This week!

Disney’s 66-acre Blizzard Beach Water Park opened in Orlando, Florida, in 1995. The third most-visited water park in the world, it’s only outdone by its sister water park, Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon, and China’s Chimelong Water Park!

Two college dropouts— Bill Gates and Paul Allen—founded Microsoft in 1975. Gates’ super-computing powers were so evident at an early age that his high school enlisted him to write a computer program to schedule students into classes. Gates complied, secretly setting it up to put him in the classes with the most girls!

What would become America’s longest-running soap opera, General Hospital, first aired on ABC in 1963. The show proved so popular that an estimated 30 million people tuned in to see the marriage of its super-couple, Luke Spencer and Laura Webber. Elizabeth Taylor even made a cameo and Princess Diana sent Champagne!

The first cellphone call was made from a street in New York City in 1973. Martin Cooper, a Motorola researcher and executive, used a bricklike 30-ounce phone to dial his chief competitor, Joel S. Engel, PH.D., of Bell Labs. Cooper’s gloating “Hello” was met with silence on the other end of the line!

The Oscar-winning biographical war film Patton, about General George S. Patton, was released in theaters in 1970. Before becoming one of the most successful combat generals in U.S. history, Patton was a top swordsmen at West Point. He was also an Olympic athlete, competing in the pentathlon at the 1912 Summer Games in Stockholm, where he came in fifth!