Alan Robert Copeland (October 6, 1926 – December 28, 2022)

(Hollywood Reporter) – Alan Copeland, the songwriter, Grammy-
winning arranger and ultra-smooth vocalist known for his many
years with The Modernaires and performances on Your Hit Parade
and The Red Skelton Hour, died December 28 in an assisted living
facility in Sonora, California. He was 96.

As recently as this fall, Copeland was still singing and playing
keyboards in a quartet called Now You Hazz Jazz.

Bessie Hendricks was the oldest living person in the US and
fourth in the world, according to Gerontology Research Group
before she passed away at Shady Oaks Care Center in Lake
City, Iowa, Tuesday at age 115.

Hendricks was born in that city on Nov. 7, 1907, and she grew
up on a farm. She later went on to raise five children, two of
whom she outlived.

The original presenter of the game show was Chuck Woolery who later worked on shows like Love Connection among
many others. Woolery had help from his lovely assistant
Susan Stafford (above).

Wheel of Fortune, one of the the longest-running syndicated
game show in American television, premieres on NBC on
January 6, 1975. Created by television legend Merv Griffin and
hosted since the early 1980s by Pat Sajak and Vanna White,
(below). Wheel is one of the most popular television shows
in the world.

On January 6, 1912, New Mexico was admitted into
the United States as the 47th state.

Spanish explorers passed through the area that would
become New Mexico in the early 16th century, they
encountered the well-preserved remains of a 13th-
century Pueblo civilization. Exaggerated rumors about
the hidden riches of these Pueblo cities encouraged the
first full-scale Spanish expedition into New Mexico, led
by Francisco Vasquez de Coronado in 1540. Instead of
encountering the long-departed Pueblo people, the
Spanish explorers met other Indigenous groups, like
the Apaches, who were fiercely resistant to the early
Spanish missions and ranches in the area.

Francisco Vázquez de Coronado
(1510 – 22 September 1554)

On January 5, 1933, construction began on the Golden Gate
Bridge, as workers began excavating 3.25 million cubic feet
of dirt for the structure’s huge anchorages.

Following the Gold Rush boom that began in 1849, speculators
realized the land north of San Francisco Bay would increase in
value in direct proportion to its accessibility to the city. Soon,
a plan was hatched to build a bridge that would span the Golden
Gate, a narrow, 400-foot deep strait that serves as the mouth of
the San Francisco Bay, connecting the San Francisco Peninsula
with the southern end of Marin County.