Today, January 4th

PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING AUTHOR & HISTORIAN DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN TURNS 77 TODAY. Her current book, Leadership in Turbulent Times—which examines the talents of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson—would seem to be a response to our current political climate. Not true, says the author, who started it 6 years ago. But realizing as she wrote it that her leaders weathered far more turbulent times than ours, “it was a way of providing reassurance to people.” (How overly optimistic those words seem today.)

BILLBOARD MAGAZINE PUBLISHED ITS 1st MUSIC HIT PARADE 84 YEARS AGO TODAY. Click here to hear this week’s top 10 songs. (#2 may surprise you.)

IT’S THE 55th ANNIVERSARY OF LYNDON JOHNSON’S “GREAT SOCIETY” STATE OF UNION ADDRESS, which heralded the creation of Medicare/Medicaid, the Voting Rights and Civil Rights Acts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Economic Opportunity Act, air- and water-pollution legislation, and much more. “We are a great society,” Johnson declared. “ But we could be greater.” Truer words were never spoken.