The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor

It's the birthday of Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Herb Caen, born in Sacramento (1916). He started writing a column for the San Francisco Chronicle in 1938, and he was still writing for them when he died in 1997. He coined the term "beatnik" in 1958, and he made the word "hippie" popular in the 1960s. He also coined "Baghdad by the Bay" to refer to San Francisco. He said, "Martinis are like breasts, one isn't enough, and three is too many." And, "Isn't it nice that people who prefer Los Angeles to San Francisco live there?"

It was on this day in 1948 that President Harry Truman signed the European Recovery Program (also known as the Marshall Plan) into law, which allocated more than $5 billion in aid to help revitalize the economy of European countries after World War II. That amount eventually grew to more than $13 billion.

Europe was on the verge of economic collapse. Whole cities had been destroyed, factories had shut down, and the winter of 1947 was one of the coldest on record. Many Europeans were unemployed and homeless, freezing to death. A small group of American strategists and diplomats decided that the only way to keep Europe from descending into chaos would be a huge infusion of cash. So they turned to Secretary of State George Marshall, a well-known war hero and public figure, hoping he could sell the plan to the public.

Marshall immediately bought the idea, and he became its spokesperson. He announced the plan at the commencement ceremony at Harvard on June 5, 1947, and then went on a national tour to promote the plan.

Winston Churchill later said that the Marshall Plan was "the most unsordid act in history."

It's the birthday of the writer Washington Irving, (books by this author) born in New York City (1783). He wrote "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle." He was the first person who referred to New York City as "Gotham," and he created the character of Diedrich Knickerbocker, the Dutch New Yorker. "Knickerbocker" came to describe any New Yorkers who could trace their family to the original Dutch settlers, and that's where the New York Knicks get their name.