Epic Idiot's what happened
On This Day

October 30

1988
Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis admits to being a "liberal." Bush had been trying to pin the "L" word on him for months.

1974
Rumble in the Jungle: Muhammad Ali beats George Foreman in Zaire for the heavyweight boxing championship.

1943
Gus Bodar scores a goal 15 seconds into his first NHL game.

1941
First U.S. warship sunk in World War II: The destroyer Reuben James is sunk off of Iceland by a German U-boat killing about 100 Americans.

1938
War of the Worlds: Orson Welles panics the nation with his realistic CBS radio broadcast.

1925
First person on TV, a 15-year-old boy working in the London lab inventor John L. Baird.

1888
First welterweight boxing championship: Won by Paddy Duffy.

1768
First Methodist church in America is dedicated, the Wesley Chapel in New York City. (Source: An Almanac of the Christian Church)

1951
Harry Hamlin, American actor. TV: L.A. Law (Michael Kuzak).

1945
Henry Winkler, American actor. TV: Happy Days (The Fonz).

1939
Grace Slick, American singer, with Jefferson Airplane.

1937
Claude Lelouch, French Oscar-winning screenwriter, film director. Film: A Man and a Woman (1966, Oscar).

1936
June Blair (Margaret June Blair), American actress. TV: The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (Dave's wife).

1932
Louis Malle, French film director. Film: Murmur of the Heart (1971), Atlantic City (1980), and My Dinner With Andre (1981).

1931
Dick Gautier, American actor. TV: Get Smart (Hymie the robot).

1923     d. 1986
Herschel Bernardi, American actor. TV: Peter Gunn (Lt. Jacoby) and voice of Charlie the Tuna in the commercials.

1896     d. 1985
Ruth Gordon (Ruth Jones), American Oscar-Emmy-winning actress. Film: Harold and Maude (1971, Maude) and Rosemary's Baby (1968, Oscar).

1895     d. 1964
Gerhard Domagk, German bacteriologist.  He was the first person to refuse a Nobel Prize (1939).  He was awarded the prize for his discovery of the antibacterial effects of Prontosil, the first of the sulfonamide drugs. He used the drug to save his own daughter's arm from amputation. He was forced to refuse the award due to pressure from the Nazi government during WWII. He was able to accept the award after the war.

1885     d. 1972
Ezra Loomis Pound, American poet, winner of the first Bollingen Prize for Poetry from the Library of Congress (1948) for Pisan Cantos. He was charged with treason for making pro-fascist broadcasts in Italy during World War II.

1735     d. 1826
John Adams, first U.S. Vice-President (1789-97) and 2nd U.S. President (1797-1801). Father of the 6th president John Quincy Adams. Both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, died on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

1975     b. 1887
Gustav Hertz, German quantum physicist. He and James Franck received the Nobel Prize for Physics (1925) for confirming the quantum theory that energy can be absorbed by an atom only in definite amounts.

1919     b. 1850
Ella Wheeler Wilcox, American poet. "Laugh and the world laughs with you, weep and you weep alone" is from her poem Solitude.

1919     b. ????
Charles H. Steinway, American piano maker.

1912     b. 1855
James Schoolcraft Sherman, 27th U.S. Vice-President (1909-12).

1910     b. 1828
Jean Henri Dunant, Swiss philanthropist. He founded the International Red Cross (1864) and was co-winner of the first Nobel Peace Prize (1901).

1823     b. 1743
Edmund Cartwright, English inventor. He revolutionized weaving with his invention of the power loom (1785).

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