Dean Winters is 56. Rock musician Stone Gossard (Pearl Jam) is 54. Actor Reed Diamond is 53. Actor Josh Holloway is 51. Singer Vitamin C is 51. Actress Sandra Oh is 49. Actor Omar Epps is 47. Actor Simon Rex is 46. Actress Judy Greer is 45. Actor Charlie Korsmo is 42. Singer Elliott Yamin (YAHMEEN’) (American Idol) is 42. Supermodel Gisele Bundchen is 40. Rock musician Mike Kennerty (The All-american Rejects) is

40. Actor Percy Daggs III is 38. Actor John Francis Daley is 35. Country singer Hannah Blaylock (Edens Edge) is 34. Dancersinger-actress Julianne Hough is 32. Washington Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg is 32. Actress Billi Bruno is 24.