Today in History - November 17 | Murderer's bizarre reaction after killing his model mother - Voice of Asia

On November 17, 1972, wealthy heiress, model, and socialite Barbara Daly Baekeland was stabbed to death by her own son. Baekeland had married Brooks Baekeland, whose scientist grandfather invented one of the first mass-produced plastics, Bakelite, and achieved great commercial success.

Baekeland graced the covers of Vogue and Harper's Bazaar and gave birth to her son, Antony, in 1946. There are conflicting accounts of whether Antony was bisexual or homosexual, but what is certain is that Baekeland never accepted her son's sexual orientation. She reportedly hired prostitutes and even claimed to have had an incestuous relationship with her son in an attempt to "cure" him.

Antony was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia but was initially left untreated, as his father considered psychiatry to be "professionally unethical" and refused to pay for it. Antony reportedly pushed his mother into traffic and eventually stabbed her to death with a kitchen knife in their London penthouse. When police arrived at the scene, he was calmly ordering Chinese food on the phone.

Antony pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sent to a mental institution. After his release, he stabbed his grandmother (who survived) and later committed suicide at the age of 34. In 2007, the tragedy was made into a film, "Savage Grace," starring Julianne Moore and Eddie Redmayne. Following the film's release, Samuel Adams Green, Baekeland's post-divorce lover, expressed doubt about her claims of incest. "I don't believe she had sex with Tony, I think she just liked to shock people," he said.

On November 17, 2019, the first case of SARS-CoV-2 was identified in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. The virus, now known as COVID-19, still has an uncertain origin. However, data from the Chinese government in March 2020 traced the first case back to November 17. Five years later, nearly 800 million cases of the virus have been recorded globally, and more than 7 million people have died from the disease.

On November 17, 2003, former Hollywood actor and bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn in as Governor of California. The star of "The Terminator" and "Predator" ultimately served two terms as governor of the most populous state in the United States. His eight years in office included opposition to same-sex marriage, the implementation of environmental policies to combat climate change, the vetoing of a large number of bills, and the infamous labeling of his opponents in the legislature as "economic girly men."

On November 17, 1973, U.S. President Richard Nixon declared, "I am not a crook," during a heated press conference amid the Watergate scandal. When asked if members of his reelection committee were behind the infamous break-in, he said, "People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I'm not a crook. Everything I've got, I've earned." Less than a year later, facing almost certain impeachment and removal from office, he resigned in disgrace due to the scandal.