Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

March 20

2003
Iraq War: The U.S. begins bombing Iraq.

1987
First AIDS drug: AZT is approved by the FDA.

1976
Patty Hearst is convicted of bank robbery and sentenced to seven years. She participated in the crime with Symbionese Liberation Army who had abducted her in 1974.

1969
The Beatles: John Lennon marries Yoko Ono.

1907
Typhoid Mary (Mary Mallon) is apprehended in New York. She was suspected of causing 24 cases of the disease while working as a cook.

1897
First comic book: The Yellow Kid, by Richard Felton Outcault, is released.

1886
First U.S. alternating current (AC) power plant to go into commercial operation, Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

1856
First U.S. governor removed from office by a state supreme court. W.A. Barstow of Wisconsin for election irregularities.

1852
Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, is published in book form. It became the first American novel to sell 1,000,000 copies. It had previously been published as a serial in a Washington D.C. anti-slavery newspaper.

1841
The Murders in the Rue Morgue, by Edgar Allen Poe, is published, establishing the literary genre of the detective story.

1833
First U.S. treaty with a Far Eastern country, the Treaty of Amity and Commerce with Siam, is signed. It was ratified in 1836.

1782
Lord North resigns as Prime Minister of England, due to pressure from the peace faction in Parliament.

1958
Holly Hunter, American Oscar-winning actress. Film: Broadcast News (1987), Raising Arizona (1987), and The Piano (Oscar).

1957
Spike Lee (Shelton Jackson Lee), American actor, director. Film: She's Gotta Have It (1986), School Daze (1988), Do the Right Thing (1989), and Jungle Fever (1991). In 1992, he took out an ad in Rolling Stone magazine claiming that AIDS is a government plot, against gays, blacks, and Hispanics, that went out of control.

1951
Carl Palmer, British Drummer, with Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Music: Lucky Man (1970), Tarkus (1971), and Brain Salad Surgery (1974).

1950
William Hurt, American Oscar-winning actor. Film: Altered States (1980), Body Heat (1981), Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985, Oscar), and Broadcast News (1987).

1945
Pat Riley, American basketball coach, coached the Lakers to four NBA championships and was twice named NBA Coach of the Year.

1943
Paul Junger Witt, American Emmy-winning film producer, Brian's Song, and The Golden Girls.

1937
Jerry Reed (Jerry Hubbard), American Grammy-winning country musician, actor. Music: Lord, Mr. Ford (1973, #1). Film: Smokey and the Bandit.

1935
Ted Bessel, American director. TV: The Tracey Ullman Show.

1931
Hal Linden (Harold Lipshitz), American Emmy-winning actor, singer. TV: Barney Miller (title role).

1928     d. 2003
Fred M. Rogers, American children's entertainer. TV: Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.  One of his sweaters is on display at the Smithsonian.

1922     d. 1990
Ray Goulding, of the comedy team Bob & Ray.

1922
Carl Reiner, American actor, writer. He created the Dick Van Dyke Show and co-created, with Mel Brooks, the 2,000-year-old man.

1919
Vera Lynn (Vera Welch), British singer. She became the first British artist to hit #1 on the American Billboard chart (1952) with Auf Wiederseh'n, Sweetheart.

1918     d. 1984
Jack Barry, American game-show host, Joker's Wild and Twenty-One, which was involved in the '50s game show scandals.

1907     d. 1975
Ozzie Nelson (Oswald George Nelson), American actor, musician. TV: The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (creator and star).

1904     d. 1990
B.F. Skinner (Burrhus Frederic Skinner), American psychologist, pioneer in behaviorism.

1903     d. 1979
Edgar Buchanan, American actor. TV: Petticoat Junction (Uncle Joe) and Green Acres (Uncle Joe).

1856     d. 1915
Frederick Winslow Taylor, America's first efficiency expert, called the father of scientific management.

1741     d. 1828
Jean Antoine Houdon, French sculpture, created the bust of George Washington (1788) that now appears on the U.S. quarter.

43 B.C.     d. 18 A.D.
Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso), Roman poet. Writings: Metamorphoses and Heroides.

1974     b. 1911
Chet Huntley (Chester Robert Huntley), American newsman. TV: NBC's Huntley-Brinkley Report. "Goodnight, Chet."

1932     b. 1870
Ilya Ivanovich Ivanov, Soviet biologist, specializing in artificial insemination. He tried to create a human-ape hybrid via artificial insemination as part of Stalin's quest for a super-warrior. (More...)

1928     b. 1863
James Ward Packard, American inventor, automobile maker.

1908     b. 1842
Sgt.William Harvey Carney, American soldier, the first black to receive the Medal of Honor (1900) for bravery in 1863. During the Civil War assault on Fort Wagner in Charleston, South Carolina, Carney, although wounded four times, struggled across the battlefield and retrieved the Union flag. This battle is portrayed in the film Glory (1989).

1899     b. ????
Martha M. Place, American murderer, first woman executed in the electric chair. She had been convicted of killing her stepdaughter.

1727     b. 1642
Sir Isaac Newton, English mathematician, philosopher, astronomer. He discovered the three laws of motion, the law of gravity, and invented calculus.

1413     b. 1367
Henry IV, King of England (1399-1413).

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