DAILY ALMANAC
Today is Wednesday, Feb. 8, the 39th day of 2023. There are 326 days left in the year. On this date in:
1587: Mary, Queen of Scots was beheaded at Fotheringhay Castle in England after she was implicated in a plot to murder her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I.
1693: A charter was granted for the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg in the Virginia Colony.
1910: The Boy Scouts of America was incorporated.
1922: President Warren G. Harding had a radio installed in the White House.
1924: The first execution by gas in the United States took place at the Nevada State Prison in Carson City as Gee Jon, a Chinese immigrant convicted of murder, was put to death.
1952: Queen Elizabeth II proclaimed her accession to the British throne following the death of her father, King George VI.
1960: Work began on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, located on Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street in Los Angeles.
1965: Eastern Air Lines Flight 663, a DC-7, crashed shortly after takeoff from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport; all 84 people on board were killed. The Supremes’ record “Stop! In the Name of Love!” was released by Motown.
1968: Three Black students were killed in a confrontation between demonstrators and highway patrolmen at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg in the wake of protests over a whites-only bowling alley.
1971: NASDAQ, the world’s first electronic stock exchange, held its first trading day.
1973: Senate leaders named seven members of a select committee to investigate the Watergate scandal, including its chairman, Democrat Sam J. Ervin of North Carolina.
2007: Model, actor and tabloid sensation Anna Nicole Smith died in Hollywood, Florida, at age 39 of an accidental drug overdose.
2020: The U.S. Embassy in Beijing said a 60-year-old U.S. citizen who’d been diagnosed with the coronavirus had died on Feb. 5 in Wuhan; it was apparently the first American fatality from the virus.
Composer-conductor John Williams is 91. ABC News anchor Ted Koppel is 83. Actor Nick Nolte is 82. Comedian Robert Klein is 81. Actor-guitarist
Creed Bratton (“The Office”) (The Grass Roots) is 80. Actor Mary Steenburgen is 70. Author John Grisham is 68. Actor
Henry Czerny (“Revenge,” “The Tudors”) is 64. Singer Vince Neil of Motley Crue is 62. Actor Missy Yager (“Manchester By The Sea”) is 55. Actor Mary Mccormack is 54. Actor
Susan Misner (“Billions,” “The Americans”) is 52. Musician Guy-manuel de Homem-christo of Daft Punk is 49. Actor
Seth Green (“Austin Powers,” “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”) is 49. Actor
Joshua Morrow (“The Young and the Restless”) is 49. Bassist Phoenix of Linkin Park is 46. Actor William Jackson Harper (“The Good Place”) is 43. Actor
Jim Parrack (“True Blood”) is 42. Musician Joey Ryan of Milk Carton Kids is 41. Actor Cecily Strong (“Saturday Night Live”) is 39.