0064 – The Great Fire of Rome began.

1536 – The authority of the pope was declared void in England.

1743 – “The New York Weekly Journal” published the first half-page newspaper ad.

1789 – Robespierre, a deputy from Arras, France, decided to back the French Revolution.

1812 – Great Britain signed the Treaty of Orebro, making peace with Russia and Sweden.

1830 – Uruguay adopted a liberal constitution.

1872 – The Ballot Act was passed in Great Britain, providing for secret election ballots.

1914 – Six planes of the U.S. Army helped to form an aviation division called the Signal Corps.

1927 – Ty Cobb set a major league baseball record by getting his 4,000th career hit. He hit 4,191 before he retired in 1928.

1932 – The U.S. and Canada signed a treaty to develop the St. Lawrence Seaway.

1935 – Ethiopian King Haile Selassie urged his countrymen to fight to the last man against the invading Italian army.

1936 – The first Oscar Meyer Wienermobile rolled out of General Body Company’s factory in Chicago, IL.

1936 – The Spanish Civil War began as Gen. Francisco Franco led an uprising of army troops based in Spanish North Africa.

1936 – “The Columbia Workshop” debuted on CBS radio.

1942 – The German Me-262, the first jet-propelled aircraft to fly in combat, made its first flight.

1944 – U.S. troops captured Saint-Lo, France, ending the battle of the hedgerows.

1944 – Hideki Tojo was removed as Japanese premier and war minister due to setbacks suffered by his country in World War II.

1947 – U.S. President Truman signed the Presidential Succession Act, which placed the Speaker of the House and the Senate President Pro Tempore next in the line of succession after the vice president.

1964 – Pete Rose (Cincinnati Reds) hit the only grand slam home run of his career.

1970 – Ron Hunt (San Francisco Giants) was hit by a pitch for the 119th time in his career.

1971 – New Zealand and Australia announced they would pull their troops out of Vietnam.

1985 – Jack Nicklaus II, at age 23 years old, made his playing debut on the pro golf tour at the Quad Cities Open in Coal Valley, IL.

2000 – It was announced that Christopher Reeve would direct and serve as executive producer on the TV movie “Rescuing Jeffrey.”

2001 – A train derailed, involving 60 cars, in a Baltimore train tunnel. The fire that resulted lasted for six days and virtually closed down downtown Baltimore for several days. (Maryland)

President Harry Truman signed an Executive Order determining the line of succession if the president becomes incapacitated or dies in office. Following the vice president, the speaker of the house and president of the Senate are next in succession.

This became the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified on February 10, 1967.

On July 17, 2014, two New York Police Department officers confront Eric Garner, a 43-year-old African American father of six, for illegally selling cigarettes. Garner dies after losing consciousness as a police officer locks him in an illegal chokehold, and within hours, a video …read more

https://youtu.be/s9SFJrEpzRY

On July 17, 1967, one of the oddest musical pairings in history comes to an end when Jimi Hendrix dropped out as the opening act for teenybopper sensations The Monkees.

The booking of psychedelic rock god Jimi Hendrix with the made-for-television Monkees was the brainchild of Hendrix’s manager, Mike Jeffery, who was seeking greater public exposure for a young client who was a budding star in the UK, but a near-unknown in his native United States. It was in the UK, in fact, that Monkee Mike Nesmith first heard a tape of Hendrix playing while at a dinner party with John Lennon, Paul McCartney and Eric Clapton. Nesmith and his fellow Monkees Peter Tork and Micky Dolenz became instant Jimi Hendrix fans, and after witnessing his legendary performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in June 1967, they encouraged their own manager to invite the little-known but highly respected Jimi Hendrix Experience to join their upcoming U.S. tour.

Hendrix himself appears to have had no direct input on the decision, though he’d made his opinion of the Monkees clear several months earlier in an interview with Melody Maker magazine: “Oh God, I hate them! Dishwater….You can’t knock anybody for making it, but people like the Monkees?” Nevertheless, Hendrix joined the tour in progress in Jacksonville, Florida, on July 8. Predictably, the reception given to the now-legendary rock icon by the young fans of the bubblegum Monkees was less than worshipful. As Mickey Dolenz later recalled, “Jimi would amble out onto the stage, fire up the amps and break out into ‘Purple Haze,’ and the kids in the audience would instantly drown him out with ‘We want Daaavy!’ God, was it embarrassing.”

Jimi Hendrix managed to get through a total of only seven dates with the Monkees, culminating in his final show on July 17, 1967, which may or may not have ended with Hendrix saluting the crowd with his middle finger. There was no truth to the widely circulated rumor that he’d been kicked off of the tour after protests by the Daughters of the American Revolution that his show was “too erotic.”

Source: history.com

Citation Information

Article Title Jimi Hendrix drops out as opening act for The Monkees Author History.com Editors

Website Name HISTORY

URL https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/jimi-hendrix-drops-out-as-opening-act-for-the-monkees Date Accessed July 17, 2023 Publisher A&E Television Networks Last Updated July 15, 2020 Original Published Date November 16, 2009

In Memory

On July 17, 2020, in the midst of a pandemic and a time of unparalleled racial tensions in the United States, the nation loses one of the last towering figures of the civil rights movement. John Lewis, former Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a chief …read more