On January 13, 1982, an Air Florida Boeing 737-222 plunged into
the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., killing 78 people. The
crash, caused by bad weather, took place only two miles from
the White House.

The Air Florida flight took off from Washington National Airport
in Arlington, Virginia, with 74 passengers and 5 crew members
on board. The plane had flown into Washington from Miami in
the early afternoon and was supposed to return to Ft. Lauderdale,
Florida, after a short stop.

NEW YORK (AP) — Ronnie Spector, the cat-eyed, bee-hived rock ‘n’
roll siren who sang such 1960s hits as “Be My Baby,” “Baby I Love
You” and “Walking in the Rain” as the leader of the girl group The
Ronettes, has died. Spector died Wednesday after a brief battle
with cancer, 

The Ronettes in 1964.

SANDY KOZEL

Hattie Ophelia Wyatt Caraway
(February 1, 1878 – December 21, 1950)

Caraway became the first woman elected to serve a full term as
a United States Senator. Caraway represented Arkansas. She was
the first woman to preside over the Senate. She won re- election to a
full term in 1932 with the active support of fellow Senator  Huey Long
of neighboring Louisiana, She was the first woman to win an election
for the United States Senate.

From left: Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll going over
the script for the popular Amos and Andy radio program.

On January 12, 1926, the two-man comedy series “Sam ‘n’ Henry”
debuts on Chicago’s WGN radio station. Two years later, after
changing its name to “Amos ‘n’ Andy,” the show became one of
the most popular radio programs in American history.

Though the creators and the stars of the new radio program,
Freeman Gosden and Charles Carrell, were both white, the
characters they played were two Black men from the Deep
South who moved to Chicago to seek their fortunes. By that
time, white actors performing in dark stage makeup—or
“blackface”—had been a significant tradition in American
theater for over 100 years. Gosden and Carrell, both vaudeville
performers, were doing a Chicago comedy act in blackface
when an employee at the Chicago Tribune suggested they
create a radio show.

Maya Angelou (Marguerite Annie Johnson)
(April 4, 1928 – May 28, 2014)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States Mint said Monday it has
begun shipping quarters featuring the image of poet Maya Angelou,
the first coins in its American Women Quarters Program.

Angelou, an American author, poet and Civil Rights activist, rose
to prominence with the publication of "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" in 1969. Angelou, who died in 2014 at the age of 86, was
honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2010 by
President Barack Obama.