A crucial court case clarifies the importance of freedom of the press and the birthday club includes Guy de Maupassant, Mary Ritter Beard, and Wendell Berry - with a reading of Berry's poem "The Peace of Wild Things."

The Fairness Doctrine is rescinded and the birthday club includes Nicolas-Jacques Conte, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and Robert Hayden - with a reading from an essay by Donella Meadows.

Christopher Columbus sets sail and the birthday club includes Ernie Pyle and Leon Uris - with a reading from Pyle's newspaper column "Here is Your War."

The letter that started the Manhattan Project, and it is the birthday of author and thinker James Baldwin - with a reading from his book "The Fire Next Time."

The British abolish slavery, Henry Perky patents shredded wheat, and the birthday club includes Francis Scott Key and Herman Melville - with a reading from Melville's classic novel "Moby Dick."

Author Daniel Defoe is locked in a pillory, the U.S. and Soviet Union sign the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, and the birthday club includes Ignacio Cervantes, Primo Levi, and Ahmet Ertegun - with a reading from Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe."

Samuel de Champlain starts a nearly 100-year war, Walt Disney releases his first Oscar winner, and the birthday club includes Anna Maria Mozart and Emily Bronte - with a reading from Bronte's "Wuthering Heights."

The way light, itself, was perceived changes in big, important ways, the world's major powers try to limit war crimes, and the birthday club includes Alexis de Tocqueville and Mary Lee Settle - with a reading from Tocqueville's "Democracy in America."

The 14th Amendment is ratified, Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia, President Hoover orders U.S. soldiers to push U.S. veterans away from the White House, and the Irish Republican Army announces it will stop using weapons to oppose British rule. This episode includes a reading from Wallace Stegner's "Crossing to Safety."

The actual Macbeth is defeated in an important battle, Maximilien Robespierre is arrested by the French National Assembly, researchers at the University of Toronto prove that the hormone insulin regulates blood sugar, Warner Brothers releases the animated short "A Wild Hare," introducing Bugs Bunny - with a reading from Banting's notebook.