January 20, 2024
QUOTE
Too bad that all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair.
--George Burns
BIRTHDAYS
1896 – George Burns, American actor, comedian, and producer
1920 – DeForest Kelley, American actor
1923 – Slim Whitman, American country and western singer-songwriter and musician
1929 – Fireball Roberts, American race car driver
1930 – Buzz Aldrin, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut
IN MEMORY
1947 – Josh Gibson, American baseball player
1990 – Barbara Stanwyck, American actress
1993 – Audrey Hepburn, British actress and humanitarian activist
2022 – Meat Loaf, American singer and actor
IN ON THIS DAY
1265 – The first English parliament to include not only Lords but also representatives of the major towns holds its first meeting in the Palace of Westminster, now commonly known as the “Houses of Parliament”.
1841 – Hong Kong Island is occupied by the British during the First Opium War.
1887 – The United States Senate allows the Navy to lease Pearl Harbor as a naval base.
1909 – Newly formed automaker General Motors (GM) buys into the Oakland Motor Car Company, which later becomes GM’s long-running Pontiac division.
1953 – Dwight D. Eisenhower is inaugurated as the 34th President of the United States of America, becoming the first president to begin his presidency on January 20 since the 20th Amendment changed the dates of presidential terms.