Sole Focus

News, Views, Rantings & Ramblings by Carey Parrish

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Location: Georgia, United States

Thursday, January 27, 2011

This Day in History: January 27

1606 - The trial of Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators began. They were executed on January 31.

1870 - Kappa Alpha Theta, the first women’s sorority, was founded at Indiana Asbury University (now DePauw University) in Greencastle, IN.

1880 - Thomas Edison patented the electric incandescent lamp.

1888 - The National Geographic Society was founded in Washington, DC.

1900 - In China, foreign diplomats in Peking, fearing a revolt, demanded that the imperial government discipline the Boxer rebels.

1926 - John Baird, a Scottish inventor, demonstrated a pictorial transmission machine called television.

1927 - United Independent Broadcasters Inc. started a radio network with contracts with 16 stations. The company later became Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS).

1931 - NBC radio debuted "Clara, Lu ’n’ Em" on its Blue network (later, ABC radio).

1943 - During World War II, the first all American air raid against Germany took place when about 50 bombers attacked Wilhlemshaven.

1944 - The Soviet Union announced that the two year German siege of Leningrad had come to an end.

1945 - Soviet troops liberated the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Birkenau in Poland.

1948 - Wire Recording Corporation of America announced the first magnetic tape recorder. The ‘Wireway’ machine with a built-in oscillator sold for $149.50.

1951 - In the U.S., atomic testing in the Nevada desert began as an Air Force plane dropped a one-kiloton bomb on Frenchman Flats.

1957 - The "CBS Radio Workshop" was heard for the first time.

1967 - At Cape Kennedy, FL, astronauts Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom, Edward H. White and Roger B. Chaffee died in a flash fire during a test aboard their Apollo I spacecraft.

1967 - More than 60 nations signed the Outer Space Treaty which banned the orbiting of nuclear weapons and placing weapons on celestial bodies or space stations.

1973 - The Vietnam peace accords were signed in Paris.

1977 - The Vatican reaffirmed the Roman Catholic Church's ban on female priests.

1981 - U.S. President Reagan greeted the 52 former American hostages released by Iran at the White House.

1984 - Carl Lewis beat his own two-year-old record by 9-1/4 inches when he set a new indoor world record with a long-jump mark of 28 feet, 10-1/4 inches.

1984 - Wayne Gretzky set a National Hockey League (NHL) record for consecutive game scoring. He ended the streak at 51 games.

1985 - The Coca-Cola Company, of Atlanta, GA, announced a plan to sell its soft drinks in the Soviet Union.

1992 - Former world boxing champion Mike Tyson went on trial for allegedly raping an 18-year-old contestant in the 1991 Miss Black America Contest.

1996 - Mahamane Ousmane, the first democratically elected president of Niger, was overthrown by a military coup. Colonel Ibrahim Bare Mainassara declared himself head of state.

1997 - It was revealed that French national museums were holding nearly 2,000 works of art stolen from Jews by the Nazis during World War II.

1998 - U.S. First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared on NBC's "Today" show. She charged that the allegations against her husband were the work of a "vast right-wing conspiracy."

1999 - The U.S. Senate blocked dismissal of the impeachment case against President Clinton and voted for new testimony from Monica Lewinsky and two other witnesses.

2002 - A series of explosions occurred at a military dump in Lagos, Nigeria. More than 1,000 people were killed in the blast and in the attempt to escape.

2003 - Altria Group, Inc. became the name of the parent company of Kraft Foods, Philip Morris USA, Philip Morris International and Philip Morris Capital Corporation.

2010 - Appled enveiled the "iPad".

Tina Turner Thursday


One of the most rocking tracks from the Foreign Affair album, Tina Turner’s cover of Tony Joe White’s Undercover Agent For The Blues always gets audiences going in a big, big way. This is a real blues number. It’s got that unmistakable driving bass and inescapable groove that only Tina Turner can take and run with.

Always a rousing audience favorite in her live shows, Tina takes this number and lets loose on it like only she can. No one can do it better. Undercover Agent For The Blues stirs you from deep within, gets you moving, and drives you wild with delight as Tina belts it out. It really rattles you “down to your shoes.”

In this clip from one of Tina’s shows, the audience is as adoring as ever and Tina is having a blast as she delivers the song. As exciting on the album as it is in concert, the word masterpiece comes to mind whenever critics describe it. This is a tour de force performance from a woman who can do it all.

Thought for Today

“Egotism - usually just a case of mistaken nonentity.” -- Barbara Stanwyck