Natalie Maria Cole(February 6, 1950 – December 31, 2015)
Fifteen years and five #1 hits after breaking into the music industry by working in a style completely different from her famous father’s, Natalie Cole stopped distancing herself from Nat King Cole’s musical legacy and instead embraced it, recording an entire album of standards from her father’s old repertoire. Though it exposed her to charges of exploiting his memory, it also gave Cole the biggest hit album of her professional career: Unforgettable: With Love, which climbed to the top of the Billboard 200 album chart on July 27, 1991.
Cole had "ongoing health issues".According to Cole’s publicist, Maureen O’Connor, the singer’s death was the result of congestive heart failure. She was 65. (HISTORY)
The Bob Dylan’s "Like a Rolling Stone" was recorded as part of the sessions for the forthcoming album Highway 61 Revisited. The song reached No. 2 in the Billboard charts (No. 1 in Cashbox) and became a worldwide hit.
Critics have described the song as revolutionary in its combination of different musical elements, the youthful, cynical sound of Dylan’s voice, and the directness of the question "How does it feel?" "Like a Rolling Stone" completed the transformation of Dylan’s image from folk singer to rock star, and is considered one of the most influential compositions in postwar popular music. (Wikipedia)
At an auction in 2014, Dylan’s handwritten lyrics to the song fetched $2 million, a world record for a popular music manuscript.
The Spanish Civil War began on this day in 1936 as Gen. Francisco Franco (below) led an uprising of army troops based in Spanish North Africa.
It was on this day in 1969.
Senator Ted Kennedy wearing a neck brace following the accident.
Senator Ted Kennedy ran his car off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, killing his passenger Mary Jo Kopechne. He swam free, leaving the scene, and did not report the accident to the police for ten hours.
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (July 18, 1918 – December 5, 2013)
South African revolutionary and politician who radically changed the conditions of the Apartheid state of South Africa by addressing institutionalized racism and inequality. He served 27 years in prison and, upon his release in 1994, he became South Africa’s first black chief executive, an office he served for five years.
Seven year old Ricky Skaggs on television in 1961.
Country and bluegrass singer Rickie Lee Skaggs is 64 today.
Ricky Skaggs was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame this year. He has achieved 12 #1 hits, 8 CMA awards, and 8 ACM awards. In 1982, he became a member of the Grand Ole Opry, the youngest to ever be inducted at that time.
A drawing of the execution of Tsar Nicholas II and his family.
The room in the Ipatiev House, Yekaterinburg, where the Russian royal family was brutally murdered.
Disneyland opened in Anaheim, CA. on this day in 1955.
Disneyland theme park is now divided into 8 extravagantly themed lands: Main Street, U.S.A., Tomorrowland, Fantasyland, Mickey’s Toontown, Frontierland, Critter Country, New Orleans Square and Adventureland.
Walter Elias Disney (December 5, 1901 – December 15, 1966)
Nicaraguan President Anastasio Somoza resigned and fled to Miami, Florida in exile on this day in 1979.
Somoza talks to the press after fleeing to safety in Miami.
An Apollo spaceship (left) docked with a Soyuz spacecraft in orbit on this day in 1975. It was the first link up between the U.S. and Soviet Union.
It was on this day in 1961.
Coltrane’s first recordings were made when he was a sailor.
John William Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967)
John Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer, also known as "Trane". Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career,Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes and was later at the forefront of free jazz. He died of liver cancer at a Hospital in New York on July 17, 1967, at the age of 40.
On this day in 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty could constitute "cruel and unusual punishment." The ruling prompted states to revise their capital punishment laws.
Israel removed barricades, re-unifying Jerusalem on this day in 1967.
On this day in 1995, the shuttle Atlantis and the Russian space station Mir docked, forming the largest man-made satellite ever to orbit the Earth.
A long-time smoker, Clooney was diagnosed with lung cancer at the end of 2001. Around this time, she gave one of her last concerts in Hawaii, backed by the Honolulu Symphony Pops; her last song was "God Bless America". Her final show was at Red Bank New Jersey’s Count Basie Theater in December 2001. Despite surgery, she died six months later on June 29, 2002, at her Beverly Hills home. Her nephew, actor George Clooney, was a pallbearer at her funeral, which was attended by numerous stars.
Pallbearers carry the casket of Rosemary Clooney out of St. Patrick’s Church after funeral services in Maysville, Ky. Actor George Clooney, at center.
Recorded live on November 16, 2001, Released on November 19, 2001.
Katharine Houghton Hepburn(May 12, 1907 – June 29, 2003)
In 1997, Katharine Hepburn had become very weak, was speaking and eating very little, and it was feared she would die.She showed signs of dementia in her final years. In May 2003, an aggressive tumor was found in Hepburn’s neck. The decision was made not to medically intervene, and she died from a cardiac arrest on June 29, 2003, a month after her 96th birthday at the Hepburn family home in Fenwick, Connecticut.
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