Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

September 24

1992
The Sci-Fi Channel debuts. Its first show was Star Wars.

1968
60 Minutes debuts on CBS, featuring Harry Reasoner and Mike Wallace.

1964
The Munsters debuts on CBS.

1961
Bullwinkle gets his own show when NBC debuts The Bullwinkle Show, a spinoff of Rocky and His Friends.

1960
First nuclear-powered aircraft carrier: The USS Enterprise is launched at Newport, Virginia.

1957
Civil Rights: Pres. Eisenhower orders federal troops to enforce the court order allowing blacks to enter Central High School, Little Rock, Arkansas.

1956
First transatlantic telephone cable goes into operation, between Newfoundland and Scotland.

1955
First U.S. Vice President to temporarily assume the Presidency: Nixon takes charges after Pres. Eisenhower suffers a heart attack.

1954
First hydrogen bomb fatality: A Japanese fisherman dies after having been exposed to fallout from a U.S. H-bomb on March 1.

1951
Famous sex-change operation: George Jorgensen, an American, becomes Christine. It was performed in Denmark under the supervision of Dr. Christian Hamburger.

1929
First blind airplane flight: James H. Doolittle takes off and lands using only instruments.

1895
First around-the-world bicycle trip by a woman: Annie Londonberry arrives back in Boston. She had departed in June of 1894.

1869
Black Friday: Stock market panic due to crashing gold prices caused by an attempt to corner the market by Gould and Fisk.

1852
First flight of a dirigible: Henri Giffard of Paris flies his hydrogen-filled 3-horsepower steam-powered craft.

1794
Whiskey Rebellion: Pres. Washington orders a 15,000-man militia to suppress an uprising of western Pennsylvania farmers. They were protesting an excise duty placed on stills and spirits distilled in the U.S.

1789
Federal Judiciary Act is passed by Congress. It established the six-member U.S. Supreme Court and the office of Attorney General.

1493
Columbus: The explorer sets sail on his second voyage to the "New World," on which he brought the first cattle and discovered the Virgin Islands.

1948
Phil Hartman, Canadian actor. TV: Saturday Night Live.

1943
Lee Aaker, American actor. TV: The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin (Rusty).

1942
Linda McCartney, American photographer, singer, wife of Paul.

1936     d. 1990
Jim Henson, American muppeteer, created the Muppets (1956) and has won 18 Emmy, 7 Grammy, 4 Peabody, and 5 ACE awards. He died of toxic shock syndrome.

1932
Svetlana Beriosova, Russian prima ballerina, created the leads in Le Baiser de la Fée and Perséphone.

1931
Anthony Newley, English singer, actor, composer. Film: Oliver Twist (the Artful Dodger). He and Leslie Bricussse wrote the musical Stop the World, I Want to Get Off.

1924
Shiela MacRae, English singer, actress. TV: The Honeymooners (Alice Kramden from 1966-71).

1921
Jim McKay, American ABC sportscaster.

1911     d. 1985
Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko, president of the Soviet Union and general secretary of Soviet Communist Party.

1905     d. 1993
Severo Ochoa, Spanish-born American Nobel-winning biochemist. He shared the 1959 Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology with Arthur Kornberg for his discoveries that furthered the research in heredity.

1900     d. 1955
Ham Fisher (Hammond Edward Fisher), American cartoonist, created Joe Palooka (1927).

1898     d. 1968
Sir Howard Walter Florey, Australian-born British physician, won a Nobel prize (1945) for his work with Alexander Fleming in developing penicillin.

1896     d. 1940
F. Scott Fitzgerald (Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald), American author. Writings: This Side of Paradise (1920) and The Great Gatsby (1925).

1884     d. 1973
Ismet Inönü, Turkish statesman and its first prime minister (1923-37) and second president (1938-50).

1883     d. ????
Frank C. Mars, American candy maker, founder of Mars, Inc.

1870     d. 1960
Georges Claude, French physicist, inventor of the neon light (1910).

1843     d. 1924
Adam Willis Wagnalls, American publisher, co-founder of Funk & Wagnalls Company (1891), who first published their famous dictionary in 1912.

1755     d. 1835
John Marshall, 4th chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1801-35), and principle founder of the U.S. system of constitutional law. The Liberty Bell cracked whiled tolling his death.

1991     b. 1904
Dr. Seuss (Theodor Seuss Geisel), American Pulitzer-winning children's author. Books: The Cat in the Hat (1957), How the Grinch Stole Christmas (1957), and Green Eggs and Ham (1960). He won a 1946 Oscar for his documentary Hitler Lives.

1952     b. circa 1876
John Washington Butler, American politician, Tennessee state senator, author of the anti-evolution law which resulted in the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial.

1945     b. 1882
Hans Geiger, German physicist, inventor of the Geiger counter (1908). He also helped to prove that the atom is composed of a dense nucleus surrounded by electrons (1913).

1939     b. 1867
Carl Laemmle, German-born American motion picture executive. He founded Universal Pictures (1912) and was one of the first to promote actors by their own names.

1834     b. 1798
Pedro I, first Emperor of Brazil (1822-31).

1815     b. 1745
John Sevier, American pioneer and Indian fighter, first and only governor (1785-88) of the American state of Franklin. He was also the first governor (1796-1801) of Tennessee.

1541     b. 1493
Paracelsus, Swiss physician, alchemist. He was one of the first to recognize that illnesses had specific causes that could be treated, as opposed to the then-current belief that they were caused by the imbalance of body fluids.

1143     b. ????
Innocent II, Italian religious leader, 164th Pope (1130-43).

366     b. ????
Liberius, Italian religious leader, 36th Pope (352-366).

Please send Corrections and Omissions to epicidiot.com