President Lyndon B. Johnson (left) signed Medicare, a health insurance
program for elderly Americans, into law. At the bill-signing ceremony,
which took place at the Truman Library in Independence, Missouri,
former President Harry Truman (seated right) was enrolled as Medicare’s
first beneficiary receiving the first Medicare card.         

Johnson wanted to recognize Truman, who, in 1945, had become the first
president to propose national health insurance, an initiative that was
opposed at the time by Congress.

President Lyndon Johnson (left) and President Harry S. Truman
shake hands at the Medicare Bill Signing.

On this day in 1970, President Richard Nixon signs legislation
officially banning cigarette ads on television and radio. Nixon,
who was an avid pipe smoker, indulging in as many as eight
bowls a day, supported the legislation at the increasing
insistence of public health advocates.

(Fox News) – Crooner Linda Ronstadt (above) is losing her voice to Parkinson’s disease. The 72 year old singer revealed that her voice started to go as early as 2000, though she didn’t reveal her Parkinson’s diagnosis to the world until 2013
and didn’t stop performing until 2009. She will be inducted into the 2014 Rock
and Roll Hall of Fame on April 10 at the Barclays Center in New York.

Linda Ronstadt during her early career.

SANDY KOZEL

U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry (left) addressing a press
conference on the release of the 1964 Report on Smoking and
Health.

The establishment of the Veterans Administration (VA) came in 1930
when Congress authorized the president to "consolidate and coordinate
Government activities affecting war veterans". The three component
agencies became bureaus within the Veterans Administration. Brigadier
General Frank T. Hines, who directed the Veterans Bureau for seven
years, was named as the first Administrator of Veterans Affairs, a job
he held until 1945.

Frank Thomas Hines (April 11, 1879 – April 3, 1960)