MILESTONES: June 5, birthdays for Mark Wahlberg, Troye Sivan, Suze Orman

June 5, 2018 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Mark Wahlberg. Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP

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On this day in 1942, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported on the famous Battle of Midway. The story reported, “A major naval-aerial battle was developing in mid-Pacific today after United States forces had damaged a Japanese battleship and an aircraft carrier, probably damaged other ships and shot down many planes in beating off a cruiser-based plane attack on Midway Island.” The story continued, “Victorious in the first phase of a big engagement, the United States naval and air forces were continuing their attack on the enemy forces off Midway.”

Meanwhile, Mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia announced that all of New York City would be blacked out the night of June 5, the first such citywide measure since the beginning of World War II, even though each borough had also been blacked out separately. The mayor said that the blackout would begin at 9:30 a.m. and last 20 minutes, along with a simultaneous full mobilization of air raid wardens, auxiliary forces and reserves. “Not much notice, is there?” LaGuardia observed. “There will be less and less notice as we go along. Hitler and Mussolini, the oberschwein and the yellow dog, are not going to give us any notice. But they are not going to catch us unaware.”

Brooklyn Heights seemed to show defiance over the blackout. Claiming that the civilian population is not taking the blackout warnings seriously, an Eagle reporter found “flagrant violations.” “Glaring lights were discovered in upper floors of the St. George, Bossert and Pierrepont Hotels. City administration buildings in the Borough Hall section on some floors were brightly illuminated.” The article spelled out the dimout requirements: “Lower all shades, awnings and blinds below the level of your lamps, and “Keep lamps from windows.”

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On this day in 1919, the Eagle ran an editorial on the passage of the 19th “suffrage” Amendment granting women the right to vote: “The passage by the Senate of the Constitutional amendment giving suffrage to women has been discounted for some time,” the editorial began. “With 15 states having full suffrage and twelve having partial suffrage for women the resources for influence upon Senators were large and they have been used with the utmost skill by the managers of the women’s campaign. The members of that committee went in to win; they have won after a long and arduous campaign, and to them should go the honors accruing to skillful political leadership.”

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On this day in 1940, the Eagle reported on the Brooklyn Dodgers’ game against the St. Louis Cardinals, at the latter team’s newly-lit Sportsman’s Park. “Eight tall towers make Sportsman’s Park the best lighted ball yard your agent has seen,” the Eagle reported. The Cardinals were playing their first night game at home the field since lighting was installed there earlier that year — at a cost of $150,000. However, the lighted field worked to the benefit of the Brooklyn Dodgers. The Cardinals were already behind for the season, with a 14-22 record. That first game resulted in the firing of Cardinals manager Ray Blades and the banning of glass drinkware in the stadium.

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On this day in 1947, the Eagle reported, “Secretary of State George C. Marshall, in a thinly veiled attack on communist tactics, warned today that the United States will oppose firmly any governments or groups that seek to ‘perpetuate human misery for political purposes.’” Marshall, who made the statements at Harvard’s 296th Commencement where he also received an honorary doctor of laws degree, also declared that the country “must extend Europe additional financial help for the next three or four years to prevent crises of “grave character.” However, saying that the U.S. cannot do this singlehandedly, he urged other nations to join the effort.

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NOTABLE PEOPLE born on this day includeactor Chad Allen, who was born in 1974; wife of former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden Jill Biden, who was born in 1951; author Margaret Drabble, who was born in 1939; author Ken Follett, who was born in 1949; film producer and executive Kathleen Kennedy, who was born in 1953; singer Brian McKnight, who was born in 1969; journalist Bill Moyers, who was born in 1934; author TV personality and speaker Suze Orman, who was born in 1951; author Rick Riordan Jr., who was born in 1964; singer and actor Troye Sivan, who was born in 1995; and actor and former rapper Mark Wahlberg, who was born in 1971.

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ROBERT F. KENNEDY WAS ASSASSINATED ON THIS DAY IN 1968. Sen. Kennedy was shot while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination in Los Angeles and died the following day. Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of his murder.

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JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1883. The British economist wrote extensively on the subject and was the author of “Treatise on Money and the General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money,” which focused on “expansionist” economic policy. Keynes died in England in 1946.

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THE APPLE II COMPUTER WAS RELEASED ON THIS DAY IN 1977. It went on sale for $1,298. Its predecessor, the Apple I, was sold largely to electronic hobbyists the previous year. Apple released the first Macintosh computer in 1984.

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TODAY IS THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE FIRST BALLOON FLIGHT. In 1783, brothers Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier held the first public demonstration of a hot-air balloon flight in Annonay, France. The Montgolfiers succeeded in launching the 33-foot-diameter flying globe that they had invented. The unmanned balloon rose an estimated 1,500 feet and traveled, wind-borne, about 7,500 feet before landing after a 10-minute flight — the first sustained flight of any object achieved by man.

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ADAM SMITH WAS BORN ON THIS DAY IN 1723. The Scottish economist and philosopher is known for his 1776 book “An Enquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.” Smith died in Scotland in 1790. “Consumption,” he wrote, “is the sole end and purpose of production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.”

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Special thanks to “Chase’s Calendar of Events” and Brooklyn Public Library.

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“Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous.” — journalist Bill Moyers, who was born on this day in 1934