Dishonorable Mention: January 14, 83 BC: Mark Antony. All the movies made over the years about Julius Caesar and Cleopatra, usually involving Marcus Antonius, gloss over one key fact: Caesar and Antony were the bad guys. Caesar was establishing a dictatorship (though he never used the word "empire"), and Antony was his right-hand man.
Dishonorable Mention: January 14, 1741: Benedict Arnold. Yes, he was wronged, by the Continental Congress and by men he thought were his friends. No, turning coat was not the way to respond to it.
Dishonorable Mention: January 14, 1952: Maureen Dowd. No, she's not a traitor to her country like the previous two. And she did write some pretty rough things in her New York Times column about both Presidents George Bush, father and son.
But her columns about President Bill Clinton were greatly irresponsible. And when Hillary Clinton was nominated for President, Dowd's columns became absolutely despicable. To make matters worse, it was Dowd, rather than the long-departed Anna Quindlen, that Maggie Haberman made her role model as a Times columnist. Had Dowd and Haberman simply told the truth in October 2016, about both Hillary and Donald Trump, Hillary would have won, and we would have been spared the most disgraceful and dangerous Presidency ever.
Somewhat Honorable Mention: January 14, 1892: Martin Niemöller. First, this Lutheran minister in Germany supported Adolf Hitler and the rise of the Nazis. Then the Nazis stuck their noses in Protestant church business, and he opposed them. He was sent to the Dachau concentration camp. Even after being liberated, he lived nearly another 40 years, and remained a self-identifying anti-Semite until the end. So, "Somewhat Honorable" is the best I can do here.
In 1946, after being liberated, he made a statement whose wording has never been definitive, but usually sounds like this: "First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me."
10. January 14, 1941: Faye Dunaway.Bonnie and Clyde. The Thomas Crown Affair. The Three Musketeers. Chinatown. The Towering Inferno. Network. The Eyes of Laura Mars. The original film version of The Handmaid's Tale. Few women have been so good at playing so bad. One was Joan Crawford -- and Dunaway played her in Mommie Dearest.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1943: Holland Taylor. She was playing horrible bosses and surprisingly saucy older women before it was cool.
9. January 14, 1896: John Dos Passos. Like Ernest Hemingway, he interrupted a writing career to become an ambulance driver in World War I, and went on to become part of the "Lost Generation" of American writers.
Unlike Hemingway, he wasn't a dick to most people, especially women. And he had learned from the artists he had met, eventually designed his own novel covers, something few authors do. Also unlike Hemingway, his basic politics weren't reinforced by his experiences observing the Spanish-American War: While Hemingway became an even more devoted leftist, Dos Passos turned to the right, to the point where he endorsed Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon for President.
8. January 14, 1969: Dave Grohl. He was the drummer for Nirvana. It could be said that Nirvana's greatest contribution to music was making it possible for Grohl to become the guitarist and singer for Foo Fighters.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1936: Clarence Carter. He is to blues guitar what Stevie Wonder is to keyboards: A triumph of brilliance over blindness.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1938: Jack Jones. The son of actors Allan Jones and Irene Hervey, Jack is basically known for 2 songs, neither of which was a big hit, but both became legends: "The Impossible Dream," even though he never appeared in the musical from which it came, Man of La Mancha, written by Mitch Leigh and Joe Darion; and the theme from the TV series The Love Boat, written by Paul Williams (the short blond guy, not the Temptations singer) and Charles Fox.
Interestingly, after Richard Dawson left Match Game in 1978, both Jones and Williams occasionally occupied the Number 5 seat on the show's panel of stars.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1938: Allen Toussaint. He wrote "Whipped Cream,""Java,""Mother-in-Law,""I Like It Like That, "Working in the Coal Mine,""Yes We Can Can" and "Southern Nights." His hometown of New Orleans just renamed Robert E. Lee Boulevard for him.
7. January 14, 1948: Carl Weathers. A linebacker who played 2 seasons with the Oakland Raiders and 3 for the CFL's B.C. Lions, he turned to acting. As Apollo Creed, a Heavyweight Champion of the World with Muhammad Ali's talent, flamboyance and ego but a patriotism that made him an Anti-Ali, Weathers may be the best actor in the Rocky franchise.
It just now occurred to me while writing this that, by picking a defeated Rocky Balboa up and getting him back into shape to take the title back in Rocky III, and then dying in Rocky IV, Apollo reversed the races of Brian's Song: He was the analogue to Brian Piccolo, and Sylvester Stallone's Rocky to Gale Sayers.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1949: Lawrence Kasdan. He's written 4 Star Wars films: The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, The Force Awakens and Solo. He also co-wrote Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Bodyguard. He both wrote and directed Body Heat, The Big Chill, Silverado, The Accidental Tourist, Grand Canyon and Dreamcatcher.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1963: Steve Soderbergh. He directed Sex, Lies, and Videotape. (That's all one film, in 1989.) This made him, at age 26, the youngest solo director to win the Palme d'Or (Golden Palm) at the Cannes Film Festival on the French Riviera.
It also launched him to directing Out of Sight, Erin Brockovich, Traffic, Magic Mike, and the Ocean's film franchise with George Clooney. For Traffic, he won the Oscar for Best Director.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1969: Jason Bateman. He played a rotten kid opposite good kid Ricky Schroeder on Silver Spoons. In real life, it turned out to be the other way around. He's now best known for starring in Arrested Development. Keith Olbermann talks about that show almost as much as Michael Kay talks about The Sopranos.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1990: Grant Gustin. As Dr. Barry Allen, police forensic scientist and the titular superhero on The Flash, he may be the best actor in The CW's Arrowverse franchise of superhero shows.
6. January 14, 1919: Andy Rooney. He served in the U.S. Army on D-Day, the Liberation of Paris and the Battle of the Bulge. He came home and reported for CBS News. His A Few Minutes With Andy Rooney segment closed the news program 60 Minutes from 1978 until his death in 2011.
Sometimes it was serious. Sometimes it was funny -- sometimes, unintentionally. It inspired comedians ranging from Jerry Seinfeld ("Did you ever wonder... " became "Did you ever notice... ") to Vic DiBitetto ("You know what really gets my goat?" became "You know what really ticks me off?") Come to think of it, like Vic, Andy was a huge New York Giants fan.
5. January 14, 1904: Babe Siebert. One of the top hockey players of his time -- as was the similarly-named, but differently-spelled, Earl Seibert -- Charles Albert Siebert was equally adept as both a forward (in his case, left wing) and a defenseman. In his own time, the only other player about whom that could be said was Boston Bruins star Dit Clapper. Since then, the only one has been Red Kelly, a defenseman for the Detroit Red Wings who, in mid-career, became a center for the Toronto Maple Leafs.
He won the Stanley Cup with the 1926 Montreal Maroons and the 1933 New York Rangers. In 1937, with the Montreal Canadiens, he was awarded the Hart Trophy as the NHL's Most Valuable Player. He retired in 1939, and was respected enough to be immediately named the Canadiens' head coach. But he died in a boating accident before he could coach a single game. A benefit game was held for his family at the Montreal Forum, and he was posthumously elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame.
4. January 14, 1875: Albert Schweitzer. Because he brought modern medicine to France's colonies in Africa, his name has become a watchword for humanitarianism and enlightened doctors. He was also, in his time, one of the world's leading writers on the subjects of music and religion.
3. January 14, 1915: Mark Goodson. The King of Game Shows, with Bill Todman he created and produced, among others, What's My Line?, I've Got a Secret, The Price Is Right, Beat the Clock, Password, Match Game, Concentration, Tattletales, Family Feud and Card Sharks. His commitment to integrity allowed his shows to survive the Quiz Show Scandal of the late 1950s and early 1960s. As they would have said on Match Game, he was one of the biggest (blank)s in TV history.
2. January 14, 1940: Julian Bond. A major figure in the Civil Rights Movement, he was among the founders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in 1960 and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in 1971.
He was the 1st black person since Reconstruction elected to the Georgia House of Representatives, in 1966; and was promoted to the State Senate in 1974, retiring for the 1986 election. From 1998 to 2010, he was Chairman of the NAACP.
Honorable Mention: January 14, 1947: Taylor Branch. Although white, he has written what is regarded as the definitive biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, a three-volume set whose first volume (covering the years 1954 to 1963) earned him the Pulitzer Prize. He's also collaborated on books with President Bill Clinton and basketball legend Bill Russell.
1. January 14, 1968: LL Cool J. Queens native James Todd Smith -- the letters stand for "Ladies Love Cool James" -- is the Hank Aaron of rap: He was so good for so long that people didn't realize just how much he had done. And he's become a really good actor, starring on NCIS: Los Angeles. And with that physique, nobody doubts that his Special Agent Sam Hanna was once a Navy SEAL.
Still alive as of this writing: Dowd, Dunaway, Taylor, Grohl, Carter, Jones, Weathers, Kasdan, Soderbergh, Bateman, Gustin, Branch, LL.