A 1903 advertisement for Ford automobiles

Today in History

• The “typographer,” an early precursor to the typewriter, receives a patent (1829)
• The Ford Motor Company sells its first car (1903)
• Italy’s fascist government bans the use of foreign words (1929)
• Holocaust: The Treblinka extermination camp is opened (1942)
• The Sandinista National Liberation Front is founded in Nicaragua (1961)
• The first publicly transmitted live transatlantic television program is transmitted via Telstar (1962)
• The only successful hijacking of an El Al jet takes place (1968)
• A helicopter accident during the filming of The Twilight Zone movie kills Vic Morrow and two children (1982)
• Comet Hale-Bopp is discovered. It will not be visible to the naked eye until nearly a year later (1995)

Birthdays

• Georges Matchabelli, perfumer (1885)
• Raymond Chandler, crime novelist and screenwriter (1888)
• Haile Selassie, emperor of Ethiopia (1892)
• Arthur Treacher, actor and namesake of Arthur Treacher’s Fish and Chips (1894)
• Virgil Finlay, illustrator (1914)
• Pee Wee Reese, baseball player (1918)
• Calvert DeForest, actor best known as Larry “Bud” Melman on The Late Show With David Letterman (1921)
• Bert Convy, actor and game show host (1933)
• Don Drysdale, baseball player (1936)
• Don Imus, radio host (1940)
• Gardner Dozois, editor and author (1947)
• Woody Harrelson, actor (1961)
• Philip Seymour Hoffman, actor (1967)
• Gary Payton, basketball player (1968)
• Charisma Carpenter, actress (1970)

Deaths

• Domenico Scarlatti, composer (1757)
• Roger Sherman, US founding father (1793)
• Isaac Singer, founded Singer Sewing Machines (1875)
• Ulysses S. Grant, general, 18th US President (1885)
• Glenn Curtiss, aviation pioneer (1930)
• D. W. Griffith, filmmaker (1948)
• Philippe Pétain, Marshal of France, head of the Vichy government (1951)
• Montgomery Clift, ator (1966)
• Van Heflin, actor (1971)
• Eddie Rickenbacker, US World War I ace (1973)
• Donald Barthelme, author (1989)
• Jean Muir, actress (1996)
• Eudora Welty, author (2001)
• Leo McKern, actor (2002)
• Chaim Potok, author (2002)
• Daniel Schorr, television journalist (2010)
• Amy Winehouse, singer-songwriter (2011)
• Sally Ride, astronaut (2012)

Holidays and Celebrations

• Birthday of Haile Selassie (Rastafari)
• Children’s Day (Indonesia)
• National Remembrance Day (Papua New Guinea)
• Renaissance Day (Oman)
• Revolution Day (Egypt)

July 23 is the 204th day of the year (205th in leap years). There are 161 days remaining until the end of the year.