Ed Donahue
    
    
    
   

José Montserrate Feliciano García is 78 years old today.

The Puerto Rican musician, singer and composer. He recorded
many international hits, including his rendition of the Doors‘
"Light My Fire" and his self-penned Christmas song "Feliz
Navidad".

Prisoners seized control of the maximum-security Attica
Correctional Facility near Buffalo, New York beginning
on September 9, 1971. Later that day, state police retook
most of the prison, but 1,281 convicts occupied an exercise
field called D Yard, where they held 39 prison guards and
employees hostage for four days. After negotiations stalled,
state police and prison officers launched a disastrous raid
on September 13, in which 10 hostages and 29 inmates were
killed in an indiscriminate hail of gunfire. Eighty-nine others
were seriously injured.

On September 9, 1776, the Continental Congress formally
declares the name of the new nation to be the “United
States” of America.