The Story of Writing

Happy Burns night! Mendelsohn's "Wedding March" hits the big time, and the birthday club includes Robert Burns, of course, W. Somerset Maugham, and Virginia Woolf - with a reading of Burns' "A Red, R…

Gold is discovered in California, canned beer is sold for the first time in the U.S., and happy birthday to Edith Wharton - with a reading from Mark Twain's "Roughing It."

The first female medical doctor in the U.S., Wham-O buys the rights to a flying toy disc, the U.S. ratifies the 24th Amendment to the Constitution - and a reading from Agatha Christie's "Murder in Me…

The U.S. Supreme Court issues its decision in "Roe v. Wade," Apple Inc. introduces the Macintosh home computer, and happy birthday to Lord Byron - with a reading from Byron's "Don Juan."

The first novel published in the U.S. is released and the birthday club includes Ito Noe and Elaine Showalter. Today's reading is from "The House of Mirth," by Edith Wharton.

Happy birthday to Huddie Ledbetter and Fareed Zakaria - with a reading from "Democracy and Social Ethics," by Jane Addams.

Goethe's play "Faust: A Tragedy" (part 1) premieres, the ACLU is founded, and happy birthday to Edgar Allan Poe - with a reading from one of Poe's letters.

Happy birthday to Alan Alexander Milne - with a reading from one of his best known works "The House at Pooh Corner."

Happy birthday to Anne Bronte - with a reading from her second novel, "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall."

Miguel Cervantes publishes "Don Quixote," Virginia adopts the Statute of Religious Freedom as written by Thomas Jefferson, Ernest Shackleton reaches the magnetic South Pole, and the signing of the Ch…

Happy Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Jean-Francois Roberval is commissioned to colonize New France. The Pemberton Medicine Company is incorporated. James Naismith publishes the rules of basketball …

The U.S. Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris, which formalized peace with England and independence for the United States. Happy birthday to Emily Hahn and Maureen Dowd. And a reading from Walt Whit…

Emile Zola publishes "J'accuse!" and exposes the French military's deceit during the Dreyfus Affair. Happy birthday to Shonda Rhimes - and a reading from Zola's "J'accuse!"

The birthday club includes Laura Adams Armer, Jack London, Haruki Murakami, and Issa Rae - and a reading from London's "Call of the Wild."

Louis B. Mayer announces the creation of the American Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the U.S. Surgeon General publishes the report "Smoking and Health," and happy birthday to Aldo L…

Thomas Paine publishes "Common Sense," "The New England Journal of Medicine" publishes "Addiction Rare in Patients Treated with Narcotics," the birthday club includes Stephen Ambrose, Jim Croce, Dona…

The iPhone is introduced to the world, the birthday club includes Simone de Beauvoir, Judith Krantz, and Joan Baez - and a reading from de Beauvoir's "The Second Sex."

The first U.S. State of the Union, the birthday club includes Gypsy Rose Lee and Graham Chapman - and a reading from "O Pioneers!" by Willa Cather.

Marian Anderson becomes the first person of color to perform on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera and happy birthdays to Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson and Zora Neale Hurston - with a reading from Hurst…

FDR delivers his "Four Freedoms" speech, and happy birthday to Charles Sumner and Alan Watts - and a reading from Watts.