MIKE GRACIA

On this day, Pvt. Eddie Slovik became the first American
soldier since the Civil War to be executed for desertion
and the only one who suffered such a fate during World
War II.

CAMILLE
BOHANNON

Robert Anthony Plant is 72 today.

Plant has had a successful singing career spanning over
50 years. In 2008, Rolling Stone editors ranked him
number 15 on their list of the 100 best singers of all
time. In 2011, Rolling Stone readers ranked Plant the
greatest of all lead singers. In 2006, Hit Parader
magazine named Plant the “Greatest Metal Vocalist
of All Time”. In 2009, Plant was also voted “the greatest
voice in rock” in a poll conducted by Planed Rock.

Launching of the Mercury-Redstone 3 (MR-3) rocket from Cape
Canaveral on astronaut Alan B. Shepard’s Freedom 7 suborbital
mission. 

From Cape Canaveral, Florida, Navy Commander Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr.
is launched into space aboard the Freedom 7 space capsule, becoming the
first American astronaut to travel into space. The suborbital flight, which
lasted 15 minutes and reached a height of 116 miles into the atmosphere,
was a major triumph for NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration.

The Soviet Union inaugurates the “Space Age” with its launch of Sputnik,
the world’s first artificial satellite. The spacecraft, named Sputnik after the
Russian word for “satellite,” was launched at 10:29 p.m. Moscow time from
the Tyuratam launch base in the Kazakh Republic. Sputnik had a diameter
of 22 inches and weighed 184 pounds and circled Earth once every hour
and 36 minutes. Traveling at 18,000 miles an hour, its elliptical orbit had an
apogee (farthest point from Earth) of 584 miles and a perigee (nearest point)
of 143 miles. Visible with binoculars before sunrise or after sunset, Sputnik transmitted radio signals back to Earth strong enough to be picked up by
amateur radio operators. Those in the United States with access to such
equipment tuned in and listened in awe as the beeping Soviet spacecraft
passed over America several times a day. In January 1958, Sputnik’s orbit deteriorated, as expected, and the spacecraft burned up in the atmosphere.

      
CAMILLE
BOHANNON

On this day in 1977, Voyager 2 was launched by NASA from a
spaceport in Cape Canaveral, Florida with a Titan IIIE / Centaur
rocket . The spacecraft was carrying a copper phonograph
record containing greetings in dozens of languages and
samples of music (below).

Singer Robert Anthony Plant is 71 today.

Led Zepplin reunited for a show at London’s O2 arena, 2007.