1988 Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis admits to being a "liberal." Bush had been trying to pin the "L" word on him for months.

1974 Rumble in the Jungle Muhammad Ali beats George Foreman in Zaire for the heavyweight boxing championship.

1943 Gus Bodar scores a goal 15 seconds into his first NHL game.

1941 First U.S. warship sunk in World War II The destroyer Reuben James is sunk off of Iceland by a German U-boat killing about 100 Americans.

1938 War of the Worlds Orson Welles panics the nation with his realistic CBS radio broadcast.

1925 First person on TV a 15-year-old boy working in the London lab of John L. Baird, inventor of the world's first working television system.

1888 First welterweight boxing championship Won by Paddy Duffy.

1768 First Methodist church in America is dedicated, the Wesley Chapel in New York City. Source: An Almanac of the Christian Church

1951 Harry Hamlin American actor. TV: L.A. Law (Michael Kuzak).

1945 Henry Winkler American actor. TV: Happy Days (The Fonz).

1939 Grace Slick American singer, with Jefferson Airplane.

1937 Claude Lelouch French Oscar-winning screenwriter, film director. Film: A Man and a Woman (1966, Oscar).

1936 June Blair (Margaret June Blair), American actress. TV: The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (Dave's wife).

1932 Louis Malle French film director. Film: Murmur of the Heart (1971), Atlantic City (1980), and My Dinner With Andre (1981).

1931 Dick Gautier American actor. TV: Get Smart (Hymie the robot).

1923 Herschel Bernardi d. 1986 American actor. TV: Peter Gunn (Lt. Jacoby) and voice of Charlie the Tuna in the commercials.

1896 Ruth Gordon d. 1985 (Ruth Jones), American Oscar-Emmy-winning actress. Film: Harold and Maude (1971, Maude) and Rosemary's Baby (1968, Oscar).

1895 Gerhard Domagk d. 1964 German bacteriologist.  He was the first person to refuse a Nobel Prize (1939).  He was awarded the prize for his discovery of the antibacterial effects of Prontosil, the first of the sulfonamide drugs. He used the drug to save his own daughter's arm from amputation. He was forced to refuse the award due to pressure from the Nazi government during WWII. He was able to accept the award after the war.

1885 Ezra Loomis Pound d. 1972 American poet, winner of the first Bollingen Prize for Poetry from the Library of Congress (1948) for Pisan Cantos. He was charged with treason for making pro-fascist broadcasts in Italy during World War II.

1735 John Adams d. 1826 first U.S. Vice-President (1789-97) and 2nd U.S. President (1797-1801). Father of the 6th president John Quincy Adams. Both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, died on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

1975 Gustav Hertz b. 1887 German quantum physicist. He and James Franck received the Nobel Prize for Physics (1925) for confirming the quantum theory that energy can be absorbed by an atom only in definite amounts.

1919 Ella Wheeler Wilcox b. 1850 American poet. "Laugh and the world laughs with you, weep and you weep alone" is from her poem Solitude.

1919 Charles H. Steinway b. ???? American piano maker.

1912 James Schoolcraft Sherman b. 1855 27th U.S. Vice-President (1909-12).

1910 Jean Henri Dunant b. 1828 Swiss philanthropist. He founded the International Red Cross (1864) and was co-winner of the first Nobel Peace Prize (1901).

1823 Edmund Cartwright b. 1743 English inventor. He revolutionized weaving with his invention of the power loom (1785).

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