Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

July 17

1990
Baseball: The Minnesota Twins become the first team to score two triple plays in the same game. They still lost 1-0 to the Boston Red Sox.

1984
First woman to walk in space: Soviet Soyuz T-12 is launched with cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya. She made her historic walk on July 25th.

1981
Hyatt Regency disaster: Two concrete skywalks fall onto a crowd of 1,500 people at the Kansas City hotel killing 114. Two engineers, who designed the skywalks, had their licenses revoked in 1986.

1969
Space Flight Is Possible: The New York Times publishes an apology for a 1920 article ridiculing Dr. Goddard's theory that rockets could function in the vacuum of space. This came after the successful launch of Apollo 11 on its way to the Moon. (One might say they had to "Apollo-gize")

1955
Nuclear Power: Arco, Idaho becomes the first town powered entirely by atomic energy when a 3,500-watt experimental power plant went on line for an hour.

1954
First major-league baseball game in which the majority of a team's players were black: The Brooklyn Dodgers - which included black greats Jackie Robinson and Roy Campanella - lose 6-1 to the Milwaukee Braves. (Source: Famous First Facts)

1946
First American Saint: Mother Frances Xavier Cabrina (1850-1917), founder of the Institute of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart, is declared a saint by the Roman Catholic Church. She is the Patron Saint of Emigrants.

1944
WWII - Port Chicago Mutiny: An ammunitions depot in Port Chicago, California explodes killing 320 men, including 202 blacks assigned by the Navy to handle explosives. The unsafe working conditions continued, resulting in 258 out of the 320 African-American sailors in the ordnance battalion refusing to load ammunitions. Fifty black men were later convicted for refusing to return to work.

1941
Baseball: Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak comes to an end. He had 91 hits for a .408 average.

1938
Wrong-Way Corrigan: The American aviator takes off from New York making a nonstop transatlantic flight - without a permit - landing in Ireland the next day. He claimed he had intended to fly to Los Angeles, but had followed the wrong end of his compass.

1936
Spanish Civil War: The war starts with an Armed Forces rebellion against the recently-elected leftist Popular Front government of Spain.

1924
Future baby doctor Benjamin Spock wins an Olympic gold medal for rowing.

1918
Russian Revolution: Czar Nicholas II, his wife, and three of his five children are killed by the Bolsheviks during the aftermath of the revolution. The bodies of his two other children, Alexi and Anastasia have never been found.

1866
First U.S. underwater highway tunnel: The Washington St. Tunnel beneath the Chicago River in Chicago is authorized. It was completed in 1869.

1862
Blacks in the military: Pres. Lincoln signs the first federal law allowing persons of African descent to serve in the U.S. military. Over 186,000 would eventually serve in Union forces during the Civil War.

1861
First U.S. paper money: Congress authorizes $50,000,000 in demand notes. Issue began on March 10, 1862 in denominations of $5, $10, and $20, but they weren't declared legal tender until March 17th. (Source: Famous First Facts)

1790
First sewing machine: English cabinetmaker Thomas Saint patents a machine with features that are basic to most modern sewing machines. It is not known if he ever built one.

1453
100 Years War: France defeats England at Castillon ending the war. The British lost possession of all land in France except Calais.

1952
Phoebe Snow (Phoebe Laub), American singer, Poetry Man (1974).

1952
David Hasselhoff, American actor. TV: The Young and the Restless, Knight Rider, and Baywatch.

1951
Lucie Arnaz, American actress, daughter of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.

1935
Donald Sutherland, Canadian actor. Film: M*A*S*H (1970, Hawkeye), Don't Look Now (1973), and Ordinary People (1980).

1935
Diahann Carroll (Carol Diahann Johnson), American actress, singer. She was the first black woman to star in a TV series (1968-71, Julia), since Beulah (1950-53) and the first black woman to star in a TV series in which she didn't play a domestic.

1920     d. 2005
Gordon Gould, American Physicist. He is credited with inventing the laser (1957) and he also coined the term "laser" (Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation).

1917
Phyllis Diller (Phyllis Driver), American comedienne, actress. She got her start when, as a 40-year-old mother of five, she began doing stand-up.

1912
Art Linkletter, Canadian-born TV personality.

1905     d. 1979
William Gargan, American actor. TV: Martin Kane, Private Eye (title role). After losing his voice to cancer in 1960, he became an anti-smoking advocate.

1899     d. 1986
James Cagney, American Oscar-winning actor. Film: Mr. Roberts (1955, the captain). He started his career as a female impersonator in a New York revue.

1894     d. 1966
Father Georges-Henri Lemaître, Belgian astronomer, Roman Catholic Priest. He first proposed what later became known as the Big Bang to explain the origin of the Universe (1931). Einstein initially derided his theories, but later stated that not accepting them was the greatest error of his life. He was the very first recipient of the Eddington Medal award of the Royal Astronomical Society.

1889     d. 1970
Erle Stanley Gardner, American lawyer, author, creator of Perry Mason (1933).

1827     d. 1902
Sir Frederick Abel, English chemist. With Sir James Dewar, he invented cordite, a smokeless explosive (1891). Used by the British army in WWI, it enabled the battlefield to remain visible during heavy bombings.

1744     d. 1814
Elbridge Gerry, 5th U.S. Vice-President (1813-14), signer of the Declaration of Independence, father of the "gerrymander."

1674     d. 1748
Isaac Watts, English clergyman, founder of modern English hymnody, and author of the hymn Joy To the World (1719). (Source: An Almanac of the Christian Church)

2006     b. 1918
Mickey Spillane (Frank Morrison), American author, creator of the hardboiled detective Mike Hammer. He has sold over 100 million books and inspired several TV series and movies. He started out as a comic book writer, working on titles such as Captain America, Human Torch, and Submariner. Writings: I, the Jury (1947), Kiss Me, Deadly (1952), and The Deep (1961)

2005     b. 1916
Sir Edward Heath, British prime minister (1970-74). An avid yachtsman, he captained Britain's winning team for the Admiral's Cup in 1971.

1974     b. 1911
Dizzy Dean (Jay Hanna Dean), American baseball Hall of Famer and sports announcer.

1967     b. 1926
John Coltrane, American tenor saxophonist, the most influential jazz musician of the 60s. Music: My Favorite Things (1960).

1961     b. 1886
Ty Cobb (Tyrus Raymond Cobb), American baseball player, "The Georgia Peach." He was the first person elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame (1936).

1959     b. 1915
Billie Holiday (Eleanora Fagan McKay), American blues singer, performed with Benny Goodman and Count Basie.

1956     b. 1878
Gus "Watso" Mager, American cartoonist, created Sherlocko the Monk (1910).

1887     b. 1802
Dorothea Lynde Dix, American philanthropist and prison reformer. She also helped establish over 30 hospitals for the mentally ill.

1790     b. 1723
Adam Smith, British moral philosopher, political economist, author of Wealth of Nations (1776), the first systematic formulation of classical English economics.

855     b. ????
Saint Leo IV, Italian religious leader, 103rd Pope (847-855).

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