It was on this date, March 1, 1969, that Spanish actor Javier Bardem – the first Spanish actor to receive an Oscar nomination – was born Javier Ángel Encinas Bardem in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, the Canary Islands, Spain. He father having left his mother, Bardem was reared by his mother and churched in […]

It was on this date, February 21, 2012, that masked members of the feminist punk-rock collective Pussy Riot staged a performance on the soleas of Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior (Храм Христа Спасителя) to protest the support of Orthodox Church leader Kirill I for Vladimir Putin during his election campaign that year. The resulting […]

It was on this date, February 20, 1932, that American newspaper editor and writer James A. Haught was born. As he writes in “A Freethinker’s Testimony” (7/9/2011), “Just because you grow up in the Bible Belt (I was born in a West Virginia hamlet with no electricity) doesn’t mean automatically that you’re a fundamentalist. My […]

It was on this date, February 14, 1970, that English actor, comedian, writer, film producer and director Simon Pegg was born Simon John Beckingham in Brockworth, Gloucestershire, England. Simon was seven when his parents divorced and he took the surname of his stepfather, Pegg, after his mother re-married. Simon Pegg is known for having co-written […]

It was on this date, January 28, 1936, that American actor, director, screenwriter, and author Alan Alda was born Alphonso Joseph D’Abruzzo to actor and singer Robert Alda and Joan Browne, a former showgirl and Miss New York pageant winner. His adopted stage and screen name, “Alda,” is a portmanteau of ALphonso and D’Abruzzo. A […]

It was on this date, January 20, 1956, that American stand-up comedian and author William “Bill” Maher, Jr. was born in New York City to a Jewish mother and Catholic father and reared in River Vale, N.J.. Maher attended Cornell University and started his stand-up comic career in 1979. In addition to his live stand-up […]

It was on this date, January 14, 1919, that Andrew Aitken Rooney, who grew up to be legendary CBS News commentator Andy Rooney, was born in Albany, New York. It seems Rooney was born to be a newsman. Rooney began writing for Stars and Stripes in London after he (a pacifist who opposed the war) […]

It was on this date, January 8, 1942, that English theoretical physicist, cosmologist and author of A Brief History of Time Stephen Hawking was born in Oxford. He entered Oxford University in 1959, showing an interest in classical music and science fiction as well as physics and cosmology. With a reputation as something of a […]

Read about comedian Paula Poundstone, the Vatican recognizing Israel, Flemish anatomist Andreas Vesalius, Swiss Protestant reformer Huldrych Zwingli, American science and science fiction writer Isaac Asimov, Roman statesman and orator Marcus Tullius Cicero, the founding of the Fabian Society, and more … (concludes the series)

It was on this date, December 29, 1959, that American stand-up comedian and writer Paula Poundstone was born in Huntsville, Alabama, but grew up in Sudbury, Massachusetts, where she dropped out of high school to pursue show business. Now known for her trademark suits and ties, Poundstone started doing stand-up in Boston in 1979, then […]