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Festival
of the Anthesteria,
ancient Greece (End of February)
 Festival of Flowers
(Held during the full moon following the full
moon of the Lênaia,
and two moons following the full moon nearest the winter solstice.)
Today was the first day of the three-day Anthesteria, a
floral festival of ancient Greece dedicated to Dionysus,
the god of wine and ecstasy. The last year's vintage was tasted
amid the celebrations for the god who taught mankind how to make
wine. The object of the festival was to celebrate the maturing of the wine stored at the previous vintage, and the beginning of Spring.
Dionysus was
commemorated by devotees who sometimes went to the extremes of long
dance sessions to the point of exhaustion, sometimes even tearing
apart wild beasts in their frenzy. Dionysus, who equates with the
Roman Bacchus, took long journeys throughout the world to teach
mankind the winemaker's art.
Dionysus is
probably the Greek version of the Vedic god Soma, judging by
similarities of their function and legends. He was originally solely
a god of wine, later of vegetation and warm moisture, then some kind
of supreme god. At first he was depicted as a bearded man, then
later as a rather effeminate beardless youth.
The discoverer of the winemaker's art was stricken
by Hera with madness, and went on a long journey to Dodona to
consult the oracle there for a cure. On the way, he had to cross a
marsh and mounted a donkey to do so. He rewarded the beast with the
power of speech.
"On the first day, called Pithoigia
(opening of the casks), libations were offered from the newly
opened casks to the god of wine, all the household, including
servants and slaves, joining in the festivities. The rooms and the
drinking vessels in them were adorned with spring flowers, as were
also the children over three years of age.
"The second day, named Choes (feast of beakers),
was a time of merrymaking. The people dressed themselves gaily,
some in the disguise of the mythical personages in the suite of
Dionysus, and paid a round of visits to their acquaintances.
Drinking clubs met to drink off matches, the winner being he who
drained his cup most rapidly. Others poured libations on the tombs
of deceased relatives. On the part of the state this day was the
occasion of a peculiarly solemn and secret ceremony in one of the
sanctuaries of Dionysus in the Lenaeum, which for the rest of the
year was closed. The basilissa (or basilinna), wife of the archon
basileus for the time, went through a ceremony of marriage to the
wine god, in which she was assisted by fourteen Athenian matrons,
called geraerae, chosen by the basileus and sworn to secrecy.
"In ancient Greece,
Anthesteria
was the name of a festival during which the participants ritually
expelled the Keres, evil female spirits, from their houses."
Source: Wikipedia
Festivals in ancient Greece
Runic half-month of Tyr commences
This is
a time of positive regulation, sacrifice and hard work in order to
progress.
Egyptian
day (dies egypticus, dies ægypticus or dies
mala), unlucky day in Medieval Europe. ("But, notwithstanding
I will trust the Lord" was the associated saying.)
 Festival
of the Equiria, ancient
Rome
Horse races were held in honour of the god of war, Mars,
at the Campus Martius (the field of Mars). Romulus instituted this
tradition to herald the beginning of the sacral year. Purification
rites were held for the army, which must have taken a lot of energy
and time.
This
is the first Equiria (or Equirria), with a second held on March 14.
Romans walked around the city boundaries in solemn procession and
then gave sacrifice, followed by a public feast. If
the Campus Martius was overflowed by the Tiber, the races took place
on a part of the Mons Coelius, which was called from that
circumstance the
Campus
Martialis.
Four racing factions were popular in Rome – the blues, greens, whites and reds, the
colours worn by the charioteers who often became the wealthy sports superstars of their day. Portrayals of them in sculpture, mosaics and moulded glassware have survived, sometimes with their names.
There was also a festival on October
15 (idus),
in which the right hand horse of the winning pair of a race was
sacrificed to Mars. The tail was rushed to the regia
to have its blood drip on the hearth there. There was a traditional
fight over its head between the inhabitants of the Subura who
wanted it for the Turris Mamilia, and those of the Via
Sacria who wanted it for the regia.
Roman
festivals and notable days in the Book of Days
Feast
day of St Alnoth, of England, martyr
Bailiff to St Wereburge, he became an anchoret, and was killed by
robbers; his relics are kept at Stow, near
Weldon,
Northamptonshire,
England.
Feast day of St Anne Line
Feast day of St Augustus
Chapdelaine
Feast day of St Baldomerus
Feast day of St Emmanuel of
Cremona
Feast day of Blessed Gabriel of
Our Lady of Sorrows (Gabriel Possenti)
Born on March
1, 1838, Gabriel Possenti was the 11th child of 13
children of an Italian lawyer. He was a bon vivant and flamboyant
ladies' man, even somewhat vain.
Falling
ill, he swore to take up a religious life if restored to health. He
did not keep this vow on becoming well, and it took another bout of
illness for him to ask to join the Jesuits. He was tempted by the
world, but when his sister died in a cholera epidemic he fulfilled
his vow.
He was
known for his piety, prayerfulness and care for the poor. No penance
was too much for him. He died of tuberculosis. The cult of St
Gabriel is especially popular amongst Italian youth and Italian
migrants have spread the cult to areas such as the USA,
Central
America and South
America.
Feast day of St Roger
Filcock
Feast
day of St Galmier, of Lyon
A locksmith at Lyon, he gave his all to the poor. His relics worked
miracles, till the Huguenots destroyed them in the 16th
Century.
As a mark of God's special
favour, wild birds would eat from his hand. Patron of locksmiths, he
is represented in art with pincers and other tools of his trade.
Feast day of St Honorina
Feast day of St John of
Gorze
Feast day of Ss Julian,
Chronion, and Besas,
martyrs
Feast day of St Leander
of Seville (Leander, bishop of Seville)
(Lungwort, Pulmonaria officinalis, is
today's plant, dedicated to this saint.)
Called the Apostle of the Visigoths, whose efforts converted from
the heresy of Arianism the Western Goths or
Visigoths, who had ruled
Spain for centuries, Leander was born in the
6th Century to a
noble family in
Cartagena
and was brother to St
Fulgentius
of Écija, St
Florentina
and St
Isidore of
Seville.
He entered the religious life and became
Archbishop of Seville. In 583, St Leander went to
Constantinople as
an ambassador of the Catholic Church to the Emperor, and there he
bacame firm friends with St
Gregory the Great. He died in 596 and
his relics are now in a chapel in Seville Cathedral. In art, he is
sometimes represented with a flaming heart in his hand as a symbol
of his zeal for the conversion of the Visigoths.
Feast day of St Maria
Caridad Brader
Feast day of St Mark
Barkworth
Feast
day of St Thalelaeus (Thalilaeus)
A 'weeper' in Syria. A native of
Cilicia, he died c. 450 CE.
He lived as a hermit on a mountain for sixty years and wept almost
non-stop. He lived for ten years in a wooden cage that was so small
his chin rested on his knees. Perhaps this accounts for his
lachrymosity. Asked the reason for the cage, he replied, "I punish
my criminal body that God, seeing my affliction for my sins, may be
moved to forgive them and deliver me from the torments of the world
to come, or at least to mitigate their severity." He spent sixty
years as an ascetic, weeping almost without intermission.
Alban Butler
(Lives of the Saints) tells us that his hut was beside a heathen
shrine near Gibala, to which the pagans used to sacrifice to devils.
Click for Eastern Orthodox liturgical days Shop saints
Time of the Old Woman,
Morocco (Feb 25 - Mar 4)
Powamu,
Pueblo/Hopi purification ceremony, (Feb 12 - 28)
Sounkyo
Ice Festival, Sounkyo Onsen (spa),
Hokkaido,
Japan (Jan 29 - Mar 5)
Ayyám-i-Há (Intercalary
Days in the
Bahá'í
calendar), Bahá'í Faith (Feb 25 - Mar 1)
Street Urchins'
Carnival,
Denmark
Statehood Day,
St Kitts
and Nevis
St Kitts and Nevis is part of the West Indies Associated States.
Today celebrates the achievement of self-government through
agreements with Great Britain on February 27, 1967
Threepenny Day,
Eton College,
England
On the death of Provost Bost in
1504, it was found in his will that the Etonian administrator had
left a sum of money that, if wisely invested, was earmarked to
provide two pennies per year for each 'colleger' or boarding
boy. The money was to ensure they got enough to eat, for in those
days, tuppence would buy half a sheep. Provost Lupton, his
successor, added to the bequest in his own will, and the legacy
became threepence for each lad. Every February 27, the students
gather in College Hall for the Threepenny Ceremony. Each boy in turn
plucks his coin from the crown of a top hat. In exchange, each boy
must recite a prayer for Bost's soul.
Anneli Rufus, The
World Holiday Book: Celebrations for every day of the year, Harper
San Francisco, 1994
National Day, Dominican Republic
Public holiday with parades
and political meetings. Independence was secured when the Haitians
withdrew in 1844.
274 CE Constantine
I (Constantine the Great), first Christian emperor of
Rome, born
at Naissus,
(today's Niš, Serbia) in Upper Moesia. His feast day is May 21 and
that of his mother Helena, finder of the True Cross, August 18.
1691
Edward Cave
(d.
January 10,
1754),
English printer, editor and publisher. In
The Gentleman's Magazine, he created
the first general-interest 'magazine'
in the modern sense.
1807 Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow (d. 1882), American poet ('The Song of
Hiawatha')
'Daylight and Moonlight'
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In broad daylight, and at noon,
Yesterday I saw the moon
Sailing high, but faint and white,
As a schoolboy's paper kite.
In broad daylight, yesterday,
I read a poet's mystic lay;
And it seemed to me at most
As a phantom, or a ghost.
But at length the feverish day
Like a passion died away,
And the night, serene and still,
Fell on village, vale, and hill.
Then the moon, in all her pride,
Like a spirit glorified,
Filled and overflowed the night
With revelations of her light.
And the Poet's song again
Passed like music through my brain;
Night interpreted to me
All its grace and mystery.
1847
Ellen Terry, English stage actress
1848 Sir
Hubert
Parry, English
composer
1850
Henry Edwards
Huntington,
American railroad executive and philanthropist
1861 Rudolf Steiner (d. 1925)
Austrian philosopher, founder of anthroposophy
Rudolph Steiner
Archives
Steiner's
medicine: a skeptical view
1881
Sveinn Björnsson, first president of Iceland
1886 Hugo
Black (d. 1971), associate justice of the United
States Supreme Court1888 Lotte Lehmann
(d. 1976),
singer 1890 Freddie Keppard
(d. 1933),
jazz
musician 1891 David Sarnoff
(d. December
12, 1971),
American broadcasting pioneer, General Manager of Radio
Corporation of America (RCA) from its founding in 1919 to
his retirement in 1970.
On April 14, 1912, a 21-year-old telegraph operator in New York picked up the message from SS
Olympic through the static: "SS Titanic ran into iceberg. Sinking fast". He sat for hours taking down whatever information he could, communicating it to the anxiously waiting world, until he collapsed, exhausted.
The young man was David Sarnoff.
1891 Anne
Samson (d. 2004), oldest-known Canadian
2002 -
'04, and oldest nun on
record 2003 - '041892 William
Demarest (d. 1983), actor (TV series:
My Three Sons) 1897 Marian Anderson
(d. 1993),
African-American singer, banned by
Daughters of the American
Revolution (DAR). When the DAR refused to let her use
Constitution
Hall, Anderson sang before 75,000 people at the
Lincoln Memorial on
Easter Sunday, 1939. Some historians cite this as the first strategic
victory of the modern civil rights movement. The DAR later managed
to prevent Joan Baez from performing at Constitution Hall.
1899 Charles Best (d. 1978)
medical scientist, Canadian co-discoverer of insulin for the
treatment of diabetes 1902 John Steinbeck (d. 1968), American writer, winner of
the Nobel Prize in literature 1962, (The Grapes of Wrath;
East of Eden)
1903
Grethe
Weiser (d. 1970), actress1905 Franchot Tone
(d. September 18, 1968), American actor
(Bombshell;
Mutiny on the
Bounty;
Dangerous) 1907 Mildred Bailey
(d. 1951),
jazz
performer 1910
Peter de Vries, American comic novelist
1910 Joan Bennett
(d. 1990),
actress1912 Lawrence Durrell (d.
November 7, 1990),
British novelist (The Alexandria Quartet),
poet, dramatist, and travel writer
1913 Irwin
Shaw, (d. 1984) writer1917 John Connally (d. 1993),
Governor of Texas 1918 William
Jefferson Blythe III (d. 1946), father of US President Bill Clinton
1923 Dexter Gordon (d. 1990),
jazz saxophone
player
My
Sharon-uh
1928
Ariel
Sharon, former Prime
Minister of Israel. During the 1982
Lebanon War, while Ariel Sharon was
Defence
Minister, the Sabra
and Shatila massacre took place, in which between 460 and 3,500
Palestinian civilians in the refugee
camps were killed by the Phalanges
– Lebanese Maronite Christian militias. The Security Chief of the
Phalange militia, a Lebanese himself, Elie
Hobeika, was the ground commander of the militiamen who entered
the Palestinian camps and killed the Palestinians. The Phalange had
been sent into the camps to clear out PLO
fighters, and Israeli forces had been sent to the camps at Sharon's
command to provide them with logistical
support and to guard camp exits. The incident led some of Sharon's
critics to refer to him as "the Butcher of Beirut".
On September
28, 2000, his
provocative visit to the Al-Aqsa mosque,
a holy shrine of Islam, launched a new round of continuing conflict
in Israel and Palestine. From about 2004, he began to
face opposition in his Likud
party for such plans as unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza
Strip.
Other detractors have publicly distrusted Sharon's motives for
this plan, and their suspicions were further roused when top Sharon
aide Dov Weisglass was quoted in Haaretz
on October
6, 2004, as saying the purpose of disengagement was to destroy
Palestinian aspirations for a state for years to come. This incident
has bolstered the position of critics that Sharon is intentionally
trying to destroy the Peace Process, an accusation refuted by the
Prime Minister's camp. See Israel's
unilateral disengagement plan of 2004.
On
January 4,
2006, following a
massive stroke,
Sharon lapsed into a coma. On
November 6,
2006,
it was reported that Sharon had been moved out of an intensive care
unit after treatment for a heart infection. Source:
Wikpedia
Biography
at Jewish Virtual Library BBC
profile www.indictsharon.net/
1928
Alfred
Hrdlicka, sculptor and graphic artist
1930 Joanne Woodward,
London-born American actress (Oscar:
The Three Faces of Eve) 1930 Peter
Stone, writer
1932 Elizabeth
Taylor, American actress, a leading child star by the age of 12
after her performance in MGM's
National Velvet. (Cleopatra;
Oscars: BUtterfield
8;
Who's Afraid of Virginia
Woolf?)
1934 Ralph
Nader, American consumer rights campaigner and author
 Ralph Nader: hero or villain?
Ralph Nader has his fan club, eg http://www.nader.org
…
"In 1963, Ralph Nader, then an unknown twenty-nine-year old
attorney, abandoned a conventional law practice in Hartford,
Connecticut, and hitchhiked to Washington, DC, to begin a long
odyssey of professional citizenship …"
…
and his detractors:
"Saint Ralph loves to preach about democracy and 'citizen
power', but he runs his carefully concealed empire with an iron
grip. Of 19 groups associated with Nader, the most powerful and
important groups are all directly controlled by Nader or
completely under his influence and no one else's. With some
groups, Nader is the only contributor; others are controlled by
his sister, Laura Nader Milleron, or his cousin. …"
Source
Infatuation is when you think he's
as sexy as Robert Redford,
as smart as
Henry Kissinger, as noble as Ralph Nader, as funny
as Woody
Allen, and as athletic as Jimmy Conners. Love is
when you
realize that he's as sexy as Woody Allen, as smart as
Jimmy
Connors, as funny as Ralph Nader, as athletic as Henry
Kissinger
and nothing like Robert Redford – but you'll take him
anyway.
Judith Viorst
An Unreasonable Man
1935 Mirella Freni,
Italian soprano
1941 Paddy Ashdown,
British politician
1943 Morten
Lauridsen, composer
1947 Gidon Kremer,
Latvian violinist
1957 Adrian Smith,
musician (Iron Maiden)
1971 Derren Brown,
psychological illusionist
1973
Peter André,
English-born Australian pop singer
1980 Chelsea Clinton,
daughter of former U.S.
President Bill Clinton
1981 Josh
Groban, American singer
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February
24
Calendar Day
24
Obnoxious Day
24
Children's Day
25
Cuddle Day
27
Polar Bear Day
March
1 Pig
Day
1 Share
A Smile Day
1 St
David's Day
1
Peanut
Butter Lovers'
Day
2 Banana
Cream Pie Day
2 Give
Up Easily Day
3 I
Want You To Be Happy Day
3 Employee
Appreciation Day
3 National
Anthem Day
(USA)
3
Hina
Matsuri (Japan)
4
Tavern Day
5
Say Hi To Mom Day
5
Multiple Personality Day
6
Chocolate Cheesecake Day
6
Dentists' Day
7
Cereal Day
8
International Women's Day
8
No Smoking Day
9
Telephone Day
10
Money Day
11
Dream Day
11
Frankenstein's Birthday
12
Plant A Flower Day
12
Alfred Hitchcock Day
12
Department Store Day
13
Uranus Day
14
Pi Day
14
Potato Chip Day
14
Genius Day
14
White Day
15
Ides Of March
15
Buzzard Day
16
Everything You Do Is Right Day
16
St Urho's Day
16
Curlew Day
16
Hiccup Day
17
St Patrick's Day
17
St Patrick's Day Parade (New York)
17
Submarine Day
18 Paper
Dress Day
...
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1534 Münster Rebellion: The beginning of an Anabaptist 'New
Jerusalem', Germany, under the charismatic leadership of
Jan
Matthys (also spelled Matthijs, Mathijz,
Matthyssen, Mathyszoon; a follower of
Melchior Hoffman)
and Jan van Leyden (John of
Leyden/Leiden, Jan Bockelson
or Beukelszoon; 1509?
- '36). All Lutherans and
Roman Catholics were to be eliminated by driving them out or converting them, so
as to create a community bound by love and without sin. Van Leyden
legalized
polygamy,
and himself took sixteen wives, one of whom he beheaded himself in the
marketplace.
Community of goods was also established. Non-belief was made a
capital offence. It resisted besieging armies and lasted for more than a year.
New
Jerusalem
"By February 1534, influence of the newly
arrived Anabaptists permeated the town. Guild leader Bernard Knipperdolling
joined Jan van Leyden in street preaching, screaming for citizens to repent.
Waves of hysteria followed: people fell in the streets, some foaming at the
mouth. Claims of sensational 'end-time' visions gripped the populace.
"The message of Matthys's minions was clear:
while destruction descended on the rest of the world, Anabaptists would
survive behind the walls of Münster, the 'city of refuge'.
"Migration began immediately—in both
directions. Münster's Lutheran population started to flee. Control of the
city shifted into the hands of the visionary from Haarlem."
Source
1557 The first
Russian ambassador to
England arrived in
London, after having been shipwrecked
en route on the coast of Scotland. The ambassador appeared first at the royal
court on March 25.
1560 The Treaty of Berhick, which would expel the French
from Scotland, was
signed by England and the
Congregation of Scotland.
1594 Henry IV
was crowned King of France.
1617 Sweden
and Russia
signed the Treaty of
Stolbovo, ending the Ingrian War and
shutting Russia out of the Baltic Sea.
1693 The Ladies Mercury
[sic], the first
specifically women's magazine, commenced publication in Britain, for
aristocratic women. It promised to answer "all the most nice and curious
questions concerning love, marriage, behaviour, dress, and humour of the female
sex, whether virgins, wives, or widows".
Picture
of February 27, 1693 edition
1700 The island
of New Britain was
discovered.
1706 Death of John Evelyn (b. 1620), diarist.
1734 The first
polar bear arrived in London, from
Greenland.
1782 British Parliament voted to abandon the American War of
Independence.
1784 "Count St Germain is supposed by some to have
died on this day in 1784. He was seen by the composer Rameau and the young
Countess Georgy in 1710 and looked about 45. Thirty years later at Louis XV's
court, he still looked about 45. In 1789, five years after his death and
certified burial and still looking about 45, he visited his old friend Mme
d'Adhemar – to her great surprise, as she had thought his dead and buried – and
told her that he would see her five more times. The last time was before the
murder of the Duc du Berri in 1820."
Source
1793 The Giles
Resolutions were introduced to the United
States House of Representatives asking the House to condemn Alexander
Hamilton's handling of loans.
Hamilton's duel
with Burr
1801 Washington, DC
was placed under the jurisdiction of the US
Congress.
1812 Poet Lord Byron gave
his first address as a member of the House of Lords,
in defence of Luddite
violence against Industrialism
in his home county of Nottinghamshire.
1814 Beethoven's
8th Symphony premiered in
Vienna.
1827 USA: New
Orleans, Louisiana celebrated its first Mardi Gras.
1844 The Dominican
Republic gained independence from Haiti.
1861 A crowd in Warsaw
protesting Russian rule over Poland
was fired upon by Russian troops, who killed five protesters.
1863 Australia: The South Australian Parliament opened.
1864 American
Civil War: The first Northern prisoners arrived at the Confederate
prison at Andersonville,
Georgia.
1865 Australia:
'Black Monday' – a NNW wind inflicted terrible damage in
Melbourne.
1870 Completion of the Bombay-Aden submarine cable,
3,016 km (1,874 mi)
long.
1879 At the Johns Hopkins
University, Baltimore, USA, the chemists
Constantine Fahlberg and Ira Remsen announced their discovery of
saccharine.
1881 The British were defeated by the
Boers at the
Battle of Majuba
Hill
in Northern Transvaal.
1887 Death of Alexander
Borodin
(b. 1833),
Russian composer.
1897 Britain gave the
USA authority over the Western Hemisphere by agreeing to US arbitration in a
border dispute between British Guiana and
Venezuela, thus quelling a dangerous
US-British diplomatic crisis.
1900 Boer
War: In South Africa, British
military leaders received an unconditional notice of surrender from
Boer General Piet Cronje.
1900 The British
Labour Party was founded.
 1902 Harry
'Breaker'
Morant (b. 1864) was executed by firing squad in
South Africa.
Breaker Morant's last day
On this day in 1902, one of
the most famous moments in Australia's history took place on a field, not in
Australia, but thousands of kilometres away in South Africa.
Poet and rebel Harry Morant, nicknamed
'The Breaker', had been born 37 years earlier in Devonshire,
and arrived in Queensland in 1884 after a
term of service in the Royal Navy.
Following a period as a poet published in the important Australian journal, The Bulletin, The Breaker signed up to
fight with the colonial troops in the
Boer War in South Africa, after having
walked to Adelaide, South
Australia, to enlist.
The war bored this man of
action, and instead of capturing prisoners and bringing them back to camp, he
shot 12 and stood trial accused of killing intending prisoners of war. Found
guilty, his death warrant was
personally signed by the British commander in
South Africa, Lord
Kitchener. He was
executed by firing squad (sources differ as to date) with a comrade-at-arms Lt Peter
Handcock.
In 1980, Australian director
Bruce Beresford made the movie
Breaker Morant.
Footnote: On
March 13,
1884, Morant had
married Daisy May O'Dwyer, who later became famous in Australia as the
controversial anthropologist
Daisy Bates ('Kabbarli'),
who lived among tribal Indigenous people for many years.
Lawson & Co:
associations with Henry and Louisa Lawson
1907 The
Old
Bailey (Central Criminal Court) was opened on the site of
Newgate Prison,
London, England.
1915 The first American soldier died in World War One.
1922 A challenge
to the Nineteenth
Amendment to the United States Constitution, allowing women the
right to vote,
was rebuffed by the Supreme
Court of the United States.
"In Washington, D.C., the 19th Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution, providing for female suffrage, is unanimously declared
constitutional by the eight members of the U.S. Supreme Court. The 19th
Amendment, which stated that "the right of citizens of the United States to
vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State on
account of sex," was the product of over seven decades of meetings,
petitions, and protests by women suffragists and their supporters."
Source
A world chronology of women's electoral rights
1923 The foundation in New York, USA, of the
Mohegan Colony Association, based on anarchist principles.
"Mohegan Colony was established at the South end of Mohegan Lake
in 1930 as a utopian attempt to provide an egalitarian way of living and raising
one's family. Part of the Modern School movement, Mohegan Colony was a hotbed of
new thinking. The Colony established its own school, and had some 300 families.
A number of publications were issued by the Mohegan Modern School in Peekskill.
The homeowner association survives, and strives to retain some of the history
..." Source
1928
Bert Hinkler
completed a solo flight from England to his home town of
Bundaberg,
Queensland,
Australia.
This reduced the England-Australia record from 28 days to just under 15½ days.
1932 The announcement of the discovery of the neutron by
James
Chadwick.
1933 Reichstag
fire: Germany's
parliament building in Berlin, the Reichstag, burned down with Nazis
blaming a Dutch Communist, Marinus van der Lubbe, giving
Adolf Hitler the opportunity
to oppress the Communists and consolidate their power. Hitler suspended freedom
of the press in Germany on the same day. Historians are uncertain who burned the
building down, though many believe it was the Nazis themselves.
The Digital
Reichstag The Reichstag Fire and
9-11
Bush's 9/11
Reichstag Fire Operation Northwoods And The Reichstag Fire
1939 American
Civil Rights Movement: Sit-down strikes were
outlawed by the Supreme
Court of the United States.1939 Britain and France recognised General Franco's Nationalist
government in Spain.
1939 Borley Rectory, reputedly Britain's most haunted house,
burned to the ground.
1942 World War II:
The USS Langley,
the first United States aircraft
carrier, was sunk by Japanese warplanes.1948 The
Czechoslovakian
Communist Party seized power in
Prague.
1951 The Twenty-second
Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents
to two terms, was ratified.
1952
The United Nations building in New York saw its first session.
1953 A proposal to simplify English spelling cleared its second hurdle in
the British House of Commons, which voted 65 votes to 53 to approve the Simplified Spelling Bill for consideration by parliamentary committees.
The bill was seconded by Conservative MP, James Pitman, whose grandfather
Sir Isaac
Pitman devised the Pitman shorthand system.
1964 The
government of Italy asked for help
to keep the Leaning
Tower of Pisa from toppling over.1967 Dominica
gained independence from the United Kingdom. 1973 The American
Indian Movement occupied Wounded
Knee, South Dakota. 1974 Australia: Sir John Kerr, Chief Justice
of New South Wales, was appointed by Prime Minister Gough Whitlam as the
Governor-General to succeed Sir Paul Hasluck. On November 11 the following year,
Kerr sacked Whitlam in Australia's greatest constitutional crisis, known
commonly in that country as 'The
Dismissal'.
1974 USA: People
magazine
was published for the first time.
1975 In the USA, the
Food and Drug Administration recalled 1,241
already implanted heart
pacemakers because of potential malfunction.
1976 Western Sahara
declared independence.1980 Michael Jackson won his first
Grammy.
1986 The United
States Senate allowed its debates to be televised on a
trial basis.1990 Exxon
Valdez oil spill: Exxon and its shipping
company were indicted on five criminal counts. 1991 Gulf
War: USA President George HW Bush
announced that "Kuwait is
liberated". 1996 Pokémon
game debuted for Nintendo Game
Boy. 1998 Jack Micheline (born Harvey Martin
Silver; 1929 - 1998), heavy drinking howling Beat poet died while
riding on the BART train to Orinda in the East Bay Area near San Francisco.
1999 While
trying to circumnavigate the world in a hot air balloon,
Colin Prescot and Andy Elson set a new endurance record after being
in a hot air balloon for 233 hours and 55 minutes.1999 Olusegun
Obasanjo became Nigeria's first
elected president since mid-1983. 2002 Death of Spike
Milligan (b. 1918),
Irish
writer,
artist,
musician,
humanitarian and
comedian and
poet.
2002 Ryanair
Flight 296 caught fire in London
Stansted Airport. Subsequent investigations criticised Ryanair's
handling of the evacuation.
2002 2002
Gujarat violence: a train caught fire a few minutes after it
left the Godhra railway
station, killing an estimated 58 Hindu pilgrims
returning from Ayodhya and
triggering riots that led to the death of about 1,000 people, mostly
Muslims.
2003 Rowan Williams
was enthroned as the 104th
Archbishop
of Canterbury in the Anglican church.
2004 Crew members Michael Foale and Alexander
Kalery conducted the first spacewalk involving the entire crew of the International
Space Station (Soyuz 26 was the first involving the whole crew of a
vehicle).
2005 Pre-pay
price capping on the Transport
for London Oyster
card was introduced.
Tomorrow: The strange case of the Tichborne fraud
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How many dogs does it take to change a light bulb?
Golden Retriever: The sun is shining, the day is young, we've got our whole lives ahead of us, and you're inside worrying about a stupid burned out bulb?
Border Collie: Just one. And then I'll replace any wiring that's not up to code.
Dachshund: You know I can't reach that stupid lamp!
Rottweiler: Make me.
Lab: Oh, me, me!!!! Pleeeeeeze let me change the light bulb! Can I? Can I? Huh? Huh? Huh? Can I?
Malamute: Let the Border Collie do it. You can feed me while he's busy.
Jack Russell Terrier: I'll just pop it in while I'm bouncing off the walls and furniture.
Poodle: I'll just blow in the Border Collie's ear and he'll do it. By the time he finishes rewiring the house, my nails will be dry.
Cocker Spaniel: Why change it? I can still pee on the carpet in the dark.
Doberman Pinscher: While it's dark, I'm going to sleep on the couch.
Boxer: Who cares? I can still play with my squeaky toys in the dark ...
Mastiff: Mastiffs are NOT afraid of the dark.
Chihuahua: Yo quiero Taco Bulb.
Irish Wolfhound: Can somebody else do it? I've got this hangover ...
Pointer: I see it, there it is, there it is, right there ...
Greyhound: It isn't moving. Who cares?
Australian Shepherd: First, I'll put all the light bulbs in a little circle....
Old English Sheep Dog: Light bulb? That thing I just ate was a light bulb?
Hound Dog: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
Cat: Dogs do not change light bulbs. People change light bulbs, I am not one of THEM, so the question is: how long will it be before I can expect my light?
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
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reetings from Australia.
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