Today is Thursday, March 21st, the 80th day of the year.There are 285 days until the end of the year.
On this day:
In 1963,the last inmates were transferred out of Alcatraz federal prison in San Francisco Bay following an order from Attorney General Robert Kennedy.
In 1965,Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and more than three-thousand civil rights demonstrators began their march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama.An additional 25-thousand people joined the march along the way.
In 1980,J-R Ewing was shot on the season finale of "Dallas."It remained unclear for the next few months whether J-R was dead.The cliffhanger left the nation wondering "Who Shot J-R?"
In 1987,actor Robert Preston died at the age of 68.He starred as Professor Harold Hill in "The Music Man."
In 1989,Dick Clark announced he would step down as host of "American Bandstand."
In 1991,Hall-of-Fame guitar maker Leo Fender died at the age of 81.
In 1994,Hall-of-Fame actor MacDonald Carey died at the age of 81.He is best remembered for his role as Dr. Tom Horton on the soap opera "Days of Our Lives."
In 2011, the perjury and obstruction of justice trial for baseball star Barry Bonds began in San Francisco.Bonds was accused of lying in testimony related to the government's investigation of a steroid scandal involving the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative.He was convicted on April 13th, 2011 on the obstruction of justice charge.
In 2016, President Obama met with President Raul Castro in Havana, before attending a state dinner at the Revolutionary Palace.In a joint statement with Castro, Obama said "it's a new day" in U.S.-Cuba relations.