They were the most successful American pop group of the 1960s— a group whose 12 #1 hits in the first full decade of the rock and roll era places them behind only Elvis and the Beatles in terms of chart dominance. They helped define the very sound of the 60s, but like fellow icons the Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel, they came apart in the first year of the 70s. The curtain closed for good on Diana Ross and the Supremes on January 14, 1970, at the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.
A security guard and an unidentified man check out an area where several people were killed as they were caught in a surging crowd.
The general-admission ticketing policy for rock concerts at Cincinnati’s Riverfront Coliseum in the 1970s was known as “festival seating.” That term and that ticketing policy would become infamous in the wake of one of the deadliest rock-concert incidents in history. Eleven people, including three high-school students, were killed on December 3, 1979, when a crowd of general-admission ticket-holders to a Cincinnati Who concert surged forward in an attempt to enter Riverfront Coliseum and secure prime unreserved seats inside.
Festival seating had already been eliminated at many similar venues in the United States by 1979, yet the system remained in place at Riverfront Coliseum despite a dangerous incident at a Led Zeppelin show two years earlier. That day, 60 would-be concertgoers were arrested, and dozens more injured, when the crowd outside the venue surged up against the Coliseum’s locked glass doors.
Cincinnati police officers help people crushed during a stampede at Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati.
Jefferson Davis died in New Orleans on this day in 1889. He was the first and only president of the Confederate States of America and the highest ranking confederate leader of the South.
On this day in 1957, America’s first attempt at putting a satellite into orbit failed when the Vanguard TV-3 launch vehicle lost thrust after lift-off and exploded on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral, FL. The launch was in response to the Soviet Union’s orbiting of Sputnik l.
American singer-actor Rick Springfield performs before a large crowd at the Live Aid famine relief concert at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia on this day in 1985.
Live Aid concert crowds at Wembley Stadium in London.
Jean-Paul Marat, a famous French revolutionary and member of the Club des Cordeliers, was assassinated by the Girondin sympathizer Charlotte Corday on this day in 1793.
Jean-Paul Marat (May 24, 1743 – July 13, 1793)
In New York, Civil War draft riots erupted on this day in 1863.
It was on this in 1977 when a power blackout hit the Big Apple.
Actor Harrison Ford is 76 years old today.
Iconic actor Harrison Ford’s memorable characters include Han Solo from the original StarWars trilogy from 1977, Indiana Jones trilogy beginning in 1981, and Rick Deckard from the 1982 sci-fi classic Blade Runner. He earned Golden Globe Award nominations for his roles in Witness(1985), The Mosquito Coast (1986), The Fugitive (1993) and Sabrina (1995). He was ranked #1 on Empire’s 1997 list of the Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time.
