On April 17…

“The American people are not complacent about Iron Curtain tanks and planes less than 90 miles from our shores. The evidence is clear, and the hour is late. We and our Latin friends will have to face the fact that we cannot postpone any longer the real issue of the survival of freedom in this hemisphere.”
~ President John F. Kennedy
The Day After the Failed Bay of Pigs Invasion

1843 – Samuel Morey died at the age of 80.
Morey, a resident of Orford, NH and later Fairlee, VT, successfully operated a steamboat on the Connecticut River in 1793 nearly 20 years before Robert Fulton’s Clermont in 1807.
Fulton took advantage of a loophole in the U.S. Patent process, thereby receiving the recognition of becoming the first to invent the steamboat.
Undaunted, Morey continued to experiment with various methods of power by combining water, carbon, and air. This led to his “Gas or Vapor” engine in 1826, becoming the first to invent the internal-combustion engine which later was used to propel most modes of mechanical transportation, including automobiles.
So why am I mentioning this? Well, I’m a native Vermonter and I’m looking out for Morey’s reputation. Besides, Lake Morey (named after him) in Fairlee, VT has a beautiful resort and spectacular golf course.
I have played the course many times, so this is a rather long-winded way of giving the resort, the golf course … and Samuel … a free plug.

1864 – The state of Virginia’s secession convention voted to secede from the United States, becoming the 8th state to join the Confederate States of America.
The following day, Union Colonel Robert E. Lee was offered a role as major general to command the defense of Washington by presidential advisor Francis P. Blair.
Lee replied: “Mr. Blair, I look upon secession as anarchy. If I owned the four millions of slaves in the South I would sacrifice them all to the Union; but how can I draw my sword upon Virginia, my native state?“
Although privately opposed to secession as “nothing but revolution and an unconstitutional betrayal of the efforts of the Founding Fathers,” Lee resigned his position three days later and took command of the Virginia state forces.

1865 – Federal soldiers, investigating the death of President Abraham Lincoln, visited Mary Surratt’s boarding house in Washington.
The agents found a picture of John Wilkes Booth, pictures of Confederate leaders including Jefferson Davis, a pistol, and a mold for making bullets.
As Mary was being arrested for conspiracy to assassinate Lincoln, Lewis Powell appeared at her door in disguise. Although Surratt denied knowing him, Powell foolishly claimed that he was a laborer hired by Surratt to dig a ditch the next morning.
The discrepancy and Powell’s unusually well-groomed appearance, quite unlike a ditch-digger, prompted his arrest.
He was later identified as the man who had attempted to assassinate Secretary of State William Seward.

1941 – Representatives of Yugoslavia’s various regions signed an armistice with Nazi Germany at Belgrade, ending 11 days of futile resistance against the invading German Wehrmacht.
More than 300,000 Yugoslav officers and soldiers were taken prisoner.
Only 200 Germans died in the conquest of Yugoslavia.

1951 – Mickey Mantle made his major league debut for the New York Yankees in a 5-0 win over the Boston Red Sox.
Baseball fans with sharp eyes will notice the future Hall of Fame outfielder was wearing #6 on his uniform.
He wore that number until July 15, 1951, when he was sent back to the Triple-A League Kansas City Blues.
He was called back to the Yankees on August 24 that same year and was then assigned #7.

1960 – Rock star Eddie Cochran (Summertime Blues, C’mon Everybody, Twenty Flight Rock) died the day after a taxi carrying him from a show in Bristol, England, crashed on the way to the airport in London.
Cochran, who was thrown from the vehicle, suffered a severe head injury.
Gene Vincent (Be Bop A Lula), traveling with Cochran in the cab, suffered a broken leg and would walk with a limp for the rest of his life.

1961 – The Bay of Pigs invasion began when a CIA-financed and trained group of Cuban refugees landed in Cuba and attempted to topple the communist government of Fidel Castro. The attack was a complete failure.
Though many of his military advisers indicated that an amphibious assault on Cuba by a group of lightly armed exiles had little chance for success, President John F. Kennedy gave the go-ahead for the attack. Over 1,400 exiles, armed with American weapons and using American landing craft, waded ashore at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba.
The plan immediately fell apart when the landing force met unexpectedly rapid counterattacks from Castro’s military. The United States refrained from providing necessary air support. Over 100 of the attackers were killed, and more than 1,000 were captured.
The failure at the Bay of Pigs cost the United States dearly.
Castro used the attack to solidify his power in Cuba and he requested additional Soviet military aid. Eventually that aid included missiles, and the construction of missile bases in Cuba sparked the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962, when the United States and the Soviet Union nearly came to blows over the issue.
Kennedy tried to redeem himself by publicly accepting blame for the attack and its subsequent failure, but the botched mission left the young president looking vulnerable and indecisive.

1961 – At the 33rd Academy Awards, The Apartment, Spartacus and Elmer Gantry all took home multiple Oscars.
The Apartment was the overall winner with five awards, including Best Picture, Best Director (Billy Wilder), and Best Original Screenplay (Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond).
Elmer Gantry won three Oscars; Best Actor (Burt Lancaster), Best Supporting Actress (Shirley Jones), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Richard Brooks).
Spartacus had four wins, including Best Supporting Actor (Peter Ustinov) and Best Art Direction.
Emotional Moment: Gary Cooper was selected by the Academy Board of Governors to be the year’s recipient of the Academy Honorary Award “for his many memorable screen performances and the international recognition he, as an individual, has gained for the motion picture industry”.
Cooper was too ill to attend the ceremony, though his condition was not publicly disclosed. At the awards ceremony James Stewart, a close friend of Cooper, accepted the Honorary Oscar on his behalf.
Stewart’s emotional speech hinted that something was seriously wrong, and the next day newspapers ran the headline, “Gary Cooper has cancer.”
Less than four weeks later, on May 13, 1961, six days after his 60th birthday, Gary Cooper died.

1969 – Sirhan Bishara Sirhan was convicted for the 1968 assassination of Sen. Robert Kennedy. Six days later, he was sentenced to death in the gas chamber.
His sentence was commuted to life in prison in 1972 after California abolished the death penalty.

1970 – Paul McCartney released McCartney, his solo debut album.
He played all the musical instruments on the album – from acoustic and electric guitars and bass to keyboards, drums and various percussion instruments – with wife Linda supplying backing vocals on some songs.
Conflicts over the release of McCartney estranged him from his former bandmates, as he refused to delay the album’s release to allow for Apple’s previously scheduled titles, notably the Beatles’ album Let It Be.
The album received mostly negative reviews and was widely criticized for being under-produced and for its unfinished songs, but it benefited from the publicity surrounding the Beatles’ break-up.
It held the #1 position for three weeks on the US Billboard Top LPs chart and peaked at #2 in Britain.

1981 – Caveman, starring Ringo Starr, Barbara Bach, Dennis Quaid, Shelley Long, and former NFL player John Matuszak, premiered in U.S. theaters.
It bombed at the box office and critical reception was mostly negative. Film critics Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel both gave the film a negative “don’t see it” review. Ebert added, “The movie has an interesting cast – or would have an interesting cast, if the actors were given interesting things to do.”
Perhaps it was because the film’s dialogue was almost entirely in “caveman” language.
Love Factoid: Bach and Starr first met on the set of the film. They were married just over a year later … and that is the only positive thing I can say about the movie.

1983 – Musician Felix Pappalardi was shot and killed by his wife, Gail (Collins), with a derringer he had given her as a gift a few months earlier.
He is best known as the bassist with the band Mountain, whose song Mississippi Queen became a classic rock radio staple.
He had earlier been involved with the British power trio Cream, producing their albums Disraeli Gears and Wheels Of Fire.
In 1979, he released a solo album (Don’t Worry, Ma), a soul filled collection of music that displayed a much softer side of his music.
Aftermath: Collins, a gifted lyricist who co-wrote Cream’s Strange Brew and World of Pain, was acquitted of second degree murder and manslaughter, but found guilty of criminally negligent homicide. She spent two years in prison
On December 6, 2013, Collins was found dead by her landlord in the Mexican village of Ajijic, Jalisco, where had been undergoing cancer treatments.

2008 – Danny Federici died after a three-year battle with melanoma. He was 58.
He was best known as the organist, accordion player, and a founding member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band.
In a band with larger-than-life characters such as saxophonist Clarence Clemons, drummer Max Weinberg, and guitarist “Little” Steven Van Zandt, Federici was content to play in his familiar position to the side of the stage. But his playing was as vital to Springsteen’s live show as any instrument in the band.
His organ solo was a highlight of Springsteen’s first top 10 hit, Hungry Heart, and his accordion solo on 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy) was always a crowd favorite.
His organ coda on the 9/11-inspired Springsteen song You’re Missing provided one of the more heart-wrenching moments on The Rising album in 2002.
In November 2007, Federici took a leave of absence from Springsteen’s “Magic Tour” to pursue treatment for melanoma. Springsteen stated, “Danny is one of the pillars of our sound and has played beside me as a great friend for more than 40 years. We all eagerly await his healthy and speedy return.”
Federici made his only return to the stage on March 20, 2008, when he appeared for portions of a Springsteen and E Street Band performance at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, as shown below.
He died less than a month later at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City.

2016 – Actress Doris Roberts following a stroke. She was 90 years old.
In a career that spanned six decades, she appeared in over 30 films, but found true success on television, becoming known for her role as Mildred Krebs in Remington Steele, and her role as Marie Barone (Raymond’s mother) on the long running sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond.

2018 – Barbara Bush, the First Lady of the United States from 1989 to 1993, died of congestive heart failure at the age of 92.
The wife of George H. W. Bush, who served as the 41st President of the United States, and the mother of George W. Bush, the 43rd President, she left a legacy of her own.
Family literacy was Barbara Bush’s cause as First Lady, and she called it “the most important issue we have”.
She became involved with many literacy organizations, served on literacy committees and co-founded the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy.

Compiled by Ray Lemire ©2020 RayLemire.com / Streamingoldies.com. All Rights Reserved.