Today In History: An Anthem for the Rainbow

On this day in history, October 7th, 1939, a young Judy Garland, just 16 years old, recorded the iconic ballad "Over the Rainbow" for The Wizard of Oz, forever etching her voice into Hollywood history. Nearly three decades later in 1968, the Motion Picture Association introduced its film rating system, giving us those familiar G to R labels. In 1982, Broadway welcomed Cats, the whimsical musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Fast forward to 1992, when the U.S., Canada, and Mexico initialed NAFTA, a free trade agreement that would shape North American economics for decades before being replaced in 2020. On this day in 1995, Pope John Paul II held Mass in New York’s Central Park, drawing a crowd of 130,000. In 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger swapped movie scripts for politics, winning California’s governorship. And in 2014, after years of music rights negotiations, The Wonder Years was finally released on DVD—complete with Joe Cocker’s unforgettable theme. That’s your October 7th Almanac, on Northwest Newsradio.