December 27: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

December 27, 2024 Brooklyn Eagle History

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ON THIS DAY IN 1892, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported, “WASHINGTON, D.C. ― Speaker [Charles] Crisp is still in the city, but intends to leave here tonight for New York. He will be in the metropolis a day or two and will call on Mr. Cleveland and have a talk with him. No hour has been fixed for the meeting with the President elect and the speaker, and, so far as can be learned, nothing has been signified to Mr. Crisp as to the matters to be discussed. It is probable that at this meeting of the two most influential officers of the government there will be a general exchange of opinions on the whole legislative outlook, and, to some extent, on the political situation. The question of an extra session of Congress, it is reasonably certain, will be one of the topics considered, and the speaker will give to Mr. Cleveland the opinion he entertains on the matter. It is not at all likely that any final and absolute determination with reference to the extra session will be reached for some time or until the cabinet slate is partly made up. As is well known, Speaker Crisp is inclined to favor an extra session soon after the 4th of March for purposes of organization, while President elect Cleveland favors an extra session in the autumn, but is not altogether averse to an earlier special session if there were assurances that its life would be short and its field of activity restricted. The cabinet problem may be taken up, but Speaker Crisp has no person to urge upon Mr. Cleveland for a cabinet office.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1902, the Eagle said, “The congestion incident to the handling of a great traffic in the Manhattan Central Station ― they keep on calling it Grand Central, like a country opera house ― has long needed remedy. The railroad people have done what they could in respect of acquiring adjacent land for sidings and freight sheds, but it is not enough, and the certainty of increased trouble as the city grows, and the road and the populations grow, has brought the authorities to cooperate with the representatives of the Vanderbilt interests, and we have promise of escape from conditions that have brought hazard and delay.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1944, the Eagle reported, “PARIS ― American forces today jarred the Nazis to a halt four miles east of the Meuse, recapturing the town of Celles, and front reports said the American drive into the southern flank of the German salient was ‘making excellent headway.’ No notable changes of position were reported, but the Germans were still probing and punching along the north flank of their salient from Stavelot to Marche, apparently hunting a soft spot where they could renew their northwestward thrusts toward Liege and Namur. The weather was again clear allowing the American air power to turn out in force, again taking a deadly toll on German armor and transport. The 1st Allied Airborne Army announced that hundreds of tons of supplies, mostly ammunition, have been dropped to the powerful American force holding out at Bastogne, a Belgian highway center, which has been under German attack for a week. Paratroopers were landed first in the area to mark out landing zones, then the supplies were rained down.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1949, the Eagle reported, “That was no ‘flying saucer’ you saw last night ― it was an ‘interplanetary visitor.’ True magazine insists that a rocket authority stationed at Wright Field, Ohio, has told Air Force personnel that the saucers are interplanetary ― but Wright Field officials told the United Press today it wasn’t as true as True said. ‘We probably have the most complete file on the saucers anywhere, but there is nothing new or startling to indicate that the saucers are interplanetary visitors,’ the officials said. True, however, said it based its conclusions on an eight-month investigation by former Navy flier Donald E. Keyhoe and that it believes: 1. Flying saucers are real; 2. The earth has been under systematic close-range examination by ‘living, intelligent observers from another planet’ for 175 years; 3. That visits to the earth have increased markedly in the past two years; 4. That the vehicles used have been identified and categorized as three definite types.”

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ON THIS DAY IN 1962, the Eagle said, “Politicians, businessmen and ― alas ― even newspapers have invoked ‘the public interest’ so often in the matter of labor-management disputes that it is with reluctance that we here at the Eagle disinter the phrase to apply it to the current shutdown of the Port of New York. Yet, faced with the facts of the quarrel between the New York Shipping Ass’n, Inc., and the International Longshoremen’s Ass’n, the Eagle feels obliged to remind both sides that there is, in reality, just such a thing as ‘the public interest.’ Urban society, of which Brooklyn and New York City are almost textbook examples, is a highly complex organism that depends on the cooperation of thousands of its ‘cells’ for continued healthy life. ‘The public interest’ demands just such cooperation between the shippers and the dockworkers, both of whom constitute vital cells in the great body of New York. Neither side, however, has in our opinion shown the slightest concern for ‘the public interest’ in their argument, which began last June and which has raged by fits and starts down to the present day, with the result that the world’s greatest port is closed today ― with incalculable results portending ― while both sides remain adamant.”

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Emilie de Ravin
Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP

NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN ON THIS DAY include former N.Y. Yankees outfielder Roy White, who was born in 1943; Foreigner guitarist Mick Jones, who was born in 1944; “Green Card” star Gerard Depardieu, who was born in 1948; “The Walking Dead” star Tovah Feldshuh, who was born in 1948; Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Self, who was born in 1962; “All My Children” star Eva LaRue, who was born in 1966; former NFL fullback Lorenzo Neal, who was born in 1970; “Today” co-anchor Savannah Guthrie, who was born in 1971; Sixpence None the Richer guitarist Matt Slocum, who was born in 1972; “Heroes” star Masi Oka, who was born in 1974; former NBA shooting guard Dahntay Jones, who was born in 1980; “Lost” star Emilie de Ravin, who was born in 1981; Paramore singer Hayley Williams, who was born in 1988; “Bates Motel” star Olivia Cooke, who was born in 1993; and “Wonka” star Timothee Chalamet, who was born in 1995.

Tovah Feldshuh
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP

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MUSIC OF THE SPHERES: Johannes Kepler was born in Germany on this day in 1571. Considered “the father of modern astronomy,” he is best known for his laws of planetary motion and the books “Astronomia Nova,” “Harmonice Mundi” and “Epitome Astronomiae.” He died in 1630.

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TOP FLIGHT: Sir George Cayley was born in England on this day in 1773. The aviation pioneer, scientist, inventor and theoretician designed airplanes, helicopters and gliders. He is credited as the father of aerodynamics and piloted the first manned glider flight. He died in 1857.

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

Quotable:

“They killed my character off and as God would have it, just when they told me I would never work again, I got cast in a little program called ‘Roots,’ and as they would say, the rest is history.”

— “Good Times” star John Amos, who was born on this day in 1939