On this day ca. 269, Roman saint, Saint Valentine was martyred. Saint Valentine has been associated since the High Middle Ages with a tradition of courtly love. All that is reliably known about Saint Valentine is his name and that he was martyred on this day. It is uncertain whether St. Valentine is to be identified as one saint or the conflation of two saints of the same name. Several different martyrologies have been added to later hagiographies that are unreliable.
The ancient Romans had a fertility festival celebrated at mid-February of every year, called Lupercalia in honor of Lupa, the wolf who was said to have suckled Romulus and Remus, who went on to found the city of Rome. Lupercalia was a pagan fertility festival celebrated with sacrifices of goats and dogs, with milk and wool and blood. Young men would cut strips from the skins of the goats then strip naked and run through the city in groups, where young women would line up to be spanked with the switches, believing it would improve their fertility. Lupercalia was still wildly popular long after the Roman Empire was officially Christian, and it’s not difficult to see why the Church would have wished to have a different sort of holiday take its place.
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He was buried at a cemetery on the Via Flaminia close to the Milvian bridge to the north of Rome. The flower-crowned alleged skull of St. Valentine is exhibited in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome. Other relics were brought to Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church in Dublin, Ireland
Because so little is known of Saint Valentine, in 1969 the Roman Catholic Church removed his name from the General Roman Calendar, leaving his liturgical celebration to local calendars. The Roman Catholic Church continues to recognize him as a saint, listing him as such in the February 14 entry in the Roman Martyrology, and authorizing liturgical veneration of him on February 14 in any place where that day is not devoted to some other obligatory celebration in accordance with the rule that on such a day the Mass may be that of any saint listed in the Martyrology for that day. Use of the pre-1970 liturgical calendar is also authorized under the conditions indicated in the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum of 2007. Saint Valentine’s Church in Rome, built in 1960 for the needs of the Olympic Village, continues as a modern, well-visited parish church. Saint Valentine’s Day, the Feast of Saint Valentine, is an official feast day in the Anglican Communion, as well as in the Lutheran Church.
Chaucer wrote in The Parlement of Foules of a spring landscape “on seynt Valentynes day” where the goddess Nature watched as every kind of bird came before her to choose and seduce their mates.
In the early 15th century, the Duke of Orleans wrote a Valentine’s poem to his faraway wife while held captive in the Tower of London. Shakespeare mentioned the sending of Valentines in Ophelia’s lament in Hamlet. The tradition of sending lacy love notes on Valentine’s Day was enormously popular with the Victorians.
On this day in 1969, Italian mafioso, Vito Genovese, died in federal prison in Springfield, Missouri at the age of 71. Born 27 November 1897 in Rosiglino, Tufino, Province of Naples, Italy. Genovese rose to power in America during the Castellammarese War to later become leader of the Genovese crime family. Genovese served as mentor to many future mob bosses including Vincent “The Chin” Gigante, and Michael “Mike the Pipe” Genovese. In the 1920’s, New York’s two leading mobsters were Joe “The Boss” Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano. They were engaged in what would be known as the infamous Castellammarese War. Lucky Luciano worked his way up to be Masseria’s top aide, but Luciano made a deal with Maranzano whereby Luciano would set up the death of Masseria in return for Maranzano’s support of Luciano becoming the head of the Masseria family and thus ending the destructive war. Masseria was assassinated in a Coney Island restaurant by Bugsy Siegel, Genovese, and Joe Adonis. Maranzano then declared Luciano his number two man, and set up the Five Families of New York (Luciano/Genovese, Gambino, Lucchese, Colombo, and Bonanno). When Luciano was sent to prison in 1936, Genovese became the acting boss of the Lucianao family. However in 1937, Genovese was indicted on a murder charge and he fled to Italy. When he returned to the U. S. he regained power over the Luciano family and renamed the family Genovese. In 1959, Genovese was convicted of selling heroin and sentenced to 15 years in prison. 
The Final Footprint – Genovese is interred in Saint John Cemetery, Middle Village, New York. St. John is an official Roman Catholic burial ground located in Middle Village in Queens a borough of New York City. It is one of nine official Roman Catholic burial grounds to service the New York Metropolitan Area. St. John is one of the largest cemeteries in New York. Since its opening, St. John has been the resting place of various famous and infamous people in New York society, most famously being John F. Hylan (1868-1936), mayor of the city of New York from 1918-1925. The most notorious being Genovese and John J. Gotti (1940-2002), the head of the New York based Gambino crime family from 1985-2002. Genovese’s grave is marked by a large upright marble monument.
On this day in 1988, composer Frederick Loewe died from a heart attack in Palm Springs, California at the age of 86. Born June 10, 1901 in Berlin. He collaborated with lyricist Alan Jay Lerner on a series of Broadway musicals, including My Fair Lady (1956) and Camelot (1960), both of which were made into films.
After Camelot, Loewe retired to Palm Springs, not writing anything until he was approached by Lerner to augment the Gigi film score with additional tunes for a 1973 stage adaptation, which won him his second Tony, this time for Best Original Score.
In 1974 they collaborated on a musical film version of The Little Prince, based on the classic children’s tale by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
Loewe was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1972 and the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1979.
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He had a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars dedicated to him in 1995. He was buried in the Desert Memorial Park in Cathedral City, California. Other notable final footprints at Desert Memorial include; Jimmy Van Heusen and Frank Sinatra.
#RIP #OTD 1989 ornithologist and expert on the birds of the Caribbean, author (Birds of the West Indies), the man whose name became 007’s, James Bond died from cancer in the Chestnut Hill Hospital in Philadelphia aged 89. Church of the Messiah in Gwynedd Valley, Pennsylvania
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On this day in 2002, singer and songwriter, Waylon Jennings, died of diabetic complications in Chandler, Arizona at the age of 64. Born Waylon Arnold Jennings on 15 June 1937 in Littlefield, Texas. Jennings played bass for Buddy Holly following the break-up of The Crickets. Jennings escaped death in the 3 February 1959, plane crash that took the lives of Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson, when he gave up his seat on the plane to Richardson. One of the founding members of the outlaw movement in country music. Jennings was a member of the supergroup The Highwaymen along with Johnny Cash and fellow Texans Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson. Jennings married four times, the last to Jessi Colter (1969 – 2002 his death). One of my songwriting heroes. My list of favorite Waylon songs would be lengthy. 
On this day in 1554, English noblewoman, great-granddaughter of Henry VII, cousin of Edward VI, de facto monarch of England from 10 July until 19 July 1553, The Nine Days Queen, Lady Jane Grey and her husband Lord Guildford Dudley were executed by beheading at the Tower of London for high treason against Queen Mary I. Lady Jane Grey was 16 or 17 years old. Dudley was 18 or 19. Lady Jane Grey was the eldest daughter of Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Suffolk, and his wife, Lady Frances Brandon. The traditional view is that she was born at Bradgate Park in Leicestershire in October 1537, while more recent research indicates that she was born somewhat earlier, possibly in London, in late 1536 or in the spring of 1537. Guildford Dudley was born c. 1535, the second youngest surviving son of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland and his wife Jane, daughter of Sir Edward Guildford. Lady Jane Grey was the great-granddaughter of Henry VII through his younger daughter Mary, and a first cousin once removed of Edward VI. When the 15-year-old King lay dying in June 1553, he nominated Jane as successor to the Crown in his will, thus subverting the claims of his half-sisters Mary and Elizabeth under the Third Succession Act. Jane was imprisoned in the Tower of London when the Privy Council decided to change sides and proclaim Mary as queen on 19 July 1553. Jane was convicted of high treason in November 1553, which carried a sentence of death, although her life was initially spared. Wyatt’s rebellion of January and February 1554 against Queen Mary I’s plans for a Spanish match led to the executions. Lady Jane Grey had an excellent humanist education and a reputation as one of the most learned young women of her day. A committed Protestant, she was posthumously regarded as not only a political victim but also a martyr. 
On this day in 2000, Texas Longhorn, U. S. Army Air Corp veteran, Hall of Fame coach, Tom Landry died in Dallas, Texas at the age of 75. Born Thomas Wade Landry on 11 September 1924 in Mission, Texas. Landry played fullback and defensive back for the Longhorns and was an all-pro defensive back for the New York Giants. He began his coaching career with the Giants, serving as their defensive coordinator from 1954 to 1959. The Giants offensive coordinator at that time was Vince Lombardi. The Giants appeared in three NFL Championship games during Landry’s tenure. Landry was the first coach to employ a 4-3 defensive formation. In 1960 he became the head coach of the newly established Dallas Cowboys. Landry served as head coach of the Cowboys until 1988 during which time the Cowboys won two Super Bowl titles (VI, XII), 5 NFC titles, 13 Divisional titles, and compiled a 270-178-6 record, the 3rd most wins of all time for an NFL coach. His 20 career playoff victories are the most of any coach in NFL history. Landry coached the Cowboys to 20 consecutive winning seasons (1966–1985), an NFL record that remains unbroken and unchallenged. It remains one of the longest winning streaks in all of professional sports history. Landry was married to Alicia Wiggs (1949 – 2000 his death). My heroes have always been Cowboys. 
On this day in 2014, comic actor and writer Sid Caesar died at his home in Beverly Hills, California, at the age of 91, after a short illness. Born Isaac Sidney Caesar on September 8, 1922 in Yonkers. Perhaps best known for two pioneering 1950s live television series: Your Show of Shows, which was a 90-minute weekly show watched by 60 million people, and its successor, Caesar’s Hour. Your Show of Shows and its cast received seven Emmy nominations between the years 1953 and 1954 and tallied two wins. He also acted in movies; he played Coach Calhoun in Grease (1978) and its sequel Grease 2 (1982) and appeared in the films It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), Silent Movie (1976), History of the World, Part I (1981), Cannonball Run II (1984), and “Vegas Vacation” (1997).
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On this day in 1862, wife of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, artists’ model, muse, poet and artist Elizabeth ‘Lizzie’ Siddal died at the age of 32, from complications related to an overdose of laudanum, at her home at 14 Chatham Place, London, now demolished and covered by Blackfriars Station. Born Elizabeth Eleanor Siddall, on 25 July 1829, at the family’s home at 7 Charles Street, Hatton Garden, London. Siddal was painted and drawn extensively by artists of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, including Walter Deverell, William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais (including his notable 1852 painting Ophelia) and her husband. She featured prominently in Rossetti’s early paintings of women. Rossetti’s relationship with Siddal is explored by Christina Rossetti (Dante’s sister) in her poem “In an Artist’s Studio”:
The Final Footprint – Siddal was interred at Highgate Cemetery in London. Rossetti enclosed in his wife’s coffin a journal containing the only copy he had of his many poems. He reportedly slid the book into Siddal’s red hair. By 1869, before publishing any newer poems, he became obsessed with retrieving the poems he had slipped into his wife’s coffin. Rossetti and his agent, Charles Augustus Howell, applied to the Home Secretary for an order to have her exhumed. It was done at night to avoid public curiosity and attention. Rossetti was not present. Howell reported that her corpse was remarkably well preserved and her delicate beauty intact, probably as a result of the laudanum. Her hair was said to have continued to grow after death so that the coffin was filled with her flowing coppery hair. Rossetti published the old poems with his newer ones. They were not well received by some critics because of their eroticism, and he was reportedly haunted by the exhumation through the rest of his life.
On this day in 1963 poet, novelist, short story writer, Pulitzer Prize recipient, Sylvia Plath committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning in the kitchen of her flat at 23 Fitzroy Road near Primrose Hill, London, at the age of 30. Born on 27 October 1932, in Massachusetts Memorial Hospital, in Boston’s Jamaica Plain neighborhood. Plath studied at Smith College and Newnham College, Cambridge, before receiving acclaim as a professional poet and writer. She married fellow poet Ted Hughes in 1956 and they lived together first in the United States and then England, having two children together, Frieda and Nicholas. Plath suffered from depression for much of her adult life. Controversy continues to surround the events of her life and death, as well as her writing and legacy. Plath is generally credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry with her two published collections, The Colossus and Other Poems and Ariel. In 1982, she won a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for The Collected Poems. She also wrote The Bell Jar, a semi-autobiographical novel published shortly before her death. 
On this day in 2012, singer, actor, model Whitney Houston died of accidental drowning in her hotel room at the Beverly Hilton, in Beverly Hills, at the age of 48. Born Whitney Elizabeth Houston on August 9, 1963 in Newark, New Jersey. Houston is one of the best-selling music artists of all-time. She released seven studio albums and two soundtrack albums, all of which have diamond, multi-platinum, platinum, or gold certification. Houston’s crossover appeal on the popular music charts, as well as her prominence on MTV, starting with her video for “How Will I Know”, influenced several artists who follow in her footsteps.
On February 11, Houston was found unconscious in Suite 434 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, submerged in the bathtub. Beverly Hills paramedics arrived at approximately 3:30 p.m. and found the singer unresponsive and performed CPR. Houston was pronounced dead at 3:55 p.m. PST. On March 22, 2012, the Los Angeles County coroner’s office reported the cause of Houston’s death was drowning and the “effects of atherosclerotic heart disease and cocaine use”. The manner of death was listed as an “accident”.
On this day in 1992, writer Alex Haley died in Seattle, Washington, of a heart attack at the age of 70. Born Alexander Murray Palmer Haley on August 11, 1921 in Ithaca, New York. He was the author of the 1976 book Roots: The Saga of an American Family. ABC adapted the book as a television miniseries of the same name and aired it in 1977 to a record-breaking audience of 130 million viewers. In the United States, the book and miniseries raised the public awareness of African American history and inspired a broad interest in genealogy and family history.
On this day in 2005, playwright and essayist, Tony Award winner, recipient of the Nobel Prize for Drama, Arthur Miller, died at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut at the age of 89. Born Arthur Asher Miller on 17 October 1915 in Harlem, New York City. His notable plays include; All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (one-act, 1955; revised two-act, 1956). Death of a Saleman was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics’ Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama; the first play to win all three of these major awards. Miller received a BA in English from the University of Michigan. Miller married three times; Mary Slattery (1940 – 1956 divorce), Marilyn Monroe (1956 – 1961 divorce) and Inge Morath (1962 – 2002 her death). Miller also wrote the screenplay for the movie The Misfits (1961) starring Monroe, Clark Gable, Montgomery Clift and Eli Wallach. Miller and Monroe would divorce shortly before the movie’s premier. The film marked the final movie for both Monroe and Gable. Miller’s papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin. 
On this day in 2008, amateur boxer, U.S. Air Force veteran, and actor Roy Scheider died from 
On this day in 1881, writer and essayist, Fyodor Dostoevsky, died in St. Petersburg, Russian Empire at the age of 59 from a pulmonary haemorrhage. Born Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoevsky on 11 November 1821 in Moscow, Russian Empire.
On this day in 1906; poet, novelist, playwright Paul Laurence Dunbar died 
He was interred in the Woodland Cemetery in Dayton.
On this day in 1587, Queen regnant of Scots,
Queen consort of France, Mary Stuart, Mary Queen of Scots, was executed at Fotheringhay Castle Northamptonshire, England, at the age of 44. Born on 8 December 1542 at Linlithgow Palace, Linlithgow, Scotland. Mary was the only surviving legitimate child of King James V of Scotland. Mary of Guise was her mother. She was 6 days old when her father died and she was crowned nine months later. In 1558, she married Francis, Dauphin of France, who ascended the French throne as Francis II in 1559. Mary was widowed on 5 December 1560 and then returned to Scotland, arriving in Leith on 19 August 1561. As a devout Catholic, she was regarded with suspicion by many of her subjects. Scotland was torn between Catholic and Protestant factions, and Mary’s illegitimate half-brother, James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray, was a leader of the Protestant faction. The Protestant reformer John Knox also preached against Mary, condemning her for hearing Mass, dancing, dressing too elaborately, and many other real and imagined offences. In 1565, she married her first cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Their marriage was not a happy one. In February 1567, there was an explosion at their house, and Darnley was found dead, apparently strangled, in the garden. Mary then
On this day in 1959, New Orleans blues guitarist Guitar Slim died of pneumonia in New York City, at the age of 32. Born Eddie Jones on December 10, 1926 in Greenwood, Mississippi.
On this day in 2000, singer and songwriter, founder of the blues-rock band Foghat, Lonesome Dave, Dave Peverett, died in Orlando, Florida at the age of 56 from cancer. Born on 16 April 1943 in Dulwich, South East London, UK.
On this day in 2001, writer, film star and singer-songwriter, the third wife of singing cowboy Roy Rogers, Dale Evans died of congestive heart failure at the age of 88 in Apple Valley, California. Born Lucille Wood Smith in Uvalde, Texas on 31 October 1912. She took the name Dale Evans in the early 1930s to promote her singing career. Evans wrote one of the classic cowboy songs, “Happy Trails”. Evans married four times; Thomas Frederick Fox (1927–1929 divorce), August Wayne Johns (1929–1935 divorce), R. Dale Butts (1937–1946 divorce) and Roy Rogers (1947–1998 his death). My heroes have always been cowboys and cowgirls. 
On this day in 1916, “The Prince of Castillian Letters”, poet Rubén Darío died aged 49, in León, Nicaragua. Born Félix Rubén García Sarmiento on 18 January 1867 in Metapa, today known as Ciudad Darío, Matagalpa, Nicaragua.
On this day in 1918, painter Gustav Klimt died in Vienna at the age of 55, having suffered a stroke and pneumonia due to the influenza epidemic of that year. Born 14 July 1862 in Baumgarten, near Vienna in Austria-Hungary. Klimt was a symbolist painter and one of the most prominent members of the Vienna Secession movement. His primary subject was the female body, and his works are marked by a frank eroticism. In addition, he painted landscapes. Early in his artistic career, he was a successful painter of architectural decorations in a conventional manner. His work was the subject of controversy that culminated when the paintings he completed around 1900 for the ceiling of the Great Hall of the University of Vienna were criticized as pornographic. He subsequently accepted no more public commissions, but achieved a new success with the paintings of his “golden phase,” many of which include gold leaf. 
On this day in 1976, United States Army Veteran, Grammy award winning jazz musician and songwriter, Vince Guaraldi died of a heart attack at the age of 47 at the Red Cottage Inn in Menlo Park, California. Born Vincent Anthony Dellaglio on 17 July 1928 in San Francisco’s North Beach area. Noted for his innovative compositions and arrangements and for composing music for animated adaptations of the Peanuts comic strip. Guaraldi went on to compose scores for seventeen Peanuts television specials, including the Christmas special, plus the feature film A Boy Named Charlie Brown. 
On this day in 1990, composer Jimmy Van Heusen died in Rancho Mirage, California, from complications following a stroke, at the age of 77. Born Edward Chester Babcock on January 26, 1913 in Syracuse, New York. He wrote songs for films, television and theater, and won an Emmy and four Academy Awards for Best Original Song.
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On this day in 1991, nightclub comedian, singer, actor, producer, and philanthropist Danny Thomas died of heart failure at age 79, in Los Angeles, California. Born Amos Muzyad Yakhoob Kairouz on January 6, 1912 in Deerfield, Michigan. His career spanned five decades. He created and starred in one of the most successful and long-running situation comedies in the history of American network television. In addition to guest roles on many of the comedy, talk, and musical variety programs of his time, his legacy includes a lifelong dedication to fundraising for charity.
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On this day in 1993, U. S. Army veteran, tennis legend and social activist, Arthur Ashe, died in New York City at the age of 49 from AIDS-related pneumonia. He contracted the HIV virus from blood transfusions during heart bypass surgery. Born Arthur Robert Ashe. Jr. on 10 July 1943 in Richmond, Virginia. Ashe attended UCLA and was the first African-American man to win Wimbledon and the U. S. Open. I enjoyed playing tennis once ago and Ashe has always been one of my favorite players. I was pulling for him to win that match at Wimbledon. I used Head tennis rackets because Ashe did. Ashe was married to Jeanne Moutoussamy.
The Final Footprint – Ashe is interred in the Ashe Private Estate in Woodland Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia. His grave is marked by a large black granite marker. The marker features the inscription; Distinguished Athlete, Scholar and Humanitarian, and A HARD ROAD TO GLORY. After his death, Arthur Ashe’s body lay in state at the governor’s mansion in Virginia. The last time this was allowed was for Stonewall Jackson of the Confederate Army during the Civil War. The city of Richmond posthumously honored Ashe’s life with a statue on Monument Avenue, a place traditionally reserved for statues of key figures of the Confederacy. In 1993, Ashe was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton. The main stadium at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows Park, where the US Open is played, is named Arthur Ashe Stadium in his honor. This is also the home of the annual Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day. His memoir is entitled Days of Grace. 
On this day in 1941, Australian bush poet, journalist and author Banjo Paterson died of a heart attack in Sydney, aged 76. Born Andrew Barton Paterson at the property “Narrambla”, near Orange, New South Wales, the eldest son of Andrew Bogle Paterson, a Scottish immigrant from Lanarkshire, and Australian-born Rose Isabella Barton, related to the future first Prime Minister of Australia Edmund Barton. Paterson wrote many ballads and poems about Australian life, focusing particularly on the rural and outback areas, including the district around Binalong, New South Wales, where he spent much of his childhood. His more notable poems include “Waltzing Matilda”, “The Man from Snowy River” and “Clancy of the Overflow”. On 8 April 1903 he married Alice Emily Walker, of Tenterfield Station, in St Stephen’s Presbyterian Church, in Tenterfield, New South Wales.
On this day in 1995, actor Doug McClure died from lung cancer in Sherman Oaks, California at the age of 59. Born Douglas Osborne McClure on 11 May 1935 in Glendale, California. Perhaps best remembered for his role as Trampas on the Western television servies The Virginian which ran from 1962 to 1971. One of my favorite shows as a kid. McClure was married five times; Faye Brash (1957 – 1961 divorce), BarBara Luna (1961 – 1963 divorce), Helen Crane (1965 – 1968 divorce), Diane Soldani (1970 – 1979 divorce) and Diane Furnberg (1979 – 1995 his death). 
On this day in 2020, 
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