Friday, July 21, 2006

 

Spotlight: Happy birthday to Garry Trudeau, who turns 58 today. The creator of Doonesbury, Trudeau was the first comic strip artist to win a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning (1975). Trudeau originally started the comic strip as a student at Yale, calling it Bull Tales. In 1970, he changed the name to Doonesbury and it debuted in some two dozen newspapers. Noted for its liberal social and political commentary, the comic strip was dropped temporarily from many newspapers over the years, in response to controversial storylines.

Quote: "I have no idea what readership is of written editorials, but it doesn't come anywhere close to the readership of editorial cartoons." – Paul Conrad

Today's News:

• Israel-Hezbollah conflict: border clashes, rocket strikes continue (story)
• AIDS: Gates Foundation infuses $287 million for vaccine search (story)
• flat-panel TVs: prices have plummeted; likely to drop further (story)
• Hillary Clinton: senator rakes in donations from the stars (story)
• eBay: raising fees of online stores in effort to drive traffic back to auctions (story)
• Kate Hudson: wins damages, apology from British mag
  that called her too thin (story)

Today's History:

• Jesuits: order of priests was dissolved by Pope Clement XIV (1773)
• 17th parallel: after defeat at Dienbienphu, France agreed to withdraw troops from communist North Vietnam (1954)
• Aswan Dam: was completed, preventing Nile floods and providing electricity and water for Egypt and Sudan (1970)

Today's Birthdays:

• Ernest Hemingway: Nobel-winning, bullfight-loving author of For Whom the Bell Tolls (1899-1961)
• Janet Reno: first woman US attorney general and longest-serving AG of the 20th century; aggressive defender of children's rights (68)
• Robin Williams: comic and endearing star of Mork and Mindy, Good Morning, Vietnam, Good Will Hunting and others (54)