10. March 6, 1926: Alan Greenspan. Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board from 1987 to 2006, at the start of his tenure, his response to a stock market crash prevented a depression. And his keeping interest rates low helped enable to economic boom of the 1990s. He could not, however, prevent the recessions of 1990-93, 2001-03 and 2007-09.
He is married to Andrea Mitchell of NBC News. I think he married her because, for the first time in his life, he could be in a relationship where he was "the interesting one."
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1929: Tom Foley. First elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1964, from a District centered on Spokane, Washington, he became Speaker in 1989. But he was not an especially strong House Democratic Leader. In 1994, he became the 1st Speaker in 132 years to lose his own seat in an election. He later served as U.S. Ambassador to Japan.
9. March 6, 1831: Philip Sheridan. The Union General won the Battle of the Shenandoah Valley, and backed up Ulysses S. Grant to get Confederate General Robert E. Lee to surrender. He later commanded troops in the Indian Wars, where he besmirched his record by saying, "The only good Indians I ever saw were dead." This was twisted into "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." Still, he was promoted to General of the Army, an early five-star General.
8. March 6, 1906: Lou Costello. With Bud Abbott, he formed one of the all-time great comedy teams, known for their worldplay, such as their best-known routine: "Who's On First?"
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1923: Ed McMahon. He was so much more than Johnny Carson's announcer and sidekick on The Tonight Show. He hosted game shows and fundraisers, and was a great commercial pitchman.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1947: Rob Reiner. The son of comedy legend Carl Reiner, and the basis for the character of Richie Petrie on The Dick Van Dyke Show (Rob was Carl, and Carl's character Alan Brady was Sid Caesar), he became a comedy legend himself, first by playing Michael Stivic on All in the Family.
But, like his contemporary Ron Howard – and his ex-wife, Penny Marshall -- he’s become better known as a director. He stuck with comedy with This Is Spinal Tap, When Harry Met Sally… and The Bucket List. But he deviated from comedy with Stand By Me, The Princess Bride, Misery, A Few Good Men, The American President, Ghosts of Mississippi and LBJ. Not bad for a "Meathead."
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1948: Anna Maria Horsford. She played Thelma Frye on Amen and Dee Baxter on The Wayans Bros.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1963: D.L. Hughley. After starring on Steve Harvey's Original Kings of Comedy Tour, he starred in the sitcom The Hughleys.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1967: Connie Britton. She's starred on the TV shows Spin City (set in the office of the Mayor of the City of New York), Friday Night Lights (set in a high school in Texas), Nashville (set in the capital of country music) and 9-1-1 (set in the Los Angeles Police Department). Not bad for somebody from Rockville, Maryland.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1968: Moira Kelly. She played a figure skater in The Cutting Edge, and a lot of her characters have been "ice queens." She starred in the 1st season of The West Wing, as political operative Mandy Hampton, but never gelled with the cast, and was written out. This gave rise to a term for places written-out TV characters go to: "Mandyville."
7. March 6, 1905: Bob Wills. One of the giants of country music, his use of jazz rhythms helped modernize it.
In 1945, he recorded Red Foley's song "Smoke On the Water," and hit Number 1 on the country charts with it, 28 years before the hard rock band Deep Purple had a hit with a different song of the same title. He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame, and to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as an "early influence."
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1944: Kiri Te Kanawa. The New Zealand opera singer is probably the most famous person of Māori descent.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1944: Mary Wilson. She was in The Supremes longer than anyone, including Diana Ross, although she was never the lead singer.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1946: David Gilmour. The lead guitarist of Pink Floyd.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1947: Kiki Dee. Although she had some solo hits, she's best known for her 1976 duet with Elton John, "Don't Go Breaking My Heart," which hit Number 1.
6. March 6, 1979: Tim Howard. A native of North Brunswick, Middlesex County, New Jersey, the goalkeeper may be the biggest name in American soccer, and is certainly the greatest goalkeeper the country has ever produced.
He started his career with the New York/New Jersey MetroStars (now the New York Red Bulls), and ended it with the Colorado Rapids. In between, he played for Manchester United and Everton, his 399 appearances a record for an American in top-flight English "football." He won an FA Cup with Man United in 2004.
With the U.S. national team, he competed in the 2000 Olympics, and the 2006, 2010 and 2014 World Cups; and won the continental title, the CONCACAF Gold Cup, in 2007 and 2017.
5. March 6, 1972: Shaquille O'Neal. In terms of both physical size and personality, Shaq was the biggest basketball player of the turn of the 21st Century. He made 15 NBA All-Star Games, and won NBA Championships with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2000, 2001 and 2002, and the Miami Heat in 2006. He also made the NBA Finals with the Orlando Magic in 1995 and the Lakers in 2004.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1898: Gus Sonnenberg. A halfback, he helped the Providence Steam Roller win the 1928 NFL Championship. He was also a champion in professional wrestling, back when it was a mostly legitimate sport.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1940: Willie Stargell. A 7-time All-Star, "Pops" hit 475 home runs, including the longest ever measured at 4 different National League ballparks. (Oddly, neither Forbes Field nor Three Rivers Stadium were among them.) A 1st baseman, he helped the Pittsburgh Pirates win the World Series in 1971 and 1979. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, and a statue of him stands outside PNC Park.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1947: Dick Fosbury. His "Fosbury Flop" not only enabled him to win the Gold Medal in the high jump at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, it revolutionized the event, to the point where almost everybody who competes in it uses it.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1987: Kevin-Prince Boateng. The midfielder helped AC Milan win Italy's Serie A in 2011, and FC Barcelona win Spain's La Liga in 2019. At this point, though, he may be better known for his anti-racism efforts.
He and his brother Jérôme Boateng were both born in Berlin, to the same Ghanian father and different German mothers. Kevin-Prince played his international football for Ghana, but Jérôme played for Germany, winning the 2014 World Cup.
4. March 6, 1900: Lefty Grove. Journalist Arthur "Bugs" Baer said that Robert Moses Grove "could throw a lamb chop past a wolf." He might have been the greatest lefthanded pitcher ever, going 300-141. He led the American League in wins 4 times, strikeouts 7 times, and earned run average 9 times.
He helped the Philadelphia Athletics win the 1929 and 1930 World Series. In 1931, he had maybe the greatest season any pitcher had ever had, going 31-4, an ERA of 2.06, and a WHIP of 1.077. The AL began giving out Most Valuable Player awards that year, and he won it. But the A's lost the World Series in 7 games.
He was named to the 1st All-Star Game in 1933, missed the next one, and was named to the next 5. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1975. In 1999, he was named to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team, and was ranked 23rd on The Sporting News' 100 Greatest Baseball Players, 2nd among lefthanded pitchers only to Warren Spahn, ahead of Sandy Koufax and Steve Carlton.
3. March 6, 1927: Gabriel García Márquez. Perhaps the most famous person ever to come from the South American nation of Colombia, he may have been the greatest writer in the Spanish language in the 20th Century. He won the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature for works such as One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1619: Cyrano de Bergerac. Much of what's been written about him is fiction. But he was a real person, he was a renowned writer in his own time, contemporary depictions do suggest that he had a big nose (if not an abnormally large one), and he did engage in a few duels. But it was a carriage accident -- or perhaps sabotage -- that led to his death at age 39.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1806: Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She was already a well-known poet before meeting and marrying Robert Browning, and remained a better one.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1885: Ring Lardner. A member of the Algonquin Round Table, he didn't only write about sports, but he was one of the earliest great sportswriters. His sons Ring Jr. and John were also renowned writers.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1917: Will Eisner. One of the pioneers of comic books, he created the superhero The Spirit in 1940. In 1978, he popularized the term "graphic novel" with his book A Contract with God.
2. March 6, 1937: Valentina Tereshkova. The 1st woman in space, aboard the Soviet capsule Vostok 6 in 1963. She orbited the Earth for 3 days, and remains the only woman ever to go into space alone.
She married Vostok 3 cosmonaut Andriyan Nikolayev. Their daughter Elena was the 1st person born to a mother and a father who had both traveled in space. The couple split up, and she later remarried. She retired from the Soviet Air Force with the rank of Major General, and has been a member of the Russian national legislature, the State Duma, since 2011.
Honorable Mention: March 6, 1927: Gordon Cooper. One of America's original "Mercury Seven" astronauts, his voyage aboard Faith 7 (Mercury-Atlas 9) had the highest orbit of any spaceflight to that point, making him the human being who has gone the furthest into space alone.
1. March 6, 1475: Michelangelo Buonarotti. If Leonardo da Vinci -- both a friend and a competitor -- had a challenger for the title of leader of the Italian Renaissance, Michelangelo was it. And that would be true if all he had done was paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in Rome. His 1504 statue of David preparing to face Goliath is the most famous masculine statue ever carved.
Still alive as of this writing: Greenspan, Reiner, Horsford, Hughley, Britton, Kelly, Te Kanawa, Gilmour, Dee, Howard, O'Neal, Fosbury, Boateng, Tereshkova.