View todays celebrity birthdays and find out what happened in history today.
What : day is it
1955 – The Famous Flames, led by singer James Brown, cut their first demo of Please, Please, Please at a radio station in Macon Georgia. It would lead to their signing with King Records.
1956 – Elvis Presley buys a new Harley Davidson motorbike and spends the day riding round Memphis with actress Natalie Wood. On the same day, Hungary withdraws from the Warsaw Pact,
1962 – Greece enters the European Common Market.
1966 – The Viet Cong shells the South Vietnamese capital Saigon.
1970 – A fire at a nightclub near Grenoble in France kills 142 people, most of them teenagers.
1972 – Poet Ezra Pound dies aged 87.
1981 – Antigua & Barbuda gains independence from Britain.
1985 – Comedy actor Phil Silvers dies aged 73.
1986 – A fire at a chemicals factory near Basle, Switzerland, sends tons of toxic chemicals into the river Rhine, turning it red.
1990 – Deputy prime minister Sir Geoffrey Howe resigns from Government over the prime minister’s policies towards Europe.
1993
The Maastricht Treaty came into effect, and with it, the European Union was formed.
The original twelve nations that signed the treaty were Spain, Portugal, Germany, the Irish Republic, France, Denmark, Great Britain, Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Greece.
1996 – The original cartoon series of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles aired its final episode. Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird invented the TMNT in 1984 in comic book form.
1998 – The European Court of Human Rights is instituted. On the same day, McLaren driver Mika Häkkinen wins the season ending Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka to claim his first Formula 1 World Drivers Championship.
2007 – Martina Hingis admits testing positive for cocaine during Wimbledon, maintains her innocence but retires from tennis.
2008 – Death of Jimmy Carl Black, former drummer with The Mothers Of Invention.
2009 – Mercedes driver Jenson Button finishes third in the inaugural Abu Dhabi Grand Prix at the Yas Marina Circuit to win the Formula 1 World Drivers Championship.
Did you know, the Colgate toothpaste company started out making starch, soap, and candles.
The plural of octopus is ‘octopuses’ or ‘octopodes.’ The word ‘octopi’ is actually incorrect.
Eventually, we will find a planet which is perfectly habitable for us in every way but we won’t be able to get there without a good looking astronaut/actor.
The Capital of Grenada is Saint George’s
Over 40,000 negatives by John F. Kennedy’s personal photographer chronicling the Kennedy’s and JFK’s presidential career were lost on 9/11 as they were stored in a safe-deposit vault at the JP Morgan Chase bank branch at 5 World Trade Centre.
TV Quotes… “What you see is what you get!” (Geraldine) on “The Flip Wilson Show”
Gary Cooper – Real Name: Francis Cooper
The richest man that drowned on the Titanic, John Jacob Astor IV, left his wife a five-million-dollar fund, the use of his mansion in New York, one of his limos, and five of his prize horses on the condition she wouldn’t remarry… she did.
New York City is farther south than Rome, Italy
Frito-Lay created an environmentally friendly 100% compostable chip bag but had to remove it from the market because people complained that it was too noisy.
The average shot length in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” is 6.7 seconds.
Every year is a smaller and smaller percentage of my life, maybe that’s why they seem to go faster and faster. #quantumthoughts
“I’ve been called over the top. How silly. If you don’t go over the top, you can’t see what’s on the other side.” – Jim Steinman
“Money can buy you a fine dog, but only love can make him wag his tail.” – Kinky Friedman
“It is the first day of November and so, today, someone will die.” – Maggie Stiefvater
2018 – Xi’an, China, introduced a pedestrian lane for people who walk while looking at their phones.
1993 – The Holbeck Hall Hotel in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, fell into the sea following a landslide, making news around the world.
1805 – The first Trooping of the Colour took place on Horse Guards Parade. It was Edward VII who moved Trooping the Colour to its June date, because of the vagaries of British weather.