Roanoke, George Orwell publishes "Animal Farm," and the birthday club includes Fredrika Bremer, Mark Felt, and Jonathan Franzen - with a reading from the 1585 writing "A Brief and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia."

The birthday club includes Lawrence of Arabia, Georgette Heyer, Wallace Thurman, William Keepers Maxwell, Jr., Charles Bukowski, and Diana Wynne Jones - with a reading from Jones' "Howl's Moving Castle."

The movie "The Wizard of Oz" premiers, Japan surrenders to end WWII, and the birthday club includes Walter Scott, Oscar Peterson, Stanley Milgram, and Stieg Larsson - with a reading from Larsson's "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo."

FDR signs the Social Security Act into law and the birthday club includes Ernest Thompson Seton, Ernest Thayer, David Crosby, Danielle Steele, and Gary Larson - with a reading from Thayer's "Casey at the Bat."

French King Louis XVI is arrested, Opha May Johnson becomes the first woman to enlist in the U.S. Marine Corps, it is Barbed Wire Sunday in Berlin, Germany, and it is the birthday of suffragist Lucy Stone - with a reading from a letter to her mother.

Isaac Singer gets the patent for the sewing machine, Sue Hendrickson discovers the best and most complete T. rex skeleton, NAFTA is born, and the birthday club includes Radclyffe Hall, Erwin Schrodinger, William Goldman, and Mary Roberts Rinehart - with a reading from Rinehart's "Writing is Work."

The Watts Riots, U.S. evacuating its last unit of ground troops, hip-hop and rap, and Reagan's "little joke" are all tied to this day. The birthday club includes Angus Wilson and Alex Haley - with a reading from Wilson's "The Middle Age of Mrs. Eliot."

The birthday club includes Era Bell Thompson, Clarence Leonidas Fender, Suzanne Collins, and Rachel Simmons - with a reading from Simmons' "The Curse of the Good Girl: Raising Authentic Girls with Courage and Confidence."