I was born on this day in 1953. Last year I assembled a list of things that happened on my birthday, and it is mostly a list of horrible disasters like Hurricane Andrew, Mt. Vesuvius, stuff like that. So this year I decided to list the stuff that happened in the year I was born. This is edited down from the entire list in wiki 1953. My comments are in italics.
January 7 - President Harry S. Truman announces the United States has developed a hydrogen bomb. Ouch.
January 14 - CIA-sponsored Robertson Panel first meets to discuss the UFO phenomenon. Official results are to publicly "debunk" them and use the media to ridicule people. The CIA goes into the disinformation biz on UFOs. I have also read somewhere that 1953 was the year for the greatest number of UFO sightings. I just knew I was alien spawn.
February 13 - Transsexual Christine Jorgenson returns to New York after successful sexual reassignment surgery in Denmark.
Wow! This was a pretty big deal.
February 18 - The first 3D film, Bwana Devil opens.
March 5 - After 29 years of ruling the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin dies.
March 14 - Nikita Khruschev selected general secretary of the Soviet communist party
March 17 - Nuclear test in Nevada - with 1620 spectators at 3.4 km.
March 26 - Jonas Salk announces his polio vaccine.
"Polio" was one of my nicknames as a kid. When I was just a few years old I told Grandpa's neighbor that I had polio (I didn't, and who knows why I said that), so he called me "Polio" for the rest of his life.
April 13 - Ian Fleming publishes his first James Bond novel, Casino Royale in the United Kingdom. I am stirred, but not shaken by that news.
April 25 - Francis Crick and James D. Watson publish their description of the double helix structure of DNA.
June 30 - The first Chevrolet Corvette is built at Flint (Michigan)
I helped to build Corvettes in St. Louis (before they moved to KY), but just for one day on loan from the boring old Impala/Caprice car line.
August 7 - Ohio admitted as a U. S. state, retroactive to 1803.
Helllooooo Cleveland!!!.
August 19 - Cold War: The CIA helps to overthrow the government of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran and retain Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi on the throne (see: Operation Ajax). Truman didn't know what kind of Pandora's Box he opened when he created the CIA.
October - The UNIVAC 1103 is the first commercial computer to use random access memory. When I was born, there was no RAM. Now look! We can't even live without it.
December 30 - The first color television sets go on sale for about $1,175 (American dollars). Three channels and not even all in color. I didn't get a color TV until sometime in the 1980s.
2 comments:
Cool, I have the honor of being the first to wish you a wonderfully Happy Birthday. I hope you day is filled with happiness, fun and celebration. A toast will be made in your honor tonight at my house with my martini. Here's to many more years of life and laughter.
Big hug and little kiss on the cheek :)
Thank you much!
Trying to work a little less today (we'll see how that goes...). Will whoop it up a little tonight in an air conditioned place with a rockabilly band!
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