On July 11, 1960, the 34-year-old novelist Nelle Harper Lee
published her first novel, To Kill a Mockingbird.

The book was instantly successful. In the United States, it
is widely read in high schools and middle schools. To Kill
a Mockingbird has become a classic of modern American
literature, winning the Pulitzer Prize, was translated into 
some 40 languages and has sold more than 40 million
copies.

Nelle Harper Lee (April 28, 1926 – February 19, 2016)

Communications satellite Telstar 1 was launched atop a Thor-Delta rocket on July 10, 1962. It successfully relayed through space the
first television pictures, telephone calls, and telegraph images,
and provided the first live transatlantic television feed. Telstar 2
launched May 7, 1963. Telstar 1 and 2, though no longer
functional ,still orbit the Earth today.

Clarence Darrow, left, and William Jennings Bryan at the
Scopes trial in 1925 (AP) 

July 10, 1925: In Dayton, Tennessee, the so-called Scopes Monkey
Trial began with John Thomas Scopes, a young high school
science teacher, accused of teaching evolution in violation of
a Tennessee state law.

The law, which had been passed in March, made it a misdemeanor punishable by fine to “teach any theory that denies the story of
the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach
instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.”

Schoolteacher John Thomas Scopes (center), 24, of Dayton, Tenn., stands before Judge Raulston just before he was
found guilty of teaching evolution and fined $100 on July 21, 
1925, at the end of the Scopes Monkey Trial held at the
Rhea County Courthouse in Dayton. (Chicago Tribune) 

L. Q. Jones (born Justus Ellis McQueen Jr.)
(August 19, 1927 – July 9, 2022)

L.Q. Jones, the colorful character actor who worked on
dozens of Westerns, including the Sam Peckinpah classics 
The Wild Bunch and Ride the High Country as a member of
the famed filmmaker’s regular posse, has died.

Jones died Saturday of natural causes at his home in the
Hollywood Hills.

L. Q. Jones – ”Love Wolf McQuade” 1983.

Thomas Jeffrey Hanks is an American actor and filmmaker. Known
for both his comedic and dramatic roles, he is one of the most
popular and recognizable film stars worldwide, and is regarded as
an American cultural icon. Hanks’s films have grossed more than
$4.9 billion in North America and more than $9.96 billion worldwide, making him the fourth-highest-grossing actor in North America.

Hanks made his breakthrough with leading roles in a series of
comedy films which received positive media attention, such as
Splash (1984), Bachelor Party (1984), and Big (1988) He won two consecutive Academy Awards for Best Actor for starring as a gay
lawyer suffering from AIDS in Philadelphia (1993) and the title
character in Forrest Gump (1994).

The Money Pit (1986)

Hanks collaborated with film director Steven Spielberg on 
five films including: Saving Private Ryan (above) (1998.

Hanks in Apollo 13 (1995).

Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump (1994)