August 8th

August 8 is the 221st day of the year.  There are 145 days remaining until the end of the year.

1709 1st known ascent in hot-air balloon, Bartolomeu de Gusmao (indoors).  Over-hyped.

1815 Napoleon Bonaparte sets sail for exile on St. Helena

1854 Smith and Wesson patents metal bullet cartridges

1864 Red Cross forms in Geneva

1925 1st national march of Ku Klux Klan (200,000) in Washington, D.C. I love a parade!

1963 16 men pull off the Great Train Robbery in England stealing more than £2.6 million (~£26 million in 2008) in bank notes on their way to be destroyed.

1973 US Vice President Spiro T Agnew says reports he took kickbacks are "damned lies" from government contracts in Maryland. He vows not to resign (Right!)

2000 Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley is raised to the surface after 136 years on the ocean floor.

1879 Emiliano Zapata [Salazar], maybe gay Mexican revolutionary

1920 Jimmy Witherspoon, maybe gay US jump blues singer 

1922 Rudi Gernreich, gay Austrian-born US fashion designer/co-founder of the Mattachine Society

1937 Dustin Hoffman, US actor 

1944 John Holmes [John Curtis Estes], iconic US pornographic actor/AIDS victim  

1949 Keith Carradine, US actor 

1951 Randy Shilts, gay US journalist/writer/And the Band Played On,  Conduct Unbecoming/AIDS victim 

1952 Anton Fig, maybe gay South African drummer/David Letterman’s Late Night CBS Orchestra 

Still hot DILF ...

1955 Peter Speach, maybe gay US actor/October ‘79 Playgirl model 

1961 Chris Freeman, gay US musician/Pansy Division 

1962 Oliver Stokowski, German actor 

1964 Jan-Josef Liefers, German actor 

1967 Steve Callahan, gay US actor (with husband, Matthew Montgomery)

1970 Chris Beetem [Christopher Lapinski], maybe gay US actor 

1972 Jorge Fernandez, Spanish actor 

1973 Mark Wills [Daryl Mark Williams], maybe gay US singer 

1974 Enzo Cilenti, English actor 

1974 [Walter] Kohl Sudduth, maybe gay US actor 

1976 [Joshua Scott] JC Chasez, maybe gay US singer / *N'SYNC 

1980 Michael Urie, gay US actor 

1980 Mike Hindert, maybe gay US bass guitarist 

1984 Richard Deacon, gay US actor (Fred Rutherford-Leave It To Beaver, Mel Cooley-Dick Van Dyke Show), flips his lid

1991 Brad Davis, gay US actor (Roots, Querelle, Sybil, Midnight Express), succumbs to AIDS at 41

2007 Joybubbles [Josef Carl Engressia, Jr.], notable US phone phreak/genius, hangs up. Read more about this amazing gentle man here.