On May 3, 1947, I was born at St. Mary’s, a Mayo
Clinic-affiliated hospital in Rochester, Minn. And, since I am a writer producing this
“almost”-daily blog post about writers, I decided to do a posting related not
to my life but rather to what was going on in the world on the day I was born.
Turns out, not so much.
Thus, without a lot of great things to write about from that
day I was born, I started wondering what might have been happening on the other
May 3rds throughout my lifetime – like May 3, 1957, or 1967, or 1977, 1987,
1997, 2007 and 2017? In other words, in
ten-year increments.
But wait, there’s more.
Since this is 2020, three years beyond the last date listed
above, why not – thought I – check on a couple of highlights from the Merry
Month of May in each of those decade-starting years, too? In other words, what was going on in May of 1950? Or 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000 and 2010?
Why do this, you ask?
To which I reply, Why not?
So on this 73rd anniversary
of my birth, I proudly present:
A very brief every 10-year highlight
review from 20 months of May, 1947-2020.
May 3, 1947: Until this little exercise, I never really
knew the actual weekday on which I was born.
Turns out, I’m a Saturday’s Child.
And, as the old nursery rhyme goes and which Google so thoughtfully
included as a reminder for all of us born on a Saturday: “Saturday’s
child works hard for a living. “ Thanks for
the reminder, although I KNEW that already!
At mid-morning on that day of my birth,
sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski arrived at a site in South Dakota’s Black Hills
where he had decided to carve a full mountain to honor the Lakota Chief Crazy
Horse. Literally, this “Crazy Horse Mountain”
carving has now encompassed my entire lifetime and it’s still going on (but
looking very impressive!). Later that day a horse named Jet Pilot won the Kentucky Derby in a time of 2:06 -- quite respectable, I'm told.
On May 5 one of my all-time favorite writers,
Robert Penn Warren, won
the first of his 3 Pulitzer Prizes for his novel All The King’s Men. And, on May 10, the day my mom & I came
home from the hospital, the B.F. Goodrich Company announced that it had
developed its revolutionary tubeless tire – thus freeing up “inner” tubes to be
completely available for kids to use in swimming holes everywhere.
May,
1950: On May 3 The
Netherlands sent a Telex to the U.S. – the first time that had been done. Not to be outdone, the U.S. sent one
back. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find
anything further about either message (probably secret stuff).
New marriage laws were enacted with the
caveat that they would be “strictly enforced” in the People’s Republic of China.
And, the world’s first credit card – a
Diner’s Club card – was announced. And,
get this: No interest charge. That’s
because the balance had to be paid off in full each month. Carrying a balance and paying interest didn’t
start until 1958.
So, what’s happened in May every 10 and 13 years since?
1957: Iron Liege won the Kentucky Derby – 4 seconds
faster than Jet Pilot’s 1947 time. And Britain
successfully tested a hydrogen bomb (so that’s what all that ground shaking was
about that year).
1960:
The musical “Fantastiks” premiered on Broadway. Eventually it would become the
longest-running musical in history. In
politics, a young U.S. Senator, John F. Kennedy, won the primary in West
Virginia and was suddenly a leading Democratic candidate. And on
the world scene The Soviet Union shot down a U.S. spy plane (while it was
flying over their country) and 3 weeks later withdrew from a scheduled “Big 4”
Summit, accusing the U.S. of spying on them. Oh come on!
1967:
Proud Clarion won the Kentucky Derby – 6 seconds faster than Jet Pilot’s
1947 time in 2:00.6. And, the U.S. launched
a satellite that started orbiting the moon by the middle of the month.
1970:
The Knicks beat the Lakers to win the NBA title (wow those NBA playoffs
ended more than a month earlier than they do now). And demonstrations were happening everywhere
against the Vietnam War. The Kent State
shootings took place on May 4, just 3 weeks before I would report for active Army
duty at Fort Benning, GA. At the time, I
honestly thought this might be my final year of life.
1977:
Seattle Slew won the Kentucky Derby – but only 4 seconds faster than Jet
Pilot’s 1947 time (1967’s Proud Clarion is starting to look like a super horse
because Seattle Slew is considered one of the greatest of all time!). And USC’s Ricky Bell was the #1 pick in the
NFL draft. ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” announced the
pick with very little fanfare except to excitedly say that he was the brother
of pop singing sensation Archie Bell of the group Archie Bell and the Drells.
1980:
The new all sports network, ESPN, proposed to the NFL that they could
broadcast their draft live, but NFL owners promptly and unanimously rejected
the proposal as “Preposterous. Nobody
will want to watch that!” NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle overrode their
vote and agreed to ESPN’s request (just one of MANY reasons Rozelle was
eventually voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame).
1987:
Alysheba won the Kentucky Derby, 3 seconds faster than Jet Pilot’s 1947
time. And France successfully conducted a nuclear bomb
test (things were definitely going the wrong way on the nuclear bomb front).
1990:
The South African government and the African National Congress, led by
Nelson Mandela, opened talks to end Apartheid.
It happened 4 years later.
By mid-May
the Dow Jones Industrial Average had soared to a record high of 2,821.53. “The stock market can’t possibly ever go
higher than this,” a leading financial wizard proclaimed.
1997:
Silver Charm won the Kentucky Derby, 2 seconds faster than Jet Pilot’s
1947 time, but still WAY behind Proud Clarion (4 seconds slower, and I’ve been
told that 4 seconds is like an hour in horse time).
Subscriptions being made on the
newfangled Internet were growing by leaps and bounds, and computers continued
to make great strides, including one called Deep Blue, which defeated world chess
champion Garry Kasparov in a playoff (jumpoff, moveoff – not sure what you call
it in chess).
2000:
A very rare event – the conjunction of the Sun with Mercury, Venus,
Mars, Saturn, Jupiter and our moon – took place. I think that meant they were all in a
row. 2000 also was the year when
everything was supposed to go ka-blooey because of something called Y2K, which
didn’t actually occur, so having a conjunction, which did occur, was pretty cool.
I ATTENDED
the Kentucky Derby on my birthday – May 3 – but all my picks to win, place or
show finished out of the money. So much
for birthday Karma. On the plus side, I
got to see a nice portrait of Proud Clarion in a display of all-time top
winners. And I was gifted a really cool
Kentucky Derby hat that I still wear today.
2007: Street Sense won the Kentucky
Derby, 4 seconds faster than Jet Pilot’s 1947 time, but 2 seconds behind Proud Clarion’s
time. Trains were allowed to cross
between North and South Korea for the first time since 1953, but the North
promptly put a damper on things by conducting a nuclear test. Still going the wrong direction on this!
2010:
The mega-earthquake that had devastated most of Haiti – a disaster that is
still being dealt with today – was getting celebrity help from more than 80
recording artists doing a remake of Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie’s “We Are
The World.” The song was going strong
in May and raising tens of millions for relief efforts.
Sixteen-year-old
Jessica Watson became the youngest person to sail solo and unassisted around
the world.
2017:
Always Dreaming won the Kentucky Derby in just under 2:04, preserving
Proud Clarion’s ranking as one of the all-time best (He is still ranked near
the top and only one second behind Secretariat’s all-time best time of 1:59.4. In fashion, France formally banned “too thin”
models from its fashion runways and said that all digitally enhanced photos must
be accurately labeled as such from now on.
So there!
2020: We’ve had the first Palindrome Day in nearly
a thousand years. On Feb. 2nd
it was the second day of the second month of 2020. In other words it was 02022020, which reads
the same both forwards and backwards.
The last time we could celebrate a Palindrome Day was the 11th
day of the 11th month in the year 1111 – in other words 111111.
Besides that, what could possibly be more
newswor…? Oh yeah, that. And,
thus, my birthday writing exercise is concluded.
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