Sen. John F. Kennedy (far right) participates in a panel discussion
on NBC’s Meet the Press, which aired on Feb. 14, 1954.

Meet the Press is a weekly television news/interview program broadcast on
NBC. It is the longest-running program in television history, though the
current format bears little resemblance to the debut episode on November
6, 1947.  It originates from NBC’s Washington, D.C. bureau.  Meet the Press
began on radio on the Mutual Broadcasting System in 1945.     

The first host was its creator, Martha Rountree (below) the program’s only
full time female moderator to date. She stepped down on November 1, 1953
and until Ned Brooks could take over.

Loretta Jane Swit was born in Passaic, New Jersey

  
Loretta Swit played the role of head nurse Major Margaret “Hot Lips” Houlihan
on CBS-TV’s M*A*S*H (1972-1983). She won two Emmy Awards for her work.  

CARLATA BRADLEY

On this day in 1986, The Ash-Shiraa, pro-Syrian Lebanese magazine, first
broke the story of U.S. arms sales to Iran to secure the release of seven
American hostages. The story turned into the Iran-Contra affair.

Lt. Col. Oliver North during the ‘Iran Contra Hearings’.

President Reagan (far right) meets with (left to right) Secretary of Defense
Caspar Weinberger, Secretary of State George Shultz, Attorney General
Ed Meese, and Chief of Staff Don Regan in the Oval Office.

Salvador Guillermo Allende Gossens was elected
the 30th President of Chile on this day in 1970.

Carol Elizabeth Moseley Braun turned 70 in August.

Carol Moseley-Braun became the first African-American woman U.S. senator
on this day in 1992.

Minnesota elected Jesse "The Body" Ventura, a former pro wrestler, as its
governor on this day in 1998.

Jesse Ventura (James George Janos) turned 66 in July.

MIKE GRACIA

Harry S. Truman holding up a copy of the Chicago Tribune with the incorrect headline

Harry S. Truman defeated Thomas E. Dewey for the U.S. presidency on this
day in 1948. The Chicago Tribune published an early edition that had the
headline "DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN (above)." The Truman victory had 
surprised many polls and newspapers.

President Truman (right) on his campaign train whistle-stop.

On this day in 1963, South Vietnamese President Ngo Dihn Diem was
assassinated in a military coup.

Howard Hughes flew his "Spruce Goose," a huge wooden airplane, for eight minutes in California on this day in 1947. It was the plane’s first and only
flight. The "Spruce Goose," nicknamed because of the white-gray color of
the spruce used to build it, never went into production.

The H-4 today is in McMinnville, Oregon, at the Evergreen Air and
Space Museum, about an hour outside of Portland.

On this day in 1959, Charles Van Doren, a game show contestant
on the NBC-TV program "Twenty-One" admitted that he had been
given questions and answers in advance.

Charles Lincoln Van Doren turned 91 in Feb.   

Henry Franklin Winkler was born in New York City.

Henry Winkler rose to fame as the greaser mechanic The Fonz on Happy Days
during the 1970s on ABC. He has since had multiple roles in film and television.

Winkler made his acting debut in his 8th grade school production of Billy Budd,
after which he earned his bachelor’s degree from Emerson College in 1967 and
graduated from Yale School of Drama in 1970.

Henry Winkler and Ron Howard