Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

September 19

2002
Iraq War: Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declares, "There are a number of terrorist states pursuing weapons of mass destruction - Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, just to name a few - but no terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people than the regime of Saddam Hussein and Iraq."

1986
Shanghai Surprise premiers, starring Madonna and Sean Penn.

1983
Kiss: The music group performs on MTV for the first time without make-up.

1981
Simon and Garfunkel reunion: 400,000 people gather in New York's Central Park when the two singers reunite after an 11-year split.

1980
A Titan II missile explodes after a fire in the missile silo, killing one and injuring 21. It was carrying a hydrogen bomb.

1975
The alligator is removed from the endangered species list in parts of Louisiana.

1942
Manhattan Project: Oak Ridge, Tennessee is designated as the secret nuclear research site. More than 1,000 families were relocated to make room for the facility.

1928
First talking cartoon: Walt Disney's Steamboat Willie starring Mickey Mouse is released. The voice was provided by Disney.

1876
First carpet sweeper is patented, by American inventor Melville Bissell.

1787
First newspaper to publish the U.S. Constitution: The Pennsylvania Packet and Daily Advertiser prints the Constitution which had been signed two days earlier.

1967
Jim Abbott, American Major League Baseball pitcher, despite being born with only one hand. He pitched a no-hitter for the New York Yankees against Cleveland (1993) and also won a gold medal pitching for the United States in the 1988 Summer Olympics.

1966
Eric Robert Rudolph, American terrorist. He bombed the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, two abortion clinics, and a lesbian nightclub, killing three people and injuring 150 others. In 2003, after spending more than five years in the Appalachian wilderness as a fugitive, he was captured and sentenced to life in prison.

1950
Joan Lunden, American broadcast journalist.

1949
Twiggy (Leslie Hornby), English actress, model.

1948
Jeremy Irons, English Oscar-winning actor. Film: Reversal of Fortune (1990, Oscar, Claus von Bulow).

1945
Randolph Mantooth, American actor. TV: Emergency! (John Gage) and Loving (Alex Masters).

1941     d. 1974
"Mama" Cass Elliot (Ellen Naomi Cohen), American folk singer, with The Mamas and the Papas. Music: California Dreamin' and Monday, Monday. The urban legend that she died from choking on a ham sandwich are false. She actually died of heart failure.

1940
Paul Williams, American singer, songwriter. He co-wrote hits We've Only Just Begun, Rainy Days and Mondays, and Just an Old Fashioned Love Song.

1934     d. 1967
Brian Epstein, British impresario, discoverer and first manager of The Beatles.

1933
David McCallum, Scottish actor. TV: The Man From UNCLE (Illya Kuryakin).

1928
Adam West (William Anderson), American actor. TV: Batman (Bruce Wayne).

1911     d. 1993
Sir William Golding, British Nobel-winning author. Writings: Lord of the Flies (1954) and Rights of Passage (1980).

1778     d. 1868
Henry Peter Brougham, Scottish orator. "Education makes a people easy to lead, but difficult to drive; easy to govern, but impossible to enslave."

1737     d. 1832
Charles Carroll, American Revolutionary leader. He was the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence, and the richest U.S. citizen at the time of his death.

86 A.D.     d. 161
Antonius Pius, Roman emperor (138-161 A.D.).

1995     b. 1907
Orville Redenbacher, American popcorn maker, co-creator of "snowflake" popcorn.

1968     b. 1906
Chester F. Carlson, American physicist, inventor of the Xerox machine (1959).

1881     b. 1831
James A. Garfield, 20th U.S. President (Mar. 4 - Sept. 19, 1881), assassinated by Charles J. Guiteau.

1860     b. 1808
Thomas Dartmouth Rice, American entertainer, "father of American minstrelsy." In 1828 he began performing Jim Crow - a song he had learned from an elderly black in Kentucky - in blackface. His act became a hit in England (1836), making "Jim Crow" synonymous with blacks.

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