T.S. Eliot Dies
Poet T.S. Eliot dies at the age of 76 in London on January 4, 1965. His "The Waste Land" (1922) is considered "the most influential work of poetry of the 20th Century".
The opening lines of the poem are:
"April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain."
In 1948, Eliot was awarded "The Order of Merit" by King George VI & won the 1948 Nobel Prize in Literature.
January 4, 1965
LBJ delivers his State of the Union message. Following his election to the Presidency in November 1964, Lyndon B. Johnson outlines his "Great Society" program.
LBJ introduces Medicare-Medicaid, Head Start, The Voting Rights Act, The Civil Rights Act, & The Department of Housing & Urban Development.
LBJ also reaffirms US commitment to support South Vietnam. He says: "Our own security is tied to the peace of Asia."
January 4, 1974
President Richard M. Nixon refuses to hand over his "Watergate" tape recordings & documents that had been subpoenaed by the U.S. Senate Select Committee investigating the "Watergate" affair.
"Watergate" became public with the break-in of the Democratic National Headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. in the summer of 1972 by members of the Committee to Re-elect the President (CREEP).*
*Some of these "burglars" were involved in the "Bay of Pigs" invasion in 1961.
The decision on this date has been described as "the beginning of the end" of the Nixon Presidency.
January 4, 1643
Issac Newton, Physicist, Mathematician & Astronomer, is born in Grantham, England. He has been called "the culminating figure in the scientific revolution of the 17th Century".
January 4, 1999
Europe is united with a common currency for the 1st time since the 9th Century. Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal & Spain are hopeful that this action will both unify & strengthen the Continent's economy.
