Today's Highlight in History:
In 1850, in a three-hour speech to the U.S. Senate, Daniel Webster of Massachusetts endorsed the Compromise of 1850 as a means of preserving the Union. (Critics bitterly denounced Webster for endorsing a compromise which included a provision for returning runaway slaves to their owners.)
On this date:
In 1793, during the French Revolutionary Wars, France declared war on Spain.
In 1869, the Suez Canal opened, connecting the Mediterranean and the Red Sea via Egypt.
In 1875, composer Maurice Ravel was born in Ciboure, France.
In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a patent for his telephone.
In 1887, North Carolina State University was founded.
In 1926, the first successful trans-Atlantic radio-telephone conversations took place, between New York and London.
In 1932, in the depths of the Great Depression, an estimated 3,000 men rioted at the Detroit plant of the Ford Motor Co. Four were killed.
In 1936, Adolf Hitler ordered his troops to march into the Rhineland, thereby breaking the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Pact.
In 1965, a march by civil rights demonstrators was broken up in Selma, Ala., by state troopers and a sheriff's posse.
Sheriff Jim Clark warns marchers to disperse
In 1981, anti-government guerrillas in Colombia executed kidnapped American Bible translator Chester Allen Bitterman, whom they accused of being a CIA agent.
In 1984, the U.S. Senate confirmed William Wilson as the first U.S. ambassador to the Vatican in 117 years.
In 1994, the Supreme Court, in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., ruled that a parody that pokes fun at an original work can be considered "fair use" that doesn't require permission from the copyright holder.
In 1996, three U.S. servicemen were convicted in the rape of a 12-year-old Okinawa girl and sentenced by a Japanese court to up to seven years in prison.
In 1997, a U.S. veto killed an otherwise unanimous U.N. Security Council resolution condemning new Jewish settlements in Arab East Jerusalem.
In 2000, Texas Governor George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore were the big winners in Super Tuesday primaries. The Nasdaq composite crossed the 5,000 mark for the first time before retreating.
In 2002, more than 600 people were reported dead after several days of Hindu-Muslim violence in the state of Gujarat, India.
In 2004, an investiture ceremony was held in Concord, N.H., for V. Gene Robinson, the Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop. Fourteen Palestinians were killed in the deadliest Israeli raid in Gaza in 17 months. Also in 2004, after repeated failures and missed deadlines, the Iraqi governing council signed an interim constitution.
In 2005, President George W. Bush nominated John Bolton to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, an appointment which ran into Democratic opposition, prompting Bush to make a recess appointment. The presidents of Syria and Lebanon announced that Syrian forces would pull back to Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley by March 31, but that a complete troop withdrawal would be deferred until after later negotiations. A prison fire in the Dominican Republic killed 134 inmates.
In 2006, U.S. prosecutors sought the death penalty for Zacarias Moussaoui, who pleaded guilty to terrorism conspiracy leading up to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
In 2007, sex offender John Evander Couey was found guilty in Miami of kidnapping, raping and murdering 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford, who was buried alive. An Indonesian Garuda Airlines Boeing 737-400 with 140 people aboard crashed and burned on landing in Yogyakarta, killing 49 people.
In 2008, on the heels of a gloomy report that 63,000 jobs were lost in February 2008, President George W. Bush said "it's clear our economy has slowed" as he tried to reassure an anxious public that the long-term outlook was good. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Samantha Power, who was acting as an adviser to Barack Obama, resigned after calling rival Hillary Rodham Clinton "a monster." Leon Greenman, the only Englishman sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp, died in London at age 97.
In 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met with Turkish leaders in Ankara, where she announced that President Barack Obama planned to make his own visit. Western-backed Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad submitted his resignation (however, he retained his position under a new government). Two islands off the Queensland coast in Australia were evacuated as powerful Cyclone Hamish approached. The storm, a category 5 cyclone producing winds of more than 180 miles per hour, passed within 60 miles of the Whitsunday Islands. Former Metropolitan Opera general manager Schuyler Chapin died in New York at age 86.
Today's Birthdays: Comedian Alan Sues is 84. Photographer Lord Snowdon ("Mr. Princess Margaret") is 80. TV personality Willard Scott is 76. Auto racer Janet Guthrie is 72. Actor Daniel J. Travanti is 70. Former Walt Disney Co. chief executive officer Michael Eisner is 68. Rock musician Chris White (The Zombies) is 67. Actor John Heard is 64. Rock singer Peter Wolf is 64. Rock musician Matthew Fisher (Procol Harum) is 64. Pro Football Hall-of-Famer Franco Harris is 60. Pro and College Football Hall-of-Famer Lynn Swann is 58. Rhythm-and-blues singer-musician Ernie Isley (The Isley Brothers) is 58. Actor Bryan Cranston is 54. Actress Donna Murphy is 51. Actor Nick Searcy is 51. Golfer Tom Lehman is 51. Tennis Hall-of-Famer Ivan Lendl is 50. Actress Mary Beth Evans is 49. Actor Bill Brochtrup is 47. Opera singer Denyce Graves is 46. Comedian Wanda Sykes is 46. Singer-actress Taylor Dayne is 45. Rock musician Randy Guss (Toad the Wet Sprocket) is 43. Actor Peter Sarsgaard is 39. Actress Rachel Weisz (wys) is 39. Classical singer Sebastien Izambard (Il Divo) is 37. Rock singer Hugo Ferreira (Tantric) is 36. Actress Jenna Fischer is 36. Actress Audrey Marie Anderson is 35. Actress Laura Prepon is 30.
March 7 In Entertainment
In 1946, "The Lost Weekend" was named best picture at the Academy Awards. Ray Milland won the best actor award for his role in that movie. Joan Crawford was named best actress for her role in "Mildred Pierce."
In 1956, "Blue Suede Shoes" by Carl Perkins entered the R&B chart, the first time a country artist had done that.
In 1960, Jack Paar returned as host of NBC's "Tonight Show," nearly a month after walking off in a censorship dispute with the network.
In 1963, Jack Anglin of the country duo Johnny and Jack died in a car accident while en route to a memorial service for singer Patsy Cline. Cline had been killed in a plane crash a few days earlier.
In 1969, "Pinball Wizard" by The Who, which was the first single from the album "Tommy," was released in Britain.
In 1983, the country music channel The Nashville Network went on the air.
In 1987, "Licensed to Ill" by The Beastie Boys became the first rap album to hit No. 1.
In 1994, the Supreme Court ruled 2 Live Crew's parody of Roy Orbison's "Oh, Pretty Woman" was legal.
In 1996, 20th Century Fox sued an Australian brewery for distributing Duff Beer, the brand favored by cartoon character Homer Simpson.
In 1999, filmmaker Stanley Kubrick, whose films included "Dr. Strangelove," "A Clockwork Orange" and "2001: A Space Odyssey," died of natural causes at his home in Hertfordshire, England outside London at the age of 70.
In 2000, country singer Frank "Pee Wee" King died in Louisville, Ky. at age 86.
In 2001, Pearl Jam set a record for the most simultaneous chart debuts from a single band in a single week on the Billboard album chart. They had seven of their American bootleg albums debut on the chart. The previous record holder: Pearl Jam, when five of their European bootlegs hit the album chart their first week out.
In 2003, a four-day walkout by Broadway musicians began.
In 2004, actor Paul Winfield died at age 64.
In 2009, former child actor and singer Jimmy Boyd ("I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus") died in Santa Monica, Calif. at age 70.
Thought for Today: "Caveat actor." (Let the doer beware.) — Latin proverb. [We'll be damned. (For sure.) We thought it meant "Beware of actor." — Ed.]
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