JANUARY 8 –1786 Happy Birthday Nicholas Biddle: Andrew Jackson’s banking enemy; 11949 Happy Birthday executive consultant legend Jay Abraham; 1877 Crazy Horse fights last battle;2017 La La Land takes home seven Golden Globe awards
JANUARY 8
1786 – Happy birthday Nicholas Biddle.
He was one of America’s first bankers who died miserably. Why was he miserable? I’ll get to that in a minute. Born and raised in Philadelphia, he graduated from Princeton at the top of his class at age 15. Yeah, one of those kids.
He had a love for literature and economics and helped to detail the Louisiana Purchase as well as the Louis and Clark Expedition. In 1812 he became editor for the Port Folio, the first U.S. literary journal. He married Jane Margaret Craig, an extremely wealthy heiress. He served as secretary for President James Monroe, a member of the Pennsylvania legislature, and an outspoken supporter of the 1st Bank of the U.S. He wrote and published Pennsylvania’s rejection of the Hartford Convention’s constitutional amendment proposals to restrict the powers of Congress and the president.
In 1819, President Monroe needed someone to lead the troubled 2nd Bank of the United States. After losing two unsuccessful presidents, Monroe chose his old friend Biddle. Biddle was brilliant, known as the prototype of the modern business executive. He was in charge of the nation’s money and interest rates. Until Andrew Jackson came into office and would put an end to all that. “I have no hesitation to say if they can recharter the bank, with this hydra of corruption they will rule the nation and its charter will be perpetual and its corruption influence destroy the liberty of our country.”
Like Old Hickory, Biddle was arrogant and didn’t back down from a fight very easily. He refused to allow investigations of political interferences by Bank branches during the 1928 election, and rather than try to work out a deal with the President of the US, Biddle instead got his buddies in Congress to recharter the bank early in 1832. After Old Hickory vetoed it, and Congress couldn’t override, Biddle squeezed loans and credit. Maybe he did it to protect the bank; maybe he did it to wage economic warfare. Either way, it caused a mild economic crisis big enough for Biddle to require armed guards at his door to protect him and his Philly house from mobs right there on 7th and Spruce.
If only he had just made a deal with President Old Hickory the 2nd Bank may have been saved. Though he ran the Pennsylvania state charter of a commercial bank, it didn’t have nearly the thrill of The National Bank, and Biddle’s downward spiral continued; authorizing bad loans and investments and once tried to corner the market on cotton.
Biddle retired from the banking business in 1839 and tried running for president against Martin Van Buren. The bank that Biddle left behind was unable to deal with the falling prices of cotton, and collapsed in 1841, swallowing up Biddle’s entire life’s fortunes…
Slammed with lawsuits, Biddle faced criminal charges for his role in the cotton scheme but was exonerated. Legal problem hounded him until the day he died in 1844 and that my friends is probably the main reason why Nicholas Biddle, one of America’s first bankers, died miserably.
1815 – Old Hickory gets victory at New Orleans. Yes, the War of 1812 was technically over; the Treaty of Ghent had just been signed. But Andrew Jackson, commander of the southern forces, didn’t check his Facebook page that day and didn’t know that. Neither did the British, for that matter. The British decided at this last battle of the war to take America from the South, through Louisiana and West Florida. 45 British barges docked at Bayou Bienvenue in Mississippi with 1200 men and began a ground assault. They quickly captured the Viillere plantation, but an American officer managed to escape to warn General Jackson.
The two sides fought, and the British were able to hold the line at Rodriquez Canal, and Jackson’s men had to disengage. As they prepared for battle, new commander Lt. Gen. Sir Edward Pakenham was sent in to lead the British troops and planned to attack on both sides of the river. However crossing the river was more difficult than he realized, and Jackson took charge on January 8 with a brutal attack. Pakenham continued to fight and tried to rally his troops through a losing battle, even though he had two horses shot out from underneath him. Pakenham would get killed on the battlefield.
The battle only lasted a few hours. Andrew Old Hickory Jackson had taken sloppy American ragtags and turned them into a fighting force good enough to beat, once again, quite possibly the most powerful military force in that day. If one didn’t know better, one might think the British simply gave up. If one didn’t know better, that is.
1949 – Happy Birthday legendary mover and shaker Jay Abraham.
Forbes has ranked Jay as one of the most effective executive consultants in the U.S. And why not. He started out by purchasing a fledgling arthritis cream company and transformed it into Icy Hot. That’s just getting started! According to Jay’s website, he’s coached over 10,000 businesses find their top dollar throughout 400 different industries by his strategy of creating life-long customer relationships and other subtle areas to achieve maximum value.
“Every business owner deserves the right to learn how to increase sales, multiply their profiles and mine every hidden asset and every overlooked opportunity in the world.”
Such is Jay’s philosophy.
1992 – President HW Bush blows chunks on the Japanese prime minister. On January 8 1992 George HW Bush was attending a state event for 135 diplomats at the Japan’s head of state’s home, finishing a 12-day trade oriented tip through Asia. They played a little tennis; Bush lost the match, and quickly developed the 24 hour flu. That night, while being served a dinner of cold salmon with caviar, a clear soup with mushrooms, medallions of beef with pepper sauce, and a bowl of passion fruit ice cream, for dessert, bush turned and vomited and passed out on the floor. Check please! Of course it was caught on video! For weeks, the world of satire wouldn’t let go of the footage of Bush tossing his cookies in Japan, where a new phrase was coined: Bushu-suru, which means literally to do the Bush thing.
1877 – Crazy Horse fights his last battle. Crazy Horse, who fought with Sitting Bull in the Battle of Little Bighorn against US Forces, finally came to realize the fight was getting pointless. His people were low on ammunition and food and the winter cold blizzards raged.
On January 8, 1877, the US army, led by General Miles caught up with Crazy Horse’s camp in Montana and opened fire. Crazy Horse and his group were able to retreat and seek shelter, but realized that he was fighting a losing battle.
1962 – Jack Nicklaus plays his 1st pro tournament, finished in 50th place and won 3 bucks. 1993 Michael Jordon scores his 20,000th point in his 620th game. The only player to do so faster than hat was Wilt Chamberlain.
2017 RIP Marvin Yagoda.
He’s the ringleader behind Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum in Farmington Hills, MI.
The story dates back to his parents’ drug store which first opened in 1932. 5 years later they purchased the property on the corner of Ardmore and Fenkell. Then their son Marvin took over. That’s probably a good thing that it was a pharmacy since after visiting what Marvin did to it, you’ll need a prescription of something or another for sure.
It’s a ginormousmuseum full of coin-operated animatronic dummies, mechanical games and pretty much anything else that’s weird, such as an actual Electric chair from the Sing Sing prison. Talk about putting the fun in funeral and the host in hostage!
Also, it boasts love and torture machines which apparently are a big favorite. I guess that[‘s what mommy and daddy do while the kiddies are playing the pinball machines,
I don’t know One of the toys Marvin put is a giant Cardiff, that allegedly PT Barnum tried to buy from him but was turned down, so Barnum made his own replica.
Here, you’ll see the original giant Cardiff,
I’m sure it’s amazing.