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Arise Evans had a fungous Nose and said, it was revealed to him, that the King's hand would cure him. At the first coming of Charles II into St James's Park he kissed the King's hand and rubbed his Nose with it: which disturbed the King, but cured him.
John Aubrey (1626 - 1697), English antiquary and writer; Miscellanies, 1695

…a crowd of wretched souls
That stay his cure: their malady convinces
The great essay of art; but at his touch,
Such sanctity hath Heaven given his hand,
They presently amend …
The 'Doctor' in Macbeth, iv, 3, on 'the King's Evil', scrofula

Ye Kynge his evill in me laye,
Wh. he of Scottlande charmed awaye.
He layde his hand on mine and sayd:
"Be gone!" Ye ill no longer stayd.
But O ye wofull plyght in wh.
I'm now y-pight: I have ye itche!
Source: Ambrose Bierce; The Devil's Dictionary; Scottish text on the King's Evil

Thus in a royal swoop unanimously perceived as sudden, unexpected, astounding and unheard of, the knights of a religious order which had come to symbolise in its white mantle and red cross the essence of medieval knighthood, which was said to possess 9,000 manors scattered throughout Europe, and which, owing to their efficiency and capillary structure, facilitated payments and tax collection, managed the royal treasuries of England and France, found themselves quite literally thrown from a position of wealth and power into stinking dungeons.
Edward Burman, on the raid on the French Templars in 1307; Supremely Abominable Crimes, 1994

Every day people are straying away from the church and going back to God. Really.
Lenny Bruce, American comedian, born on October 13, 1925

Communism is like one big phone company.
Lenny Bruce, American comedian, born on October 13, 1925

If Jesus had been killed twenty years ago, Catholic school children would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses.
Lenny Bruce

I won't say ours was a tough school, but we had our own coroner. We used to write essays like: What I'm going to be if I grow up.
Lenny Bruce

I hate small towns because once you've seen the cannon in the park there's nothing else to do.
Lenny Bruce

The "what should be" never did exist, but people keep trying to live up to it. There is no "what should be," there is only what is.
Lenny Bruce

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Feast day of the Translation of St

(Smooth helenium, Helenium autumnale, is today's plant, dedicated to this saint.)

Born at Islip, England, (c. 1004 - January 5, 1066), crowned at Winchester Cathedral on April 3, 1043, died at Westminster, 1066; canonised 1161.

Edward, the penultimate Saxon king of England (1042 - 1066), was the son of Ethelred II, king of the English, and Emma, sister of Duke Richard II of Normandy, and he lived in that country from about his tenth year till he was recalled to England in 1041. In the following year he succeeded to the throne, and on January 23, 1045 married Edith, daughter of the ambitious and powerful Earl Godwin. It was a spiritual marriage, with Edward refusing to consummate it for religious reasons.

Edward's reign was outwardly peaceful and he was a peace-loving man; however, he had to contend with Godwin's opposition and other grave difficulties, and he did so with a determination that hardly supports the common picture of him as a tame and ineffectual ruler. His anonymous contemporary biographer gives a convincing portrait of him in his old age that has obscured the evidence concerning his middle life. After his death, movingly described by the biographer, a religious cultus of the king was slow in developing until after his actual canonization.

The belief that Edward was a saint was supported by his general reputation for religious devotion and for generosity to the poor and infirm, by the relation of a number of miracles (he was the first sovereign reported to 'touch for the King's Evil'*, scrofula), and, too, by the assertion that he and his wife were so ascetic as always to have lived together as brother and sister.

St Edward was buried in the church of the abbey of Westminster, a small existing monastery which he had refounded and endowed with princely munificence; with one uncertain and obscure exception, he is the only English saint whose bodily remains still rest in their medieval shrine, which was set up in its present position behind the high altar in 1268.

He is called 'the Confessor', that is, one who bears witness to Christ by his life, to distinguish him from King Edward who followed. His emblem is a finger ring. When St Edward was dedicating a church to St John the Evangelist, a pilgrim came and asked alms in the saint's name, and St Edward gave him a ring from his finger. The pilgrim was none other than St John the Baptist. He revealed himself to two English pilgrims in the Holy Land, bidding them to take the ring to the king in his name, and ask him to prepare to leave this world. After this they fell asleep and awoke in Barham Downs, Kent, England. They took the ring to St Edward, on Christmas Day.

On the vigil (eve; January 5) of Epiphany Edward the Confessor died and was buried in Westminster Abbey, wearing the ring of John the Baptist.

Pictured above left: The sick pray for cures at the tomb of Edward the Confessor

*The King's Evil

On January 9, 1683, Britain's King Charles II issued orders for the future regulations of the ceremony of touching the King's Evil.

This was the name used then for scrofula (a tubercular infection of the throat lymph glands), a disease which from the time of King Clovis of France in 481 CE was believed to be curable by a touch of the monarch's hand. Shakespeare mentioned it in Macbeth. The famous English diarist, Samuel Pepys (1633 - 1703), recorded in his diary for April 10, 1661 that he saw the cure effected by the king.

The patient was required to bring a certificate declaring that he/she had a genuine affliction and that they had not received the king's blessing before. A small medallion was given to the patient, and, in the 16th century, an angel coin – known as a touch piece – was given to those who received the King's touch.

In Cornwall, it was believed that the seventh son of a seventh son was able to touch-cure the disease. The seventh son of a seventh son was widely believed in the British Isles to have all kinds of powers.

Pictured above right: Henry IV of France cures the King's Evil; André de Laurens, 1609

The Marcou

In old France it was believed that if a seventh son was born into a family, and he had no sisters, he was called a marcou, and a fleur-de-lis was branded on him. If anyone with the King's Evil (scrofula) touched the tattoo, it was supposed that they would be healed. One particular marcou, a cooper (barrel-maker) named Foulon, set up a business in Orleans, and on Good Fridays the cure was supposed to be most efficacious. Hundreds of gullible people would gather, but eventually the police stopped the practice.

Feast day of St Colman of Stockerau (Colman of Melk; Coloman of Stockerau; Coloman of Melk; Colomannus)

Misidentified by the Viennese authorities as a Moravian spy, the British-born Colman was tortured and hanged at Stockerau, Austria, with two thieves in October, 1012. Colman's body dangled for 18 months, incorrupt, and was left untouched by animals. Miracles have occurred at his grave, and years after death his body was still not rotted.

The Incorruptibles. an examination of extraordinary claims, by Brian Dunning from Skeptoid.com

Feast day of St Agnellus

Feast day of St Comgan, Abbot of Lochalsh
He was a brother of St Kentigern. At least one source says his feast day is May 12.

"Roman Catholic Saint. He was an 8^th century Abbot who was originally from Ireland. He fled with his family to Scotland and founded a monastery. Though from a noble family he lived a life of simplicity and holiness near Skye."   Source

Feast day of St Daniel

Feast day of St Gebrand

Feast day of St Gerald, Count of Aurillac, confessor

More

Feast day of St Hugolinus

Feast day of St Leo

Feast day of St Magdalen Panattieri

Feast day of St Nicholas

Feast day of St Samuel

Feast day of Seven Friar Minors, martyrs

Cheng Yeung, festival of ancestors, Macau

Ram Mating Ceremony, Anatolia, Turkey (Oct 1 - 20)

Runic half-month of Wyn commences
Wyn represents joy, the rune being the shape of a weather vane. The month represents the creation of harmony within the present conditions.

Second Wednesday in October, the Tavistock Goosey Fair

An important English Michaelmas fair was the Tavistock Goosey Fair held at Tavistock on Dartmoor, where the song was sung:

Te jist a month cum Vriday nex'
Bill Champernown an' me
Us druv a-crost ole Dartymoor
Th' Goozey Vair to zee.

A note about the dating of items in Wilson's Almanac

John Peel Day, UK
A day celebrating the life and influence of the late British DJ John Peel (1939 - 2004). In August of 2005, the BBC announced that it was declaring October 13 'Peel Day'. "Peel Day is about celebrating John's legacy and his unrivalled passion for music," said Andy Parfitt, head of BBC Radio One. It would involve several gigs across Great Britain. The BBC said that it hoped that it would become an annual event.

On which day of the week were you born? Find out here

1162 Leonora of England (d. 1214), wife of Alfonso VIII of Castile

1381 Thomas FitzAlan, 12^th Earl of Arundel (d. 1415), English politician

1453 Edward of Westminster (d. 1471), Prince of Wales

1474 Mariotto Albertinelli (d. 1515), Italian painter

1566 Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork (d. 1643), Irish politician

1696 John Hervey, Lord Hervey (d. 1743), English statesman and writer

1713 Allan Ramsay (d. 1784), Scottish painter

1714 Pieter Burmann the Younger (d. 1778), Dutch philologist

1821 Rudolf Virchow (d. 1902), German doctor, pathologist, biologist, and politician

1853 Lillie Langtry (d. February 12, 1929), British actress, born on the island of Jersey, hence her nickname, 'The Jersey Lily'.

Daughter of the Anglican Dean of Jersey, Langtry's lovers included Prince Louis of Battenberg; Queen Victoria's son Albert Edward (the future king Edward VII), and British Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel. Among her friends were the Irish writer Oscar Wilde and the American artist James McNeill Whistler.

1909 Art Tatum (d. 1956), jazz pianist

1909 Herbert Block ('Herblock'; d. 2001), editorial cartoonist

1911 Ashok Kumar (d. 2001), actor, India

1915 Cornel Wilde (d. 1989), actor

1917 Burr Tillstrom, puppeteer

1918 Robert Walker (d. 1951), actor

1921 Yves Montand (d. 1991), Italian-born French actor and singer (films The Wages of Fear; Let's Make Love)

1925 Lenny Bruce (d. 1966), caustic American comedian, banned from Australia after one performance in Sydney

1925 Baroness Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1979 - 1990)

1934 Nana Mouskouri, Greek singer

1936 Robert Ingpen, Australian author and painter, recipient of the Hans Christian Andersen Award for children's book illustration (1986)

1938 Hugo Young (d. 2003), journalist

1940 Pharoah Sanders, jazz saxophonist

1941 Paul Simon, musician, half of Simon and Garfunkel ('Bridge Over Troubled Water'; 'Mrs. Robinson')

1946 Edwina Currie, former British politician

"Israel is believed to possess the largest and most sophisticated arsenal outside of the five declared nuclear powers. Israel has never admitted possessing nuclear weapons, but abundant information is available showing that the capability exists."
Israel's Nuclear Weapons Program

How Vanunu revealed Israel's nuclear weapons secret    Charges Served Against Vanunu

Search for Vanunu articles    Interview (during Vununu's house arrest in 2007)

Israel 'may have 200 nuclear weapons'    The US Campaign to Free Mordechai Vanunu

 

1947 Sammy Hagar, singer

1959 Marie Osmond, American singer, actress, TV celebrity

1971 Sacha Baron Cohen, comic

1980 Ashanti, pop music artist, USA

 

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October

12 Columbus Day (USA)
13 Dessert Day
13 Train Your Brain Day
14 Honey Bee Day
14 World Egg Day
15 Sweetest Day
15 Grouch Day
15 Sewing Lovers Day
15 Mother's Day (Paraguay)
16 Bosses' Day
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16 Oatmeal Day
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17 Gaudy Day
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18 Watch A Squirrel Day
18 Alaska Day
18 Boost Your Brain Day
18 Long Distance Day
18 St Luke's Feast Day
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54 Roman Empire: The death of Roman Emperor Claudius I (b. 10 BCE). His death allegedly came after eating poisoned mushrooms set before him by his fourth wife, his niece Agrippina the Younger. Agrippina's son Nero became emperor this day upon his adoptive father, Claudius's, death.

"We see no reason to believe that Claudius was murdered. All the features are consistent with sudden death from cerebrovascular disease, which was common in Roman times. Towards the end of 52 AD, at the age of 62, Claudius had a serious illness and spoke of approaching death."
The death of Claudius

List of unusual deaths

1263 The remains of Edward the Confessor were removed ('translated') from their resting place to Westminster Abbey.

1282 Nichiren, founder of the Nichiren School of Buddhism, died. His ashes were interred at Taiseki-ji.

 

1307 On a Friday the thirteenth, Philip IV of France (Philip the Fair, pictured; 1268 - 1314) ordered the arrest of all 2,000 Knights Templar in France. He owed them a large sum of money, and also was no doubt troubled by the rise of the Templars as a great European banking house.

Philip confiscated their property and accused them of heresy, witchcraft, being in league with the devil, homosexual acts, the worship of heads and/or a mystery known as Baphomet. Many were burnt and tortured, and many confessed. [See also March 18, 1314, death of Templar Grand Master Jacques de Molay.] The Hospitallers of St John of Jerusalem and of Rhodes and of Malta, seeing the fate of the Templars, were also convinced to give up banking at this time.

Some believe this act to be the origin of triskaidekaphobia – the superstition regarding Friday the 13^th. It is probably one of many.  

The dawn raids were described by the monk Guillaume de Nangis of the abbey of St Denis near Paris:

On the Friday after the feast of the Blessed Dionysius [St Denis, f.d. October 9], the third day before the ides of October, all the Templars who were to be found within the kingdom of France, towards the same hour, that is when the sun began to shine or thereabouts, according to the royal decree and order were taken suddenly and sent to the various prisons.

The arrest order, the Mandate of Maubuisson, signed at the abbey of Sainte-Marie-de-Maubuisson, near Pontoise (about 30 km from Paris), by Philip's legal counsellor, Guillaume de Nogaret, said, inter alia:

We have decreed that all members of the said Order within our realm will be arrested, without any exception, imprisoned and reserved for the judgements of the Church, and that all their moveable and unmoveable property will be seized, placed in our hands and faithfully preserved.

Although the order stated that Philip had discussed the matter with the Pope and that he was acting "at the request of" the Inquisition, neither assertion was true.

From Wikipedia: According to some scholars, and recently recovered Vatican documents, these acts were intended to simulate the kind of humiliation and torture that a Crusader might be subjected to by the Saracens if captured. According to this line of reasoning, they were taught how to commit apostasy "with the mind only and not with the heart". As for the accusations of head-worship and trying to syncretize Christianity with 'Mohammedanism', some scholars argue that the former referred to rituals involving the alleged relics of Saint Euphemia, one of Saint Ursula's eleven maidens, Hughes de Payens and John the Baptist rather than pagan idols while the latter is ascribed to the chaplains creating the term 'Baphomet' (pictured at right)  through the Atbash cipher to mystify the term 'Sophia' (Greek for 'wisdom'), which was equated to the concept of 'Logos' (Greek for 'Word'). This is a highly controversial interpretation, and is largely based on conjecture.

Conspiracy theories related to the suppression of the Knights Templar often go far beyond the suggested motive of simply seizing property and consolidating geopolitical power. It is the Catholic Church's position that the persecution was unjust, that there was nothing wrong with the Templars, and that the Pope at the time was manipulated into suppressing them. In 2001, Dr Barbara Frale found the Chinon Parchment in the Secret Vatican Archives, a document that shows that Pope Clement V secretly pardoned the Knights Templar in 1314.

Lately, fringe researchers and aficionados of esotericism have claimed that the order stored secret knowledge, linking them to the Rosicrucians, the Hashshashin, the Priory of Sion, the Rex Deus, the Cathars, the Hermetics, the Gnostics, the Essenes, and ultimately lost teachings or relics of Jesus, Solomon and Moses. The Order of the Solar Temple is an example of a neo-Templar group that claimed to be a recipient of this esoterica.

However the order was always surrounded by legends concerning secrets and mysteries handed down to the select from ancient times. Perhaps most well known are the those concerning the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant and secrets of building.

Some sources say the Holy Grail was found by the order and taken to Scotland during the scourging of the order in 1307 and that it remains buried beneath Rosslyn Chapel. These stories were first invented by 18^th and 19^th century romanticists and then by 20^th century novelists.

The Knights Templar were co-founded by St Bernard of Clairvaux. Philip the Fair died in a hunting accident on November 29, 1314.

Baphomet

During the suppression of the Templars it was claimed by the Inquisition that the knights used a Baphomet (pictured above right) as part of their initiation ceremonies, and that this (among other things) sealed their heresy as an Order ... Baphomet, as Lévi's illustration suggests, has occasionally been misunderstood as a synonym of Satan or a demon, a member of the hierarchy of Hell ... More

Catholic Encyclopedia article on Templars

 

1399 The coronation of Henry IV of England.

1649 Soon after some of Oliver Cromwell's commissioners took up residence in the King's apartments at Woodstock Palace and warmed themselves by burning the locally revered King's Oak, the building was violently beset by poltergeist activity, including the oak logs being hurled from the fire. The commissioners soon fled the apartments.

1766 A mob of over a thousand rose in Great Colton, Warwickshire, England, against bread price rises. They split into flying squads 300 strong and traversed the country, enforcing prices and fighting the soldiery in Kidderminster, Birmingham, Alcester and Stratford.

1775 The United States Continental Congress ordered the establishment of the Continental Navy (later renamed the United States Navy).

1781 Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, granted a patent of religious tolerance in the Austrian Empire, and freedom of the press.

1792 In Washington, DC, the cornerstone of the United States Executive Mansion (first called 'the President's Palace', known since 1818 as the White House) was laid.

1812 War of 1812: Battle of Queenston Heights – On the Niagara frontier in Ontario, Canada, United States forces under General Stephen Van Rensselaerof were repulsed, by British and native troops led by Sir Isaac Brock, from invading Canada. General Brock was killed.

1815 Joachim Murat was shot after an abortive attempt to regain Naples.

1823 Australia: Francis Forbes was appointed the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.

1843 In New York City, Henry Jones and 11 others founded B'nai B'rith (Sons of the Covenant, a fraternal order for Jews in the USA; the oldest Jewish service organization in the world).

1845 A majority of voters in the Republic of Texas approved a proposed constitution, that if accepted by the United States Congress, would make Texas a US state.

1848 Nasir Ud-Din became Shah of Persia.

1854 Riots occurred at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, during the gold rush.

1880 Transvaal declared itself independent of Britain.

1881 Charles Parnell was imprisoned for inciting Irish to intimidate tenants taking advantage of the Land Act.

1884 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT; Zulu Time) was introduced as the time standard of Britain, whence it became the base measure of universal time. Greenwich, near London, was adopted as the universal meridian of longitude (0 degrees).

1884 The Mahdi took Omdurman.

1886 Great Quebec Fire.

1902 President Theodore Roosevelt ended a US coal strike by threatening to work mines with federal troops, and the owners agreed to the appointment of a commission to investigate miners' claims.

1904 Sigmund Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams was published.

1909 Francisco Ferrer Guardia, Spanish free-thinker and leader of militant anti-clericals in Spain, was executed.

1915 Théophile Delcassé, French Foreign Minister, resigned.

1917 Miracle of the Sun: As predicted by three children at Cova da Iria, Fatima, Portugal on May 13 the same year, the Virgin Mary appeared before 100,000 witnesses, and the sun danced.

Last of 'Fatima vision' trio dies    Last Fatima Virgin witness dies

Three Secrets of Fatima    More    Lourdes apparitions of Mary

1918 Mehmed Talaat Pasha and the 'Young Turk' (CUP) ministry resigned and signed an armistice, ending Ottoman participation in World War I.

1919 New York dock strike.

1923 Ankara (formerly Angora) became the new capital of Turkey.

1930 Dressed in full uniform, Adolf Hitler's 107 Nazi deputies took their new seats in the German Reichstag.

1933 Australia's first traffic lights were switched on in Sydney, Australia.

1936 Australia: Aviatrix Jean Batten touched down at Sydney's Mascot Airport en route to New Zealand. She became first woman to fly from Britain to NZ.

1937 Germany guaranteed the inviolability of Belgium.

1938 Adolf Hitler had the Spear of Destiny (see March 15) loaded onto an armoured train and sent to Nuremberg. Source

1939 Hitler unsuccessfully tried to persuade US president Roosevelt to negotiate a peace between Germany, France and Britain.

1940 Heavy air raids began on London.

1940 Princess (later Queen) Elizabeth broadcast to the children of Britain and the Empire a message of hope in the dark days of the war.

1941 Britain's RAF bombed Nuremberg.

1943 World War II: The new government of Italy sided with the Allies and declared war on Germany.

1943 US: Poet Robert Lowell, Jr (1917 - 1977), a conscientious objector (CO), was sentenced to a prison term of a year and a day for draft evasion.

Shocked and dismayed by the Allied firebombing of civilians in German cities like Dresden, he declared himself at this time a conscientious objector. He served for several months in jail (his experiences form the basis of Memories of West Street and Lepke).

Source: The Daily Bleed    US British Massacre at Dresden

1944 At midnight on Friday the 13^th, a ceremony was held in Great Leighs, Essex, UK, to replace a 2-ton stone in the ground that had been dislodged some days earlier by a bulldozer. The stone was traditionally believed to pin down the evil spirit of 'the witch of Scrapfaggot Green', a witch who had been buried with a stake through her heart in the 17^th Century. The local village had been beset by extreme poltergeist activity since the stone's dislodgement.

1946 France adopted the constitution of the Fourth Republic, with many abstentions.

1952 Egyptian agreement with Sudan over waters of the Nile.

1953 John Kotalawala formed a ministry in Ceylon on the retirement of D Bandaranaike.

1955 Some sources give this as the date of the first reading of Allen Ginsberg's poem, Howl. See October 7.

1956 The UN Security Council adopted the Anglo-French resolution on Suez, but it was vetoed by USSR.

1962 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? opened on Broadway.

1965 President Joseph Kasa Vubu dismissed Moise Tshombe, Congolese premier.

 

1969 Unbeknown at the time to USA citizens, under Richard Nixon their country embarked on a nuclear-armed military operation codenamed Operation Giant Lance. Nixon ordered a worldwide nuclear alert – one of the largest secret military operations in US history, and not discovered until 1983. Giant Lance was an airborne alert to bluff the leaders of the USSR into thinking the United States was getting ready for a nuclear attack. The operation was kept secret not only from the people's Congress, but even from some of the senior military officers charged with implementing it.

"I want the North Vietnamese to believe," Nixon said to White House Chief of Staff, HR 'Bob' Haldeman, in a tape released in later years, "that I've reached the point that I might do anything to stop the war. We'll just slip the word to them that for God's sake, you know Nixon is obsessed about communism. We can't restrain him when he's angry, and he has his hand on the nuclear button, and Ho Chi Minh himself will be in Paris in two days begging for peace."

"I call it the madman theory, Bob," Nixon said.

"Only Nixon, his special adviser for national security affairs Henry Kissinger, Kissinger's National Security Council aide Col. Alexander Haig, and White House chief of staff H. R. 'Bob' Haldeman, knew that the underlying purpose of the alert, known as the 'Joint Chiefs of Staff Readiness Test,' was to convince the Soviets that helping to end the war in Vietnam was in their best interests.

"The alert began on October 13, 1969, when U.S. tactical and strategic air forces in the United States, Europe, and East Asia began a stand-down of training flights to raise operational readiness; Strategic Air Command (SAC) increased the numbers of bombers and tankers on ground alert; and the readiness posture of selected overseas units was heightened. On October 25, SAC took the additional step of increasing the readiness of nuclear bombers, and two days later SAC B-52s undertook a nuclear-armed 'Show of Force' alert over Alaska, code-named 'Giant Lance.' Three days later, U.S. intelligence detected Soviet awareness of the heightened nuclear alert and Defense Secretary Melvin Laird ordered commanders to terminate the test at the end of the month.

"The alert, along with Nixon's orders to launch it, remained secret from much of the government as well as the public until 1983, when journalist Seymour Hersh reported on one of its phases and speculated about the reason behind it. Hersh suggested that it was a manifestation of Nixon's strategy in Vietnam, related in some way to 'Duck Hook'-- a massive mining and bombing operation Nixon had threatened to unleash against North Vietnam if Hanoi did not yield to Washington's terms at the Paris peace negotiations. 

"Hersh's report was an investigative coup, but his version of events was brief, fragmentary, and partially incorrect. Inexplicably, it was little noted, even at the time. 

"The declassification of documents in the 1990s, however, confirmed that the readiness test had in fact occurred ...

"Despite the scale and scope of the readiness test, Nixon, Kissinger, and Haig made only indirect and cryptic references to it in their memoirs. Perhaps they thought it was too sensitive or wondered whether their hastily improvised effort would withstand public scrutiny. Perhaps Nixon and Kissinger did not care to revisit the desperate and wishful thinking that encouraged them to think that the pressure of nuclear alerts would induce Moscow to give greater assistance on the Vietnam problem."   Source: The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

Nixon's madman strategy    More

 

1970 First meeting of the Gay Liberation Front, UK.

1970 Angela Davis, 26, a former faculty member at the University of California, Los Angeles, black militant, and self-proclaimed Communist, was arrested in New York City in connection with a shootout in a San Raphael, California, courtroom six days before.

1972 Andes Flight Disaster (1972): A Fairchild passenger plane transporting a rugby team crashed in the Andes. They were found alive December 20 but they had to resort to cannibalism to survive, as chronicled in the 1993 film Alive: The Miracle of the Andes.

1976 The first electron micrograph of an Ebola viral particle was obtained by Dr FA Murphy, now at UC Davis, who was then working at the CDC.

1977 Four Palestinians hijacked a Lufthansa Airlines flight to Somalia and demanded the release of 11 members of the Red Army Faction.

1981 A Royal Commission investigation into Australia's export meat substitution scandal began.

1982 Anthony "Scott" Weiland ran the Detroit marathon in 4 hours and 54 minutes - backwards.

1987 The first military use of trained dolphins (US Navy in the Persian Gulf).

1988 British newspapers gained the right under law to publish excerpts from Spycatcher, by Peter Wright.

1988 After tests in Oxford, Zurich and Arizona, the Shroud of Turin was declared by Professor Edward Hall of Oxford to be most likely a relic from the 13^th or 14^th centuries.

Anastasio Cardinal Ballestrero, archbishop of Turin, announced that the Shroud, revered by many as the cloth covering the body of Jesus after the crucifixion, dates only from the 13th century. It had first come to the attention of the Roman Catholic Church in the mid-14^th century. Determination was made by radiocarbon dating. Ballestrero said the church never claimed the shroud was a holy relic, but because of the image on the cloth, it would continue to be regarded with veneration.  

Source: The Daily Bleed

1990 Syria invaded Lebanon, killing more than 500.

1990 A perfect palindrome appeared on the California Lottery in the form of the numbers 1-5-7-15-17-51.

1997 Syria invaded Lebanon again.

1999 The United States Senate rejected ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

1999 "Colin Vincent, a 57 year-old handy man, beheaded himself on October 13, 1999, two months to the day after the death of his beloved wife, Joan. He had constructed a guillotine with a drop of 10 ft. in the stairwell of an outside cellar door at his home in Hallifax, West Yorkshire. When the police arrived, there was a level nearby to make sure that the blade was set true, and wouldn't jar. His head had been cleanly decapitated through the lower part of the neck. He still had a pair of pliers in his left hand that he used to cut the retaining wire, and release the heavy blade, which required three men to move. The guillotine was apparently very well constructed, and there was evidence that test drops had been made. (The Telegraph, The Yorkshire Post, Dec 3, 1999)"  Source

2001 Afghanistan: The USA tried to bomb the Kabul, airport, and missed. Residents in the nearby neighborhood would possibly have expressed their displeasure, were they not already dead.

2003 The Public Library of Science commenced publication of an open-access scientific journal, PLoS Biology.

 

 

Tomorrow: Ida Pfeiffer, 19th-Century world traveller

 

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Wikipedia and David Brown's prodigious Daily Bleed are both excellent resources that aid my research.
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© My own copyright policy is also liberal, but as this is my livelihood, conditions apply.

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