4ths

Shakespeare through one of his characters, declared “Beware the Ides of March!” which portended the demise of Julius Caesar on March 15.

I guess it was while listening to U2 sing “Early morning, April 4, a shot rings out through the Memphis sky …” (not withstanding that Martin Luther King was actually shot at 6 p.m.) that I started thinking about the 4th day of the month. The Kent State shootings just two years later were also on May 4.

At any rate, the 4ths of each month are as a whole, pretty bad days. Lets hope today is not one of them.

In January 1999 Jesse Ventura was sworn on as Governor of Minnesota.

In February 2003 Yugoslavia disappeared as a country – replaced by Serbia and Montenegro. I’m not even close to understanding what is happening there now.

On Feb. 4, 1969 Yassir Arafat became head of the PLO.

Not all bad things happened on the 4th. On March 4 1789, our Constitution went into effect

June 4 1989 was the 2nd day of the Tianenmen square massacre where thousands of Chinese students were killed.

July 4 for all its notoriety has been a bad day for former Presidents. In 1826 both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died. In 1831 James Monroe died. In 1939 Lou Gehrig made his farewell appearance at Yankee Stadium (ironically his jersey number was 4.)

On August 4, 1892 Lizzie Borden killed her parents. In 1914 Germany invaded Belgium which brought Britain into WWI. Thirty years later in 1944 Anne Frank and her family were found by the Nazis in Amsterdam.

In 1957 on Sept. 4 nine black students attempted to enter Little Rock's Central High School but were blocked by the National Guard.

The Russians launched Sputnik on October 4 in 1957. Years later in 1970 Janis Joplin was found dead of a drug overdose on another October 4.

Russian troops attacked Budapest and crushed the Hungarian revolt on November 4 1956.

On Nov. 4 1979 The American embassy in Tehran, Iran, was seized by militants and 90 Americans taken hostage.

In Nov. 1995 Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, was assassinated by another Israeli.

And unless you count Frank Zappa’s death on Dec. 4 in 1993, the 4ths of December have been pretty quiet.