1979 John Wayne, Hollywood actor (72), died. The son of Clyde Robert Morrison (1884–1937), a drunken drugstore proprietor, he weighed in at an amazing 13lbs at birth. Born Marion Mitchell Morrison, Wayne made over 160 films, notably in collaboration with Irish-American director Seán Aloysius O’Feeney, a.k.a. John Ford, and Dublin-born Maureen O’Hara. Wayne himself could trace his ancestry back to a weaver from Randalstown, Co. Antrim. Suspected of involvement in the ’98 Rebellion, Robert Morrison escaped to America as a stowaway and settled in Ohio sometime in 1801. There he joined the American army and had a distinguished military career, reaching the rank of general. Later, in civilian life, he became a judge. While Wayne’s great-great-grandfather might not have been impressed by his draft-dodging during the Second World War and his behaviour during the McCarthy era, he may well have contributed to his descendant’s not-inconsiderable intellectual abilities. Marion Morrison was a very bright student who was set for a legal career before drifting into the world of film. Considerably more cultured than his screen image, his favourite recreation was chess, which he played at almost championship level. He was a connoisseur of western art and a lover of literature, particularly Dickens and Tolkien, and could quote Shakespeare and Milton at his leisure. He always saw himself as a journeyman actor, a man who played a character called John Wayne. As he famously put it, ‘That guy you see on the screen isn’t really me … I know him well. I’m one of his closest students. I have to be. I make a living out of him.’
1862 Violet Florence Martin, novelist under the pen-name Martin Ross, and literary partner of Edith Somerville, born in Ross House, Co. Galway.
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Personal Histories
Personal Histories is an initiative by History Ireland,
which aims to capture the individual histories of Irish
people both in Ireland and around the world. It is hoped
to build an extensive database reflecting Irish lives,
giving them a chance to be heard, remembered and to
add their voice to the historical record.
Click Here to go to the Personal Histories page
2002 Alex Maskey (50) became the first Sinn Féin lord mayor of Belfast.
1981 It was reported that five men in California were suffering from a rare form of pneumonia that was found in patients with weakened immune systems—the first recognised cases of AIDS, which was to kill over 30 million worldwide.
1920 Cornelius Ryan, war correspondent and author, notably of the best-seller The longest day (1959), which became a film that set box-office records, born in Dublin.
2002 Former US President Bill Clinton opened a new £3 million peace centre named after him on the site of the 1987 Remembrance Sunday bombing in Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh.
1988 Robert Dudley Edwards, professor of modern Irish history at UCD (1945–79) and writer, notably of Church and state in Tudor Ireland (1935), died.
1968 Robert Kennedy (42), leading candidate for the Democratic Party nomination for the presidency, was mortally wounded by Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles. He died the following day.
1967 The Six-Day War began, in which Israel heavily defeated Egypt and her Arab allies, capturing the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, the West Bank from Jordan and the Golan Heights from Syria.
1916 Kerry-born Horatio Herbert Kitchener, Lord Kitchener of Khartoum, secretary of state for war, lost his life, along with over 600 others, when HMS Hampshire struck a German mine and sank west of the Orkney Islands, Scotland.
1916 Lord Kitchener, Kerry-born field marshal, was lost at sea when HMS Edinburgh was struck by a mine off the Orkneys. Winston Churchill would have accompanied him in what was a war-boost trip to Russia had he not been dropped from the coalition cabinet the previous January owing to pressure from the Conservatives.
1868 James Connolly, socialist and revolutionary, born in Cowgate, Edinburgh, to Irish immigrant parents.