July 17th

Many, many things happened throughout history on this date. Since this is such a momentous day I thought I'd share a few of them with you.

2008 - Robin turned 51
1997 - F.W. Woolworth company closed after 117 years in business
1988 - Highest temperature ever recorded in San Francisco, 103 degrees
1974 - John Lennon is ordered to leave U.S. in 60 days
1967 - Monkees perform at Forest Hills, New York, Jimi Hendrix is opening act
1959 - Dr. Leakey discovers oldest human skull (600,000 years old)
1957 - I was born!!!!
1957 - An Air Force RB-47, equipped with ECM gear (electronic countermeasures) was followed by an UFO for over 700 miles
1955 - Disneyland opened
1947 - Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall born
1936 - Spanish civil war started
1917 - British Royal family changes its name from Hanover to Windsor
1889 - Erle Stanley Gardner born (cool, I didn't know that!)
1881 - Jim Bridger died
1861 - Congress authorizes paper money
1850 - Harvard Observatory takes 1st photograph of a star, Vega
1790 - Thomas Saint patented the first sewing machine
1585 - English secret service discovers Anthony Babingtons murder plot against queen Elizabeth I
1203 - 4th Crusade captures Constantinople

And in case you are wondering, this is what 1957 looked like in the United States:

President: Dwight D. Eisenhower
Vice President: Richard M. Nixon
U.S. Population: 171,984,130

• There are 47,200,000 TV sets in use in 39,500,000 homes.
• Leave It to Beaver premier's on CBS, ushering in an era of television shows that depict the ideal American.
• Top Movies: The Bridge on the River Kwai, Twelve Angry Men, Sayonara, Peyton Place, Witness for the Prosecution, Around the World in 80 Days, Friendly Persuasion, Giant, The King and I and The Ten Commandments
• Top Books: James Agee, A Death in the Family; John Cheever, The Wapshot Chronicle; Noam Chomsky, Syntactic Structures; Lawrence Durrell, Justine; Jack Kerouac, On the Road; Denise Levertov, Here and Now; Bernard Malamud, The Assistant; Robert Penn Warren, Promises: Poems 1954-56
• General Foods Corp. introduces TANG breakfast beverage crystals.
• The 13-year-old Bobby Fisher becomes a chess champion.
• You'd find 2,974 AM radio, 530 FM radio and 471 TV Stations.
• Eveready produces "AA" size alkaline batteries for use in "personal transistor radios."
• Cost of first class stamp - 3 cents.
• B-52 bombers begin full-time flying alert in case of USSR attack.
• One thousand computers are sold. And not one of them had a Windows operating system.
• Wagon Train debuts on TV.
• American Bandstand goes national on August 5, 1957 with Dick Clark as the host.
• The average American production worker is now making $82.32 a week.
• 5,000 new products will hit the supermarket shelves, including frozen pizza.
• Introduced in the fall of '57 for the '58 season, the Edsel came into the world with a big fanfare and lots of hoopla.
• NYC ends trolley car service
• The publication of Jack Kerouac's On the Road introduces the words "beat" and "beatnik" into the American popular consciousness and gives a name to a generation.
• Theodore Geisel writes Cat in the Hat as Dr. Seuss!
• There is a 51.7% business failure rate.
• Unemployment is 4.3%
• U.S. GNP (Gross National Product) is $460.7 billion
• Perry Mason debuted on TV
• Average monthly rent was $90
• A gallon of gas cost 24 cents
  
• Average yearly wage was $4550
• Average cost of new home was $12,220

Happy Birthday to Me!

Robin, the lonely (and feeling very old) blog mistress