TODAY IN HISTORY: Death row inmate saves last meal's dessert 'for later'
Convicted murderer Ricky Ray Rector was killed on January 24, 1992, in a highly controversial execution.
After a self-inflicted gunshot wound, it was estimated Rector had an IQ of between 60 and 70.
As his last meal, Rector received a steak, fried chicken and a slice of pecan pie.
But he left the pie beside, telling officers who were leading him to the execution chamber that he was "saving it for later".
With the execution so controversial, Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton used the opportunity to emphasise his tough-on-crime credentials.
He returned to Arkansas from his presidential campaign to be in-state for the execution.
The execution was considered a turning point in the race, with voters approving of Clinton's actions.
The so-called "Man of a Thousand Voices" Mel Blanc was in a serious car accident on Los Angeles' Sunset Boulevard on January 24, 1961.
For two weeks, the voice of nearly all the Warner Bros cartoons was in a coma and completely unresponsive.
Then one of his neurologists asked him: "How are you feeling today, Bugs Bunny?"
Blanc replied in the characteristic voice: "Eh, just fine, Doc. How are you?"
Blanc soon recovered enough to record his voices from his hospital bed.
He was still in a full-body cast when he voiced Barney Rubble in several episodes of The Flintstones.
Upon his return home from hospital, Blanc sued the city over the crash at the intersection. His was one of 26 accidents at the spot in the preceding two years.
The road would be restructured, but the location was nevertheless the subject of the song "Dead Man's Curve" by Jan and Dean (pictured), released in 1964.
The president of Togo Gnassingbé Eyadéma survived a plane crash in an isolated spot on January 24, 1974.
Eyadéma claimed that his plane had been sabotaged by French imperialists, and he was the sole survivor of the crash because of his superhuman strength.
In truth, there were several other survivors of the crash.
Nevertheless, he made the date of the crash an annual holiday.
Eyadéma would spend another 31 years as president of Togo, before his death in 2005.
He died, ironically enough, of a heart attack while on a plane.
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