Today was a day of firsts. In 1910 the first public radio broadcast was made – of a live opera performance In 1990, Douglas Wilder became the first African American governor, in Virginia. The National Geographic Society was formed in 1888 and in 1893 the British Labour Party was established. Johnny Cash performed live in Folsom Prison in 1968 and in 1993 the Chemical Weapons Convention was signed, seeking to outlaw and destroy stocks of chemical weapons that had first been used almost 80 years before in WWI.

Entering into the world on this date were political figures Salmon P Chase (1808) 6th US Supreme Court Chief Justice; Andrew Yang(1975), entrepreneur and 2020 dark horse presidential candidate; Nate Silver (1978) political statistician and election prognosticator. We also gained LOTR actor Orlando Bloom in 1977 and novelist – “rags to riches” Horatio Alger in 1832.

We bid farewell to two literary notables – Edmund Spenser (the Fairie Queen) English poet in 1599 and James Joyce (Ulysses and Finnegans Wake) in 1941. The music ended for composer Stephen Foster in 1864 and the guns went silent for lawman Wyatt Earp in 1920. in 1691 George Fox went to join his heavenly Friends and Hubert Humphrey, the “Happy Warrior” ceased to orate in 1978.