Today is Thursday, Jan. 16, the 16th day of 2020. There are 350 days left in the year.
Today’s highlight: On Jan. 16, 1991, the White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait. (Allied forces prevailed on Feb. 28, 1991.)
On this date:
In 1547, Ivan IV of Russia (popularly known as “Ivan the Terrible”) was crowned Czar.
In 1865, Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman decreed that 400,000 acres of land in the South would be divided into 40-acre lots and given to former slaves. (The order, later revoked by President Andrew Johnson, is believed to have inspired the expression, “Forty acres and a mule.”)
In 1978, NASA named 35 candidates to fly on the space shuttle, including Sally K. Ride, who became America’s first woman in space, and Guion S. Bluford Jr., who became America’s first black astronaut in space.
In 1987, Hu Yaobang resigned as head of China’s Communist Party, declaring he’d made mistakes in dealing with student turmoil and intellectual challenges to the system.
Today’s Birthdays: Author William Kennedy is 92. Author-editor Norman Podhoretz is 90. Opera singer Marilyn Horne is 86. Hall of Fame auto racer A.J. Foyt is 85. Singer Barbara Lynn is 78. Country singer Ronnie Milsap is 77. Singer Katherine Anderson Schaffner (The Marvelettes) is 76. Country singer Jim Stafford is 76. Talk show host Dr. Laura Schlessinger is 73. Movie director John Carpenter is 72. Actress-dancer-choreographer Debbie Allen is 70.
Thought for Today: “I have noticed that the people who are late are often so much jollier than the people who have to wait for them.” — E.V. Lucas, English writer and publisher (1868-1938).
— Associated Press
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