And many happy returns, I guess?

Google is celebrating it's 'official' 24th birthday, despite the the fact that it has listed six other dates for it's start.

The interesting fact is that September 27 isn't the search giant's birthday. The selection of September 27 as Google's birthday seems to be a one of convenience than the actual date when the company was founded. Google celebrated September 7 (the day when the company was incorporated) as its birthday till 2005.


September 27, 1947 -
Delmer Daves' stylish noir-thriller, Dark Passage, starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, opened on this date.



Between the film's unorthodox first person perspective and Humphrey Bogart's negative press from his support of the Committee for the First Amendment established in the face of the hearings being done by the House Un-American Activities Committee, led to the film having a poor performance at the box office.


September 27, 1954 -
Steve Allen sat down at his piano and the Tonight Show premiered nationally on NBC on this date.



Steve Allen's high-energy wit and appreciation for the emerging medium lent itself to spontaneous, original humor. He put cameras on the street and tried to find unscripted comedy in random interviews with passersby. He was a comedy adventurer, jumping into vats of funny stuff like Jell-O, or dressing up in a suit of tea bags and lowering himself into a giant cup of hot water.


September 27, 1961 -
The science fiction film The Day the Sky Exploded (also known as Death Comes from Space and Death From Outer Space), directed by Paolo Heusch and starring Paul Hubschmid and Fiorella Mari, is released to US theaters.



Though the Americans and British among others had been making science fiction films earlier in the Fifties, this 1958 Italian co production is considered the first entry by that country into the sci fi genre.


September 27, 1964 -
The Beach Boys appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time on this date.



They also performed the song Wendy that evening. The song was released as a double A-side single in May 1964 with Don't Worry Baby. It is considered one of the best ever single releases along with Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever by The Beatles and Don't Be Cruel/Hound Dog by Elvis Presley.


September 27, 1975 -
The documentary film by Albert and David Maysles, Grey Gardens, premiered in the New York Film Festival on this date.



Edith Bouvier Beale was the sister of Jacqueline Kennedy's father, John V. "Blackjack" Bouvier. As a child, Jaqueline spent a great deal of time with her aunt and cousin Edith 'Little Edie' Bouvier Beale at Grey Gardens and considered "Big Edie" her favorite aunt throughout her lifetime.


September 27, 1980 -
Kurtis Blow becomes the first rapper to perform on national television when he does The Breaks on Soul Train.



The Breaks was the first rap song to sell over 500,000 copies, earning a certified Gold record. Rapper's Delight, released a year earlier, certainly sold a lot more (as Kurtis attests), but that song was released on the independent label Sugar Hill Records, which apparently never sent it to the RIAA for certification. Kurtis Blow was signed to Mercury Records, a major label that followed the standards and used their Gold records for promotion. When Kurtis signed with Mercury in early 1980, he became the first rapper signed to a major label. His self-titled debut album (with The Breaks) was the first rap record released on a major label.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
September 27, 1777 -

Lancaster, Pennsylvania became the capital of the United States, for one day after the Second Continental Congress evacuates Philadelphia to avoid invading British forces. There were not enough accommodations within the city to even properly house the representatives in Congress and with the city of Philadelphia located just a 2-3 day march away, the representatives also felt they were still at risk. Within three days the Representives of the Continental Congress had settled in York, Pennsylvania and remained there for months until the British finally abandoned Philadelphia.



This was not the first time the Continental Congress had fled Philadelphia during the Revolution. The prior winter, in December of 1776, as the British Army was getting too close to Philadelphia for comfort, the Continental Congress left Philadelphia and for a time Baltimore served as the Capital of the United States.


September 27, 1854 -
The first great disaster involving an ocean liner in the Atlantic occurred when the steamship Arctic sank in foggy weather after colliding with the iron bow of the Vesta on this date. When Captain Luce of the Arctic orders women and children into the lifeboats, the crewmen rebel and take the boats for themselves.



Of 435 on board, only 85 survived -- and none of them women or children. It is the first major ocean liner disaster in the Atlantic. The Arctic disaster shattered high Victorian notions of how men were supposed to respond under duress.


Today is the 117th anniversary of the completion by Albert Einstein of his paper, Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?, introducing the equation E=MC², on this date.



Before this, E equaled just about anything you wanted it to equal. Just think what the atomic bomb would have been like if E = grapes seeds or the real content of Schrödinger's box.


September 27, 1937 -
The last known Balinese tiger, which was an adult female, was killed in SumbarKima, West Bali, on this date. However, sightings of this subspecies still persisted for years later, up to the 1940s, but were never proven.



Being the first subspecies of tigers to go extinct, Bali tigers were never held in captivity and never displayed in a public zoo. In addition, they were never captured on film or motion picture alive. Strangely, body parts such as skulls, skins, and bones, are preserved in museums today.


September 27, 1938 -
RMS Queen Elizabeth was launched by Queen Elizabeth (after a couple of G and T's) at the John Brown and Company yard in Clydebank, Scotland.



She (the ship and not her majesty) was the largest passenger liner ever built and named to honor Queen Elizabeth, wife of King George VI of England and mother to Queen Elizabeth II.


September 27, 1940 -
Japan, Germany and Italy, signed the Tripartite Pact in Berlin on this date. The pact saw the formation of the World War II Axis powers, an opponent group against the Allies.



The Axis alliance bizarrely hoped to persuade the US against joining the Allies during the war, but failed. In 1940, Hungary was forced by Germany to became the fourth country to sign the Pact, allying themselves with the Axis powers.


September 27, 1951 -
Marvin Lee Aday, singer songwriter was born on this date.



Despite his famous moniker, Marvin doesn't like to eat meatloaf.


September 27, 1959 -
Typhoon Vera, otherwise known as the Isewan Typhoon, killed 4,464 people on the Japanese island of Honshu and injured 40,000 more. 1.5 million were made homeless.



The severe storm conditions of Typhoon Vera caused the most of destruction and loss of life of any tropical cyclone in Japanese history.


September 27, 2008 -
Chinese astronaut, Zhai Zhigang, aboard Shenzhou 7, became the first person from China to walk in space on this date.



Zhia would immediately return to his space craft when he realized that he could not get a good wi-fi connection in space.



And so it goes