Wash Singleton (1885 - 1969)

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1885 - In the year that Wash Singleton was born, Germany's Karl Benz built the Benz Patent-Motorwagen, which had an internal combustion engine. It is considered to be the world's first automobile. The Benz cost $150 - just under $4,000 in today's money.

1903 - Wash was 18 years old when the Harley-Davidson Motor Company was begun by two childhood friends, William Harley and Arthur Davidson - with help from Arthur's brother, Walter. Their first prototype - a "motor-bicycle" - couldn't climb hills without also pedaling, so they went back to the drawing board, and in 1904 their new version came in 4th in a race. Harley-Davidson and Indian Motorcycle Manufacturing Company were the only two major motorcycle companies to survive the Great Depression.

1908 - Wash was 23 years old when unemployment in the U.S. was at 8.0% and the cost of a first-class stamp was 2 cents while the population in the United States was 88,710,000. The world population was almost 4.4 billion.

1933 - At the age of 48 years old, Wash was alive when the day after being inaugurated, the new President, Franklin Roosevelt, declared a four-day bank holiday to stop people from withdrawing their money from shaky banks (the bank run). Within 5 days of his administration, the Emergency Banking Act was passed - reorganizing banks and closing insolvent ones. In his first 100 days, he asked Congress to repeal Prohibition (which they did), signed the Tennessee Valley Authority Act, signed legislation that paid commodity farmers to leave their fields fallow, thus ending surpluses and boosting prices, signed a bill that gave workers the right to unionize and bargain collectively for higher wages and better working conditions as well as suspending some antitrust laws and establishing a federally funded Public Works Administration, and won passage of 12 other major laws that helped the economy.

1969 - In the year of Wash Singleton's passing, in August, a previously planned small concert turned into a (free) more than 400,000 strong gathering of attendees and bands at Max Yasgur's farm in upstate New York - now called Woodstock. Just some of the 32 acts: Richie Havens, Joe Cocker, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Joan Baez, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Jefferson Airplane, Country Joe, Santana, The Band, and Sly and the Family Stone.

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