PGA approves participation of Black golfers

On January 19, 1952, Professional Golfers Association president Horton Smith announces that a seven-man committee “almost unanimously” votes to allow Black golfers to compete in PGA co-sponsored events. With the announcement, Smith hopes that Black golfers participate in the next two events, the Phoenix Open and Tucson Open. “I shall feel our efforts here will have gone for little if the plan doesn’t work out the next two events,” he says.

The push for inclusion into a sport dominated by whites came after pressure from former boxing champion Joe Louis, a talented amateur golfer. At the San Diego Open on January 17, 1952, Louis competed in the PGA-sanctioned event as an invited amateur. (As an amateur golfer, Louis wasn’t governed by PGA rules.) But professional Bill Spiller, a Black golfer, was denied entry in the tournament.

In response, Louis criticized the PGA, telling the New York Times, “I want people to know what the PGA is… We’ve got another Hitler to get by.” Louis told the Los Angeles Sentinel, “This is the last major sport in America in which Negroes are barred.”

The pressure from Louis worked, and Louis, Spiller, Ted Rhodes and Eural Clark would go onto break the PGA’s color barrier at the Phoenix Open.

But it would take years for the sport to approach full integration. In 1961, Charles Sifford became the first Black golfer to earn a PGA Tour card. He won the 1967 Greater Hartford Open Invitational and 1969 Los Angeles Open.

In 1975, Lee Elder became the first Black golfer to compete in the Masters—considered the sport’s most prestigious tournament—at famed Augusta National Golf Club. The club didn’t have a Black member until 1990 (businessman Ron Townsend) or female member until 2012 (former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice).

READ MORE: When Joe Louis Boxed Nazi Favorite Max Schmeling

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Sandy Koufax becomes youngest player elected to Baseball Hall of Fame

On January 19,  1972, 36-year-old Sandy Koufax, the former Los Angeles Dodgers star, becomes the youngest player elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. “This is the only thing that’s made having to retire early a little easier,” says Koufax, who retired at age 30. “This is the biggest honor I’ve ever been given, not just in baseball, but in my life.”

Koufax made his Major League Baseball debut in 1955, but was inconsistent early in his career. Before 1961, his biggest claim to fame was leading the majors in wild pitches in 1958. In 1961, however, Koufax led the National League with 269 strikeouts and made the  all-star team. 

He was the most dominant pitcher in Major League Baseball over the next several seasons, winning three Cy Young Awards and the 1963 Most Valuable Player Award. He also led the league in ERA for five straight seasons, helping the Dodgers to three NL pennants as well as World Series titles in 1963 and 1965.

The left-handed Koufax was known for his fastball and a curveball that often broke a foot or more, as well as for his commitment, as a Jew, to not pitching on the Sabbath.

After a 1964 baserunning injury, Koufax was diagnosed with traumatic arthritis in his throwing arm, but he continued pitching through constant pain. On September 9, 1965, he threw a perfect game, the first by a lefthander since 1880 and a then-record fourth career no-hitter.

Koufax declined to pitch Game 1 of the 1965 World Series because it coincided with Yom Kippur, a Jewish holiday. But he went on to make three appearances in the Series: a loss in Game 2, a complete-game shutout in Game 5, and a second shutout, on just two days’ rest, to win Game 7 and earn his second World Series MVP.

Despite his doctor’s warning that his arm could not handle another season, Koufax threw 323 innings in 1966, more than any pitcher in the majors, and led the league in wins (27), strikeouts (317) and ERA (1.73). Also, he pitched a complete game on two days’ rest to win the NL pennant, but the Dodgers went on to lose the World Series to the Baltimore Orioles in four games. Koufax retired a few weeks later.

Koufax, in his first year of eligibility, entered the Hall alongside pitcher Early Wynn and New York Yankees catcher Yogi Berra, who had famously said of Koufax’s 1963 season: “I can see how he won 25 games. What I don’t understand is how he lost five.”

READ MORE: Who Invented Baseball?

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The Howard Dean scream

At an energetic rally on the evening of January 19, 2004, Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean emits a noise that many will claim ended his career in electoral politics. The “Dean Scream,” as it quickly came to be known, was a unique and revealing moment in early-21st century American politics.

A former three-term governor of Vermont, Dean was seen as the candidate of the Left and was the only Democrat who openly criticized the Iraq War in his campaign for the party’s nomination. He was considered a frontrunner despite conservatives’ attempts to depict his campaign as a “left-wing freak show,” but finished third in the Iowa Caucuses. Despite losing the first contest of the primary to John Edwards and eventual winner John Kerry, Dean took the stage the night that night with enthusiasm. He ended his remarks by fervently cataloguing the contests yet to come, concluding with a shout of “…and then we’re going to Washington, D.C., to take back the White House! Yeah!” His voice cracked on the final “Yeah!,” turning the word into a bizarre yelp that was broadcast and, before long, replayed hundreds of times on news programs all over the country.

Ironically, nobody in the room with Dean noticed anything out of the ordinary—they witnessed what seemed like nothing more than an impassioned speech, with Dean’s famous scream drowned out by the cheers that filled the room. Dean’s audio setup, however, isolated his voice for the television audience, making the “Dean Scream” stand out jarringly and comically. The clip became a sensation on cable news, discussed and replayed countless times over the week between the Iowa Caucus and the New Hampshire primary, a perfect gift for Dean’s detractors.

Although the extent to which the incident affected Dean’s performance in the primary is impossible to fully determine—he had already underperformed in Iowa at the time of the speech, and would underperform again in New Hampshire a few days later—Dean’s campaign never regained its early momentum and is now remembered primarily for the “I Have a Scream Speech.” Kerry won the primary and lost the general, giving President George W. Bush a second term.

READ MORE: Presidential Election Facts

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Fleetwood Mac reunites to play “Don’t Stop” at Bill Clinton’s first inaugural ball


Year
1993
Month Day
January 19

On January 19, 1993, the band Fleetwood Mac reunites to perform at the recently elected U.S. President Bill Clinton’s first inaugural gala.

Fleetwood Mac had faced much intra-band squabbling since their 1970s heyday, why they released one of the biggest albums of all time—Rumours—and a string of decade-defining hits like “Landslide,” “Rhiannon,” “Say You Love Me” and “Go Your Own Way.” And then, of course, there was “Don’t Stop” (as in “thinking about tomorrow”), which was candidate Bill Clinton’s unofficial theme song during the 1992 presidential campaign.

Along with Truman’s “I’m Just Wild About Harry,” Eisenhower’s “I Like Ike” and Ross Perot’s “Crazy,” Clinton’s “Don’t Stop” can certainly be placed within the catchy-and-memorable subset of Presidential campaign songs—in contrast to, say, “Buckle Down with Nixon,”  “Get on a Raft with Taft” and “Huzzah for Madison.” Clinton’s theme song may have lacked specificity regarding his political agenda, but it had a good beat, a warm vibe and a chorus that audiences could sing along to. Fleetwood Mac’s 1977 recording of “Don’t Stop” played in a seemingly endless loop from the night of Clinton’s nomination at the 1992 Democratic National Convention that previous summer through to election night in November, so that by the time January rolled around, the mere playing of the record would have seemed a disappointing way to end the evening of the inaugural ball.

And so the Clinton transition team sprang into action and accomplished a political feat that certainly seemed to bode well for the new president’s ambitious plans to bring peace and stability to Haiti and overhaul the nation’s health-care system. It had been more than five years since Lindsay Buckingham, Mick Fleetwood, Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks had shared a stage, but in a true coup of diplomacy, the Clinton team convinced the entire Rumours-era lineup of Fleetwood Mac to reunite for a truly historic live performance of “Don’t Stop” on this day in 1993.

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Charles Wilkes claims portion of Antarctica for U.S.


Year
1840
Month Day
January 19

During an exploring expedition, Captain Charles Wilkes sights the coast of eastern Antarctica and claims it for the United States. Wilkes’ group had set out in 1838, sailing around South America to the South Pacific and then to Antarctica, where they explored a 1,500-mile stretch of the eastern Antarctic coast that later became known as Wilkes Land. In 1842, the expedition returned to New York, having circumnavigated the globe.

Antarctica was discovered by European and American explorers in the early part of the 19th century, and in February 1821 the first landing on the Antarctic continent was made by American John Davis at Hughes Bay on the Antarctic Peninsula. During the next century, many nations, including the United States, made territorial claims to portions of the almost-inhabitable continent. However, during the 1930s, conflicting claims led to international rivalry, and the United States, which led the world in the establishment of scientific bases, enacted an official policy of making no territorial claims while recognizing no other nation’s claims. In 1959, the Antarctic Treaty made Antarctica an international zone, set guidelines for scientific cooperation, and prohibited military operations, nuclear explosions, and the disposal of radioactive waste on the continent.

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Indira Gandhi becomes Indian prime minister


Year
1966
Month Day
January 19

Following the death of Indian Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi becomes head of the Congress Party and thus prime minister of India. She was India’s first female head of government and by the time of her assassination in 1984 was one of its most controversial.

Gandhi was the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of the independent Republic of India. She became a national political figure in 1955, when she was elected to the executive body of the Congress Party. In 1959, she served as president of the party and in 1964 was appointed to an important post in Lal Bahadur Shastri’s ruling government. Soon after becoming prime minister, Gandhi was challenged by the right wing of the Congress Party, and in the 1967 election she won only a narrow victory and thus had to rule with a deputy prime minister.

In 1971, she won a resounding reelection victory over the opposition and became the undisputed leader of India. That year, she ordered India’s invasion of Pakistan in support of the creation of Bangladesh, which won her greater popularity and led her New Congress Party to a landslide victory in national elections in 1972.

During the next few years, she presided over increasing civil unrest brought on by food shortages, inflation, and regional disputes. Her administration was criticized for its strong-arm tactics in dealing with these problems. Meanwhile, charges by the Socialist Party that she had defrauded the 1971 election led to a national scandal. In 1975, the High Court in Allahabad convicted her of a minor election infraction and banned her from politics for six years. In response, she declared a state of emergency throughout India, imprisoned thousands of political opponents, and restricted personal freedoms in the country. Among several unpopular programs during this period was the forced sterilization of men and women as a means of controlling population growth.

In 1977, long-postponed national elections were held, and Gandhi and her party were swept from office. The next year, Gandhi’s supporters broke from the Congress Party and formed the Congress (I) Party, with the “I” standing for “Indira.” Later in 1978, she was briefly imprisoned for official corruption. Soon after the ruling Janata Party fell apart, the Congress (I) Party, with Indira as its head, won a spectacular election victory in 1980, and Gandhi was again prime minister.

In the early 1980s, several regional states intensified their call for greater autonomy from New Delhi, and the Sikh secessionist movement in Punjab resorted to violence and terrorism. In 1984, the Sikh leaders set up base in their sacred Golden Temple in Amritsar. Gandhi responded by sending the Indian army in, and hundreds of Sikhs were killed in the government assault. In retaliation, Sikh members of Gandhi’s own bodyguard gunned her down on the grounds of her home on October 31, 1984. She was succeeded by her son, Rajiv Gandhi.

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First air raid on Britain


Year
1915
Month Day
January 19

During World War I, Britain suffers its first casualties from an air attack when two German zeppelins drop bombs on Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn on the eastern coast of England.

The zeppelin, a motor-driven rigid airship, was developed by German inventor Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin in 1900. Although a French inventor had built a power-driven airship several decades before, the zeppelin’s rigid dirigible, with its steel framework, was by far the largest airship ever constructed. However, in the case of the zeppelin, size was exchanged for safety, as the heavy steel-framed airships were vulnerable to explosion because they had to be lifted by highly flammable hydrogen gas instead of non-flammable helium gas.

In January 1915, Germany employed three zeppelins, the L.3, the L.4, and the L.6, in a two-day bombing mission against Britain. The L.6 turned back after encountering mechanical problems, but the other two zeppelins succeeded in dropping their bombs on English coastal towns.

READ MORE: London’s World War I Zeppelin Terror

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Edgar Allan Poe is born


Year
1809
Month Day
January 19

On January 19, 1809, poet, author and literary critic Edgar Allan Poe is born in Boston, Massachusetts.

By the time he was three years old, both of Poe’s parents had died, leaving him in the care of his godfather, John Allan, a wealthy tobacco merchant. After attending school in England, Poe entered the University of Virginia (UVA) in 1826. After fighting with Allan over his heavy gambling debts, he was forced to leave UVA after only eight months. Poe then served two years in the U.S. Army and won an appointment to West Point. After another falling-out, Allan cut him off completely and he got himself dismissed from the academy for rules infractions.

Dark, handsome and brooding, Poe had published three works of poetry by that time, none of which had received much attention. In 1836, while working as an editor at the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond, Virginia, Poe married his 13-year-old cousin, Virginia Clemm. He also completed his first full-length work of fiction, Arthur Gordon Pym, published in 1838. Poe lost his job at the Messenger due to his heavy drinking, and the couple moved to Philadelphia, where Poe worked as an editor at Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine and Graham’s Magazine. He became known for his direct and incisive criticism, as well as for dark horror stories like “The Fall of the House of Usher” and “The Tell-Tale Heart.” Also around this time, Poe began writing mystery stories, including “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” and “The Purloined Letter”–works that would earn him a reputation as the father of the modern detective story.

In 1844, the Poes moved to New York City. He scored a spectacular success the following year with his poem “The Raven.” While Poe was working to launch The Broadway Journal–which soon failed–his wife Virginia fell ill and died of tuberculosis in early 1847. His wife’s death drove Poe even deeper into alcoholism and drug abuse. After becoming involved with several women, Poe returned to Richmond in 1849 and got engaged to an old flame. Before the wedding, however, Poe died suddenly. Though circumstances are somewhat unclear, it appeared he began drinking at a party in Baltimore and disappeared, only to be found incoherent in a gutter three days later. Taken to the hospital, he died on October 7, 1849, at age 40.

READ MORE: The Riddle of Edgar Allan Poe’s Death

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President Ford pardons Tokyo Rose


Year
1977
Month Day
January 19

President Gerald R. Ford pardons Tokyo Rose. Although the nickname originally referred to several Japanese women who broadcast Axis propaganda over the radio to Allied troops during World War II, it eventually became synonymous with a Japanese-American woman named Iva Toguri. On the orders of the Japanese government, Toguri and other women broadcast sentimental American music and phony announcements regarding U.S. troop losses in a vain attempt to destroy the morale of Allied soldiers.

READ MORE: How ‘Tokyo Rose’ Became WWII’s Most Notorious Propagandist

An American citizen born in Los Angeles, Toguri was in Japan at the time the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. She graduated from UCLA in 1940 and hoped to become a doctor, but when an elderly aunt living in Japan became ill, Toguri’s family sent Toguri to take care of her. She left the United States in July 1941 carrying an identification card, but no passport. When rumblings of war between Japan and the U.S. reached a crescendo later that year, she tried to return to the U.S. but was denied because she did not have proof of citizenship.

Toguri experienced alienation in both the U.S. and Japan. Although an American citizen, she frequently encountered anti-Japanese racism while living in California. For their part, the Japanese government considered her an enemy alien and unsuccessfully tried to force her to renounce her U.S. citizenship. They also refused her request to be interned as a foreign national. Left to fend for herself in Japan, she found a job as a translator and typist for Radio Tokyo. Privately, Toguri refused to stifle her pro-American views on the war and as a result earned the trust of two Allied POWs who were forced to work at the station. The POWs were tortured until they agreed to write phony reports of Allied troop movements and casualty reports that a number of unidentified Tokyo Roses then broadcast. When the war ended, intense efforts to capture the notorious broadcasters began.

Upon her capture in 1945, Toguri insisted that she was forced into her traitorous role by the Japanese government and swore that she had never broadcast false military reports, limiting her shows to light musical fare while smuggling food and medicine to the Allied POWs. Nevertheless, Toguri was labeled a traitor for airing songs like My Resistance is Low. After a year’s imprisonment in Japan, Toguri was released and returned to the United States, only to be promptly re-arrested for treason. The judge, who later admitted having anti-Japanese prejudice, sentenced her to 10 years in prison and fined her $10,000. She was released early in 1956 for good behavior, but was immediately given an order deporting her back to Japan. Over the next 20 years, Toguri fought for a pardon from three presidential administrations with the help of family members, attorneys and the POWs she had helped at Radio Tokyo. Finally in 1977, after an episode of 60 Minutes was broadcast revealing Toguri’s true story and highlighting her ongoing fight for justice, President Gerald Ford granted her clemency just before leaving office. Toguri died in 2006. 

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Production begins on “Toy Story”


Year
1993
Month Day
January 19

On January 19, 1993, production begins on Toy Story, the first full-length feature film created by the pioneering Pixar Animation Studios. Originally a branch of the filmmaker George Lucas’s visual effects company, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), Pixar first put itself on the map with special effects produced for films such as Young Sherlock Holmes (1985), which featured the first fully three-dimensional digital or computer-generated image (CGI). In 1986, Pixar became an independent company after it was purchased by Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple Computer.

The fledgling company’s inaugural product was the Pixar Image Computer, which the former Disney animator John Lasseter soon used to produce an animated short film, Luxo Jr. The film won Best Animated Short at the 1986 Academy Awards, raising Pixar’s profile considerably. Lasseter won another Oscar in 1989 for Tin Toy, an animated short featuring a mechanical drummer named Tinny maneuvering around in a baby’s playroom. (Tinny later became the basis for Buzz Lightyear, the spaceman toy who was one of Toy Story’s main characters.)

In 1991, based on the success of Pixar’s short films, the company signed a $26 million deal with the Walt Disney Company to develop, produce and distribute up to three animated feature films. The Little Mermaid (1989) had become Disney’s most successful film to date, and the company was ready to take more chances on innovative animation techniques. Approached by Lasseter about a possible Christmas program, Disney’s chief of film production, Jeffrey Katzenberg, instead responded with the three-picture deal.

Toy Story was the first Pixar-Disney collaboration, and the first feature-length animated film that was completely computer generated. Its plot revolved around the rivalry between the cowboy Woody, previously the favorite toy of a little boy named Andy, and Buzz Lightyear, a shiny new astronaut toy that Andy receives for a birthday present. Multiple Oscar-winner Tom Hanks lent his famous voice to Woody, while Tim Allen of TV’s Home Improvement was Buzz. Though Pixar’s long development process included drawings, paintings, sculptures and photographs, the final work for the film was all done on computers. The sophisticated animation created a vivid three-dimensional world full of color and movement, where toys–including such childhood classics as toy soldiers, Mr. Potato Head and Etch-a-Sketch–come to life.

Released in November 1995, Toy Story received universally positive reviews, and would eventually gross more than $192 million at the domestic box office and $358 million worldwide. Lasseter received a special Academy Award for leading the Pixar team, and the movie became the first animated feature ever to score an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay. There have been three sequels, all of them critically-acclaimed: Toy Story 2 (1999), Toy Story 3 (2010) and Toy Story 4 (2019). 

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