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MILESTONES: June 29, birthdays for Gary Busey, Nicole Scherzinger, Charlamagne Tha God

Brooklyn Today

June 29, 2017 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Actor Gary Busey celebrates his birthday today. AP photo by Dan Steinberg.

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Greetings, Brooklyn. Today is the 179th day of the year.

Notable people born on this day include Gary Busey and Joe Johnson, among others.

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ON THIS DAY IN 1947, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle published a front-page article titled “Transit Relief Due Here in Early ’48.”

The article focused on the city’s plan to replace Brooklyn’s crumbling and outdated buses and streetcars.

“Delivery of the first 100 buses already have been made and the vehicles are being put into service on different lines to replace worn out units. Another 200 trolley coaches are expected to be ready for service next summer,” the Eagle reported.

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NOTABLE PEOPLE born on this day include actor Gary Busey, who was born in 1944; former hockey player Theo Fleury, who was born in 1968; actor and former U.S. Rep. Fred Grandy, who was born in 1948; basketball player Joe Johnson, who was born in 1981; and actress Sharon Lawrence, who was born in 1962.

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GEORGE WASHINGTON GOETHALS WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1858. The Brooklyn-born American engineer and Army officer was the chief engineer of the Panama Canal and first civil governor of the Canal Zone. Goethals died in New York in 1928.

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THE DEATH PENALTY WAS BANNED ON THIS DAY IN 1972. In a decision that spared the lives of 600 individuals who at the time were sitting on death row, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a 5-4 vote, found capital punishment a violation of the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits “cruel and unusual punishment.” Later overruling themselves, the court determined in 1976 that the death penalty was not cruel and unusual punishment, and in October of that year lifted the ban on the death penalty in murder cases. In 1977, Gary Gilmore became the first individual executed in the U.S. in more than 10 years.

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JAMES VANDERZEE WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1886. The pioneering African-American photographer set up a portrait studio in Harlem, N.Y. in 1916, just as that black community was exploding culturally, politically and materially. VanDerZee was the semiofficial photographer of the Harlem Renaissance (1920s to World War II), capturing such luminaries as poet Countee Cullen and Jamaican leader Marcus Garvey, as well as dancers, soldiers, street preachers and prosperous middle-class residents. He died in 1983 in Washington, D.C.

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BERNARD HERRMANN WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1911. Herrmann was a pioneering film composer, working with such directors as Alfred Hitchcock, Orson Welles and Martin Scorsese. He introduced the theremin in his score for “The Day the Earth Stood Still.” Other notable credits include Hitchcock’s “Psycho,” Welles’ “Citizen Kane” and Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver,” as well as the TV shows “The Twilight Zone” and “Lost in Space.” Herrmann died in 1975 in California.

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THE BROOKLYN HISTORICAL SOCIETY (BHS) WILL HOST “Book Talk: ‘The New Brooklyn: What It Takes to Bring a City Back’” tonight at 6:30 p.m. For decades, “Brooklyn” was synonymous with grit and struggle, yet today the borough is a hub of hipsters, booming startups and massive new developments across many neighborhoods. Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and City Journal Contributing Editor Kay Hymowitz will examine this seeming Renaissance of Brooklyn’s ever-changing landscape through seven neighborhoods: Park Slope, Williamsburg, Bed-Stuy, the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Brownsville, Sunset Park and Canarsie. In this exploration, Hymowitz will look at the successes of black and white middle classes, local policies and small businesses, while assessing the challenges left for recent immigrants and other diverse communities trying to thrive.

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Special thanks to “Chase’s Calendar of Events” and Brooklyn Public Library.

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