⅏Did You Know - These Random Facts? #8 - February

Did You Know?  For the month of

back in.....

• 1924, The first execution by lethal gas in American history is carried out in Carson City, Nevada. The executed man was Tong Lee, a member of a Chinese gang who was convicted of murdering a rival gang member. Lethal gas was adopted by Nevada in 1921 as a more humane method of carrying out its death sentences, as opposed to the traditional techniques of execution by hanging, firing squad, or electrocution.
• 1949, The NBC station in Chicago aired the first-ever TV daytime soap opera, These Are My Children.  It was not a success and prompted the critic from Television World to declare "there is no place on television for this type of program - a blank screen is preferable."

  

  Paul Newman with
  Joanne Woodward, 1958
  Los Angeles Time 
  file photograph

  
• 1952, After a long illness, King George VI of Great Britain and Northern Ireland dies in his sleep at the royal estate at Sandringham. Princess Elizabeth, the oldest of the king's two daughters and next in line to succeed him, was in Kenya at the time of her father's death; she was crowned Queen Elizabeth II on June 2, 1953, at age 27.
• 1958, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward married, after falling in love on the set of The Long, Hot Summer.  The marriage was unique for Hollywood:  It lasted 50 years, until his death in 2008.
• 1973, An agreement to end the Vietnam War was signed in Paris, ending America's role in the war in that country, which had begun in 1954.
• 1983, Gunmen steal the champion Irish race horse Shergar from a stud farm owned by the Aga Khan in County Kildare, Ireland. The five-year-old thoroughbred stallion, named European horse of the year in 1981, was worth $13.5 million and commanded stud fees of approximately $100,000.
• 1991, Whitney Houston performed "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Superbowl XXV.  The crowd loved her version so much, it was released as a single and quickly hit #20 on the charts!
• 1999, King Hussein bin Talal, the 20th century's longest-serving executive head of state dies, and his son Prince Abdallah bin Hussein ascends to the Jordanian throne.

Resources: history.com, datesinhistory.com