June 30, birthdays for Mike Tyson, Fantasia Barrino, David Alan Grier

Brooklyn Today

June 30, 2016 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Brooklyn native Mike Tyson celebrates his birthday today. Michael Clevenger/The Courier-Journal, Pool, via AP

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Greetings, Brooklyn. Today is the 183rd day of the year.

ON THIS DAY IN 1898, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle published an article titled “Canal ‘Rock’ Is Mud.”

The article focused on an upstate canal that was being “improved,” and for which state funding was inaccurately used to excavate rocks that actually turned out to not be rocks at all.

“A basin of water was brought into the room while the commission continued its inquiry. Into this water the alleged hard pan rock was deposited,” the Eagle reported. “Inside of seven minutes it dissolved and became the softest kind of mud, so soft and thin that even a schoolboy’s mud pie could not be made of it.”

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NOTABLE PEOPLE born on this day include singer and TV personality FANTASIA BARRINO, who was born in 1984; actor VINCENT D’ONOFRIO, who was born in Brooklyn in 1959; actress NANCY DUSSAULT, who was born in 1936; actor RUPERT GRAVES, who was born in 1963; actor DAVID ALAN GRIER, who was born in 1955; actress MONICA POTTER, who was born in 1971; former Congresswoman and President of the Association of American Publishers PATRICIA SCHROEDER, who was born in 1940; country singer COLE SWINDELL, who was born in 1983; and former heavyweight champion boxer MIKE TYSON, who was born in Brooklyn in 1966.

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LENA HORNE WAS born in Brooklyn on this day in 1917. Horne began singing with the chorus line at the Cotton Club in Harlem at age 16. A career on Broadway and in Hollywood followed in rapid succession and she soon became the symbol for African-American actors and singers trying to break the color barrier. She found success with both black and white audiences, although she did face her share of racial prejudice throughout her lifetime. She is best remembered for her nightclub and Broadway performances of torch songs, jazz standards and classics like her signature “Stormy Weather.” She died in New York City in 2010.

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LUNA PARK IN Coney Island will host its annual School’s Out Concert today beginning at 2:30 p.m. The free concert will feature performances by Grace Sewell, CNCO and AJR. For more information, visit lunaparknyc.com.

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

“Everyone has a plan ’till they get punched in the mouth.” — Mike Tyson, who was born in Brooklyn on this day in 1966.