Curated category
United States National Medal of Arts recipients
- Bob DylanBob Dylan was born Robert Allen Zimmerman on the 24th of May, 1941, at St. Mary's Hospital in Duluth, Minnesota. His Hebrew name was Shabtai Zisl ben Avraham.
- Stephen KingStephen King was walking on the shoulder of Maine State Route 5 on the 19th of June 1999 when a minivan struck him and sent him into a depression in the…
- NPRNPR went on the air for the first time on the 20th of April 1971, broadcasting live Senate hearings about the Vietnam War.
- Al PacinoAl Pacino was born Alfredo James Pacino on the 25th of April 1940, in East Harlem, Manhattan, to Sicilian Italian-American parents.
- George LucasGeorge Lucas was nearly killed before he ever made a film. On the 12th of June 1962, a few days before his high school graduation in Modesto, California…
- Aretha FranklinAretha Franklin heard Otis Redding's reaction to her own version of his song "Respect": "That little girl done took my song away from me." She had added a…
- Meryl StreepMeryl Streep walked into a casting meeting with Dino De Laurentiis in 1976, hoping to audition for his King Kong remake.
- Ella FitzgeraldElla Jane Fitzgerald walked onto the stage of the Apollo Theater on the 21st of November 1934, planning to dance. She was 17 years old, and she had recently…
- Kirk DouglasKirk Douglas was born Issur Danielovitch on the 9th of December 1916, the only son among seven children in a Russian-Jewish immigrant family in Amsterdam…
- Clint EastwoodClinton Eastwood Jr. entered the world at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital in San Francisco on the 31st of May, 1930, weighing 11 pounds 6 ounces.
- Saul BellowSaul Bellow was born Solomon Bellows on the 10th of June, 1915, in Lachine, Quebec, to parents who had fled Saint Petersburg two years earlier, carrying with…
- Aaron CoplandAaron Copland grew up above a Brooklyn shop at 628 Washington Avenue, in a family of Lithuanian Jewish immigrants who had traveled through Scotland just to…
- Stan LeeStan Lee signed off his monthly column with a single word: "Excelsior!" It is also the New York state motto, which suited a man born Stanley Martin Lieber on…
- John WilliamsJohn Williams played two notes for Steven Spielberg, alternating, low and ominous, and Spielberg laughed because he thought it was a joke. The film was Jaws.
- Dolly PartonDolly Rebecca Parton was born on the 19th of January 1946 in a one-room cabin on the banks of the Little Pigeon River in Pittman Center, Tennessee.
- Ralph EllisonRalph Waldo Ellison was born on the 1st of March 1913 in Oklahoma City, named after the poet Ralph Waldo Emerson by a father who hoped his son would grow up…
- Ron HowardRon Howard was five years old when he stood on a set holding a toy turtle, pretending it was dead. He had to cry. The director helping him through the scene…
- Herb AlpertHerb Alpert is the only musician in history to reach number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 as both a vocalist and an instrumentalist.
- Lewis MumfordLewis Mumford was born on the 19th of October 1895 in Flushing, Queens, and spent the next nine decades becoming one of the most wide-ranging thinkers…
- Armand HammerArmand Hammer died in Los Angeles in December 1990, aged 92, and was buried directly across the street from the headquarters of Occidental Petroleum - the…