The inventor of the typewriter and QWERTY keyboard was born on this day, as was reporter Carl Bernstein. And Voyager 1 took the picture titled "The Pale Blue Dot." Today's reading - about that dot - was written by astronomer and author Carl Bernstein.

Hundreds of the Knights Templar are arrested - inspiring superstition around Friday the 13th, ASCAP forms, the WWII firebombing of Dresden begins, Australia apologizes to the "Lost Generations," and it is the birthday of Eleanor Farjeon - and a reading of Gwendolyn Brooks' poem "We Real Cool."

Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin were born on this day in the same year. This episode looks at their decisions, written and otherwise, with readings from Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" and from Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address.

General Motors inadvertently makes the United Auto Workers a cohesive labor union, the Seabed Arms Control Treaty "opens" for signing, and the birthday club includes Joy Williams and Mo Willems - with a reading from Williams "The Quick and the Dead."

February 10th is the anniversary of the births of Puerto Rican historian Delma Arrigoitia, Russian author Boris Pasternak, and journalist William Allen White. This episode includes a reading from White's apologetic editorial for writing "What's the Matter with Kansas?"

Today marks the birthdays of American revolutionary Thomas Paine, singer-songwriter Carole King, and author Alice Walker. Today's episode includes readings from Paine's "The Rights of Man," and Walker's "The Color Purple."

On the birthdays of Jules Verne and Kate Chopin, a look at their work and how important they have become to the modern world - with a reading from Chopin's "The Awakening."

Today marks the birthdays of Sinclair Lewis and Karen Joy Fowler. And it is the day that the state of Mississippi approved the 13th Amendment - nearly 150 years after the end of the Civil War.

It is the birthday of paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey.

This episode also includes Francois Truffaut, Bob Marley, and Michael Pollan - with a reading from Leakey's "Vanishing African Art."

It is William S. Burroughs' birthday and the anniversary of invoking the Asiatic Barred Zone Act - one of the more brazenly bigoted pieces of U.S. legislation.

This episode includes a reading from one of Burroughs' letters about love.