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July 15th, 2008 tues.
July 15th, 2008

Quiz: In Africa what is meant by juju?

Yesterday’s Quiz answered below- Did Noah’s flood really happen?
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History for 7/15/2008
Birthdays: Rembrandt van Rijn, Inigo Jones, Sir Thomas Bullfinch, Mother Cabrini, Clemont Moore, Julian Bream, Linda Rondstadt, Alex Karras, Jan Michael Vincent, The Sultan of Brunei, Lola Davidovich, Forrest Whitaker, Brigette Neilsen, Jesse Ventura

765 A.D.- Mayan Scientists hold a conference at Copan to discuss astronomy and adjust their calendar. By 1492 the Mayan civilization was already 2,000 years old. Their calendar was so perfect, the difference between it and our modern atomic clocks calculation of a lunar month is just 24 seconds! They used hieroglyphic writing but also a system of numbers including zero which the Greeks and Romans never figured out. Among their surviving documents are calculations on the orbit of Venus. Tikal, one of their cities, covered 23 square miles ( Imperial Rome covered 8 ) and had a temple that was the tallest structure in America until the completion of the U.S. Capitol dome in 1863.

1780- American Colonial General Benedict Arnold sneaked a coded message to British General Sir Henry Clinton. In it, he offered to betray the fortress of West Point to the British for 20,000 English pounds. Arnold wasn’t even West Point’s commander yet, but he expected Gen. George Washington to confirm him in the job any day. The only person who warned that Gen. Arnold might be up to something fishy was a female spy planted in British Headquarters in occupied New York. Her cover was kept so complete, that her name is lost to history. We only know her as agent “355”.

1815- Napoleon boards HMS Bellerophon for the trip to St.Helena. On the trip he teaches himself English and makes friends with the British sailors to such an extent that they are reprimanded by their officers for being too friendly with him. He says to his Irish doctor O'Meara:" So you are a doctor and I am a general. How many men have you killed? I'll wager more than me!"

1915- A Secret Service agent was presented with a suitcase left by a German diplomat on a New York City subway seat. In the satchel was a complete list of known German spies and saboteurs working in the U.S., a nation still officially neutral in the war between Britain, France and Germany.

1938- Popeye cartoon "With the Jeep" introduced Eugene the Jeep. The funny little character later gave it’s name to the army’s new General Purpose Vehicle, the G.P. or Jeep.

1941- President Franklin Roosevelt sent federal mediator Stanley White to try and solve the labor strike between Walt Disney and his cartoonists.

1953- English serial killer Jack Christie was executed. In his home at Number 10 Rillington Place police found the bodies of several women buried in the garden. Two bodies weren’t even Christies, they were credited to an abortionist who was a previous tenant who had botched two and they died of internal bleeding.

1953- The film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes premiered starring Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell.

1971- Producer Steve Krantz announced the production of the first X-rated cartoon, Fritz the Cat, to be directed by newcomer Ralph Bakshi.

1979- In a nationwide address, President Jimmy Carter laid out the oil/gas crisis. He stated flatly that the U.S. and the world would be trapped in a dependence on diminishing stocks of foreign oil unless we moved fast to develop solar and other alternative fuels now. The next President, Ronald Reagan, ignored Carter’s initiatives and tore off the solar panels from the White House and renewed subsidies to oil companies for drilling.

And things have been fine since then, eh, boys & girls?

1982-Coca-Cola introduced Diet Coke. Coke officials are proud of the fact that within a year it's sales top that of Tab, but Tab was owned by Coke as well.( duh..?)

1997- Famed clothing designer Gianni Versace was murdered outside his Miami mansion by a deranged serial killer on a spree since leaving Minnesota. The killer, Andrew Cunanan, was later found in a houseboat with a self inflicted bullet in his head.

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Yesterday’s Quiz: Did Noah’s flood really happen?

Answer: Similar stories of the Babylonians and Sumerians like The Epic of Gilgamesh tell of a great flood sent by the gods to destroy all things. But there is a difference of translation between the Sumerians account of a flood that destroyed nearly everything around, and the Hebrew Bible account of a flood that destroyed the entire world. It is acknowledged today that the Hebrew version was written after the Sumerian. It might have been a story picked up by the Israelites during the years of the Babylonian Captivity as a warning about disobeying God.


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