Headline Birthdays for June 23
Giambattista Vico 1668-1744
born in Naples, Italy, the sixth of eight
brothers, whose father is a bookseller; died there Jan. 23, 1744; lawyer,
philosopher, pioneering cultural anthropologist; studies at Jesuit grammar
schools; 1694 gets law degree from the University of Naples Faculty of Jurisprudence;
1699-1741 Professor of Rhetoric at Naples; best known for his major work,
Scienza nuova (1725, The New Science), where he is the first to formulate
a systematic method of historical research, and outlines history as the account
of the birth and development of human societies and their institutions, rather
than as the biographies of great men, or as the development of God's will;
believed that every period in history had a distinct character, and that
similar periods recur throughout history in the same order, not in exactly
the same form, but subject to change from new circumstances; thus the historian
can never be a prophet; believed in an innate human sense of justice and
natural law, and that history is the key to any science of humanity; saw
each epoch as a whole in which all aspects of culture are interrelated, and
myth, poetry, and art are important means of understanding the spirit of
a culture.
Quote: "Common sense is judgment without reflection, shared by an entire
class, an entire nation, or the entire human race."
Empress Josephine 1763-1814
born Marie Josèphe Rose Tascher
de La Pagerie at Trois-Îlets, Martinique, West Indies, daughter of
an aristocrat planter; died at Malmaison, France; died May 29, 1814; 1789
married Republican general Alexandre de Beauharnais and had two children,
Hortense and Eugène, but the couple separated, and he was executed
in 1794 during the French Revolution on the orders of Robespierre; 1796 married
Napoleon Bonaparte and was crowned Empress of France by him in 1804; 1809
he had their childless marriage annulled to marry Austrian princess Marie
Louise; 
Josephine thereafter lived in retirement. On her death, Napoleon
wrote from his final exile on St. Helena, "Josephine is the only woman I
have ever truly loved. She reigns in my heart and I mourn for her."
[picture; by David, 1798; official costume; she is crowned; she is divorced; porcelain biscuit by Sèvres]
Edward VIII 1894-1972
born in Richmond, Surrey, the eldest son of
George V; died in Paris May 28, 1972; attended the naval colleges at Osborne
and Dartmouth and Magdalen College, Oxford; 1911-36 Prince of Wales; served
in World War I and was the first member of British royalty to become a pilot;
1936 Jan.-Dec. for 326 days King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland and of the British dominions and Emperor of India; abdicated the
throne in order to marry a twice-divorced American woman, Wallis Simpson;
the first English monarch to relinquish his throne voluntarily; became Duke
of Windsor on the succession of his brother as King George VI; 1940-45 Governor
of the Bahamas; spent the rest of his days in France.
Alfred Charles Kinsey 1894-1956
born in Hoboken, New Jersey; died
in Bloomington, Indiana died Aug. 25, 1956; zoologist, student of human sexual
behaviour; studied biology at Bowdoin College, New Brunswick, Maine; 1919
awarded doctorate in biology from Harvard University; 1920 to Indiana University
as an assistant professor of zoology; 1938 took over coordination of the
new marriage course at Indiana University, and began gathering the first
of over 18,000 interviews with adults on their sexual behavior; 1947 incorporated
the Institute for Sex Research, Inc. (ISR), 1948 published The Kinsey Report;
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, and five years later, Sexual Behavior
in the Human Female. Today's Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender,
and Reproduction is a private, not-for-profit corporation affiliated with
Indiana University
Quote: "If society's only interest in controlling sex behavior were to protect
persons, then the criminal codes concerned with assault and battery should
provide adequate protection. The fact that there is a body of sex laws which
is apart from the laws protecting persons is evidence of their distinct function,
namely that of protecting custom."
Alan M. Turing 1912-1954
born in Paddington, London, England; died
by his own hand at Wilmslow, Cheshire June 7, 1954; mathematician, logician,
pioneered computer theory and contributed important logical analyses of computer
processes; influenced as a boy by a book, Natural Wonders Every Child Should
Know; 1932-35 studied quantum mechanics, probability, logic at King's College,
Cambridge; 1935 elected a fellow; 1936-38 submitted a paper called "The Turing
machine: On Computable Numbers," describing a machine that could do anything
a human could do, given explicit enough instructions; it was a prototype
programmable digital computer; 1938-39 Princeton University Ph.D on Ordinal
Logic; 1939 returned to Cambridge, and secretly worked for the Government
Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park; introduced to the Enigma machine
problem (the Polish underground had captured a German battlefield cipher
machine); 1939-42 he and W. G. Welchman devised the Bomba, a computing machine
that cracked the Enigma code (one of the best kept secrets of World War II);
1941 designed the Colossus support computer, built by M.H.A. Neuman at the
University of Manchester; 1942 crossed the Atlantic to work on the electronic
encipherment of speech signals between Roosevelt and Churchill; 1944 designed
Colossus Mark II, which was brought into operation just before D-Day; 1943-45
broke the U-boat Enigma II cipher, preventing tremendous losses in the Battle
of the Atlantic; 1945 introduced to electronics at the National Physical
Laboratory, London where he worked on developing the Automatic Computing
Engine (ACE), one of the first attempts at creating a true digital computer;
1947 his Abbreviated Code Instructions marked the beginning of programming
languages; 1948 Deputy Director of the computing laboratory at Manchester
University; June 21 got the world's first prototype general-purpose stored
programcomputer, the first Universal Turing Machine, working at Manchester;
1950 wrote The Turing Test, a paper on machine intelligence, and Computing
Machinery and Intelligence for the philosophical journal Mind, suggesting
that the universal machine should be able to acquire and exhibit the faculties
of the human mind; projected a computer able to switch at will from numerical
work to algebra, codebreaking, file handling, or chess-playing; worked on
development of the Manchester Automatic Digital Machine (MADAM), believing
that machines would be created by the year 2000 that could replicate the
human mind; 1951 published a paper, The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis,
on the mathematical theory of growth and form in biology; 1952 arrested and
tried as a homosexual, and lost his security clearance for GCHQ, the post-war
successor to Bletchley Park; rather than go to prison he accepted, for the
period of a year, injections of estrogen intended to neutralise his libido;
1954 the Founder of Computer Science died by cyanide poisoning. [picture: German Enigma machine]
Bob Fosse 1927-1987
born in Chicago, Illinois; died in Washington,
DC Sept. 23, 1987; theatre and motion-picture choreographer and director
of musicals; performed as a teenager with a partner as the Riff Brothers
in vaudeville and burlesque theatres; best known for the films Cabaret (Oscar,
1972); and the Tony Award winning musicals Big Deal (1986), Dancin' (1978),
Pippin (1973), Sweet Charity (1966), Little Me (1963), Bob Fosse (1959),
Damn Yankees (1956), The Pajama Game (1955, with Gwen Verdon, his third wife);
also the Emmy Award-winning Singer Presents Liza with a 'Z' (1972-73); and
his autobiographical film: All That Jazz.
Other Birthdays
1160 06 23 Johannes de Matha, French saint/founder (Trinitarians)
1540 06 23 Johann Baptista Serranus, composer
1612 06 23 Justus G Schottel, [Schottelius], German poet
1749 06 23 Konrad Back, composer
1763 06 23 Joséphine Martiniques, empress of France (1804-14)
1774 06 23 Matthijs Siegenbeek, Dutch linguist (spelling)
1801 06 23 Daniel Smith Donelson, Major General (Confederate Army), died in 1863
1810 06 23 FranziskaFanny Elssler, Austrian ballerina
1818 06 23 Simon Vissering, Dutch economist/minister of Finances (1879-81)
1822 06 23 Young Marshall Moody, Brig General (Confederate Army), died in 1866
1824 06 23 Carl Heinrich Carsten Reinecke, composer
1837 06 23 Ernest Guiraud, composer
1838 06 23 Edwin Henry Stoughton, Brig General (Union volunteers), died in 1868
1846 06 23 George Sax, inventor (saxophone)
1848 06 23 Antoine Joseph Sax, inventor (saxophone)
1852 06 23 Stephane Raoul Pugno, composer
1855 06 23 Maude Valerie White, composer
1858 06 23 William Ernst Johnson, Cambridge England, mathematician
1859 06 23 Florentinus M Wibaut, Amsterdams social alderman (building of houses)
1875 06 23 Carl Milles, Uppsala Sweden, fountain sculptor (Wedding of Rivers)
1876 06 23 Irvin S Cobb, Ky, writer/humorist (Old Judge Priest)
1877 06 23 Blair Fairchild, composer
1877 06 23 Hermann Stephani, composer
1879 06 23 William Ewart Berry, first viscount Camrose/English nobleman
1884 06 23 Werner Krauss, Germany, actor (Cabinet of Dr Caligari, Joyless Street)
1887 06 23 Ernst Rowohlt, German publisher (Rowohlt-Verlag)
1887 06 23 John Finley Williamson, Canton Ohio, conductor (Westminster Choir)
1888 06 23 Anna Achmatova, [AA Gorenko], Russian conductor (Tsjetki)
1888 06 23 Lee Moran, Chicago IL, actor (Circus Clown)
1892 06 23 Able Kiviat, US, runner (Olympic-gold-1912)
1892 06 23 Edmund Cobb, Albuquerque NM, western actor (Comanche Territory)
1892 06 23 Mieczyslaw Horszowski, Polish/US pianist
1893 06 23 Donald McBride, Brooklyn NY, actor (Mr Clyde-My Friend Irma)
1894 06 23 Alfred Kinsey, entomologist/sexologist (Kinsey Report)
1894 06 23 Edward VIII, King of Great Brit/N-Ireland/emperor of India (1936)
1897 06 23 Winifred Wagner-William, German organizer (Wagner Festival)
1899 06 23 Alexander Moiseyevich Veprik, composer
1901 06 23 Mariel-Henri Jaspar, Belgian minister/ambassador
1901 06 23 Paul Verhoeven, Unna Germany, director (4th Man, Basic Instinct)
1902 06 23 Howard T Engstrom, Boston, computer designer (Univac)
1903 06 23 Anthony Veiller, NYC, writer (Night of Iguana, Moulin Rouge)
1903 06 23 Hans C Branner, Danish writer (Toys, Horse Rider)
1904 06 23 Carleton Coon, prof of anthropology (What in the World)
1904 06 23 Quintin McMillan, cricketer (South African leg spinner 1929-32)
1904 06 23 Willie Mae Mother Smith, gospel singer/evangelist folk artist
1906 06 23 Wolfgang Koeppen, writer
1908 06 23 Paulus Akkerman, [Paul fen Nijenborn], Frisian writer (Each om Each)
1910 06 23 Jean Anouilh, France, dramatist (Thieves' Carnival)
1911 06 23 David Ogilvy, advertising whiz (Ogilvy & Mathers)
1912 06 23 Alan Turing, mathematician/pioneer in computer theory (Turing Machine)
1912 06 23 Maurice Dallimore, England, actor (Collector, Lad: A Dog)
1913 06 23 Jacques Rabemananjara, Hungarian author/vice-president (Antsa)
1913 06 23 Molly Harris, actress/writer (Immortal)
1913 06 23 William P Rogers, Norfolk NY, US secretary of state (1969-73)
1915 06 23 Dennis Price, Twyford England, actor (Adventurers, Millionairess)
1916 06 23 Irene Worth, [Hattie Abrams], Nebraska, actress (Nicolas & Alexandra)
1916 06 23 Len Hutton, cricketer (England opener, 364 v Australia The Oval 1938)
1917 06 23 Sid Watters Jr, horse trainer
1920 06 23 Paul Des Marais, composer
1921 06 23 Jean, Grand Duke of Luxembourg (1964- )
1922 06 23 Francis Thorne, Bay Shore NY, composer (Burlesque Overture)
1922 06 23 Leonard Dorfman, horse trainer
1925 06 23 Amada Galvez Santos Ocampo, composer
1925 06 23 Art Modell, owner (Cleveland Browns, Baltimore Ravens, Modells Stores)
1925 06 23 Richard Barber, cricketer (scored 12 & 5 in only Test NZ v WI 1956)
1926 06 23 Lars Johan Werle, composer
1927 06 23 Bob Fosse, Chicago Ill, choreographer/director (Cabaret, Damn Yankees)
1929 06 23 Dave King, Twickenham England, comedian (Kraft Music Hall)
1929 06 23 Henri Pousseur, Malmédy Belgium, composer (Homo Habitis)
1929 06 23 June Carter Cash, Maces Spring Va, country singer (Johnny Cash Show)
1930 06 23 Donn Fulton Eisele, Columbus Ohio, Col USAF/astronaut (Apollo 7)
1931 06 23 Urs Jaeggi, writer
1932 06 23 Bob Blair, cricketer (NZ pace bowler in 19 Tests in 50s)
1933 06 23 Bert Convy, St Louis MO, game show host (Win, Lose or Draw)
1935 06 23 Gy”rgy K rp ti, Hungary, water polo (Olympic-gold-1952, 56, 64)
1936 06 23 Berend Boudewijn [van der Woude], Dutch TV host/director (Baantjer)
1940 06 23 Adam Faith, England, singer (Poor Me, What Do You Want?)
1940 06 23 Alexander Irvine, Lord Chanceller of UK (1997- )
1940 06 23 Diana Trask, Australia, singer (Sing Along With Mitch)
1940 06 23 Mike Shrimpton, cricketer (occasional NZ Test batsman 1963-74)
1940 06 23 Simon Hobday, Mareking South Africa, PGA golfer (1994 US Senior Open)
1940 06 23 Stuart Sutcliffe, Edinburgh Scotland, rocker (Beatles)
1940 06 23 Wilma Rudolph, St Bethlehem Tenn, runner (Olympic-3 gold-1960)
1943 06 23 James Levine, musical conductor (Tosca)/dir (Metropolitan Opera)
1944 06 23 Rosetta Hightower, US singer (Don't Hang Up)
1945 06 23 K B Wilson, methodist Preacher/Principal (Westminster College Oxford)
1945 06 23 Paul Goddard, Georgia, rock bassist (Atlanta Rhythm Section)
1946 06 23 Russ Thacker, Wash DC, producer (Golden Seal)
1946 06 23 Ted Shackelford, Okla City Okla, actor (Gary-Dallas, Knots Landing)
1947 06 23 Bryan Brown, Sydney, actor (F/X, Gorillas in the Mist, Kim, Tai-Pan)
1948 06 23 Clarence Thomas, Savannah Ga, 108th US Supreme Court Justice (1991- )
1948 06 23 Myles Goodwyn, Montreal, rock guitarist/vocalist (April Wine)
1948 06 23 Nigel Osborne, composer
1950 06 23 Sally Geeson, Sussex England, actress (Bless This House)
1953 06 23 Filbert Bayi, Karatu Tanzania, 3k steeplechase (Olympic-silver-1980)
1953 06 23 Roberta Leighton, Minneapolis Mn, actress (Ginger-Days of Our Lives)
1955 06 23 Debbie Boostrom, Peoria ILL, playmate (Aug, 1981)
1957 06 23 David Houghton, cricketer (Zimbabwe batsman, 266 v Sri Lanka 1994)
1957 06 23 Frances McDormand, actress, (Fargo, Academy Award)
1957 06 23 Lee John, [John L Mcgregor], English singer/actor (Body Talk)
1959 06 23 Danny Sharp, Hamilton Ont, Canadian Tour golfer (1986 Quinte Festival)
1961 06 23 LaSalle Thompson, NBA forward/center (Phila 76ers)
1961 06 23 Mark Drillich, Dutch pop bassist (Kong-Slauerhoff)
1962 06 23 Paul LaGreca, Bronx NY, actor (Big Trouble)
1962 06 23 Richard Coles, rock keyboardist (Communards)
1963 06 23 Kari Takko, Uusikaupunki FIN, hockey goalie (Team Finland)
1964 06 23 Joey Allen, Ft Wayne Indiana, rock guitarist (Warrant-Cherry Pie)
1964 06 23 Trent Bushey, Haverhill Mass, actor (David Rampal-All My Children)
1965 06 23 Dawn Whiteham, New London Ct, bodybuilder (Penthouse Nov 1995)
1965 06 23 John Chip McKibben II, Balboa Island Calif, rower (Olympics-1996)
1965 06 23 Leith Wastle, Benalla VIC, Australasia golfer
1965 06 23 Peter O'Malley, Bathurst NSW, Australasia golfer
1966 06 23 Barbara Jordan, US softball outfielder (Olympics-gold-96)
1966 06 23 Chantal Daucourt, Bienne Switz, mountain cyclist (world-bronze-95)
1966 06 23 Vladislav Neiman, Israel, Men's flyweight boxer (Oly-1996)
1967 06 23 Derrick Walker, NFL tight end (KC Chiefs)
1967 06 23 Laurie Wood, Orange Calif, playmate (March, 1989)
1968 06 23 Kent Steffes, Ann Arbor Mich, beach volleyballer (Olympics-gold-96)
1968 06 23 Ronnie West, WLAF RB (London Monarchs)
1969 06 23 Elbert Ellis, NFL wide receiver (Carolina Panthers, GB Packers)
1970 06 23 A C Earl, NBA center (Toronto Raptors)
1970 06 23 Kerri Ann Buchberger, Russell Manitoba, volleyballer (Olympics-96)
1970 06 23 Mike Bartrum, tight end (New England Patriots)
1970 06 23 Rich Manning, NBA center (Vancouver Grizzlies)
1970 06 23 Robert Brooks, NFL wide reciever (Green Bay Packers-Superbowl 31)
1970 06 23 Roger Knarren, soccer player (MVV)
1971 06 23 Felix Potvin, Anjou, NHL goalie (Toronto Maple Leafs)
1971 06 23 Joe Rumolo, CFL defensive linebacker (Hamilton Tiger Cats)
1972 06 23 Cory Schlesinger, NHL running back (Detroit Lions)
1972 06 23 Larry Whigham, NFL safety (NE Patriots)
1972 06 23 Roell Preston, NFL wide receiver (Atlanta Falcons)
1973 06 23 Mark Larsen, jockey
1974 06 23 Dontonio Wingfield, NBA forward (Portland Trailblazers)
1974 06 23 Lisa Bamford, Raleigh NC, Miss America-NC (1996)
1974 06 23 Maria Carolina Christina, Princess of Netherlands
1974 06 23 Mark Hendrickson, NBA forward (Sacramento Kings)
1975 06 23 Alexander Serikow, Landshut GER, hockey forward (Team Germany)
1975 06 23 Jane Jamieson, Australian heptathlete (Olympics-96)
1976 06 23 Paola Suarez, Pergamino Arg, tennis star (1995 Futures-Buenos Aires)
1977 06 23 Hayden Foxe, Australian soccer defender (Olyroos, Olympics-96)
«« | Calendar | »» | Milestones |
|
born Marie Josèphe Rose Tascher
de La Pagerie at Trois-Îlets, Martinique, West Indies, daughter of
an aristocrat planter; died at Malmaison, France; died May 29, 1814; 1789
married Republican general Alexandre de Beauharnais and had two children,
Hortense and Eugène, but the couple separated, and he was executed
in 1794 during the French Revolution on the orders of Robespierre; 1796 married
Napoleon Bonaparte and was crowned Empress of France by him in 1804; 1809
he had their childless marriage annulled to marry Austrian princess Marie
Louise; 
born in Hoboken, New Jersey; died
in Bloomington, Indiana died Aug. 25, 1956; zoologist, student of human sexual
behaviour; studied biology at Bowdoin College, New Brunswick, Maine; 1919
awarded doctorate in biology from Harvard University; 1920 to Indiana University
as an assistant professor of zoology; 1938 took over coordination of the
new marriage course at Indiana University, and began gathering the first
of over 18,000 interviews with adults on their sexual behavior; 1947 incorporated
the Institute for Sex Research, Inc. (ISR), 1948 published The Kinsey Report;
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, and five years later, Sexual Behavior
in the Human Female. Today's Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender,
and Reproduction is a private, not-for-profit corporation affiliated with
Indiana University
born in Paddington, London, England; died
by his own hand at Wilmslow, Cheshire June 7, 1954; mathematician, logician,
pioneered computer theory and contributed important logical analyses of computer
processes; influenced as a boy by a book, Natural Wonders Every Child Should
Know; 1932-35 studied quantum mechanics, probability, logic at King's College,
Cambridge; 1935 elected a fellow; 1936-38 submitted a paper called "The Turing
machine: On Computable Numbers," describing a machine that could do anything
a human could do, given explicit enough instructions; it was a prototype
programmable digital computer; 1938-39 Princeton University Ph.D on Ordinal
Logic; 1939 returned to Cambridge, and secretly worked for the Government
Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park; introduced to the Enigma machine
problem (the Polish underground had captured a German battlefield cipher
machine); 1939-42 he and W. G. Welchman devised the Bomba, a computing machine
that cracked the Enigma code (one of the best kept secrets of World War II);
1941 designed the Colossus support computer, built by M.H.A. Neuman at the
University of Manchester; 1942 crossed the Atlantic to work on the electronic
encipherment of speech signals between Roosevelt and Churchill; 1944 designed
Colossus Mark II, which was brought into operation just before D-Day; 1943-45
broke the U-boat Enigma II cipher, preventing tremendous losses in the Battle
of the Atlantic; 1945 introduced to electronics at the National Physical
Laboratory, London where he worked on developing the Automatic Computing
Engine (ACE), one of the first attempts at creating a true digital computer;
1947 his Abbreviated Code Instructions marked the beginning of programming
languages; 1948 Deputy Director of the computing laboratory at Manchester
University; June 21 got the world's first prototype general-purpose stored
programcomputer, the first Universal Turing Machine, working at Manchester;
1950 wrote The Turing Test, a paper on machine intelligence, and Computing
Machinery and Intelligence for the philosophical journal Mind, suggesting
that the universal machine should be able to acquire and exhibit the faculties
of the human mind; projected a computer able to switch at will from numerical
work to algebra, codebreaking, file handling, or chess-playing; worked on
development of the Manchester Automatic Digital Machine (MADAM), believing
that machines would be created by the year 2000 that could replicate the
human mind; 1951 published a paper, The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis,
on the mathematical theory of growth and form in biology; 1952 arrested and
tried as a homosexual, and lost his security clearance for GCHQ, the post-war
successor to Bletchley Park; rather than go to prison he accepted, for the
period of a year, injections of estrogen intended to neutralise his libido;
1954 the Founder of Computer Science died by cyanide poisoning. [picture: German Enigma machine]