This day in history

► Today is Tuesday, Aug. 9, the 221st day of 2011. There are 144 days left in the year. ► Today’s birthdays: Basketball Hall of Famer Bob Cousy is 83. Tennis Hall of Famer Rod Laver is 73. Jazz musician Jack DeJohnette is 69. Comedian David Steinberg is 69. Boxing Hall of Famer Ken Norton is 68. Actor Sam Elliott is 67. Singer Barbara Mason is 64. Former MLB pitcher Bill Campbell is 63. College Football Hall of Famer John Cappelletti is 59. College Football Hall of Famer Doug Williams is 56. Actress Melanie Griffith is 54. Actress Amanda Bearse is 53. Rapper Kurtis Blow is 52. Singer Whitney Houston is 48. Hockey Hall of Famer Brett Hull is 47. TV host Hoda Kotb is 47. Actor Pat Petersen is 45. Pro Football Hall of Famer Deion Sanders is 44. Actress Gillian Anderson is 43. Actor Eric Bana is 43. Producer-director McG (a.k.a. Joseph McGinty Nichol) is 43. NHL player-turned-assistant coach Rod Brind’Amour is 41. TV anchor Chris Cuomo is 41. Actor Thomas Lennon is 41. Rock musician Arion Salazar is 41. Rapper Mack 10 is 40. Actress Nikki Schieler Ziering is 40. Latin rock singer Juanes is 39. Actress Liz Vassey is 39. Actress Rhona Mitra is 36. Actor Texas Battle is 35. Actress Jessica Capshaw is 35. Actress Anna Kendrick is 26. ► In 1854, Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden’’ was first published. ► In 1902, Edward VII was crowned king of Britain following the death of Queen Victoria. ► In 1910, the US Patent Office granted Alva J. Fisher of the Hurley Machine Co. a patent for an electrically powered washing machine. ► In 1936, Jesse Owens won his fourth gold medal at the Berlin Olympics as the United States took first place in the 400-meter relay. ► In 1945, three days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan, the United States exploded a nuclear device over Nagasaki, killing an estimated 74,000 people. ► In 1969, actress Sharon Tate and four other people were found brutally slain at Tate’s Los Angeles home; Charles Manson and a group of his followers were later convicted of the crime. ► In 1974, President Nixon and his family left the White House as his resignation took effect. Vice President Gerald R. Ford became the nation’s 38th chief executive. ► In 1995, Jerry Garcia, lead singer of the Grateful Dead, died in Forest Knolls, Calif., of a heart attack at 53. ► In 2001, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a central Jerusalem pizzeria, killing himself and 15 other people. ► In 2006, the White House said neither Israel nor Hezbollah should escalate their month-old war, as Israel decided to widen its ground invasion in southern Lebanon. Physicist James A. Van Allen, discoverer of the radiation belts surrounding the Earth that now bear his name, died in Iowa City at 91. ► In 2010, former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, 86, the longest serving Republican in the US Senate, was killed in a plane crash in the southwestern part of his state while on his way to a fishing trip (four others also died in the crash outside Dillingham).