Quiz: If America, Japan, and Europe are the First World, and the formerly undeveloped nations of Africa & Asia are the Third World, where is the Second World?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: What was Copernicus real name?
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History for 7/10/2010
Birthdays: John Calvin, Marcel Proust, James McNeill Whistler, Carl Orff, Camille Pissarro, Adolphus Busch the founder of Budweiser, George DiChirico, Jacky "Legs" Diamond, Arlo Guthrie, Jake “Raging Bull” LaMotta, Joe Shuster- one of the creators of Superman, Fred Gywnne, David Brinkley, Arthur Ashe, Camilla Parker Bowles, Jessica Simpson is 30

138AD- Death of the Roman Emperor Hadrian at age 62. Antoninus Pius became emperor after promising to adopt as his heir young Marcus Aurelius. Hadrian, although suffering a last lingering illness, had arranged that Antoninus would have no rivals by ordering the deaths of anyone even thinking of wanting to be emperor. He even ordered the suicide of his brother-in-law Servianus, who although ninety years old had sworn to outlive Hadrian.

1040 - Lady Godiva goes for a ride on horseback in the nude to force her husband, the Earl of Mercia, to lower taxes on the poor.

1099- The magical-mystical knight of Spain Rodrigo de Bivar, called El Cid, died at the castle of Valencia. The Cid had taken a loosely written promise from King Alfonso of Castile that he could keep any territory he took from the Moors, and used it to build a private army, capture the city of Valencia and rule it as an independent prince. Nine years after his death his wife Jimena surrendered Valencia to the Almohavid Moors but the legend of El Cid Campeador, the Conquerer-Champion lived on.

1460 - Wars of Roses: Richard of York defeats King Henry VI at Northampton.

1554- The day after King Henry VIII’s sickly son Edward died at 15, Lady Jane Grey was proclaimed as England’s’ Queen. This was a desperate gamble of powerful Protestant factions to keep Henry’s eldest daughter Mary from ascending the throne. Mary was a bigoted Catholic and made no secret her desire to punish all those who turned from the Roman Church. So they dug up Lady Jane, a niece with a thin claim on the throne. It didn’t work, Mary became queen, Lady Jane became headless.

1588- French philosopher Michel de la Montaigne spent one night in the Bastille prison. The Bordeaux native had arrived in Paris in the midst of the nasty political fight between Huguenots and Catholics and was arrested as a traitor. Queen Mother Catherine de Medici ordered his prompt release.

1649- ZBARAZH- Ukrainian Cossack rebel Bogdhan Khmeilnitski besieged Polish warlord Prince Jeremy Wisnoviecki with the aid of the Crimean Tatars under Tugai Bey. After a epic battle The Polish King Jan Casimir bribed the Crimean Khan into changing sides which forced Bogdan to make peace. But the peace confirmed Bogdan Khmeilnitski as the Hetman of an autonomous Cossack Ukraine.

In 1654 Bogdan pledged allegiance to the Russian Czar in Moscow and the Ukraine would not be free of Russian rule until 1989. Cossacks sang: “Hey, Hey Tugai Bey! Tugai Bey is Mad To-Day!”

1815- After the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo, the allied armies occupying Paris start to squabble with one another. The Prussians (Germans) were disappointed they didn’t get to shoot Napoleon, burn Paris or do any other fun stuff. At least they wanted to blow up a Seine River bridge Nappy named for their humiliating defeat, the Pont du Jena. When the Duke of Wellington denounced this action as barbaric, General Von Gneisenau sneered: “you would do the same if there was a Pont du Yorktown here!” the big British defeat in the American Revolution. Wellington wouldn’t speak to von Gneisenau afterwards. The Prussians got to set off gunpowder charges but the bridge was built too solid and wouldn’t collapse, so they settled for renaming it the Pont du Louvre.

1873 - French poet Paul Verlaine wounded Arthur Rimbaud in a pistol duel.

1881 -Jesse James robbed his last bank, The Davis and Sexton Bank of Iowa. Then he changed his name to Mr. Howard and tried to live quietly with his wife Zerelda in Missouri.

1892 - 1st concrete-paved street built in Bellefountaine, Ohio.

1925- THE SCOPES MONKEY TRIAL-Tennessee school teacher John Thomas Scopes went on trial for violating a state law forbidding the teaching of evolution to children. Scopes was defended by famed lawyer Clarence Darrow sent by the ACLU, the prosecutor was William Jennings Bryan. The trial evolved (forgive the pun) from a small claims misdemeanor to a debate on Charles Darwin’s theory itself. This day the media descended upon the little town of Dayton Tennessee, which had hoped to attract attention for its slumping economy. It was the first trial broadcast live on Chicago radio WGN nationwide. Hundreds of spectators attended from hillbillies with squirrel rifles, a chimpanzee in a suit called Mr. Joe Mendy to columnist H.L. Mencken, packing 4 bottles of bootleg scotch and a typewriter. Darrow humiliated Bryan in the debate but Scopes was found guilty anyway. The ban on teaching evolution remained in Tennessee until 1967.

1932- In a baseball game against the Philadelphia Athletics, Cleveland Indian pitcher Eddie Rommel perfects the knuckleball pitch.

1940- THEIR FINEST HOUR- First German bombing raids over London known as the "Battle of Britain". The Luftwaffe's mission, in preparation for a Nazi amphibious invasion of England- Operation Sea Lion, was to destroy the RAF and British industrial and supply areas, mostly around southeast London. This is why today the areas east of the Tower of London have so many modern buildings. The British had an advantage in developing a superior radar early warning system , which the Germans tried to confuse by dropping pounds of tin foil out of planes. Despite being outnumbered by three to one, the RAF prevailed, prompting Churchill's famous: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much, owed by so many, to so few."

1941- Jazz great Jelly Roll Morton died at 50 in Los Angeles from complications of asthma. He liked to call himself the inventor of jazz but as debatable as that claim was he was one of the first musicians to develop a personal solo style distinct from the rest of his band. His mother practiced voodoo in New Orleans and she told him the reason for his fame and fortune was because she had promised his soul to the Devil for it. He spent his last hours in a panic with his wife anointing his head with Holy oil.

1943- Allied Armies hit the beaches in Sicily.

1950 - "Your Hit Parade" premieres on NBC (later CBS) TV.

1953- NIKITA KHRUSCHEV takes power in Moscow. After the death of Josef Stalin there was the inevitable shuffle of bureaucrats jockeying for top job. Commissars Bulganin, Malenkov and Molotov tried to hold power but the little bald Ukrainian with the big smile had the last laugh. At a secret meeting of the Presidium Khruschev arrested Laventi Beria, Stalin's dreaded chief executioner. Beria, a pervert who liked black silk sheets, underage girls and personally torturing prisoners, broke down and wept for his life before he was shot. Khruschev was more merciful with his other rivals: Bulganin was made manager of a Siberian power station, Molotov was made ambassador to Outer Mongolia. Comrade Khruschev held power until 1964.

1985 - Coca-Cola Co admits New Coke was a big mistake and announces it will resume selling old formula Coke.

1987- The environmental group Greenpeace first called attention to themselves by a large ship called the Rainbow Warrior used to enter atomic tests sites to protest. This day in Auckland Harbor, The Rainbow Warrior was sunk by a bomb placed on her hull by French commandos. The blast killed a photographer. Rainbow Warrior had been in the Pacific to protest France’s nuclear testing there. The Government of New Zealand determined the French were responsible. In the ensuing scandal the French Defense minister resigned and the commandos went to jail.

1979 - Chuck Berry sentenced to 4 months for $200,000 in tax evasion. The old rocker said:” It never fails, every ten years I wind up in jail for something.”

1991-Boris Yeltsin took the oath of office as first popularly elected President of Russia.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: What was Copernicus real name?

Answer: Mikołaj Kopernik

Quiz: What was Copernicus real name?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below: What do William Shatner, Chief Dan George, Pamela Anderson, and Jim Carrey have in common?
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History for 7/9/2010
Birthdays: Shopenhauer, Elias Howe, Ottorino Respighi, Nicholas Tesla, David Hockney, Samuel Elliot Morrison, Sir Edward Heath,, Kelly McGillis, Barbera Cartland, J.Paul Getty II, H.V. Kaltenborn, Daniel Guggenheim, John Tesch, Fred Savage, Chris Cooper, O.J.Simpson, Courtenay Love is 50, Debbie Sludge is 56, Tom Hanks is 54

586 BCE. -Jerusalem falls to Nebuchadnessar II, he removes the Israelites to Babylon and the 'Babylonian Captivity' begins.

1540-Henry VIII had his marriage to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, annulled. Because the match was made for political reasons, in contrast to Henry's other queens, she was not beheaded but had a nice quiet life afterwards.

1595 - Johannes Kepler theorized a geometric construction of the universe.

1686- The Treaty of the League of Augsburg. French king Louis XIV’s ambition to build his kingdom without a thought to who he offended, managed to unite most of Europe against him. Germany, Sweden, Spain, Holland, Austria and England all signed a secret alliance against France. Years ago these same nations were bitter enemies over religion, and kept apart by the diplomacy of Cardinal Richelieu. But Richelieu was long dead and even though Louis was a great catholic champion, even the Pope hated him. This treaty set the stage for the next forty years of European conflict.

1772- THE GASPEE’ INCIDENT- Another provocation leading to the American Revolution. Britain’s insistence her colonies trade through Britain exclusively made Americans a race of smugglers. Most New England businessmen had money tied up in ships doing illegal business. So when the captain of the Royal Navy ship HMS Gaspee’ was overly diligent in catching coastal smugglers, people were indignant. This day the Gaspee ran aground in the shoals off Rhode Island. That night a group of patriots seized the captain and crew and burned the ship. The next day the crew were released and everyone in the vicinity caught amnesia.

1776-The Declaration of Independence read out to Washington's army defending New York City. The people of New York celebrate by pulling down a large statue of King George III at Bowling Green. They melted the lead statue into 42,000 bullets. This was all done while knowing a huge British invasion fleet was just outside Staten Island. The happy mobs also arrested people they suspected to be loyalist sympathizers. These included Mayor David Matthews and one of General Washington’s own bodyguard.

1815 -1st natural gas well in US is discovered.

1940- VICHY- After the terrible defeat by the Germans, the remains of the French government sets up a Nazi puppet state with elderly Great War hero Marshal Petain as it's president. Because Paris was occupied by the Nazis, they met in the mineral water resort town of Vichy. The Vichy Republic was born. To this day the debate rages in France whether Petain was a traitor, or that he sacrificed his own honor to salvage what he could of France from the wreckage of the defeat.
Remember the scene at the end of the film "Casablanca" when Claude Rains pours himself some mineral water, but when he sees the label says Vichy, he tosses it into the trash.

1942- Anne Frank and her family go into hiding from the Nazis in the warehouse attic above her fathers office.

1943- Secret agent Jan Kauszka had been smuggled out of Europe so he could go to Washington. Today he told President Franklin Roosevelt that the Polish Underground Resistance (AK) had undeniable proof that Hitler’s secret plan was to murder all the Jews of Europe.

1955 - "Rock Around Clock", arguably the first Rock and Roll song, hits #1 on Top 100 chart

1956 - Dick Clark's 1st appearance as host of American Bandstand.

1972-David Bowie first appeared as his alter-ego Ziggy Stardust.

1980 - Walt Disney's the "Fox & The Hound," released. The first film Walt Disney had no influence on. Although the film has brief screen credits, it marks the torch being passed from the Nine Old Men golden age generation to the modern generation of animators. A complete personnel roster would include Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnston, Tim Burton, John Lasseter, Bill Kroyer, Don Bluth, Lorna Cook, Henry Sellick, Brad Bird, Steve Hulett, John Musker, Jerry Reese, Glen Keane and many more.

1983- The Police’s single "Every Breath You Take" goes to #1.

1993- Industrial Light & Magic completes it’s transition to digital technology by shutting down it’s Anderson Optical Printer. The Optical Printer system of mattes had been the way Motion Picture visual effects had been done since Melies in 1909, but the Digital Revolution had changed everything.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: What do William Shatner, Chief Dan George, Pamela Anderson, and Jim Carrey have in common?

Answer: They were all born in Canada.

Quiz: What do William Shatner, Chief Dan George, Pamela Anderson, and Jim Carrey have in common?

Yesterday’s question answered below: Who said: ” You may fire when ready, Gridley.”…?
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History for 7/8/2010
B-Dazes: Jean de LaFontaine the creator of Puss & Boots, John D. Rockefeller Sr, Nelson Rockefeller, Kathe Kollwitz, Count Ferdinand Von Zeppelin, Louis Jordan, Billy Eckstine, Steve Lawrence, Percy Grainger, Cynthia Gregory, Phillip Johnson, Kim Darby, Marty Feldman, Roone Arledge, Kevin Bacon is 52, Billy Crudup, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, Angelica Huston, Raffi, Jeffrey Tambor is 66

951AD Happy Birthday Paris!. The Roman city of Lutetia-muddy place- was built on the site of a Gaulish village inhabited by a tribe called the Parisi. This date was when the Franks established a castle on the present day site of the Louvre. Despite Viking raids and floods the city slowly began to grow.

1099- The Crusaders try to storm the walls of Jerusalem but are repulsed. They decided it was God telling them they were unworthy of the Holy City because they were sinful. So they drove out their camp followers and marched barefoot around the walls of Jerusalem praying and chanting. The Egyptian mercenary defenders hadn't really understood yet what this Christian Jihad stuff was all about. So they thought it was all pretty funny. They liked to urinate on the Christian knight's heads from the walls.

1249 Death of Alexander II "the Peaceful", king of Scotland who strengthened
his throne by marrying into the English royal family –his wife was called Joan MakePeace. during his reign the existing border was established and his heraldic symbol, the Red Lion Rampant on a Yellow field, became the symbol of Scotland..

1386- The Battle of Sembach- Leopold of Austria discovers why you leave the Swiss alone and let them stay neutral. His army of knights were intent on chastising this land of uppity goat herders, but they were destroyed instead. They at first held off the raging Schwyzers with a wall of spears. But then legend has it that great hero and really big schwyzer Arnold von Winkelreid shouted "Brothers! Take care of my wife and children!" and gathered up a dozen enemy spear points and shoved them into his own chest. As he pulled them down with him, that opened a gap in the Austrian line that the Swiss swarmed through to victory. Duke Leopold was found in a ditch with a battleaxe in his face and two up his butt.

1497 - Vasco da Gama departs for his trip to India by way of the Horn of Africa.

1673- William of Orange elected Stadholder of Holland while the country was fighting an Anglo French invasion. In electing him the Dutch chose an aristocratic prince over the republican party of the Great Pensioner Jacob De Witt. William was for no compromise with invaders, while De Witt favored a humiliating peace. De Witt was murdered by a mob. William called for national resistance and the Dutch opened their dykes and flooded the land around Amsterdam to stop the French army. William won and he eventually became King of England as well.

1755-THE BATTLE OF THE MONONGAHELA or BRADDOCKS DEFEAT- The French and Indian War, the North American installment of the greater European conflict known as the Seven Years War began. British General Braddock, marching to surprise French held Ft. Duquesne in western Pennsylvania, was ambushed on the Monongahela River by the French and their Indian allies. Out that far in the wilderness no one was sure if the war between France and England had even been declared, so it certainly was a surprise. Braddock and all the officers were killed except for a young militia captain named George Washington. Daniel Boone was also there as a young scout. After the war Ft. Duquesne became British and renamed it after Prime Minister William Pitt, so it became Pittsburgh.

1758- French general the Marquis de Montcalm with 3,000 men at Ft. Ticonderoga, New York, throw back a British attack of 15,000 under General Abercrombie.

1775- Before the Declaration of Independence was conceived, the more conservative members of the American Congress tried a compromise. They drafted an appeal to the King to resolve America’s differences with London and stay part of the British Empire. They called it the Olive Branch Petition. It was written by John Dickinson and carried to London by William Penn III. But King George’s blood was up with these unruly Yankees. He had just got the news of his redcoat troops getting shot up on Bunker Hill. So when this weenie appeal came he brushed it aside.

1776- The new Declaration of Independence was celebrated in Philadelphia with parties and parades. With great solemnity the Royal Coat of Arms was taken down from the State House judges bench and tossed on a bonfire. Congressman John Dickinson, who argued passionately against independence, nevertheless demonstrated his love for America by joining the Continental army fighting in New York.

1801- Touissaint L’Ouverture created a new constitution for the island of French Saint Dominique’, now called Haiti. Even though Haiti became only the second democratic republic in the Americas and Americans loudly called on all nations to assert their freedom, still the Founding Fathers could not bring themselves to support a Black Republic of former slaves.

1815- The British army occupied Paris after Waterloo. A camp of white tents set up in the Bois du Boulonge. The allied bayonets returned the fat elderly Bourbon king Louis XVIII to the throne in place of Napoleon.

1822- Poet Percy Shelley drowned when a storm sank his yacht the Simon Bolivar off Leghorn, Italy. His body was cremated but his heart was embalmed in lead and presented to his wife Mary Wollenstonecraft Shelley. Lord Byron swam offshore during the cremation so they could observe Shelley's spirit rising to Heaven.

1835- The Liberty Bell cracked. It rang for the Declaration of Independence and was being rung for the death of Chief Justice John Marshall.

1838- THE TRAIL OF TEARS- Cherokee Removal Treaty goes into effect. President Andrew Jackson, Indian name: "Sharp Knife", forced the entire Cherokee Nation to evacuate Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee. 17,000 people were marched to Oklahoma. One third died along the way. The token amounts paid for their land could not help their heartbreak at leaving their ancestral home. Large warriors would touch or kiss trees as they trudged away to the amusement of the soldiers. The Supreme Court ruled the harassment of the Cherokee Nation was unconstitutional but President Jackson ignored them. Jackson said:" Chief Justice Marshal has ruled, now let him try to enforce it." One Georgia man later said:" I fought through the Civil War and have seen men shot to pieces and slaughtered in the thousands, but the Cherokee Removal was the cruelest work I ever knew."

1889-The Wall Street Journal first published.

1889- The last great bareknuckle championship fight. John L. Sullivan defeated Jake Kilrain in Mississippi for a purse of $20,000. After 60 rounds one of Sullivan’s eyes was shut, he was covered with welts and blood was showing above his shoes. When his manager recommended declaring a draw, Sullivan said:" Hell no. I want to kill him!" He won at Sundown, after 75 rounds. Sullivan was one of the first flamboyant prizefighters and the first American fighter to declare himself Champion of the World. He’d travel from town to town building his legend:"I’m John L. Sullivan and I can lick any man in the house!" And he usually did.

1896- William Jennings Bryan"the Son of the Plains", electrifies listeners at the Democratic Convention with a speech denouncing the gold standard: "You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold!" Whether federal currency should be backed by gold or cheaper silver divided Americans along class lines. Modern people only recall Bryan as the attorney Clarence Darrow made look silly in the Scopes "Monkey Trials". But Bryan was a fiery populist orator and strong rogue political force who made several tries at the Presidency. He was a Ralph Nader with Pat Robertson and some Ethel Merman thrown in.

1907-The First Ziegfield Follies, staged on the roof of the New York Theater, now called the New Amsterdam Theater.

1911- Burbank incorporated as a city.

1918- A young American ambulance driver serving in Italy during the First World War gets badly wounded by shrapnel fire. His name was Ernest Hemingway. His long recovery and love affair with his nurse he later worked into his novel "A Farewell To Arms".

1922- Horn player Louis Armstrong left his hometown of New Orleans to go to Chicago and play in King Oliver’s Jazz band.

1932- THE DEPRESSION STOCK MARKET HITS ROCK BOTTOM - free falling since the Great Crash of October 1929, and compounded by the Harley-Smoot trade act of 1931, which started a trade war that killed off overseas exports. From a Dow Jones high in the Roaring Twenties of 262, today’s average hit bottom at 58. Only 720,278 shares exchanged. One local club wallpapered the bar with unsold bond certificates. The Bond market lost around ten million in value, Total output of heavy industries like steel production were working at only 12% of capacity. 25% of the U.S. workforce was unemployed, 50% of New York City, 80% of industrial cities like Detroit and Toledo.

Top Wall Street securities firms like Morgan and Salomon Brothers encouraged "Apple Days"- one day a week for brokers to go on the street to sell apples to supplement their income. One songwriter wrote a song about the unpopularity of stock traders: " Please Don't Tell Mother I Work on Wall Street, She Thinks I Play Piano in a WhoreHouse. " The just completed Empire State Building was nicknamed the "Empty State Building." because there were no businesses to move into it.

Yet President Herbert Hoover could only spout unrealistic slogans like "the economy is fundamentally sound" and "prosperity is just around the corner." Mt. Rushmore sculptor Judson Borglum said: "If you put a flower in Hoover's hand, it would wilt !"

1932- Tod Brownings disturbing movie "Freaks" about a family of circus sideshow performers, premiered. One of Us, One of Us!

1951- The first meeting of American, United Nations, North Korean and Chinese officials to discuss peace terms to end the Korean War. The talks dragged on for months and eventually signed as the Treaty of Panmunjom. At this first meeting the reds and allies noted little psychological victories. The North Koreans drove up in a captured American jeep. When the chief Communist negotiator General Nom Il wanted a smoke he pulled out a Russian cigarette. But after striking 14 Peoples Democratic Chinese matches he still couldn’t get it to light. So he was finally forced to light his cigarette by borrowing from the Americans a good old capitalist Zippo lighter.

1961-YEAH, BABY YEAH!! Upon arriving at Cliveden, Estate of Lord and Lady Astor, Britains Secretary for War Sir John Profumo was introduced to Christine Keilor, a 19 year old party girl swimming nude in the pool. Profumo and Lord Astor chased Christine around the pool trying to pull her towel away while bejeweled guests arrived for a party. It was bad enough that the married Profumo started a hot affair with Christine, but also her manager Stephen Ward was connected to an East German Communist spy ring. The Profumo Scandal brought down the MacMillan Tory Government in 1963.

1969 - Thor Heyerdahl and his raft Ra II landed in Barbados 57 days from Morocco. He was trying to prove ancient mariners could have traveled from Africa to the Americas using a ship made from papyrus reeds. It also may explain the phenomenon that some Egyptian mummies have been found to have traces of tobacco and chocolate in their stomachs.

1978- 100,000 rallied in Washington D.C. in support of the Equal Rights Amendment- the ERA.

1982- Walt Disney's TRON- the first film claiming to be made chiefly with computer graphics premiered. It only was about 20 minutes of actual CGI, and the computer images were still printed onto traditional animation cells and painted, but it was still a significant achievement. Remember in 1981 there were no off the shelf graphics software. Wavefront wouldn't exist for several years and Parallel processing didn't really get going until '84. Warping or morphing was about 4 years away in the future. The big deal at the time was that MAGI had just solved the "hidden Line" problem.

1998- An original 1477 William Caxton copy of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" became the world's most expensive book when it was sold for £4,621,500 to billionaire oil heir Paul Getty
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Yesterday’s Quiz: Who said: ” You may fire when ready, Gridley.”…?

Answer: In 1898 the battle of Manila Bay began when Admiral Dewey signaled to the captain of his flagship, USS Olympia to begin firing." You may fire when ready, Gridley."

Quiz: Who said: ” You may fire when ready, Gridley.”…?

Yesterday’s Question answered below: True or False: It is illegal to fly a US flag in the dark?
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History for 7/7/2010
Birthdays: Gustav Mahler, Satchel Page, Ringo Starr is 70, Doc Severinsen, Robert Heinlein, William Kuntsler, Gian Carlo Menotti, Ken Harris, Shelley Duval is 60, Ted Cassidy-Lurch in the Adams Family, Michelle Kwan, David McCullough, Pierre Cardin, and according to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle this is the birthday of Sherlock Holmes’ sidekick Dr. John Watson

750 BC- 391AD This was the Roman Feast of Quirinus, then day when Romulus the founder of Rome was taken up to heaven and assumed his place beside the Gods as the deified Quirinus.

175AD- The future Roman Emperor Commodus attained manhood. There was a special celebration when a Roman boy grew his first beard. He made a ceremony of putting off his boys cloak-tunica and donning the man’s toga.

1569- Sir Francis Drake boldly sailed into the harbor of Cartagena ( in modern Columbia), the largest port on the Spanish Main, and looted a treasure galleon.

1607- The English anthem God Save the King first sung in honor of King James Ist.

1666- King Charles II and his court quit London in the wake of the Great Plague.

1735-King Stanislas Lescynski lost the throne of Poland to a boyfriend of Russian Empress Catherine the Great. Stan was the father-in-law of king Louis XV of France fortunately, so Louis gave him the Duchy of Lorraine to live in. In the town square of Nancy there is a statue of Stanislas pointing east. Some say he's pointing home to Poland, others say towards the red light district of Nancy, where he spent a lot of his time.

1754- Kings College in New York founded. After the American Revolution the name was changed to Columbia University.

1839-The First European Railroad link opens between Vienna and Prague, thanks to the entrepreneurial investment of Meyer Rothschild, the Austrian branch of the House of Rothschild. Even though the English invented the locomotive years earlier European development moved much slower than in America where vast distances needed to be linked up fast. There was medical concern about people being moved at such high speeds as 35 miles an hour! A Viennese doctor wrote that at if the human body moved faster than 15 mph, blood would squirt out of your eyes and ears. Men would go mad and women sex-crazed.

1894-The Pullman Strike-U.S. troops battle 5,000 Chicago area railroad workers and their families in the streets. Dozens are killed. Troops were called for after marshals and detectives refused to shoot at unarmed working people. Other unions go out in sympathy with the Pullman workers and make the strike nationwide. Union president Eugene Debs is arrested for sedition and treason but acquitted by three grand juries. He later runs for president on the socialist ticket in 1912. President Cleveland before crushing the strike with regular army troops had just set the date for the first Labor Day.

1895-THE FIRST SUNDAY COMICS - The first modern comic strip Hogan’s Alley featuring "The Yellow Kid" by Richard Felton Outcault, debuts in the Sunday edition of Pulitzer's New York World. The strip was so popular it gave the name "Yellow Journalism" to the sensationalist tabloid press. Comic strips at this time became the mass media of the day. For people who couldn’t afford a theater ticket and couldn’t yet speak English, the little characters in the penny papers were extremely popular and made celebrities out of cartoonists like Outcault, Bud Selig George McManus and Winsor McCay. Richard Outcault later inventing the backend deal when he asked for a percentage of all sales from his new comic strip "Buster Brown and his dog Tige"

1900- Warren Earp, the youngest brother of Wyatt Earp, was killed in a gunfight. He had gotten into an argument in a saloon in Wilcox Arizona. Warren Earp was not at the OK Corral in 1881 but he did help his brothers hunt down the killers of Morgan Earp.

1911- THE AGADIR INCIDENT or "The Panther's Leap' In the tense international climate just before the Great War Germany sparked a major international incident by making moves to take southern Morocco from France. They sent the battle cruiser Panther to Agadir Harbor to "protect endangered German citizens", There were no Europeans in that part of Morocco so the German ministry cabled a Herr Weiland to rush overland by train to meet the warship. He was nicknamed "The Endangered German". After a lot of diplomatic bluffs and threats between Paris, Berlin, London and St. Petersburg, Germany eventually backed down. One Berlin newspaper said:" To think we almost went to war with Britain & France over a country that can only provide sand for our canary cages!" An angry German minister said:" The incident had the same effect as viewing a dead squid. First shock, then amusement, then revulsion."

1943-BANZAI- Climax of the Battle of Saipan- 4,300 Japanese troops stream out of the jungle in a massed Banzai charge on U.S. Marine positions. Fighting devolved into insane hand to hand combat with Samurai swords and rifle-bayonets, more reminiscent of the Civil War than World War Two. One of the Marines wounded in the attack was future movie star Lee Marvin, nicknamed Captain Marvel by his buddies for his gung-ho attitude. Almost all the Japanese were killed. Later in a cave the Marines found the bodies of General Saito and Admiral Nagumo, the fleet commander at the Pearl Harbor attack. They had committed hari kari when the attack had failed. This event also caused Prime Minister Hideki Tojo's government to fall, since Tojo had pledged the U.S. could not take Saipan, an island which placed Japan within range of US long range bombers.

1946-Mother Cabrini made the first American Saint. She was an immigrant from Italy. Later St. Elizabeth Ann Seton became the first native born American saint.

1947- THE ROSSWELL INCIDENT- An official news report from the USAF 509th bomber command -the same unit that dropped the Hiroshima bomb- stated they had recovered the wreckage of a UFO in the New Mexico desert near Rosswell and were examining it. The next day the commanding general of the 8th Air Force flew to Rosswell. He announced to the press that the earlier report was in error, and it was only a downed weather balloon. The wreckage was removed under heavy-armed guard. Complete secrecy was then imposed, and maintained to this day. The communications officer Major Jesse Marcey, who posed for an official photo showing him with the balloon wreckage, later told his son it was faked. Marcey, who died in 1967 and his adjutant Lt. Haut still stick to the original version of their story. Lt. Haut also claimed the base commander Col. William Blanchard thought it was UFO debris. This report coming only two weeks after the first modern sighting of "flying saucers" over Mt. Reynier in Oregon sparked the Flying Saucer craze that gripped America throughout the 1950’s.
After the Cold War ended, the Pentagon tried to explain the incident by saying at Rosswell and the base Area 51 they were experimenting with high altitude balloons carrying sniffer devices to detect Russian nuclear tests. The rumored alien bodies recovered were in reality test dummies. But then the military added to the mystery when they still refused any access to the mysterious Area 51. When asked what is done there, the Army spokesman said: "Uh, Secret Stuff...."

1949-"I’m Friday"- The program Dragnet first debuted on radio. Jack Webb conceived, wrote, directed and starred in the show. His hardest job was urging actors "not to act" but to speak the lines normally like the average person does.

1960- First demonstration of a practical laser beam. In Russia it had been theorized since 1951. Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation or LASER.

1967- Vivien Leigh, the actress who played Scarlet O’Hara in Gone with the Wind and Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, died in a mental institution at age 53.

1967 - Beatles' "All You Need is Love" is released. In 2002 for her Jubilee Queen Elizabeth II requested it because it was one of her favorite songs.

1967 – The Doors' "Light My Fire" hits #1.

1976- First women cadets enroll at West Point Military Academy.

1981- Judge Sandra Day O’Connor becomes the first woman nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.

1982- A drunken lunatic named Michael Fagin with a bleeding left hand broke into Buckingham Palace, got past all the security and startled Queen Elizabeth in her bed. Her personal bodyguard was out walking the royal dogs. The Queen kept the man engaged in conversation at the foot of her bed until guards dragged him away.

2005-THE 7-7 ATTACK- Four Al Qaeda terrorist bombs exploded in the London subway Tube and a doubledecker bus, killing 50 and injuring one thousand..
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Yesterday’s Quiz: True or False: It is illegal to fly a US flag in the dark?

Answer: According to Section 3 of the Code of the United States, if you do not lower the flag at sunset or else put a spotlight on it, you are breaking a federal law.

Quiz: True or False: It is illegal to fly a US flag in the dark?

Yesterday’s questions answered below: What is a Gotterdamerung?
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History for 7/6/2010
Birthdays: John Paul Jones, Czar Nicholas Ist, Frida Kahlo, Della Reese, Bill Haley, Nancy Reagan,, Sylvester Stallone is 64, Merv Griffin, Janet Leigh, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sebastian Cabot, James Bordrero, The Dalai Lama, LaVerne Andrews of the Andrews Sisters, Geoffrey Rush, Ned Beatty is 73, Former President George W. Bush is 64, 50 Cent is 35

83 B.C. Sulla the Dictator stormed Rome and defeated the supporters of Marius. This first civil war amongst powerful Roman factions is known as the" Wars of Marius & Sulla" or “the Social Wars”. No one had ever dared take soldiers into Rome itself and it spelled the death of the democratic Republic. Sulla published lists of hundreds of political enemies called the Proscribed. If you were on that list anybody could kill you without trial or appeal. Even a slave could kill his master and get the reward. Sulla had on his staff a kid who recently changed sides. His name was Gaius Julius Caesar.

1190- Death of Henry II, King of England and the Angevin Empire – he ruled a territory almost as great as Charlemagne but his reign was marred by the martyrdom of
Thomas à Becket and quarrels with his family. Henry had pledged to go on Crusade to liberate Jerusalem and after his death his Crusade was taken up by his son Richard the Lionhearted. In the end Henry was so disgusted by the feuds and rebellions of his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine and sons Richard, Geoffrey and John Lackland, that his dying breath was a curse on his own family.

1480- The hunchback Duke of Gloucester was crowned King Richard III. He is referred to as the Last Plantagenet, meaning the last of the bloodline of Geoffrey of Anjou and Richard the Lionhearted. He was defeated and killed by Henry VII of the House of Tudor. Whether he was as bad a guy as Shakespeare and Hollingshed portrayed him, was even a hunchback or the last real native English king is a matter for scholars to argue over. Shakespeare was writing plays for the granddaughter of the man who killed him so that would obviously color his interpretation of events.

1685- THE BATTLE OF SEDGEMOOR AND THE BLOODY ASSIZES.-The illegitimate son of King Charles II, the Duke of Monmouth, tried to overthrow his Catholic uncle King James II with the help of many Protestant Englishmen, angry that the Catholic monarch was planning to subvert the liberties won by Cromwell in the English Civil War. This day Monmouth hightailed it for the hills while his army was cut to pieces in battle.
After the battle the punishment of the rebels under Judge Jefferies was so brutal it was nicknamed the Bloody Assizes. An assize was another name for circuit court. Hundreds were beheaded, tongues cut out, limbs branded with hot irons then transported as slaves to the Bahamas and Barbados to cut sugar cane. White sugar was a new delicacy sweeping the nation. To this day many white skinned Bahamians can claim descendant from these condemned rebels. In the 1890s Rafael Sabatini wrote a novel about one slave who escaped to become a pirate named Captain Blood, later made into an Errol Flynn movie.

180-? THE IMMORTAL BELOVED LETTERS.- Composer Ludwig van Beethoven never married, but not for want of trying. The bad tempered loner loved several women, but never formed a serious relationship. After his death, several love letters were found. The letters written this day were of a supremely passionate nature, where he begged some unknown woman to keep an appointment with him at some unstated rendezvous in Hungary. “Though still in bed my thoughts go out to you, My Immortal Beloved…” The letters were never sent and have no addresses or names. Who was this Immortal Beloved, Beethoven yearns for?

1853- In Ripon, Wisconsin Free-Soil Whigs and other lefty radicals form the new Republican Party. They were called the Anti-Nebraska Men, then Black-Republicans for awhile because of their strong anti-slavery stance.

1885- Louis Pasteur gave the first inoculation to cure rabies.

1886 - Horlick's of Wisconsin offers the1st malted milk to public. It began as an attempt to create a new type of baby formula.

1895- A businessman named William Sydney Porter returned from Honduras where he had fled after being indicted for embezzlement. He had returned because he had learned of the illness of his wife. Porter was sent to prison and while there began writing little stories which he later published under the name O. Henry.

1917 – As Lowell Thomas’ news reel cameras rolled, Lawrence of Arabia and Bedouin Sheik Ouda Abu-Tai captures the Red Sea Port of Al Aqaba from Turkish troops. The battle was dramatized in the 1962 David Lean epic Lawrence of Arabia.

1928- The film "The Lights of New York" premiered at the Strand theater on Broadway. 1927's the Jazz Singer popularized sound movies while still being half silent. This film was the first with an all dialogue track.

1938- THE EVIAN CONFERENCE- No, it wasn't about bottled water. Before Hitler started putting all Jews and political undesirables into concentration camps, he was happy to see them leave the country. Since1933, the refugees fleeing the Reich grew to tens of thousands. President Franklin Roosevelt called for a summit of Western powers at Evian France to discuss the issue of the rising numbers asking asylum in the democracies. The conference turned into a parade of diplomats making excuses. It accomplished nothing. From 1938 to 1944 only half the quota for U.S. visas allowed were ever filled. The rest were held up by red tape while the Holocaust raged. Also the British Mandate authority bowed to Arab anger to restrict immigration to Palestine. Saudi Prince Ibn Saud said:” Why should we be punished for the sins of Europe?” The only nations on Earth who accepted unrestricted Jewish immigration from the Nazis were Holland and Denmark. Young delegate and future Israeli leader Golda Meir was asked what she hoped to get out of the conference. “All I want to see before I die, is for my people to get something else beyond Expressions of Sympathy.”

1944- A fire broke out in the main tent of Ringling Bros Circus during a children’s matinee in Hartford Connecticut. The big top had been waterproofed with a paraffin solution thinned with gasoline and now that mixture engulfed the tent in flames. 168 died and 682 more were injured, mostly children. In 1950 a deranged arsonist named Robert Segee admitted setting the Hartford Circus Fire.

1957-Chuck Jones short "What’s Opera, Doc?" debuts. “Kill da wa-bitt, kill da wa-bitt..."

1957-16 year old John Lennon first met 15 year old Paul McCartney at a church picnic near Woolton, England. Lennon invited McCartney to join his first band called the Quarrymen, but MacCartney missed their first engagement because of a boy scout trip.

1964 - Beatles' film "Hard Day's Night" premieres in London. The bands iconoclastic, antics portrayed by Richard Lesters surreal free style direction set the style for the music videos of the future.

1965- TV sitcom F-Troop premiered. Shortly after the series began production it was learned that lead actress Melody Patterson (Wrangler Jane) was actually underage- 16 years old. She kept her part, but the writers had to tone down any sexual innuendo in the scripts.

1965 - Rock group "Jefferson Airplane" formed.

1974- The first broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion, Garrison Keilor’s ode to a small town in Minnesota. Brought to you by Powdermilk Biscuits.

1998- French workers at Disney’s Paris theme park went on strike for better pay and not having to smile all the time like Americans do.
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Yesterday’s Quiz: What is a Gotterdamerung?

Answer: Richard Wagner’s opera about Siegfried, Brunhilde and the end of the world.
It’s the German version of the Norse Ragnarok, the final battle where the gods and monsters all destroy one another. So a Gotterdamerung can be used as another word for a total immolation.