Paradise Driver

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Today is Sunday, March 14th.

The 74th day of 2004.

There are 292 days left in the year.



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Today's Highlight in History:



On March 14, 1743, the first recorded town meeting in America was held, at Faneuil Hall in Boston.



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On this date:



In 1629, a royal charter established the Massachusetts Bay colony.



In 1644, England granted a patent for Providence Plantations (now Rhode Island).



In 1794, Eli Whitney received a patent for his cotton gin, an invention that revolutionized America's cotton industry.



In 1879, American physicist and Nobel laureate, Alebert Einstein, was born in Ulm, Gemany. Best known as the creator of the "special" and "general theories of relativity" and for his bold hypothesis concerning the particle nature of light. He is perhaps the most well-known scientist of the 20th century. He died in 1955.



In 1883, Karl Marx, a Prussian political theorist, economist, and sociologist whose ideas formed the basis of communism, died in London, England, at the age of 65.



In 1891, The submarine Monarc laid telephone cable along the English Channel bed to prepare for the first telephone links across the Channel.



In 1891, the International Copyright Act was approved.



In 1900, Congress ratified the Gold Standard Act.



In 1900, In Holland, Botanist Hugo de Vries rediscovered "Mendel's laws of heredity".



In 1903, The United States Senate ratifies the Hay-Herran Treaty, which guarantees the U.S. the right to build a canal at Panama.



In 1904, The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the government's claim that the Northern Securities Company was an illegal merger between the Great Northern and Northern Pacific Railway companies.



In 1914, Henry Ford announced the new continuous motion method to assemble cars.



In 1918, The first seagoing ship made of concrete was launched at Redwood City, CA, near San Francisco. The ship was named "Faith" and those who launched her had plenty of that. They had faith that the vessel wouldn't sink. It didn't. "Faith" cost $750,000 to build.



In 1923, Warren G. Harding became the first president to file an income tax report.



In 1935, Donald Duck makes his first appearance in the Mickey Mouse daily newspaper comic strip.



In 1936, Adolf Hitler told a crowd of 300,000 that Germany's only judge is God and itself.



In 1939, the republic of Czechoslovakia was dissolved, opening the way for Nazi occupation.



In 1943, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt became the first U.S. President to fly in an airplane while in office.



In 1943, Aaron Copland's orchestral work "Fanfare for the Common Man" premiered in New York, with George Szell conducting.



In 1945, In Germany, a 22,000 pound "Grand Slam" bomb was dropped by the Royal Air Force Dambuster Squad on the Beilefeld railway viaduct. It was the heaviest bomb used during World War II.



In 1947, Moscow announced that 890,532 German POWs were held in the U.S.S.R.



In 1950, The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) begins its “10 Most Wanted Fugitives” program.



In 1951, during the Korean War, United Nations forces recaptured Seoul.



In 1954, Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio were married. They were only married about 9 months.



In 1955, Elvis Presley was interviewed on Jimmy Dean's "Town & Country Jubliee" television show. Elvis did not perform.



In 1964, a jury in Dallas found Jack Ruby guilty of murdering Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin of President Kennedy.



In 1965, Israel's cabinet formally approved establishment of diplomatic relations with West Germany.



In 1965, Petula Clark made her American TV debut on CBS' "Ed Sullivan Show."



In 1967, the body of President Kennedy was moved from a temporary grave to a permanent memorial site at Arlington National Cemetery.



In 1968, The final episode of "Batman" aired on ABC.



In 1989, Imported assault guns were banned in the U.S. under President George H. W. Bush.



In 1991, a British court reversed the convictions of the Birmingham Six, who had spent 16 years in prison for an Irish Republican Army bombing, and ordered them released.



In 1995, American astronaut Norman Thagard became the first American to enter space aboard a Russian rocket.



In 1996, U.S. President Bill Clinton committed $100 million for an anti-terrorism pact with Israel to track down and root out Islamic militants.



In 1998, An earthquake left 10,000 homeless in southeastern Iran.



In 1998, Carolina farmers began assessing damage to their frost-bitten peach and strawberry crops as a result of three days of freezing weather. A third hard freeze overnight ruined tiny peaches emerging on early blooming trees in North and South Carolina orchards.



In 1998, Israeli Infrastructure Minister Ariel Sharon told an Israeli television station that Israel would try again to assassinate Hamas leader Khaled Meshal.



Ten years ago (1994):



Associate Attorney General Webster Hubbell, a longtime friend of President and Mrs. Clinton, resigned because of controversy over billings he'd charged while in private law practice.



Secretary of State Warren Christopher wrapped up three days of meetings with Chinese leaders, who rejected attempts to link their human rights record with preferred trade status.



Apple introduces the Power Macintosh.



Five years ago (1999):



The Clinton administration conceded the Chinese had gained from technology allegedly stolen from a federal nuclear weapons lab but insisted the government responded decisively; Republicans disagreed and pressed for a comprehensive review of U.S. policy toward China.



One year ago (2003):



U.S. President George W. Bush extended a waiver of sanctions against Pakistan. The sanctions were removed due to President Pervez Musharraf siding with the United States after the terrorist attacks against the U.S. on September 11, 2001.



Actor Robert Blake was released from jail on $1.5 million bail, 11 months after he was arrested on charges of murdering his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley.



Christopher Boyce, whose Cold War spying was immortalized on film in "The Falcon and the Snowman," was released from a halfway house in San Francisco after about a quarter-century in prison.



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Today's Birthdays:



Former astronaut Frank Borman is 76.



Singer Phil Phillips is 73.



Actor Michael Caine is 71.



Composer-conductor Quincy Jones is 71.



Former astronaut Eugene Cernan is 70.



Movie director Wolfgang Petersen is 63.



Country singer Michael Martin Murphey is 59.



Rock musician Walt Parazaider (Chicago) is 59.



Actor Steve Kanaly is 58.



Comedian Billy Crystal is 56.



Country singer Jann Browne is 50.



Actor Adrian Zmed is 50.



Prince Albert of Monaco is 46.



Actress Penny Johnson Jerald is 43.



Producer-director-writer Kevin Williamson is 39.



Actress Megan Follows is 36.



Actress Elise Neal is 34.



Rock musician Derrick (Jimmie's Chicken Shack) is 32.



Actor Jake Fogelnest is 25.



Actor Chris Klein is 25.



Actress Kate Maberly is 22.



Singer-musician Taylor Hanson (Hanson) is 21.



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Thought for Today:

"The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity." -

- George Bernard Shaw, Irish-born playwright (1856-1950).

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