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Saturday, October 04, 2008

OCTOBER 4TH

Today is Saturday, Oct. 4, the 278th day of 2008.
There are 88 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

  • On Oct. 4, 1957, the Space Age began as the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite, into orbit.

On this date:

  • In 1777, George Washington's troops launched an assault on the British at Germantown, Pa., resulting in heavy American casualties.
  • In 1822, Rutherford B. Hayes, the 19th president of the United States, was born in Delaware, Ohio.
  • In 1940, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini conferred at Brenner Pass in the Alps.
  • In 1957, Jimmy Hoffa was elected president of the Teamsters Union.
  • In 1958, the first trans-Atlantic passenger jetliner service was begun by the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) with flights between London and New York.
  • In 1965, Pope Paul VI became the first pope to visit the Western Hemisphere as he addressed the U.N. General Assembly.
  • In 1970, rock singer Janis Joplin, 27, was found dead in her Hollywood, Calif., hotel room.
  • In 1976, agriculture secretary Earl Butz resigned in the wake of a controversy over a joke he'd made about blacks.
  • In 1978, a funeral mass was held at the Vatican for Pope John Paul I.
  • In 1980, some 520 people were forced to abandon the cruise ship Prinsendam in the Gulf of Alaska after the Dutch luxury liner caught fire; no deaths or serious injury resulted. (The ship capsized and sank a week later.)

Ten years ago:
  • Russian envoys warned Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic that NATO might launch airstrikes unless he took "decisive measures" to end the humanitarian crisis in the southern province of Kosovo.
  • Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso won re-election.

Five years ago:
  • A Palestinian woman blew herself up inside a restaurant in Haifa, Israel, killing 21 bystanders.

One year ago:
  • Idaho Sen. Larry Craig defiantly vowed to serve out his term in office despite losing a court attempt to rescind his guilty plea in a men's room sex sting.
  • Former city maintenance worker John Ashley shot five people in a law office in Alexandria, La., killing two of them; Ashley was shot and killed by police following a standoff.
  • South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il pledged to pursue a peace treaty and end their countries' decades-long standoff.

Today's Birthdays:
  • Country singer Leroy Van Dyke is 79.
  • Actress Felicia Farr is 76.
  • Actor Eddie Applegate is 73.
  • Author Roy Blount Jr. is 67.
  • Author Anne Rice is 67.
  • Actress Lori Saunders ("Petticoat Junction") is 67.
  • Actor Clifton Davis is 63.
  • Actress Susan Sarandon is 62.
  • Blues musician Duke Robillard is 60.
  • Playwright Lee Blessing is 59.
  • Actor Armand Assante is 59.
  • Actor Alan Rosenberg is 58.
  • Actor Bill Fagerbakke is 51.
  • Producer Russell Simmons is 51.
  • Musician Chris Lowe (The Pet Shop Boys) is 49.
  • Country musician Gregg "Hobie" Hubbard (Sawyer Brown) is 48.
  • Actor David W. Harper is 47.
  • Singer Jon Secada is 47.
  • TV personality John Melendez ("The Tonight Show") is 43.
  • Actor Liev Schreiber is 41.
  • Actor Abraham Benrubi is 39.
  • Country singer-musician Heidi Newfield is 38.
  • Rock musician Andy Parle is 38.
  • Actress Alicia Silverstone is 32.
  • Actor Phillip Glasser is 30.
  • Rock singer-musician Marc Roberge (O.A.R.) is 30.
  • Actress Rachael Leigh Cook is 29.
  • Actor Jimmy Workman is 28.
  • Rhythm-and-blues singer Jessica Benson (3lw) is 21.
  • Actor Michael Charles Roman is 21.
  • Figure skater Kimmie Meisner is 19.

Thought for Today:
"He who confers a favor should at once forget it, if he is not to show a sordid, ungenerous spirit."
Demosthenes, Greek statesman (384 B.C.E.-322 B.C.E.).


"Let's all be careful out there!"