This day in history 4 July 2009

1862 - A mathematics professor named Charles Lutwidge Dodgson goes rowing with Alice Liddell (the young daughter of a friend) and her sisters Lorina and Edith. He creates a story on the spot to amuse Alice and her sisters. Much of the story he invents is based on a picnic a couple of weeks earlier in which they had been caught in the rain. He will eventually write this story down and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland will be published 3 years later on July 4 under Dodgson’s pen name - Lewis Carroll.

1898 - Actor Johhny Lee, the voice of Br’er Rabbit in Disney’s 1946 Song of the South, is born on the 4th of July in Los Angeles, California.

1914 - 4 July, Savlaram Ravji Patil (P. Savlaram), film lyricist and story writer, was born.

1982 - Ozzy Osbourne married his manager, Sharon Arden on 4th July.

1995 - 4 July, At Lollapalooza in George, WA, Courtney Love hit Kathleen Hanna (Bikini Kill). Love received a suspended one-year sentence and was required to take courses in anger management.

2000 – 4th July, Sanjay Dutt denies charges in bomb blast case. A designated TADA court recorded the statement of film actor Sanjay Dutt, an accused in bomb blast case, who denied the charges leveled against him. Dutt appeared before designated TADA judge P D Kode to testify on the evidence tendered by the prosecution. Nearly 100 other accused were also present. Prosecution alleged the film producers Samir Hingora and late Hanif Kadawala had shown co-accused Baba Chavan and other accused Dutt’s residence where they had gone with arms and ammunition in a car.

2001 - 4 July, Probe ordered into the death of witness; in the murder case of Music tycoon Gulshan Kumar. Keki Balsara, a key witness in the Gulshan Kumar murder case, died at the police headquarters. The commission served notices to state chief secretary V Ranganathan, director general of police Subhash Malhotra and Mumbai police commissioner M N Singh and asked them to explain in an affidavit the cause of Balsara’s death.

2002 - 4 July, Sunil Dutt settled a row between builders and tenants. This builder-tenant problem saw the then Congress MP Sunil Dutt intervene on behalf of the tenants.

2003 - 4 July, Rituparno Ghosh, one of the country’s top directors, crossed regional barriers by casting Aishwarya Rai in Chokher Bali.

2003 – 4 July, Dimple Kapadia planned to fit into the shoes of Nicole Kidman! This gorgeous actress was all set to do a desi version of The Others. - SAMPURN