104 years ago today, the Right Honorable Viscountess Astor, Nancy Astor, became the first woman elected to the Parliament of Great Britain. Born and raised in Virginia, USA, she would eventually marry another American-born Englishman, Waldorf Astor, in 1906 and follow his path into politics. Winning the seat for Plymouth-Sutton, she entered the House of Commons as a member of the then-Unionists, now-Conservative Party. READ about her stances and actions… (1919)
If we who live in democracies and republics are to recognize certain milestones in the development of these institutions, we must do so by acknowledging their contributions and their detriments side by side. Under that lens, Astor is an interesting character.
During her time in Parliament, Astor was an advocate for temperance, welfare, education reforms, and women’s rights. She gained attention as a woman and as someone who did not follow the rules, often attributed to her American upbringing which she did not bury at all, and rather could be heard sometimes saying that “I’m a Virginian, we shoot to kill.”
She used her money for charitable causes, and organized support for a series of nursery schools.
Like many Conservatives she strongly supported the Church of England, and was vehemently anti-communist. However she was also a true antisemite, blaming Jews for the death of Jesus, among other things, and sympathetic to the Nazi Party, a decision which would eventually see her out of politics before the Second World War began.
MORE Good News on this Date:
- Iceland gained independence from Denmark when an agreement was signed after decades of national unrest over its identity—which finally severed its ties to Denmark 26 years later when the island, and its 3,000-mile coastline, became a republic (1918)
- The Divine Miss M, Bette Midler, turns 77 years old (1945)
- I Want to Hold Your Hand debuted, The Beatles’ first single released in the United States (1963)
- Central African Republic became independent from France (1958) and Papua New Guinea from Australia (1973)
- First World AIDS Day to promote awareness of the disease (1988)
- East Germany‘s parliament abolished the communist party from the constitutional provision that granted it the leading role in governing (1989)
- Sections in the Channel Tunnel met as the last rocks were cleared 40 meters beneath the seabed connecting France and the UK (1990)
- Vicente Fox was sworn in as president of Mexico, ending 71 years of rule by a single political party (2000)
- An all-female on-field refereeing team took charge of a men’s World Cup game for the first time in a group-stage match between Costa Rica and Germany (2022)
And, 26 years ago today, Kenny G set a new world record when he held a note on his saxophone for 45 minutes and 47 seconds using a technique that allows him to blow and breathe at the same time.
Now 65, Kenny G is the biggest-selling instrumental musician of the modern era and one of the best-selling artists of all time, with global sales of more than 75 million records. WATCH him explain the circular breathing… (1997)
68 years ago today, the seamstress Rosa Parks refused to obey an order from a bus driver to give up her seat to a white man and was arrested for violating Montgomery, Alabama’s racial segregation laws.
Although Parks was not the first person to ‘stand up’ in order to stay seated on a bus, her act of defiance sparked a yearlong city bus boycott that galvanized the Civil Rights Movement.
At the time, Parks was secretary of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP and had been trained as an activist. But, on this day, she acted as a private citizen who was simply “tired of giving in”. She became an international icon of resistance to racial segregation and organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including Martin Luther King, Jr., a new minister in town. Although widely honored in later years for her act, she suffered, too; she was fired from her job as a seamstress in a local department store, and received death threats for years afterwards. See books on Rosa Parks, here. (1955)
56 years ago today, Axis: Bold as Love was released by Track Records in the UK where it peaked at number 5 and spent 16 weeks on the charts. Despite average sales in the UK, it was certified platinum in the US. Jimi Hendrix’ second album only accelerated his meteoric rise, and proved that as well as being a spectacular guitar player, he wasn’t half bad behind the mixing board, after having enough studio time to get a good idea of the sounds he wanted.
Axis: Bold As Love’s scheduled release date was almost delayed when Hendrix lost the master tape of side one of the LP, leaving it in the back seat of a London taxi. With the deadline looming, Hendrix, producer Chas Chandler, and engineer Eddie Kramer remixed most of side one in a single overnight session, but they could not match the quality of the lost mix of “If 6 Was 9”.
Bassist Noel Redding had a tape recording of this mix, which had to be smoothed out with an iron as it had gotten wrinkled. During the verses, Hendrix doubled his singing with a guitar line which he played one octave lower than his vocals. Hendrix voiced his disappointment about having re-mixed the album so quickly, and he felt that it could have been better had they been given more time. (1967)
And, 39 years ago today Beverly Hills Cop, starring Eddie Murphy, premiered in Los Angeles.
The action-comedy film directed by Martin Brest and written by Daniel Petrie Jr. featured Murphy as Axel Foley, a reckless Detroit detective who visits Beverly Hills, California to solve the murder of his best friend. Judge Reinhold and John Ashton play the straight-laced Sergeant Taggart and Detective Billy Rosewood assigned to follow Axel, and later escort him to the border of Tinsel Town, but the street-smart cop determined to get to the bottom of things is too cagey to be tailed.
This first of three films in the Beverly Hills Cop series catapulted Murphy to international stardom, won the People’s Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture and was nominated for both the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy) and Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. It became the highest-grossing film of the year in the US. WATCH the 2-minute trailer… (1984)
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