Today in History for 2nd January 2023

[CoM Moderators]

Historical Events

1890 - Record 19.2 feet alligator shot in Louisiana by American businessman Edward Avery McIlhenny
1909 - 1st official Dutch 11 city skate (Minne Hoekstra in 13:50)
1939 - 5th Sugar Bowl: #1 TCU beats #6 Carnegie Tech, 15-7
1941 - World War II: German bombing severely damages the Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff, Wales
1961 - 27th Sugar Bowl: #2 Mississippi beats Rice, 14-6
1985 - Nevada Las Vegas basketball gives coach Jerry Tarkanian his 600th career victory with a 142-140 win over Utah State in triple overtime; total of 282 points breaks NCAA men's record of 275 set in 1976

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Famous Birthdays

1873 - Thérèse de Lisieux, French Roman-Catholic nun (d. 1897)
1907 - Salvador Ley, Guatemalan pianist, composer, and educator (National Conservatory; Westchester Conservatory), born in Guatemala City, Guatemala (d. 1985)
1928 - Vaughn Beals, CEO (Harley Davidson motorcycle), born in Cambridge, Massachusetts
1945 - Slobodan Praljak, Bosnian Croat general and war criminal, born in Čapljina, Independent State of Croatia (d. 2017)
1954 - Henry Bonilla, American politician (US House of Representatives (R) from Texas, 1993-2007), born in San Antonio, Texas
1965 - Greg Swindell, American baseball pitcher (World Series 2001; MLB All Star 1989; Houston Astros, Cleveland Indians, Arizona Diamondbacks), born in Fort Worth, Texas

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Famous Deaths

1918 - Sybe Kornelis Bakker, Dutch Christian socialist and reformed preacher, dies at 42
1923 - Sam Carter, African American resident of Rosewood Florida, lynched in the Rosewood Massacre
1971 - Lloyd Hall, African-American chemist and pioneer in food chemistry (science of food preservation), dies at 76
1994 - Sammy Taft, Canadian businessman (coined term "hat trick"), dies at 81
2012 - Gordon Hirabayashi, American sociologist and opponent to Japanese-American internment, dies after Alzheimer's disease at 93
2020 - Grant Weatherstone, Scotland rugby union winger (16 caps; Edinburgh District), dies at 88

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[+ Charlie]

In case you wonder who Edward Avery McIlhenny was, his father invented and marketed tabasco sauce; it was the source of the entire family's great wealth. His nephew Henry was the President of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, with a mansion on Rittenhouse Square. He was also well known in the Philadelphia gay community in the mid-20th century. I was taken to a couple of parties at the mansion in the 1960s.