Golf Central

On this day in 1978, Jack Nicklaus defended his Jackie Gleason Inverrary Classic title in stunning fashion, making birdies on each of the last five holes to defeat the shocked Grier Jones. (The tournament still remains, although most of us know it now as the Honda Classic at PGA National in Palm Beach, Florida).

The title was one of 73 PGA Tour wins for the Golden Bear, who now has to sit and watch in near-stunned silence as Tiger Woods chases down his records in similar style. As for Grier Jones, he ended up with a serviceable three PGA Tour wins and finished fourth on the 1972 money list. He retired from tour golf in '83, Jones dedicated his life to teaching the game: His college teams at Wichita State University have reached the US NCAA championships twice since 1995 ...

And also on this day in 1909, Gene Homans was born in Englewood, New Jersey to a fine amateur golfing career. However, the lanky, bespectacled Homans is best known today as the answer to a trivia question: Who was the man that Bobby Jones beat 8&7 to win the 1930 US Amateur, completing his single-season Grand Slam? You got it, Gene Homans ...

And in the rest of the world: On this day in 1991, Iraqi troops abandoned their siege of Kuwait city, as forces of the Gulf War Allies liberated the Kuwaiti capital after 208 days under Iraqi occupation ... and two years later, a car bomb exploded in the World Trade Center in New York, killing five people. No one knew at the time how intertwined the events would be little more than 10 years later ...

And strangely enough: On this day in 1998, an $11-million lawsuit was rejected by an Amarillo, Texas jury, deflating a group of Texas cattle barons who had claimed that Oprah Winfrey's talk show exposing mad-cow disease had harmed their profits. Which just goes to show that spoiled-rich Texans don't win all the time ...

And in sport: On this day in 1977, in Swansea, Wales, the twinkle-toed rugby winger Shane Williams was born. Since then, the pint-sized Williams has amazed rugby fans with 195 points in 54 caps for Wales, invariably provoking the remark: "How does that little so-and-so do that!"

That said, it's gratulerer med dagen!, as they say in Oslo, to the R&B veteran Fats Domino (80); to the fantastically shorn blue-eyed soul singer Michael Bolton (55), who is a 10-handicap golfer; and to the sweet-voiced R&B songbird Corinne Bailey Rae, who hit No. 1 with her single Put Your Records On, but to our knowledge, does not hit golf balls.

And there are a host of Premiership football birthdays today: The seemingly ageless Norway and Man United hitman Ole Gunnar Solskjær is 35; Abdoulaye Diagne-Faye, the Senegalese and Newcastle "Makelele", is 30; Pompey and Portugual middleman Pedro Mendes is 29; and the gravity-defying Arsenal and Togo star Emmanuel Adebayor is 24. Keep bangin' 'em in, Manu ...

It also would have been a birthday for the country-rock god Johnny Cash (b. 1932), but sadly the Man In Black heard that lonesome whistle blowin' for him in 2003 ... 'Til tomorrow ...