 Puck Fair, Killorglin, on the Ring of Kerry, in County Kerry, Ireland (Aug 10 - 12)
Held in the little village of Killorglin,
this is an ancient festival ruled by a wild goat. The fair, held
over three days and attended by about 100,000 people from far and
near, is one of the three oldest in Ireland, the others
being Ould
Lammas Fair, Ballycastle and the Great October Horse Fair,
Ballinasloe.
The first day of the main social, economic
and cultural event in the Killorglin calendar is called Gathering
Day. In accordance with tradition, the Puck, a wild goat, is caught
on the August bank holiday Monday. Then, on Gathering Day morning
the goat is paraded through the streets of Killorglin, where he is greeted
with cheering and rapturous applause. Puck is paraded to the
town square where he is crowned King of the Fair, then ceremoniously
raised on a scaffold platform about eight metres high. There the
poor beast resides for the three days and nights of the fair,
looking down on his subjects. The Foley family traditionally has the
task of caring for the royal Caprinae
of the family Bovidae,
and feeding him cabbages.
"On the
final day, Scattering Day or Children's Day, the goat-king is
dethroned by a throng of excited children. Accompanied by pipers, he
is processed through town and over the bridge, whereupon he is
turned loose. Or, according to MacNeill [MacNeill, Maire, The
Festival of Lughnasa, Oxford University Press 1962], he is
carried around on the shoulders of four men, while the shopkeepers
contribute to his upkeep, then auctioned off."
Source:
School of the Seasons
There is conjecture that the tradition's
origins lie in a pre-Christian Celtic pagan festival in
honour of the sun god Lugh, as
Puck Fair has always occurred at approximately the time of the Lughnasadh
(Lammas)
celebrations of a fruitful harvest. This line of thought usually
suggests that the male goat or 'Puck' was a pagan symbol of
fertility, like the pagan god Pan, who has the hindquarters, legs,
and horns of a goat, in the same manner as a satyr,
and is one of the deities within the archetype of the Horned God.
That it was once a Lammas fair is indicated
by a patent from 1613 that gives the proprietor the right "to hold
a faire in Killorglin on Lammas Day and the day after". Others
believe the fair started as early as the 13th
Century. According to the fair's official website:
"The most widely mentioned story relating to the origin of King Puck,
associates him with the English Ironside Leader Oliver Cromwell. It
is related that while the 'Roundheads' were pillaging the
countryside around Shanara and Kilgobnet at the foot of the
McGillycuddy Reeks, they routed a herd of goats grazing on the
upland. The animals took flight before the raiders, and the he-goat
or 'Puck' broke away on his own and lost contact with the herd.
While the others headed for the mountains he went towards Cill
Orglain (Killorglin) on the banks of the Laune. His arrival there in
a state of semi exhaustion alerted the inhabitants of the
approaching danger and they immediately set about protecting
themselves and their stock.
"It is said that in recognition of the service rendered by the goat,
the people decided to institute a special festival in his honour and
this festival has been held ever since."
 The goat in mythology and folklore
Capricornus is one of the constellations of the zodiac.
It is commonly called Capricorn,
especially in astrology, in which it reigns from December 22
- January 19.
It represents a horned goat, although it is commonly called the
sea-goat. Vedic India identified the he-goat, a sacrificial animal,
with the fire-god, Agni,
who sometimes rides a chariot drawn by goats. Thor, too, travels in a
chariot drawn by goats (Tanngnjóstr and Tanngrisnir) – the Eddas note that the
earth is scorched and the mountains cracked as the goats run across
them.
The goat is one of the twelve-year cycle of animals which
appear in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar. It is thought that
each animal is associated with certain personality traits; those
born in a year of the goat are predicted to be shy, introverted,
creative, and perfectionistic. In British folklore, Robin Hood,
the forest dweller, is believed to have associations with Pan/Phaunos/Faunus.
(NB, Fauna
is an alternative name for Bona Dea,
the 'good goddess'.)
In Greek mythology, Amalthea
('tender') is the foster-mother of Zeus, king
of the gods. She is sometimes represented as the goat which
suckled the infant-god in a cave in Crete,
sometimes as a nymph of uncertain parentage (daughter of Oceanus,
Haemonius, Olen, Melisseus),
who brought him up on the milk of a goat. This goat having broken
off one of its horns, Amalthea filled it with flowers and fruits and
presented it to Zeus, who placed it together with the goat amongst
the stars. According to another story, Zeus himself broke off the
horn and gave it to Amalthea, promising that it would supply
whatever she desired in abundance. Amalthea gave it to Achelous
(her reputed brother), who exchanged it for his own horn which had
been broken off in his contest with Heracles
for the possession of Deianeira.
According to ancient mythology, the owners of the horn were many and
various. Speaking generally, it was regarded as the symbol of
inexhaustible riches and plenty, and became the attribute of various
divinities (Hades, Gaea, Demeter,
Cybele,
Hermes),
and of rivers (the Nile) as fertilizers of the land.
The term 'horn of Amalthea' is applied to a
fertile district, and an estate belonging to Titus Pomponius Atticus was
called Amaltheum. Cretan coins represent the infant Zeus being
suckled by the goat; other Greek coins exhibit him suspended from
its teats or carried in the arms of a nymph (Ovid,
Fasti, v. 115; Metam. ix. 87).
Amalthea's skin also became the aegis in
some traditions.
The Roman festival of the Lupercalia
(which transmogrified into Valentine's
Day) had strong associations with the goat, beginning with a sacrifice
by the Luperci of goats and a dog. Male participants
were brushed, whipped or splattered with februa, thongs of
sacrificial goatskin, symbolically blessing them with fertility.
"The goat has long been a visual aid in
symbolic and mythological literature and stories. It has a varied
significance: gentleness in one tradition and sensuality in another.
Both sexes of the goat symbolize fertility, vitality and ceaseless
energy. The he-goat (buck) is the epitome of masculine virility and
creative energy, while the female (doe) typifies the feminine and
generative power and abundance. Symbolically, the goat can be
interchanged with the gazelle or the antelope. The wild goat of the
Old Testament and Arabic lore is the Ibex.
"The goat was probably, after the dog,
the earliest domesticated animal. Goats grazing or at rest, or being
milked by a goat-herder, are frequent subjects for idyllic scenes,
representing the paradisial state; as such they appear on both pagan
and Christian sarcophagi.
History
"There have been many strange beliefs and
myths about goats. Oppian says they breathe through their horns,
while Varro maintains that they breathe through their ears; Pliny
expresses a general belief that they are perpetually feverish. Goat
skins were used for water and wine bottles when traveling and
camping and as parchment for writing. Goat hairs were woven and the
animal provided food and milk. The goat, especially the kid, was a
sacrificial animal and was used also as a sin-offering (the
Scapegoat.) The he-goat is lust personified, and a goat with a human
head depicts depravity.
Goats in Mythology
"The Sumerian god Marduk often has a goat
as an accompaniment, and it also appears with hunting goddesses. The
wild goat was sacred to Artemis and is an attribute of Dionysos, who
took this form when fleeing from Typhon, and of the satyrs, who are
half-goats with goats' horns. Pan also has the legs, horns and beard
of a goat." Source
Festival of Faunalia, to Pan/Phaunos/Faunus,
December 5
in the Book of Days
Kartikeya,
Narada and the goat, a Hindu legend
Puck Fair webcams Lots about Puck
Elvis the goat is king of the fair
Greater
Panathenaea, ancient Athens,
in honour of goddess Athena
(c. Aug 8
- 17)
Third day: Musical contests.
Dog Days, ancient Rome (Jul 3
- Aug 11)
Feast day of St Bettelin
(Bertram) of Ilam
"Date unknown. There is a chapel, font, well, and substantial
portions of Bettelin's shrine at Ilam in Stafford, but little
remains of his memory. He may have been an Anglo-Saxon hermit, who
lived, died, and was venerated in that area. Legend adds some rather
improbable details borrowed from the legend of Saint Bertelme of
Fécamp: he was a Mercian prince who fell in love with an Irish
princess, brought her back to England, and left her in the forest in
labor. When he returned with a midwife, a pack of wolves was
devouring her. As a result, he became a hermit for the rest of his
life (Farmer)." Source
Feast day of St Blane (Blaan),
Bishop of Kinngaradha, Scotland
Feast day of St Deusdedit, confessor
Feast day of St Gerontius
(Geraint; main feast day is January
10, qv)
Feast
day of St Hugh of
Montaigu
Feast day of St Thiento and
Companions
Click for Eastern Orthodox liturgical days Shop saints
Tenth of August
The term 'the Tenth of August' is widely used by
historians as a shorthand for the Storming of the Tuileries
Palace on August 10, 1792, the effective end of the French monarchy until it was restored in 1814.
Kochi Yosaki Matsuri, at Oji, Japan (Aug 9 - 12)
Ghanta Kharna Day, Nepal
"Celebrates the death of Ghanta Karna, a blood-thirsty demon who
haunts crossroads and is the enemy of the God Vishnu."
Source:
Earth, Moon and Sky
Prison Justice Day, Canada
Independence
Day in Ecuador
The movement began in Quito in 1809.
Independence was not achieved until May
1822.
National S'mores Day, USA
On which day of the week were you born? Find out here
1397 Albert II of Habsburg, emperor of
the Holy Roman Empire
1729
Sir William
Howe, 5th Viscount Howe PC
(General William Howe; d. July
12, 1814),
English
general; Commander-in-Chief of British forces during the American
Revolutionary War
1821 Jay
Cooke (d. 1905), financier
1845 Abai Kunanbaev (d. 1904), Kazak poet
1872 Bill Johnson (d. 1972), jazz
musician
1874 Herbert Clark
Hoover, (d. October 20, 1964) 31st
President of the United
States (1929 - 33), who was for a time founder-manager of
the Broken Hill Zinc Corporation at Broken Hill, NSW,
Australia.
He was in Australia in 1897 - '98 working for the Bewick,
Moreing Company, and returned in 1902 and 1907.
After the stock market crash of 1929,
"Hoover announced that while he would keep the Federal budget
balanced, he would cut taxes and expand public works spending.
However, he signed the Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act, which
raised tariffs on over 20,000 dutiable items. This act is often
blamed for deepening the depression, and being Hoover's biggest
political blunder. The Hoover administration's tightening of the
money supply (for fear of inflation)
is also regarded by most modern economists as a mistaken tactic
given the situation." Source:
Wikipedia
Pictured: Herbert Hoover, age 24, just after college
as a mining consultant on his way to Australia in 1897. Source
"Aged just 22, with only a little mining experience in California, New Mexico and Colorado, he applied for and was appointed to a position overseeing their investments in Western Australia in 1897.
"Hoover landed in the port of Albany in May 1897 and travelled to Coolgardie by train – a country he described as beset with ' red dust, black flies, and white heat' ; in September he sent a detailed report to BM about the Sons of Gwalia Mine at Leonora on the eastern goldfields on the edge of the Great Victoria Desert and recommending purchase. In January 1898. Sons of Gwalia, claimed by Welsh miners a few years before who had named it for the ancient name for Wales, was a BM Mine.
"In May 1898, at the age of 23, Hoover was installed as Superintendent of the Sons of Gwalia Gold Mine where he spent about six and a half months before accepting a senior position with the company in China. Sons of Gwalia was one of the most famous and successful of Bewick Moreing's concerns and made many people's fortunes. But this came at a cost. Hoover was extremely efficient at mine management but he set up a pattern for ruthless industrial relations, including importing labour and management expertise from overseas and interstate, something guaranteed to rile local workers."
Source
More
on Hoover in Australia Herbert
Hoover chronology His
memoirs online
1880 Robert L Thornton, Dallas, Texas, USA businessman,
philanthropist and mayor
1887 Edward
Leedskalnin (d.
December 7,
1951), eccentric
Latvian emigrant to the United States,
pamphleteer,
and amateur sculptor who, it is alleged, single-handedly built the
remarkable monument known Rock Gate Park, better known as
Coral
Castle, in
Homestead,
Florida, USA
"Before Ed moved from Latvia at age 26,
he grew up in a family of stone masons. Very little is known
about what type of stone mason work he did in Latvia, but it
probably explains his interest and knowledge of quarrying,
cutting, and carving stone. He then lived in Canada and worked
as a lumberjack, work which is largely about moving felled
trees. A tree the weight of Ed's largest coral block, 30 tons,
is not at all uncommon — some trees can weigh hundreds of tons.
Before Ed ever started work on Coral Castle, he had a wealth of
work experience that gave him all the knowledge he'd ever need
to build his creation. It's simply not necessary to invoke
made-up mystical powers, aliens, or magnetic vortex energy to
explain Coral Castle."
Source: Skeptoid.com
CoralCastle.com
1898 Jack
Haley (d. 1979), actor
1900 Wolfgang Pauli (d. 1958), physicist
1902 Norma
Shearer (d. 1983),
American actress, nicknamed 'the First Lady of the Screen' (Romeo and Juliet; Marie Antoinette)
1902 Curt Siodmak (d. 2000), science fiction author
1912 Jorge
Amado, novelist
1923 Rhonda Fleming, actress
1928 Jimmy
Dean, country and western singer (Big Bad John)
1928
Eddie Fisher, American singer better known for his wives (Elizabeth
Taylor, Connie Stevens and
Debbie
Reynolds) than for his songs
1928
Gus Mercurio, American
born Australian
character actor and former boxer;
father of Simply Ballroom's Paul Mercurio
1940 Bobby Hatfield, who with Bill
Medley formed the Righteous Brothers
1943 Ronnie Spector, American singer,
formerly with The Ronettes;
former wife of Phil
Spector
 1947
Anwar Ibrahim,
a former deputy prime minister
of Malaysia
who was imprisoned. In the early 1990s, he was being
groomed to succeed Mahathir bin Mohamad as prime minister but fell out
of favour, largely due to differences in opinion on economic
issues.
In 1998, Anwar was arrested on charges
of sodomy and corruption, and the subsequent series of trials have
drawn into question the independence of the Malaysian judiciary with
regard to politically sensitive cases.
"Anwar has described both charges as
fabrications intended to remove him as a political rival to
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, whose administration is alleged
by him to be riddled with corruption."
Source: BBC News
Anwar Ibrahim and Other Detainees Tortured by
Police
Official
Site of International Free Anwar Ibrahim Campaign
Free Anwar Ibrahim Google links
Anwar Ibrahim at Wikipedia
1947 Ian Anderson, musician from Jethro Tull
1959 Rosanna Arquette,
American actress (Desperately Seeking Susan)
1960 Antonio Banderas, actor (Desperado, Spy
Kids)
 1963
Phoolan Devi
(d. July
25, 2001),
popularly known as 'The Bandit Queen', an Indian
dacoit
(armed robber), who later turned politician. She was often popularly
regarded as a champion of the downtrodden and poor, in the manner of
England's Robin
Hood.
Devi first came to national and international attention in 1981 as the leader of
a gang of 'dacoits' (bandits) who allegedly killed 22 high-caste Thakur men in
a village of Uttar Pradesh, in what was later dubbed the St Valentine's Day
Massacre. She denied any involvement in the massacre.
The 1994
Indian film Bandit Queen was purportedly about her life up
through her 1983 surrender to authorities. She fiercely disputed its accuracy
and fought to get it banned in India. Devi played herself in the 1996 TV
documentary, Phoolan: The First
Rebel.
1965 Claudia Christian, actress (Babylon
5)
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August
7
Picnic
Day
8 Cheesecake
Day
8 Happiness
Happens Day
8 Prank
Night
9 Send
An E-mail Day
10 Lazy
Day
10 Grab
Some Nuts Day
11 Sons
And Daughters Day
11 Chinese
Valentine's Day
11 Alcatraz
Day
12 Thank
You Day
12 Aloha
Day
13 Left-Handers
Day
14 Independence
Day (Pakistan)
15 Sit
Back And Relax Day
15 Independence
Day (India)
16 True
Love Forever Day
16 Joke
Day
16 Roller
Coaster Day
17 #2
Pencil Day
19 Daffodil
Day
19 Soft
Ice Cream Day
19 Spicy
Food Day
20 Lemonade
Day
20 Zoroastrian
New Year
22 Be
An Angel Day
23 Hug
Your Sweetheart Day
23 Ride
The Wind Day
25 Kiss
And Make Up Day
26 Women's
Equality Day
26 Cherry
Popsicle Day
26 Toilet
Paper Day
27 Just
Because Day
27 Banana
Lovers Day
... More
Events
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612 BCE The assassination of Sinsharishkun,
King of the Assyrian
Empire, and the beginning of the destruction of Nineveh.
Nineveh (Ninua)
was an important city in ancient Assyria. This "exceeding great city" as it is called in
the Book
of Jonah, lay on the eastern bank of the Tigris, along
which it stretched for some 50 kilometres (30 miles), having an average breadth
of 20 km (10 mi) or more from the river back toward the eastern hills. This
whole extensive space is now one immense area of ruins. The city was mentioned
in about 1800 BCE as
a worship place of the goddess Ishtar,
who was responsible for the city's early importance.
258 Death of St
Lawrence, martyr.
843
The Treaty of Verdun
divided the empire of the Franks.
"Though often presented as the
beginning of a devolution or dissolution of Charlemagne's
unitary empire, it in fact reflected the continued adherence to the Frankish idea of
a partible or divisible inheritance rather than primogeniture." (Wikipedia)
955 Battle of Lechfeld: Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor defeated the Magyars, ending
50 years of Magyar
invasion of the West. Being St Lawrence's Day, the Christian army attributed
victory to the intercession of the saint.
1492 Alexander
VI was elected Pope,
one of the most notorious of the Roman Catholic Church.
1498 King
Henry VII of England rewarded John Cabot with 10 pounds for
the 'discovery' of Canada.
1519 Ferdinand Magellan's five ships set sail from Seville to
circumnavigate the globe.
1575 We
learn from Raphael
Holinshed's Chronicles (the ones that Shakespeare used for some of
his plots) that on this day, Peter Bales (Balesius),
English calligrapher (1547 - c.1610), completed writing the Lord's Prayer, the
Creed, the Decalogue, two short Latin prayers, his own name, a motto, the day of
the month, the year and the year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (to whom he
presented it) all on an English penny. He made a ring out of it and covered it
with crystal and all the writing was legible. Bales in his brilliant career also
wrote the whole Bible small enough to be cased in a walnut.
He also devised one of the earliest forms of shorthand,
published in his book Arte of Brachygraphie (1590).
1653 Death of Maarten
Tromp, Dutch admiral.
1675
England: The foundation stone of the Royal
Greenwich Observatory was laid by King Charles II.
1680 The Pueblo
Revolt began in New Mexico. Popé (San Juan tribe) attacked the New
Mexican capital of Santa Fe, killing 400; 11 days later, the Spanish abandoned
Santa Fe and began a long retreat to El Paso, Texass.
After more than a decade of preparation, pueblo Amerindians all
over the Spanish colony of Neuvo Mexico rose in revolt, driving out the
Spaniards, killing 21 missionary priests, and burning Santa Fe. They were
assisted by mestizo workers from the barrio of Analco and succeeded in
liberating the territory from foreign rule for twelve years.
Source: The Daily Bleed
1741
In the Gulf of Alaska, naturalist Georg Steller observed for two hours an
'aquatic monkey', 1.5 metres long. It had no front limbs and a finned tail.
[Cf English navigator Henry Hudson and a mermaid, June 15, 1608 -
PW]
1788 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his Jupiter
symphony.
1792 French
Revolution: Members of a new revolutionary Commune in Paris stormed
the Tuileries Palace and the royal family fled. Louis XVI of France was arrested and taken into
custody.
1803 British
took possession of Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania, Australia).
1809 Ecuador declared
independence from Spain.
1821 Missouri was
admitted as the 24th US state.
1833 Chicago
was officially named.
 1840 The Fortsas Hoax
On this day, an auction of
a unique collection of very rare books was scheduled to be held in Binche,
Belgium. Earlier that year, a catalogue with the lengthy title 'Catalogue d'une tres-riche mais peu nombreuse collection de livres provenant de la bibliotheque de fen M. le Comte J. N. A. de Fortsas' ('Catalogue of a very rich but very small collection of books coming from the library of Monsieur Count
JNA Fortsas') had appeared in Europe and received a great deal of attention from book dealers, librarians and book collectors across the continent. Many of them had received the catalogue by mail.
Although only 52 books were listed in this extraordinary auction catalogue, the passions of the bibliophiles were excited because Jean Nepomucene Auguste Pichauld, Comte de Fortsas, who had died aged 69 on
September 1 of the previous year, had a special passion of his own: he collected books of which only one copy existed, some of them new and previously unheard of sources. His heir, it seems, was offering the books for sale.
"Buy, I conjure you, at any price, the follies of our rascally grandfather", wrote the Princess de Ligne to her agent, urging him to buy one of the Fortas collection's listed items,
the one and only copy of her grandpere's memoir, Mes Campagnes.
In the days leading up to August 10, the hotels of Binche must have been booked out, for prospective purchasers flocked to the town. However, on the very day, it was announced in a broadside which suddenly appeared that the sale had been cancelled, and that the Count had donated his collection to the local library. The fact that there was no public library in Binche dismayed the buyers even further, but it soon dawned on the throng that they had been duped. Someone discovered that there was no Comte de Fortsas either.
 The elaborate hoax had been contrived by Renier-Hubert-Ghislain Chalon
(1802 - 1889; pictured), a retired military officer, prominent numismatist and
sometime practical joker. In his later years he was made honorary life President of
La Société Royale de Numismatique de Belge.
Biblio-Fraud
More
And more
Piltdown &
Co. (hoaxes, in the Scriptorium)
1842 The
Mines Act prohibited employment of women and children underground, Britain.
1846 The
Smithsonian Institution was chartered by the
United States Congress after $500,000 was
given for such a purpose by scientist Joseph Smithson.
1856 In
Louisiana,
USA, a hurricane
killed about 400 people.
1856 More than 140 vacationers – perhaps many
more – drowned at a ball on Last
Island, Louisiana, USA when a hurricane drove huge waves over the resort
island. Last Island (Islas Dernieres, or L'Ile Derniere), 45
miles south of Houma, was a playground for Southern aristocrats but since the
storm has been reduced to four small islands that continue to diminish in size.
Local lore says that the
privateer Vincent Gambi looted the bodies, burying his booty on Treasure Bayou
near an area known as La Chene a Gambi (Gambi's Oak). People approaching it on
a dark, stormy night hear the mournful music heard by those who were doomed on
Last Island. Or, so it is said.
The
Legend of L'Ile Dernier
1857 Gas lighting was first used
in Melbourne, Australia.
1861 American Civil War: Battle of Wilson's Creek – The war
entered Missouri
when a band of untested Confederate troops defeated Union
forces in the south-western part of the state.
1862 Death
of Shusaku Honinbo, Go player.
1873 Death
of
William Francis King (b. 1807), 'The Flying Pieman; a Sydney
eccentric known for his remarkable feats of running and walking.
1877
USA: Army troops under Colonel Gibbon attacked a sleeping Nez Perce encampment
at Big Hole, Idaho, killing more than 50 women and children.
Source: The Daily Bleed
1885 The
first Promenade Concert (The Proms) was
held at Queen's Hall, London.
1885 Horse-drawn
tram service began in Queen Street, Brisbane.
1889 The
screw-top bottle is patented by the Hope Glass Works, near Barnsley, England.
1893 At Augsburg, Rudolf
Diesel's prime model ran on its own power for the first time. Because of
this, August 10 is the International Biodiesel
Day.
1896 Otto
Lillenthal, the German aviation pioneer, died after a glider crash.
 1901
The Versailles 'adventure' of the Misses Moberly and
Jourdain
Charlotte Anne Elizabeth Moberly (1846 - 1937)
was Principal of St Hugh's College, Oxford, 1886 - 1915, and wrote under the
name Elizabeth Morison. Eleanor Frances Jourdain (d. 1924) was Principal of St
Hugh's College, Oxford, 1915 - 1924.
On this day in 1901, these two ladies visited the
gardens of the Petit Trianon
at Versailles, France. In their wanderings they saw a number of people dressed
in late-18th century dress. They were also seen by the old-fashioned people in
the Trianon, and twice the two ladies asked for and received directions within
the gardens. It is not known whether they saw a group of contemporary people
playing at dressing-up, or if in fact they shared a trance-vision of the 1770s.
Their book, An Adventure, documented
the strange sight, and recently a movie has been made of the mysterious affair.
Archives
1901 The British Admiralty ordered that only Australian wine was
henceforth to be used at its functions.
1913 Second
Balkan War ended: Delegates from Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro,
and Greece
signed the Treaty of Bucharest, ending the war.
1913 The
signing of the Treaty of Bucharest, which ended the second Balkan War and
partitioned Macedonia between Serbia, Breece, Romania and Bulgaria.
1920 World War I:
Ottoman
sultan Mehmed
VI's representatives signed the Treaty
of Sevres which divided up the Ottoman
Empire between the Allies.
1944 World War
II: American forces defeated the last Japanese troops on Guam.
1945 World
War II: Japan
agreed to the Potsdam Conference terms of unconditional
surrender, ending the war.
1948 Candid
Camera made its television
debut after being on radio
for a year as Candid Microphone.
1949 US
President Harry S Truman signed the National Security Bill, streamlining the
defence agencies of the United States government, and replacing the
National Military Establishment with
the United States Department of Defense.
1949 "Acid
bath" killer John Haigh, 39, was executed in Wandsworth Prison, England, for
killing nine people and disposing of the bodies in a drum of sulphuric acid.
1954 At Messena, New York, the ground-breaking ceremony
for the St Lawrence Seaway is held.
1961 Britain applied to join the EEC.
1964
Rolling Stone Mick
Jagger was fined 32 pounds for driving an uninsured car in Liverpool, England.
1965 Mr
Terry Pell, of Spalding, Lincolnshire, UK, while driving his vegetable truck
towards Warminster in Wiltshire, at about 4.30 am, saw a red light about fifty
metres in front of him. He woke his sleeping passengers, his wife and daughter,
both of whom saw the mysterious light, as had many others in the district.
1966
Lift-off for the first American moon satellite, Orbiter 1.
1969 A
day after murdering Sharon Tate and four others, members
Charles
Manson's cult killed Leno and Rosemary LaBianca.
1977 In Yonkers,
New York, 24-year-old postal employee David
Berkowitz ('Son of Sam') was arrested for a series
of killings in the New York City area over a year's period.
1981 The head of John Walsh's
son Adam was found in Hollywood, Florida. This event will later prompt
the United States Congress to pass the Missing Children's Act, giving the Federal Bureau of Investigation
greater authority to track the disappearance of children. It also made Walsh a
national spokesman against crime and eventually led to the establishment of America's Most Wanted.
1984
USA: Two Plowshares activists, Barb Katt and John LaForge, damaged a Trident
submarine guidance system with hammers at a Sperry plant in Minnesota. In
sentencing them later to six months' probation, the judge in the case
commented:
"Why do we condemn and hang individual killers,
while extolling the virtues of warmongers?"
Source: The Daily Bleed
1988 Japanese American Internment: US
President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, providing
$20,000 payments to Japanese-Americans who were either interned or
relocated by in the United States during World War
II.
1990 The Magellan
space probe reached Venus.
1995 USA: Oklahoma City bombing: Timothy
McVeigh and Terry Nichols were indicted for the bombing. Michael
Fortier pleaded guilty in a plea bargain agreement for his testimony.
2001
USA: The Hudson
River Way was opened to traffic.
2003
The highest temperature ever recorded in the UK,
38.5°C
(101.3°F),
occurred in Kent [1].
It was the first time the UK
has recorded a temperature over 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
2003 Yuri
Ivanovich Malenchenko became the first person to marry in space.
2003 The American television series Futurama
ended.
2005
Lee
Seung Seop dieed from exhaustion in South Korea after playing the computer
game StarCraft
continuously for 49 hours.
Tomorrow: Happy (Mayan) New Year!
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Wikipedia
and David Brown's prodigious Daily Bleed
are both excellent resources that aid my research.
I frequently make use of their generously liberal 'fair use', 'copyleft'
and 'anti-copyright' policies, with much gratitude.
© My own copyright
policy is also liberal, but as this is my livelihood, conditions apply.
Read more about today at Wilson's
Blogmanac
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reetings from Australia.
How it works
Feast day of St Lawrence (Laurence; Laurent; Laurentius;
Lawrence of Rome; Lorenzo), martyr
Family occupied the handle. Gridirons are
featured all through the building: sculptured gridirons, iron gridirons,
painted gridirons, gridirons in marble, and so on. Gridirons, too, are
over doors, in the yards, in the windows, in the galleries. Before the
palace stood a silver statue of the saint, gold gridiron in hand; however,
the valuable metals were looted by Napoleon's soldiers. The only very
precious article still there is a bar of the original gridiron, which Pope
Gregory found in the martyr's tomb at Tivoli. Or, so it is said. 
