QUIZ: What is The Natchez Trace?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: Who was Ajax? (hint: not a kitchen cleanser)
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History for 8/14/2023
Birthdays: Gary Larson, Erwin "Magic" Johnson, Lina Wertmuller, David Crosby, Alice Ghostly, Buddy Greco, Nehemiah Persoff, The 20's Parisian nightclub singer Bricktop, Dick Lundy, Mark "The Bird" Fidrych, C.S. Watson, James Horner, Rene Goscinny, Wim Wenders, Emmanuele Beart, Halle Berry is 57, Mila Kunis is 40, Steve Martin is 78

1248 - Construction of the DOM Cologne Cathedral begun. It was finished 600 years later in 1848. Hey, these things take time.

1281-A Pacific typhoon, called by the Japanese the Kamikaze, or The Divine Wind destroyed the Mongol invasion fleet of Kublai Khan as it approached the shores of Japan. To show the Japanese that they meant business, the Mongole crucified the captured civilians to the topmasts of their ships.

1385- Battle of Aljubarrota- Portuguese King John the Great defeated a Spanish army trying to put a relative on his throne. Portugal celebrates this as their Independence Day. Among Johns’ army were English archers freelancing after a lull in their Hundred Years War.

1457- The first printed Gutenburg Bible finished. One agent of Gutenberg’s bringing the first shipment of bibles to Paris was arrested for witchcraft by the locals. They thought it was humanly impossible for one person to make so many identical books without the aid of black magic.

1498 - Columbus explored the mouth of the Orinoco River in Venezuela.

1585 - Queen Elizabeth I of England politely turned down an offer of the Dutch to be Queen of Holland. She was trying to avoid angering Spain any further. Spain had a long festering feud with the Dutch. Shopping around for monarchs was not so unusual in those days. In 1700 England would go shopping for a Protestant king until they found the German George I. In 1827 the throne of Greece was offered to both a German Hohenzollern and a Russian Romanov.

1744- LOUIS LE BIEN AIMEE- Pleasure loving French King Louis XV had become gravely ill and was near death. His father confessor the Bishop of Soisson refused to give him the sacraments unless he banished his mistresses and reformed his sinful life. He did so and Louis health improved. He was so good the peasants began calling him Louis le Bien Aimee’- the Well Beloved. But boys will be boys. King Louis soon grew bored with being a faithful, sober husband. So he called back his mistresses and banished the Bishop instead. Louis XV lived happy, if disreputably, to a very old age.

1761-Battle of Liegnitz-Frederick the Great beat the Austrian army trying to surround him. Communications were so faulty 30,000 Russian soldiers stood around doing nothing while they could hear the distant cannon of their Austrian allies being defeated.

1781- At their camp in Wethersfield Conn, George Washington and the Comte du Rochambeau had been debating whether to use their combined forces against occupied New York City or Lord Cornwallis in Virginia. Today Washington received a letter from the Admiral DeGrasse that he was bringing his large French fleet with supplies and troops to meet them at the Chesapeake Bay. Washington knew this could be their last campaign, since his French allies wouldn’t send any more help in 1782, and everyone was starting to listen to a rumor that the Czarina Catherine of Russia was offering to broker an international peace conference in Vienna. Washington was sure that at this peace conference among the crowned heads of Europe, American Independence would probably be negotiated away. He resolved to accept the French plan to attack Cornwallis at Yorktown Virginia.

1784- On Kodiak Island, Grigori Shelekov founded Three Saints Bay, the first Russian colony in the Americas. The Russians would continue to expand their trading posts and settlements until Russian America extended from Alaska to just north of San Francisco California.

1820 - 1st US eye hospital, the NY Eye Infirmary, opens in NYC.

1873 - "Field & Stream" magazine began publishing.

1893 - France issues 1st driving license, included a required driving test.

1900 – The 1st electric tram began in the Netherlands -Leidseplein-Brouwersgracht.

1900 -The end of the 55 DAYS IN PEKING. A multinational military force relieved the diplomats besieged by the rebellious Boxers in the Chinese capitol. The Dowager Empress Zhou Zhsi fled into the countryside. British, American, German, Russian, French, Italian and Japanese troops fought side by side, and looted and destroyed the beautiful Imperial Summer Palace.
Just in case you thought tasteless cheap “fake-news” journalism is a modern problem- At this time back in Europe no one knew the Peking diplomats fate. The press had picked up on a report from a Shanghai correspondent for the London Daily Mail that reported them all massacred, with lots of lurid "eyewitness "details of their gang rape and torture. Queen Victoria had been fooled to the point of ordering a memorial service at St. Paul's Cathedral before reconsidering until more substantive proof came in.

1908- The first international beauty pageant held in Kent, England.

1920- THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA -An obscure action to western historians, but it poses an interesting "what if..." The Poles and Bolshevik Russians were having a war after the Red Revolution. The Reds had thrown the Poles back from Moscow and on this day they were beaten back by Marshal Pilsudski from the gates of Warsaw. The "What if" is the fact that Lenin and Trotsky never intended the Communist Revolution to be confined to Russia alone. The Red Army would missionary it across Europe the way Napoleon's battalions had spread in their wake social reforms of the French Revolution. Russian Marshal Tuckhashevsky told his men: " The Road to a World Conflagration lies over the Corpse of Poland !"

With post-Great War Berlin, Vienna, Rome and Budapest in political chaos, if the Poles hadn't stopped the Bolsheviks when they did, instead of a Nazi Europe the 1920's we could have seen a Europe where the Communist Russia extended to the borders of France and Holland. Analysts at the time said this battle was as important as Marathon or Waterloo.

1928 - Ben Hecht & Charles McArthur's play" The Front Page," premiered in NYC. They later went on to become top comedy writers in Hollywood after Sound pictures created a need for snappy dialogue. They came out to Hollywood after a mutual friend, writer Herman Mankiewicz sent Ben a telegram, “Hecht, some quick! Fortunes to be made and your competition are idiots!"

1935- President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into law the National Social Security Act. Considered the most successful US Federal social program ever.
1936- Rainey Bethea was the last person ever hanged in the USA, after having confessed to the rape and murder of a 70-year old woman named Lischia Edwards.
1937 "Bloody Saturday" in Shanghai. With the opening of the Sino-Japanese War, the Chinese hoped for foreign help by making a stand at Shanghai, within full view of the International Settlement. On August 14, some American trained Chinese bombers attacked the Japanese warship Izumo, anchored in the river in the heart of the city. They misjudged--some said their bomb sights hadn't been adjusted-- and they dropped two bombs on Nanking Road, the "5th Avenue" of Shanghai.
One bomb went through the roof of the Palace hotel, the other detonated on the street: 729 people killed, 861 wounded. The same day, another tragic mistake--once again, Chinese bombers miscalculated, with worse results.( the area was crowded with refugees) 1,011 dead and 570 wounded.—the bodies were packed so tightly, blood flowed in the gutters like water.

1939 - 1st night game at Comiskey Park -White Sox 5, Browns 2.

1939- Donald Duck Day at the NY World’s Fair.

1941- Nazi spy & saboteur Josef Jakobs was the last prisoner ever to be executed in the Tower of London. No, he wasn’t beheaded, he was shot by firing squad. He had suffered a broken ankle during his capture, so he faced his end seated in a Windsor chair.

1942 – General George Marshall named Dwight D Eisenhower as US commander for invasion of North Africa. Marshall wanted at first to run the show himself, but President Roosevelt said he was too valuable and had to stay in Washington in overall charge. Eisenhower was a controversial choice. A career staff desk jockey, he had no experience leading men in combat. This was especially galling to British Field Marshall Montgomery, who had been in the field battling Nazis for 3 years now. But George Marshal foresaw the job of European Allied commander would be a more administrative and even diplomatic, juggling act between the Yanks, British and Free French, so Eisenhower was his man.

1945-VJ DAY (Aug 15th in Japan) -President Truman announced the surrender sparking wild celebrations in allied cities like New York and London. In Japan citizens were politely asked to stand at attention by their radios as Emperor Hirohito explained to his people about the surrender. It is the first time they had ever heard his voice. At 3 am that morning 1,000 Japanese troops attacked the palace trying to prevent the disgrace of the surrender announcement. They were fought off by the Imperial guard and the guard commander was killed. The speech was pre-recorded and went on anyway.
Defense minister Anami committed Hara-Kiri while his radio played the address. Gangs of angry kamikaze pilots wandered the streets looking for trouble. Their commanders had emptied the gas tanks of their planes to obey the Imperial edict.

1956- The Marilyn Monroe movie "Bus Stop" premiered.

1962 - French & Italian workers break through at Mount Blanc to create an auto
Tunnel through the Alps.

1962 - NASA test pilot Joseph Walker takes the X-15 supersonic plane to 60,000 ft.

1962 - US mail truck in Plymouth, Mass robbed of more than $1.5 million.

1964 –California angels pitcher Bo Belinsky is suspended after attacking sportswriter Braven Dyer.

1965 - Sonny & Cher's "I Got You Babe" hits #1.

1965- Jane Fonda married director Roger Vadim, who put the beautiful young blonde in naughty movies like Barbarella. His previous wife Bridgette Bardot was a beautiful young blonde that he put in naughty movies….hmm.

1971 – The British began internment without trial in Northern Ireland.

1979 – A rainbow was seen in Northern Wales that lasted for 3 hours duration.

1980- SOLIDARNOSC!! - At a strike at the Lenin Shipyards in Gdansk, Communist Poland the first mass peoples movement that would eventually topple European Communism was created. An electrician named Lech Walsesa climbed the fence and joined the strike, eventually becoming the leader of the movement Solidarity. He was a political prisoner, a Nobel Prize winner and eventually President of democratic Poland.

1980- Dorothy Stratton was a beautiful Playboy model whose acting career was beginning to take off, as well as a relationship with top Hollywood director Peter Bogdanovich. She was encouraged by Hugh Hefner among others, to shed her old loser boyfriend Paul Snider, who kept hanging around her. Today Dorothy Stratton was found shot to death by Snider, who then turned the gun on himself. She was age 20.

1994 – The world’s most wanted terrorist "Carlos the Jackal" was arrested in Khartoum Sudan when he entered a clinic to have a varicose vein removed from his testicle.

1995- Super-agent Michael Ovitz of CAA was named President of the Walt Disney Company under Michael Eisner. After 14 fruitless months he left.

2003- Another blackout shut down the power again in the Northeast, from New York to Toronto to Detroit.

2006- A UN brokered ceasefire stopped the open war between Israel and the Hezbollah living in Lebanon.

2009- Hayao Miyazaki’s Ponyo opened in North America.

2126- Get your catchers mitts out! Comet Swift-Tuttle will pass very close by the Earth.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: Who was Ajax? (hint: not a kitchen cleanser)

Answer: Ajax was a Greek hero of the Trojan War, second only to Achilles. Ajax fought many battles throughout the siege of Troy, protecting Greek troops and ships and killing many, but was never wounded himself. He even fought Hector, the Trojan hero, who, after a day of one-on-one combat that came to a draw, gave Ajax his sword as a gift of respect.


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QUIZ: Who was Ajax? (hint: not a kitchen cleanser)

Answer to yesterday’s question below: What is an ottoman? (Besides a Turkish sultan)
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History for 8/13/2023
B-Dayz: Annie Oakley, Alfred Hitchcock, Erwin Schroedinger, Don Ho, Buddy Rogers, Bert Lahr, Ben Hogan, Richard Baseheart, Saul Steinberg, Regis Toomey, Johann Christoph Denner (1655)- inventor of the clarinet. Danny Bonaduce, John Logie Baird one of the inventors of television, Fidel Castro, Hockey great Bobby Clarke, Daniel Schorr, Bombay movie star Viyayanthimala

Egyptian Festivals of Isis & Serapis

Festival of the Greek goddess Dianna of Ephesus. She had six breasts. Diana in her Greek form as Artemis from the older Near Eastern goddess Cybele. She had the dual nature of Virgin & Mother. Hmm…Sound familiar?
These three pagan festivals of Isis, Serapis and Artemis were in the Middle Ages converted into the Feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. In the Italian city-state of Sienna this is the date for the Pallio, the traditional horse race through the streets in medieval splendor.

Today is also the Feast Day of Saint Cassian, the Patron Saint of Stenographers.

29BC- Octavian celebrated a triumph in Rome for his victory over Anthony and Cleopatra.

1521- The Aztecs surrender to Cortez. After Montezuma was killed, the Aztecs chose Guatamoc as their new emperor and he drove the conquistadors from their capital Tenochtitlan vowing:" We will eat the Spaniards flesh with salsa !” But smallpox ravaged the population and Cortez soon returned with heavy reinforcements of allied Indian tribes from Texcoco who hated Aztec dominance. After 80 days of bloody house to house fighting that destroyed most of the capitol. Guatamoc and a few survivors surrendered. Cortez built Mexico City on the ruins.

1642- Astronomer Christian Huygens noticed that Mars had a southern polar ice cap too.

1727- Count Nicholas Von Hutzendroff formed a group of Bohemian Protestant refugees into the movement Unas Fratrum or the Moravian Brethren. The Moravians strict but gentle practices were a great influence on Pastor John Wesley who created Methodism.

1790- The PEOPLE OF NEW SPAIN BECOME MEXICANS. almost 269 years after the Aztec surrendered, workmen in Mexico City were clearing a building site for a convent when they unearthed a giant statue of the snake skirted Aztec goddess Tonnantzin Coatlicue. The find galvanized Mexican society. Indians and Mestizos crowded around the statue and recalled their once mighty civilization. Worried Spanish colonial authorities quickly reburied the statue but the damage was done.
Dominican monk Servando De Meir preached that the Aztec god Quetzalcoatal was actually St. Thomas the Wandering Apostle, so that meant Mexico was Christian before Spain was. Twenty years later when Father Hidalgo rang the liberty bells he called for revolution in the name of Our Lady of Guadalupe Tonnantzin. The people of New Spain named their country after the old Aztec name Mexica or Mexico.

1805- LEWIS GETS LAID, or, THE END OF A MYSTERY-historians have always puzzled why Meriwether Lewis, of Lewis & Clark's famous trek to the Pacific, killed himself in a lonely cabin on the Natchez Trace in 1809. Lewis was a personal protege of Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe and was first Governor of Upper Louisiana -everything from Missouri to Wyoming. He was likely to one day become President. Yet despite his coolness under extreme hardship after his death stories evolved about his manic-depression, alcoholism or even that he was murdered.

Recently a Seattle scholar theorized that on this day in 1805 he spent the night with a Shoshone woman to celebrate getting safely across the Continental Divide. The Shoshone regarded sexual contact as hospitality and that particular tribe was known to be rife with syphilis. Lewis subsequent illnesses and his increasing suicidal depression was clinically symptomatic with the final stages of the disease. And this would also explain why Jefferson and Captain William Clark would have been so quick to hush up any further investigation of his death, even resorting to calling Lewis an alcoholic, which in those days had far less social stigma than venereal disease.

1846- Commodore Stockton and Colonel Freemont with a contingent of U.S. Marines marched up from their ships in San Pedro Harbor to Ciudad Los Angeles. They interrupted a local fiesta to inform the startled inhabitants that they were now part of the United States, whether they liked it or not. They then moved south to attack San Diego.

1889- The first coin operated telephone set up in a Hartford Conn. bank.

1907-The first motorized TAXICABS hit the streets of New York. Taxi comes from Taximeter, a little machine that tallied the fare based on distance traveled. Cab is short for the earlier form of hired horse drawn carriage. Originally called a Cabriolet, then a brand name of Hansom Cabs, then just Cabs.

1910- Florence Nightingale died after being in sickbed convinced, she was dying since age 37. She died at 90. Although claiming to be too sick to walk down a flight of stairs, she worked ceaselessly reforming the army medical system, founding nursing colleges and drove several friends into early graves in the cause of medical reform. She created the ideal of the clean cut, disciplined, nurse professional.

1914 - Carl Wickman begins Greyhound, the 1st US bus line, in Minnesota.

1920- PONZI SCHEMES- This day U.S. investors attacked the offices of financier Charles Ponzi, demanding their money back. Carlo Ponzi had emigrated from Italy and came up with the idea of talking investors into giving him money without being specific about how he would make them rich. He used the millions to buy suits, cars and mansions. Like all pyramid schemes this one finally blew up. Ponzi spent some jail time and was deported. Mussolini gave him a job in the finance ministry and Ponzi proceeded to embezzle the Italian Treasury. He escaped to Brazil where he died comfortably in 1949. He gave his name to the term Ponzi Schemes.

1932- German President Von Hindenberg had a fifteen minute meeting with Adolf Hitler. He rebuked Hitler for tying up the Reichstag and the violence in the streets. Hitler refused any partial role in the government short of full power. After Hitler left, the old general grumbled:" That man for a Chancellor? I’d rather make him a postmaster so he could lick stamps with my head on it!"

1934- First Little Abner comic strip by Al Capp. Dogpatch, Mammy Yokum, Daisy Mae, Kickapoo Joy Juice, Jubilation T. Cornpone and the Schmoo are born. Al Capp was a hard drinking old curmudgeon of a cartoonist who lost one leg when as a child he fell off an ice truck and it was severed by a streetcar.

1937- The Japanese army reopened its’ campaign to conquer China by mass daylight bombing of Shanghai.

1941- James Stuart Blackton certainly had an interesting career. The English born artist became a top newspaper cartoonist, a vaudevillian drag act as Mademoiselle Stuart, the first American animator, founder of the Vitagraph Company, the movie fanzine Motion Picture World. He even successfully faked a newsreel of the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898 by using toy boats, sparklers and cigar smoke. He made fortunes and lost them just as quickly. On this day, a poor freelance artist for low budget Republic Pictures, he died after was struck and killed by an auto on Pico Blvd.

1942- Disney's Bambi opened in theaters nationwide. Today the film looks quaint but in its time artists felt it was as realistic as artists could attain. Designer Rico LeBrun had a hunter friend bring in a real deer he shot in the Sierras. LeBrun set up drawing and anatomy sessions to study the dead animal. But LeBrun was so inspired by the opportunity he refused to dispose of the carcass even after several days it began to smell badly and attract flies. Finally the other animators waited until LeBrun had left for lunch and tossed the rancid thing.

1945-After the atomic bombings Japan prepared to surrender. A note delivered to the Swedish Embassy in Tokyo expressed the wish of the Imperial Japanese Government to accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. Emperor Hirohito pre-recorded a radio message to prepare his people for something they had never faced since the days of Kublai Khan- foreign occupation.

1946- MGM cartoon Northwest Hounded Police. One of the best examples of the 'Tex Avery Take" - used since in films like The Mask, Roger Rabbit and Casper.

1955- Shooting wrapped on Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments. He was remaking the film he had done as a silent movie in 1925. One wag said: DeMille has done God one better, because he has now parted the Red Sea twice."

1960- French West Africa declared independence from France and became the nations of Chad and the Central African Republic.

1967- The World’s Fair at Montreal Canada, Expo-67 Held the opening reception of its World Exhibition of Animation Cinema. Famous animators from around the world gathered in a special reception. Opening night featured a screening of Disney’s Dumbo, and animator Bill Tytla was saluted. Attendees included Chuck Jones, Bob Clampett, June Foray, Art Babbitt, Walter Lantz, Dusan Vukotic’, Bruno Bozzetto, Dave Fleischer and more.

1967- Bonnie & Clyde with Warren Beaty and Faye Dunaway opened in theaters. “They're Young. They're in Love. And They Kill People”

1981- At his California ranch in a dense morning fog, Pres Ronald Reagan signed the Kemp-Roth Economic Recovery Act of 1981, the first of massive tax cuts for the rich that would slowly destroy the American Middle Class and shift the massive income tax burden from the rich to the poor. The wealthy saw their tax rate drop from 70% to 14% and estate taxes eliminated. The tax rate on corporations dropped by half. Tax incentives were given to companies who moved their factory jobs overseas and banked their assets in the Cayman Islands or other tax shelters.

1991- Jack Ryan died. The toymaker was the inventor of Hot Wheels toy cars, and helped launch the doll Barbie.

2000- In a presidential debate with Al Gore, candidate George W. Bush attacked the Clinton presidency for being too quick to use the military. Bush declared “The U.S. should not be in the business of nation building.” Once in office, Bush invaded two countries and was only stopped invading a third with great difficulty.

2016- At the Rio Olympics, American swimmer Michael Phelps won his 22 gold medal, His final total was 28, the most Olympic gold medals of anyone in history. The second most wins was Leonidas of Rhodes in 164BC. But in Leonidas time they didn’t get medals. They received a laurel wreath and several large pots of premium olive oil.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: What is an ottoman? (Besides a Turkish sultan)

Answer: It is a small hassock placed in front of an easy chair so you could put your feet up.

Quiz: What kind of companies were these? RCA, Admiral, Zenith, Motorola, Phillips.

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: The Ghostbuster movies created the idea of “being slimed”. It comes from an arcane Victorian belief in ectoplasm. What was ectoplasm?
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History for 8/11/2023
Birthdays: Antonio Salieri, Frederick Ludwig Jahn 1778- founder of the Gymnastics Movement, Alex Haley, Jack Haley, Rev Jerry Falwell, Hulk Hogan- real name Terry Bollier-is 74, Dick Browne the creator of Hagar the Horrible, Steve Wozniak the co-founder of Apple Computers, Raymond Leppard, Lloyd Nolan, Mike Douglas, Patti Duke Astin, Chris Helmsworth is 38, Rob Minkoff

Today is the Feast day of Saint Claire of Assisi, who followed Saint Francis into renouncing the world and formed the sisterhood of nuns called the Poor Claires. Their rule of poverty was so severe that the Vatican criticized them for making everyone else in the Church look bad.

883AD- The Abbassid Caliphs capture Al Mukhtara, crushing the Zanj slave revolt. So you get your Arabian Nights movie costumes correct- The Ummoyad Caliphs who followed immediately after the Prophet flew Green banners; the Abbasids, or the dynasty the most famous Caliph of the Arabian nights Harun al Rashid, flew black banners.

1297-French King Louis IX canonized a saint. While St. Louis was running around the Middle East being Saintly, his mother Blanche of Castile was ruling France with an iron hand. She crushed revolts, beat back invasions, and in Paris built the beautiful cathedral of Sainte Chappelle. She created one of the most enlightened courts since Eleanor of Aquitaine. But since the Medieval mind couldn't accept that a woman could do anything like that, not much was written about her.

1270- Prince Edward of England leaves Dover for his Crusade. Nobody had pointed out to Eddie that the Crusades were pretty much over and done with by then.

1772- A volcanic eruption destroyed Papandayan Java, killing 3,000.

1860 – The nation's 1st successful silver mill opened in Virginia City, Nevada.

1866 - World's 1st roller skating rink opens (Newport RI)

1874 - Harry S. Parmelee patents the sprinkler head.

1896 - Harvey Hubbell patents electric light bulb socket with a pull chain.

1908- The Hearst syndicate press published a story today that Annie Oakley was destitute and was arrested in Chicago trying to buy cocaine from a black man! The story was a phony. The woman arrested was a burlesque dancer who had previously impersonated Annie Oakley. The real Annie Oakley, one of the first big media stars, spent the next 6 years suing 55 newspapers. She won all but one lawsuit.

1909-The first S.O.S.-'Save Our Ship' Morse signal sent by the liner S.S. Arapahoe off Cape Hatteras North Carolina.

1932- The original Rin Tin Tin died. The German shepherd dog was the first animal movie star. Legend was he was rescued from a WWI battlefield by a doughboy named Lee Duncan who called him "Rinty". Later in Hollywood people joked he was more spoiled than any human star. Before sound he was the main moneymaker of struggling little Warner Bros studio. Jack Warner called him “Our little rent check.” 
In 1967 Warners admitted they had bred 16 duplicate dogs in case anything happened to him.

1934- The Mickey Mouse cartoon The Orphan’s Benefit. The first cartoon where Donald Duck lost his temper and did his fighting stance, and they started calling Dippy Dog by his new name- The Goof, or Goofy.

1942- Off the coast of Malta, the German U-Boat U-73 torpedoed and sank HMS Eagle, one of the world’s first aircraft carriers.

1942- Hollywood actress Hedy Lamarr is awarded a patent for her radio-guided torpedo. It was ignored in her time, but many years later the principles became the basis of Spread Spectrum Technology, revolutionizing wireless communications.

1944- THE FALAISE GAP- It took weeks for the Anglo-American armies to fight their way up from the Normandy beachhead. The allies began an encircling movement around the German armies forbidden by Hitler to pull back and maneuver. When wiser Generals like Rommel and Von Runstedt advised retreat, Hitler replaced them. Now their successor General Von Kluge finally made Hitler understand he was being surrounded. This day Hitler gave permission for a general withdrawal. Still, fifteen thousand trapped German troops in Falaise surrendered. The German retreat became a fighting rout across France, Belgium and Holland. Anglo Americans liberated hundreds of kilometers a day, and easily captured World War I battlefields their fathers bled for. The Allied advance wasn’t stopped until the Rhine was reached in October.

1946- Playwright Moss Hart married Miss America Kittie Carlisle.

1949- Margaret Mitchell, author of "Gone With the Wind" was hit by a taxicab crossing Peachtree Street in Atlanta, and died 5 days later. Her last request was for her husband to burn the original manuscript of Gone With The Wind, which he did. Once accused of being a racist, it came out later Mitchell quietly paid for scholarships for dozens of black students to attend medical school and become doctors.

1954- Formal peace treaties signed between French Colonial forces and Communist Viet Minh ending 7 1/2 years of war.

1956- Abstract artist Jackson Pollack died when he drunkenly crashed his car into a tree near East Hampton Long Island. He was 44.

1957- The Toyota Car Company of Japan introduces itself to the United States with a car called the Toyopet. It's first year’s sales were so bad; they almost gave up on the U.S.

1960- Chad declared its independence.

1962- Actor Sir Lawrence Olivier founded the National Theatre in London.

1965- THE WATTS RIOTS- 6 days of urban warfare began when an angry crowd attacked some LAPD apprehending a black motorist named Marquette Frye. 34 deaths, 1000 injured. Similar riots erupted in a number of U.S. cities that year including Detroit, Newark and Washington D.C.

1972- San Antonio Texas holds its first annual Cheech & Chong Day.

1973- American Graffiti opened nationwide. George Lucas film cost $777,000. And made $140 million. Making George Lucas a serious Hollywood player.

1975- The Indonesian Army invaded East Timor, ostensibly to end a Civil War, but they stayed until 2009 after the final defeat of the rebel Tamil Tigers.

1984- COLD WAR CHUCKLES- President Ronald Reagan was asked to do some sound checks for a nationwide radio address. He said into the mike: "Today we have passed legislation that will ban Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes..." The joke got out to the press and didn't do much to calm new cold war tensions.

1995- The Walt Disney short Runaway Brain, featuring Mickey Mouse, premiered.

2001- First day shooting on the film Hero, directed by Zhang Yimou.

2002- The Parliament of the Republic of Turkmenistan passed a bill renaming the months of the year for their President Saparmurat Niyazov the Turkmenbashi- Father of all the Turkmen. Mr Niyazov had ruled the country since he was appointed Communist Party chief in 1985 when it was still part of the Soviet Union. He was made president for life in 1999.
He quickly developed a cult of personality, suppressing legitimate political opposition. Much of the cash for grandiose palaces and statues is thought to stem from deals involving Turkmenistan's rich oil and gas reserves. He has also issued a decree officially extending adolescence until the age of 25 and postponing old age officially until age 85. Saparmurat Niyazov died in 2006.

2014- Comedian/Actor Robin Williams committed suicide in his San Francisco home. He had been battling depression and recently received a diagnosis of Diffuse Lewy Body Dementia, a form of early onset Alzheimer’s. Then incurable. He was 63.

2017- The town of Charlotteville, Virginia was debating the removal of a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. Today was the first day of a massive Unite the Right rally, which brought marching Nazis and White Supremacists chanting “Jews shall not replace us!” The next day, a right-wing fanatic deliberately drove his car into a crowd of anti-protestors, killing a young girl. The reaction of President Trump was “ There are good people on both sides..” The President’s tacit endorsement encouraged American extremists and racists to come out in the open.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: The Ghostbuster movies created the idea of “being slimed”. It comes from an arcane Victorian belief in ectoplasm. What was ectoplasm?

Answer: Edwardian society had a fascination with spiritualism, that we could communicate with the dead. They believed psychic ectoplasm was a strange sticky substance that ghosts were made of. That a good psychic medium could excrete this stuff from their minds during a trance.

Quiz: The Ghostbuster movies created the idea of “being slimed”. It comes from an arcane Victorian belief in ectoplasm. What was ectoplasm?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: In olden times, what were you looking for when you visited a cobbler?
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History for 8/10/2023
Birthdays: Alexander Glauzunov, Billie Holiday, Eddie Fisher, Leo Fender, Herbert Hoover, Polish King Jan III Sobieski, Norma Shearer, Rhonda Fleming, Jimmy Dean, Justin Theroux, Rosanna Arquette is 64, Antonio Banderas is 63

70 AD - JERUSALEM WAS DESTROYED BY THE ROMANS- After a prolonged siege, the Roman legions of Vespasian and Titus broke into the city and crushed the Zealot revolt with great slaughter. The cedar panels and muslin curtains of the Great Temple of Herod caught fire and the entire temple was destroyed but for an outer building retaining wall, known thereafter as the Wailing Wall.

70AD - One mystery about the destruction of Jerusalem is the disappearance of the ARK OF THE COVENANT, which was taken from the Great Temple of Herod by the Romans and kept as a treasure in Rome. Some say it was carried off by the Goths when Rome fell four hundred years later and buried with their king Alaric. Another legend said a Christian Roman Emperor named Valerian returned the Ark to Jerusalem but the Muslims sacked the monastery it was hidden in. Still another said it is supposedly in Ethiopia guarded for life by a family of Orthodox monks who keep it in a temple hewn out of rock, with one door and one key.

256 AD- St. Lawrence's day. He was the Saint whose emblem is the grill he was roasted on. Supposedly he showed his contempt for his torturers efforts by saying:" I think I'm done on this side." The Perseid Meteor Shower occurs around this time. It has been called the Burning Tears of Saint Lawrence.

1415- King Henry V of England and his army embarked from Dover to cross the Channel and press his claim to be king of France as well.

1492- Cardinal Roderigo Borgia elected Pope, despite openly keeping his children Caesar and Lucretia Borgia. He promised so many bribes to the other cardinals that humorists make jokes comparing him to Christ giving his worldly riches to the poor. When asked what his Papal name would be he replied, “by the name of the Invincible Alexander”, who was not even a Christian. So, Pope Alexander VI it was. When he died and his bitterest enemy became pope, that cardinal chose the name Julius II, probably for Julius Caesar. Also not quite a Christian.

1536- CANADA GETS ITS NAME-French explorer Cartier discovered a great river on St. Lawrence's Day, which he calls the St. Lawrence River. Cartier asks the Huron people "what people lived upstream?". They replied people who work with red copper, in their language" Caignetdaze". Cartier recorded in his log, the land "Chemin de Canada".

1557- Battle of San Quentin. King Henry II of France thought to see if the new young king of Spain Phillip II was as tough as his predecessor Charles V was. Phillip’s armies beat the French in this battle and threatened Paris before all sued for peace.

1628- Swedish King Gustavus built a huge battleship called the Vasa. This day in front of the whole court he launched it into a fjord and it immediately sank to the bottom. Doh! 333 years later it was brought up, and today is a nice attraction in a Stockholm museum.

1629- Painter Diego Velasquez traveled to Italy to study the Renaissance masters on the advice of his buddy, painter Peter Paul Rubens.

1675 - King Charles II lays foundation stone of Royal Observatory, Greenwich.

1680- THE GREAT PUEBLO INDIAN REVOLT. In Spanish New Mexico the Pueblo, Zuni, Hopi, Acoma and eastern Apache had had enough of Spanish colonists and their Christianity. A Pueblo leader named Pope' coordinated a simultaneous attack timed by giving each chief a rope with the days marked off with knots. Today the last knot was untied and the Indians attacked the Spaniards from all sides. 500 out of 2,000 Europeans were killed and the town of Santa Fe burned. The Madonna brought from Valencia Spain called La Conquistadora was riddled with arrows, the marks of which you can still see today. The Spaniards retreated back to Old Mexico, but returned in force 13 years later.

1787- Mozart completed his Eine Kleine Nachtmusik -A Little Night Music.

1788- Mozart’s on a roll! This day he completed his Jupiter Symphony #41. It was his last symphony. He never heard it performed in his lifetime.

1792- The FRENCH REVOLUTION HEATS UP. Since the fall of the Bastille two years earlier France and King Louis XVI had tried to work as a constitutional monarchy guided by the Marquis de Lafayette. But Louis only played for time while negotiating with his royal relatives in Germany and Austria to send armies to help him put his peasants in their place.
By now the French nation had enough. Mobs stirred to anger by radicals like Danton and Marat marched on the Tuileries Palace demanding justice. The King Louis XVI's Swiss bodyguard opened fire on them. The enraged peasants tore the guards to pieces and looted the palace, sticking soldier's ears on the king’s desk. The king and queen tried to escape out the back door but were grabbed by the mob. A flag was made from a Swiss red uniform coat- the very first Red Flag of Revolution. Lafayette later fled into exile and was imprisoned.
Standing in the street watching all this was a young unemployed lieutenant named Napoleon Bonaparte. He later wrote that if King Louis had the nerve to appear on a horse at the head of his supporters he could have triumphed. Napoleons conclusion: " Quel connard!”- “What an asshole!"

1793- In one of the more positive results of the Reign of Terror, the French Revolutionary Government opened the royal art collection of the Louvre to the public as a museum.

1867- Rather than put up with his pushy Secretary of War any longer, President Andrew Johnson asks for Edwin Stanton's resignation. Stanton (who formed the first American Secret Service and as a lawyer invented the "temporary insanity" plea) not only refused, he barricaded himself in his office and his partisans in the former Lincoln cabinet began impeachment proceedings against President Johnson.

1889 - Dan Rylands patented the screw -on cap.

1897 -German chemists working for the Bayer Company invent Aspirin, the first mass market over the counter drug. A powdered willow tree root that was known to the Native Americans for years. The Romans ground willow root and dissolved it in water for pain.

1913-The Treaty of Bucharest signed ending the Second Balkan War. Bulgaria was beat up by Greece, Serbia, Montenegro and Romania over the territory they all took from Turkey.

1921- After a long day of physical exercise, young politician Franklin D. Roosevelt told his family “I feel funny. I’m going to bed.” He went to sleep and, in the morning, discovered he could no longer walk. It was polio. He never walked on his own ever again.

1928- Calvin Coolidge dedicated the cornerstone of the monument at Mount Rushmore, South Dakota. The last time a President of the United States rode a horse to attend an official event.

1942- HALELIEUYAH NIGHT- The Marines in the jungles of Guadalcanal were tensely awaiting a night attack by the Japanese. They convinced each other that because Japanese attempting to speak English have difficulty pronouncing the letter “L”, all passwords should contain them. So when a few Korean slave laborers straggled into the camp perimeter, the alarmed Marines, thinking the attack had started, yelled to each other: “LOLLYPOP! LAPLAND! LOLLAPALOOZA!”

1945- After Hiroshima & Nagasaki bombings a third atomic pile was delivered to Tinian Island air base to be assembled into one more A-bomb. But it's dropping was canceled by President Truman. He told his aide Dean Acheson: "Another 100,000 people...I can't see killing any more kids." The military had plans for three more atomic bombings in September and three more in October before the land invasion of Kyushu on Nov. 2nd.

1945- Even after the two atomic bomb attacks the Japanese cabinet is still deadlocked 3 - 3 on whether to surrender. Prime minister Suzuki still thought he could get Russia to negotiate separately -Stalin had just declared war and sent troops to invade Manchuria and the Kurile islands. War minister Korechika Anami said the national honor demanded a final battle on the home soil:" Wouldn't it be wonderful to see all of Japan destroyed… like a beautiful flower!"
The impasse was broken by Emperor Hirohito, who broke with tradition and personally intervened "The time has come to bear the unbearable". Next morning a note requesting negotiations based on Japan's acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration was sent to the Swiss and Swedish consulates. Anami committed suicide in front of his radio as the Emperor announced the surrender.

1948 – Allen Funt's "Candid Camera" TV debut on ABC.

1962- Amazing Fantasy comic #152 hit the newsstands, introducing a new character called The Amazing Spiderman, written by Stan Lee and drawn by Steve Ditko.

1964- Near Ely, Nevada the U.S. Forrest Service cut down a Bristlecone Pine that scientists thought to be the oldest living thing- 4,900 years old.

1966 - Daylight meteor seen from Utah to Canada. Only known case of a meteor seen
entering Earth's atmosphere & leaving it again.

1966- Murderer James French was sent to the electric chair by the state of Oklahoma. He joked; How about this for a headline for tomorrow's paper? FRENCH FRIES!

1969- The night after Charles Manson’s cultists murdered actress Sharon Tate, they attacked another Los Angeles home at random. They murdered attorney Leo and Rosemary LaBianca on Waverly Drive in the neighborhood of Los Feliz.

1970 - Jim Morrison is charged in Miami on "lewd & lascivious behavior"

1972 - Paul & Linda McCartney are arrested in Sweden on drug possession.

1973 –San Francisco’s first BART train travels through the transbay tube to Montgomery St Station.

1978- Ford announces a recall of its Pinto series car after tests prove when bumped from behind the auto’s gas tank explodes into flames.

1979- Britain's first official nudist beach opened at Brighton.

1983- Discovery of the Vega Galaxy. This was the first physical proof of a planetary system outside our Milky Way. With modern orbiting telescopes we’ve since found millions of them.

1984- Famed New Yorker cartoonist and former Disney artist Virgil “Vip” Partch died in a car crash with his wife, outside of Valencia, California.

1987- Clara Peller, the elderly actress who gained last minute advertising fame by saying Where's the Beef? died at 86. The director and writer of the spots was the father of J.J. Sedelmier, who created the Ambiguously Gay Duo and other TV Funhouse animations for SNL.

2001- Warner Bros film Osmosis Jones opened in theaters.

2019- Jeffrey Epstein was a Wall St. financier who on the side ran an upscale prostitution ring. He even had his own pleasure island in the Caribbean where Princes, Presidents and CEOs could molest underage girls as young as 14. He was finally arrested and kept at the downtown Manhattan men’s detention center. Before he could be made to reveal any of his clients’ names, this night he committed suicide. Although on a suicide-watch, the two guards assigned to watch him just happened to be missing, and the 24 hr camera on him just happened to be turned off.
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Quiz: In olden times, what were you looking for when you visited a cobbler?

Answer: A cobbler was a shoe maker.

Quiz: What mythical hero became invulnerable to weapons when as a baby his mother dipped him in the River Styx?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: What is the difference between a missile and a ballistic missile?
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History for 8/8/2023
Birthdays: Emiliano Zapata. Esther Williams, Gene Deitch, Dino DeLaurentis, Keith Carradine is 73, Rory Calhoun, Mel Tillis, Martin Brest, Peter Weir, Connie Stevens, Patricia Arquette, Dustin Hoffman is 85, Lee Unkrich is 56, Mamoru Oshii is 72

1143- Byzantine Emperor John II Comnenus was killed in a hunting accident, when a poisoned arrow sitting in his own quiver scratched his leg. I don't know who hunts with poisoned arrows, but that's Byzantine politics for you.

1170- The birth of St. Dominic- Dominic was a Spanish zealot who wanted to preach to pagans, but the Pope sent him to south France to try and re-convert the Albigensian heretics, who were all former Catholics. After ten years of fasting, begging and praying his legendary summary of his efforts was:" Someone should take a stick to those people!" The Holy Office of the Inquisition was later administered by Dominicans. Saint Dominic is reputed to have said “Nothing Cleans like Fire.”

1502 – King James II of Scotland married Margaret Tudor, the sister of English King Henry VII. Their child was Mary Queen of Scots. Her child James would be selected by Queen Elizabeth to succeed her as king of The United Kingdom.

1588- THE GREAT PROTESTANT WIND- Most of the Spanish Armada was not destroyed by the English Navy, but by a huge North Sea storm that hit them off the coast of Northern Ireland. This is why if you want to view relics of the great Spanish galleons don't go to Cadiz, go to The Museum of Belfast. King Phillip of Spain said, “I sent my Armada against men, not God’s wind and waves.” Supposedly the thousands of Spanish and Italian sailors marooned on the Irish coast intermarried with the Irish population. They created the racial strain Black Irish, or Celts with milk white skin and black hair and eyes.

1662- We all have heard of how England captured New Amsterdam and named it New York, well on this date Dutch Admiral Van Tromp came back with a bigger Dutch fleet and took it back. He renamed New York "New Orange". But it didn't stick, and after the peace treaty of Utrecht was signed, New York went back to the English. New Yorkers didn't really much care so long as it didn't affect their business.

1709 - 1st known ascent in hot-air balloon indoors by Bartolomeu de Gusmao.

1811- THE IRON CROSS- Before medals common soldiers were rewarded for bravery with a few gold coins. George Washington and Napoleon made medals things soldiers competed for. General Gerhard von Gneisenau urged the King of Prussia to create a medal like the French Legion d'Honneur that all ranks in the German Army might aspire to. At first the sulky King was against anything that led soldiers to believe they were better than the common schweinhund he felt they were, but he finally was made to give in. The new medal was based on the heraldic symbol of the Crusader order of the Teutonic Knights, a black cross formed by four arrowheads. The "Iron Cross" medal was created. Goths, Surfers and Hells Angels rejoiced.

1818- 22 year old English poet John Keats returned from a trip to the Lakes District only to discover the first signs of the tuberculosis that would kill him.

1876 - Thomas Edison patented the mimeograph, a forerunner of the Xerox photocopier.

1892-The Emancipated Duel- In Liechtenstein, Princess Pauline von Metternich and Countess Anastasia Keilmannsegg disagreed so vigorously about the flower settings at an exhibition that they fought a duel with swords. They had lady seconds and lady doctors on hand and no men were allowed in the room. They both agreed to fight topless, since the fight was not to the death, but just until someone drew first blood. (schmiss). After three rounds the Princess nicked the countess on the arm, so honor was satisfied. At the time the press made much of the leaked story, although both protagonists published vehement denials anything of the sort happened.

1918- During World War I, this was the Breakout at Amiens, to the Germans "Der Schwarz Tag" The Black Day. The British mass 500 newfangled tanks, and burst through the German front line trenches, impregnable for four years. For the first time since Napoleon, a German army was on the run. But with their typical shortsightedness, the Allied commanders were so surprised by their success they halted the advance to study it. Yet, master strategist Eric von Ludendorf now knew the Great War was kaput, and the best Germany could hope for was to negotiate a decent peace.

1920- The German National Socialist -NSDP or Nazi Party formed.

1925- The National Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan staged a massive march in Washington D.C. Twenty thousand white hooded members of the Invisible Nation marched down Pennsylvania Ave. in broad daylight. Around this time in Queens New York, a thousand KKK marched and fought with protestors. One Klansman arrested was Fred Trump, the father of the future president.

1939- On Walt Disney’s soundstage, Leopold Stokowski met with Walt and the story artists and directors of Fantasia to hammer out their approach to Beethoven’s 6th Pastorale. Ham Luske, Webb Smith, Otto Englander, Ben Sharpsteen and Ed Penner. To fit in the movie, Stokowski had to edit the 40 minute symphony down to 20 minutes without any noticeable parts missing.

1942- THE BATTLE OF SAVO ISLAND- The US and Australian Navy suffered the worst defeat of the Pacific War since Pearl Harbor. In the waters between Guadalcanal and Tulagi Islands, the Japanese warships of Admiral Murayama attacked the Americans and Australians at 1:30AM in a spectacular surface night battle. Four American and one Australian cruiser were sunk. The only Japanese ship sunk was done afterwards by a roving US submarine completely unaware of the battle. The Japanese ships slipped in and out under American air cover. One reconnaissance PBY Catalina plane actually spotted the enemy battle fleet early. But instead of radioing an alarm, he casually continued on his patrol and back at his base he filed a routine report in writing!

1944 - Smokey the Bear, named after NYC fireman Smokey Joe Martin born.

1945- Two days after the Hiroshima bombing, the Soviet Union declared war on the Japan and began landing troops in Manchuria, Korea and the northern Kurile Islands. The Japanese cabinet had hoped to avoid a total unconditional surrender by first negotiating a separate peace with Stalin, then using him to arrange a deal with the Anglo-Americans. But Stalin had his own ideas. Even today with Stalin dead and Communism long gone, the Russians still won’t give back the Kuriles.

1960 – Brian Hyland’s song "Itsy-Bitsy, Teenie-Weenie, Yellow Polka-dot Bikini" hits #1.

1963 – THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY- In Buckinghamshire England a small group of masked men stopped the London to Glasgow express and stole 2.6 million pound sterling, about $7.3 million U.S.. English police netted most of the gang, but the ringleader Ronald Biggs escaped. Biggs lived well in Rio de Janeiro for 38 years and gave frequent interviews to British media. Old and sick, he finally returned to England and jail in 2001. “I just want one more pint in a pub” he sighed.

1963 – The Kingsmen released the song "Louie, Louie". Many labeled it obscene, although no one is quite sure just what the song lyrics mean. In the 1980s Northwestern University staged Louie-Louie Marathons- 44 straight hours of Louie-Louie, played by punk bands, polka bands, marching bands, folk trios, and singing water glasses.

1964 - Rolling Stones 1st Dutch concert.

1973-Vice President Spiro Agnew vows not to resign. He resigned shortly afterwards.

1974 – KNEEL WITH ME, HENRY. Richard Nixon decided to resign the U.S. Presidency, after Senators Howard Baker and Barry Goldwater informed him his last supporting congressmen on the Senate Impeachment Committee intended to change their vote to yes for impeachment. Insiders say his last call before making up his mind was to Dixiecrat George Wallace, who told the President he could no longer count on the support of Southern white conservatives. Tonight he went on nationwide TV and told the nation.

1978- The character of Odie the dog first met Garfield in Jim Davis’ comic strip.

2008- Putin’s Russia invaded Georgia. Part of the opening attack was a massive Russian cyber-attack, crashing all the websites and web communications in Georgia. Russian bombers also targeted cell phone towers. Estonia offered to keep the Georgian gov’t ministry channels open. Elderly senator John McCain declared “We are all Georgians!” Even though no one asked him to, and it was not yet the policy of the USA.

2008- The Beijing Olympic Games opening ceremony, using 20,000 dancers. As director Zhang Yimou said “Hey, we’ve got the people…”

2022- The FBI raided the home of former President Donald Trump.
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Yesterday’s Question: What is the difference between a missile and a ballistic missile?

Answer: A ballistic missile carries ballistics, i.e. explosives.