Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

February 25

1987
Iran-Contra Affair: Fawn Hall admits to destroying papers for her boss Lt. Col. Oliver North.

1981
9-year-old bank robber: A boy robs a New York bank at gunpoint. He got away with $118, but later surrendered to the FBI.

1972
Love, American Style airs a segment called Love and the Happy Day starring Ron Howard and Anson Williams. Happy Days was a spin-off of this segment.

1964
Muhammad Ali: The boxing legend wins his first of three heavyweight titles by beating Sonny Liston.

1940
First televised hockey game: W2XBS of New York broadcast a game between the New York Dodgers and the Montreal Canadians.

1913
16th Amendment goes into effect. It gave Congress the power to lay and collect income taxes.

1837
First practical electric motor is patented, by Thomas Davenport.

1836
Samuel Colt patents his revolver.

1791
Bank of the U.S. is chartered.

1751
First performing monkey in the U.S.: A New York City man charged a schilling to watch a two-foot tall monkey walk a tightrope and dance. (Source: Famous First Facts)

1943     d. 2001
George Harrison, British singer, one of the Beatles.

1938
Diane Baker, actress, director, writer.

1937
Tom Courtenay, English actor. Film: Doctor Zhivago (1965) and The Dresser (1983).

1928
Paul Elvstrom, Danish yachtsman. He tied the record for longest span of Olympic competition (1948-88). He also pioneering the technique of "hiking" (aka "sitting out."). He was the first to use toe-straps in the bottom of his dinghy to enable him to get more of his body weight outside the boat. (source: Guinness Book of World Records)

1918
Bobby Riggs, American tennis player. He lost to Billy Jean King in "The match of the century" (1973).

1917     d. 1993
Anthony Burgess (John Anthony Burgess Wilson), British author. Writings: A Clockwork Orange (1962).

1913     d. 1989
Jim Backus (James Gilmore Backus), American actor. TV: Gilligan's Island (Thurston Howell III) and Mr. Magoo (voice of Magoo).

1913     d. 1988
Gert Frobe (Karl-Gerhard Frobe), actor. Film: Goldfinger (1964, Auric Goldfinger).

1907     d. 1981
Mary Coyle Chase, American Pulitzer-winning playwright. Plays: Harvey (1944, about an oversized imaginary rabbit).

1901     d. 1979
Zeppo Marx (Herbert Marx), American comedian, one of the Marx Brothers.

1873     d. 1921
Enrico Caruso, Italian tenor, known for his power and control in performances such as Rigoletto and Pagliacci.

2006     b. 1918
Henry Morris, American young earth creationist, considered to be the father of modern creation science.  Co-wrote The Genesis Flood (1961) which used the great flood to explain many geological formations.

2006     b. 1922
Darren McGavin (William Lyle Richardson), American Emmy-winning actor. TV: Mike Hammer (1957, title role), The Night Stalker (Carl Kolchak) and Murphy Brown (Murphy's dad). Film: A Christmas Story (1983, Father)

1999     b. 1912
Glenn Theodore Seaborg, American Nobel-winning chemist. He was the co-discoverer of plutonium (1940), for which he shared a 1951 Nobel Prize, the isotope plutonium 239 (1941), americium (1944), curium (1944), berkelium (1949), and californium (1950).

1985     b. 1907
Rudd Weatherwax, American actor, animal trainer.  Lassie's trainer for the film Lassie Come Home (1943) and the TV series.  He is also the uncle of Ken Weatherwax who played Pugsley in The Addams Family.

1983     b. 1911
Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams), American Pulitzer-winning playwright. Writings: The Glass Menagerie (1944), A Streetcar Named Desire (1947, Pulitzer), and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955, Pulitzer).

1914     b. 1820
Sir John Tenniel, English illustrator. He illustrated Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.

1895     b. 1814
Royal Earl House, American inventor. He patented a printing telegraph (1846), and was the first to use stranded wire for telegraph lines.

1723     b. 1632
Sir Christopher Wren, English architect, designed and built St. Paul's Cathedral in London (1675-1710) and designed the towers of Westminster Abbey (1713).

1713     b. 1657
Frederick I, first King of Prussia (1701-13).

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