History Brooklyn Boro

MILESTONES: July 16, birthdays for Will Ferrell, Stewart Copeland, Corey Feldman

Brooklyn Today

July 14, 2017 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Actor Will Ferrell celebrates his birthday today. Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

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Greetings, Brooklyn. Today is the 197th day of the year.

Notable people born on this day include Will Ferrell and Stewart Copeland, among others.

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ON THIS DAY IN 1912, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle published a front-page article titled “Brooklyn Theaters to Have No Music.”

The article focused on the tension between the Musical Union and the Association of Theatrical Managers.

“The trouble between the musicians and the managers has reached such a stage that there seems to be little, if any, likelihood of a settlement, and from present indications it seems that neither side will give in under any consideration unless concessions are made. As both are equally insistent that they won’t budge an inch, every theater will open without orchestras and continue without music indefinitely,” the Eagle reported.

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NOTABLE PEOPLE born on this day include soccer player GARETH BALE, who was born in 1989; singer and actor RUBEN BLADES, who was born in 1948; actress PHOEBE CATES, who was born in 1963; drummer STEWART COPELAND, who was born in 1952; actor COREY FELDMAN, who was born in 1971; comedian and actor WILL FERRELL, who was born in 1967; dancer MICHAEL FLATLEY, who was born in 1958; actor MARK INDELICATO, who was born in 1994; actress JAYMA MAYS, who was born in 1979; former football player BARRY SANDERS, who was born in 1968; and violinist PINCHAS ZUKERMAN, who was born in 1948.

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IDA B. WELLS WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1862. The African-American journalist and antilynching crusader grew up as Jim Crow and lynching were becoming prevalent. Wells argued that lynchings occurred not to defend white women but because of whites’ fear of economic competition from blacks. She traveled extensively, founding antilynching societies and black women’s clubs. Wells’s “Red Record” was one of the first published accounts of lynchings in the South. Wells died in Illinois in 1931.

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BARBARA STANWYCK WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1907. The Flatbush native won a leading role in the Broadway melodrama “Noose” at the age of 18 she appeared for the first time as Barbara Stanwyck. She appeared in 82 films including “Stella Dallas,” “Double Indemnity” and “The Lady Eve” and in the television series “The Big Valley.” In 1944 the government listed her as the nation’s highest-paid woman, earning $400,000 per year. Stanwyck died in 1990 in California.

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THE ATOMIC BOMB WAS TESTED ON THIS DAY IN 1945. In the New Mexican desert at Alamogordo Air Base, 125 miles southeast of Albuquerque, the experimental atomic bomb was set off at 5:30 a.m. Dubbed “Fat Boy” by its creator, the plutonium bomb vaporized the steel scaffolding holding it as the immense fireball rose 8,000 feet in a fraction of a second, ultimately creating a mushroom cloud to a height of 41,000 feet. At ground zero, the bomb emitted heat three times the temperature of the interior of the sun. All plant and animal life for a mile around ceased to exist.

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

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“The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.” — journalist and activist Ida B. Wells