Well, we start off with someone who we might not want to celebrate too much. Happy birthday(?) to Nero, Roman Emperor, born on this date in 37. Contrary to what you've heard, he didn't fiddle during the great fire. He actually did a great job of trying to get the fire under control, feeding the population, and rebuilding the City. It's basically everything he did later that caused him problems. Why has a false story persisted for 2000 years? Well, if you know Nero, he wasn't the nicest guy in the world, so when he was dead and buried, there were a lot of people who wanted to make him look even worse. We'll see that again in about 10 days, with a German guy in New Jersey.
Another Roman emperor was also born on this date, in 130. He name was Lucius Verus, and technically he was a co-emperor. And that's about all I know regarding him, and I don't care enough to look him up. Maybe next year.
Gustave Eiffel, an engineer and architect was born on this date in 1832. Guess what he did? Yeah, pretty much. So happy birthday to him.
J. Paul Getty was born on this date in 1892. He made a crap-ton of money in the oil industry. He got a nice birthday present in 1973, when his grandson John Paul Getty III was found alive in Italy, albeit minus an ear. He'd been kidnapped a few months before, and there wasn't a lot of info on him until Grandpa paid the ransom. Well, most of it. The rest of the needed money was loaned to JP the Second by his less-than-generous Dad. In fairness, Grandpa felt that paying a ransom would make his other grandkids less secure. Perhaps- and it's also worth noting that paying a ransom doesn't actually work that well. But in this case it did. However, Grandpa refused to even talk to III when he called to thank him. So he was not a particularly nice guy. What the hell- he was rich though.
In 1921, American pop music had a pretty big day. Happy birthday to Alan Freed, who is given credit for coining the phrase "rock and roll". Although, if the Drew Carey Show is to be believed, it was actually Drew's mom who inspired Freed. I'll let you decide which version you believe.
A very funny man was born today in 1933- Tim Conway. If you're old enough to remember the Carol Burnett Show, you're a lucky person. You saw not only one of the best tv shows EVER, but you saw Conway at his finest. He used to go off and improv these riffs that usually wound up putting Harvey Korman in stitches- right in the middle of a sketch. Man, I remember when that show defined "Must See TV". Good times...
In 1942, Dave Clark was born. He played in a British Invasion band called The Dave Clark Five. Wonder where they got that name from... Surprisingly, he wasn't the front man, but the drummer. And he made a ton of money from other ventures. Ever heard of "Ready Steady Go!"? It was a popular British show from the 60s. Guess who owns the rights to it?
Big news for Tiger fans. Happy birthday to the Skipper, Jim Leyland, aka The Marlboro Man. He's 67 today. And still going. Not bad. And his brother, by the way, is known as "Father Tom", and he's the priest at a Toledo church; where the family grew up.
Musically, happy birthday to Carmine Appice, drummer extraordinaire. Born in 1946, he played in Vanilla Fudge (the band, not the food product. That would be quite messy). He also played with Rod Stewart, and was even in a band with Jim McCarty, who later founded Detroit legends The Rockets. So that makes Carmine sorta cool. Adding to the coolness factor? He's Italian.
Not Italian is birthday girl Melanie Chartoff, who I had a crush on back in the day. She was on "Fridays" back in the early 80s with Michael Richards, where she was the cohost of "Friday Edition". You might better understand all this if you just substitute "SNL" for Fridays, and "Weekend Update" for Friday Edition. Yeah, that pretty much explains it all.
In more "hot women of my younger years" news, happy birthday to Helen Slater, who was born in 1963. She's best known as an actress for being "Supergirl" back in the 80s. She later starred in "The Legend of Billie Jean", best known for the Pat Benatar theme song. Her costar there was Christian Slater, who is no relation. Nowadays, she mostly does music, supposedly pretty well. Dunno. Oh, and she was Judge Reinhold's wife in "ruthless people" which is a pretty under-rated movie from the old days.
And that's about it. Short and sweet.
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