Author Topic: Event of the Day  (Read 29199 times)

Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« on: August 16, 2004, 05:57:13 PM »
That's right, here is the spinoff of Mike's famed word of the day that he has let fall completely out of use.



 :woot:
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #1 on: August 16, 2004, 06:02:51 PM »
ELVIS LEAVES THE BUILDING: :crying:
August 16, 1977


Popular music icon Elvis Presley dies in Memphis, Tennessee. He was 42. The death of the "King of Rock and Roll" brought legions of mourning fans to Graceland, his mansion in Memphis. Doctors said he died of a heart attack, largely brought on by his addiction to prescription barbiturates, but some labeled it suicide.

Elvis Presley was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, on January 8, 1935. His twin brother, Jesse, died during the birth. Elvis grew up dirt-poor in Tupelo and Memphis and found work as a truck driver after high school. When he was 19, he walked into a Memphis recording studio and paid $4 to record a few songs as a present to his mother. Sam Philips, the owner of the studio, was intrigued by the rough, soulful quality of his voice and invited Presley back to practice with some local musicians. After Philips heard Elvis sing the rhythm-and-blues song "That's All Right," which Presley imbued with an accessible country-and-western flavor, he agreed to release the rendition as a single on his Sun Records label. The recording went to the top of the local charts, and Presley's career was launched.

During the next year, Elvis attracted a growing following in the South, and in 1955 Sun Records sold his contract to a major record label, the Radio Corporation of America (RCA), for a record $40,000. His first record for RCA was "Heartbreak Hotel," which made him a national sensation in early 1956. He followed this up with the double-sided hit record "Hound Dog"/"Don't Be Cruel." In September 1956, Elvis appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, a national variety television show, and teenagers went into hysterics over his dynamic stage presence, good looks, and simple but catchy songs. Many parents, however, were appalled by his sexually suggestive pelvic gyrations, and by his third appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, Elvis was filmed from only the waist up.

From 1956 through 1958, Elvis dominated the music charts and ushered in the age of rock and roll, opening doors for both white and black rock artists. During this period, he starred in four successful motion pictures, all of which featured his soundtracks: Love Me Tender (1956), Jailhouse Rock (1957), Loving You (1957), and King Creole (1958).

In 1958, Presley was drafted into the U.S. Army and served an 18-month tour of duty in West Germany as a Jeep driver. Teenage girls were overcome with grief, but Elvis' manager, Colonel Tom Parker, kept American youth satiated with stockpiled recordings that Presley made before his departure. All five singles released during this period eventually became million-sellers.

After being discharged as a sergeant in 1960, Elvis underwent a style change, eschewing edgy, rhythm-and-blues-inspired material in favor of romantic, dramatic ballads such as "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" He retired from concerts to concentrate on his musical films, and he made 27 in the 1960s, including G.I. Blues (1960), Blue Hawaii (1961), Girls! Girls! Girls! (1962), Viva Las Vegas (1964), and Frankie and Johnny (1966). In 1967, he married Priscilla Beaulieu, and the couple had a daughter, Lisa Marie, in 1968.

By the end of the 1960s, rock and roll had undergone dramatic changes, and Elvis was no longer seen as relevant by American youth. A 1968 television special won back many of his fans, but hits were harder to come by. His final Top 10 entry, "Burning Love," was in 1972. Still, he maintained his sizable fortune through lucrative concert and television appearances.

By the mid 1970s, Elvis was in declining physical and mental health. He divorced his wife in 1973 and developed a dangerous dependence on prescription drugs. He was also addicted to junk food and gained considerable weight. In the last two years of his life, he made erratic stage appearances and lived nearly as a recluse. On the afternoon of August 16, 1977, he was found unconscious in his Graceland mansion and rushed to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead. He was buried on the grounds of Graceland, which continues to attract fans and has been turned into a highly successful tourist attraction
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #2 on: August 17, 2004, 02:33:52 PM »
:pistols: 1877 Billy the Kid kills his first man  :2gun:  


Though only a teenager at the time, Billy the Kid wounds an Arizona blacksmith who dies the next day. He was the famous outlaw's first victim.

Just how many men Billy the Kid killed is uncertain. Billy himself reportedly once claimed he had killed 21 men-"one for every year of my life." A reliable contemporary authority estimated the actual total was more like nine-four on his own and five with the aid of others. Other western outlaws of the day were far more deadly. John Wesley Hardin, for example, killed well over 20 men and perhaps as many as 40.

Yet, William Bonney (at various times he also used the surnames Antrim and McCarty) is better remembered today than Hardin and other killers, perhaps because he appeared to be such an unlikely killer. Blue-eyed, smooth-cheeked, and unusually friendly, Billy seems to have been a decent young man who was dragged into a life of crime by circumstances beyond his control.

Such seems to have been the case for his first murder. Having fled from his home in New Mexico after being jailed for a theft he may not have committed, Billy became an itinerant ranch hand and sheepherder in Arizona. In 1877, he was hired on as a teamster at the Camp Grant Army Post, where he attracted the enmity of a burly civilian blacksmith named Frank "Windy" Cahill. Perhaps because Billy was well liked by others in the camp, Cahill enjoyed demeaning the scrawny youngster.

On this day in 1877, Cahill apparently went too far when he called Billy a "pimp." Billy responded by calling Cahill a "son of a bitch," and the big blacksmith jumped him and easily threw him to the ground. Pinned to the floor by the stronger man, Billy apparently panicked. He pulled his pistol and shot Cahill, who died the next day. According to one witness, "[Billy] had no choice; he had to use his equalizer." However, the rough laws of the West might have found Billy guilty of unjustified murder because Cahill had not pulled his own gun.

Fearing imprisonment, Billy returned to New Mexico where he soon became involved in the bloody Lincoln County War. In the next four years, he became a practiced and cold-blooded killer, increasingly infatuated with his own public image as an unstoppable outlaw. Sheriff Pat Garrett finally ended Billy's bloody career by killing him on July 14, 1881.
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #3 on: August 18, 2004, 02:53:59 PM »
1958 Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov is published  :newspaper:


On this day in 1958, Vladimir Nabokov's controversial novel Lolita is published in the U.S.

The novel, about a man's obsession with a 12-year-old girl :hitit: , had been rejected by four publishers before G.P. Putnam's Sons accepted it. The novel became a bestseller that allowed Nabokov to retire from his career as college professor.

Nabokov was born in 1899 in St. Petersburg, Russia, into a wealthy and privileged family. He lived in a St. Petersburg townhouse and on a country estate, and learned boxing, tennis, and chess. He grew up speaking both English and Russian, attended Cambridge, and inherited $2 million from an uncle. However, his family lost much of their wealth when the Russian Revolution forced them to flee to Germany. Nabokov earned money by teaching boxing and tennis, and creating Russian crossword puzzles. He worked during the day and wrote at night, sometimes in the bathroom so the light wouldn't bother his family. He wrote many novels and short stories in Russian. In 1939, the tall, athletic scholar was invited to Stanford to lecture on Slavic languages. He stayed in the U.S. for 20 years, teaching at Wellesley and Cornell, and pursuing an avid interest in butterflies. (In fact, he was a research fellow at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology and discovered several species and subspecies of butterflies.) He and his wife, Vera, spent summers driving around the U.S., staying in motels, and looking for butterflies. The motels, the American landscape, and butterflies all figure prominently in various works.

Nabokov's first novel in English was The Real Life of Sebastian Knight. His most successful books in the U.S. were Lolita and Ada (1969), a family chronicle about a childhood romance between two close relations, which becomes a lifelong obsession between the characters.

Nabokov and his wife returned to Europe in 1959, and he died in Switzerland in 1977.
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Offline Pornomonkey

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Event of the Day
« Reply #4 on: August 18, 2004, 11:36:54 PM »
August 18, 1996: Emilee Klein wins LPGA Weetabix Women's British Golf Open
August 18, 1991: Hurricane Bob hits NC with 115 MPH wind
August 18, 1977: 2 girls are killed by a runaway car outside of Graceland
August 18, 1961: Construction on Berlin Wall completed
August 18, 1943: Final convoy of Jews from Salonika Greece arrive at Auschwitz

I couldn't choose which to post, so I posted the ones most interesting to me :)

Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #5 on: August 20, 2004, 03:04:58 PM »
1962 Birth Of The T-Bird

The first 1963 Ford Thunderbird was produced on this day. Originally conceived as Ford's answer to the Corvette, the Thunderbird has enjoyed an illustrious place among American cars. It was promoted as a "personal" car rather than a sports car, so it never had to compete against imports and so experienced enormous success. Its name was eventually shortened to "T-Bird," as mentioned in the famous Beach Boys song, "I Get Around."
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Offline Slaughter

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Event of the Day
« Reply #6 on: August 20, 2004, 03:10:49 PM »
August 20, 1997 Shelly Moore, 18, of Tenn, crowned 15th Miss Teen USA
August 20, 1996 India defeat Pakistan in Under-15 World Challenge Final at Lord's
August 20, 1995 "Play's the Thing" closes at Criterion Theater NYC after 75 perfs
August 20, 1995 Indians' Jose Mesa sets record with his 37th consecutive save
August 20, 1995 Kerrie Webb wins LPGA Weetabix Women's British Golf Open
August 20, 1994 109.8¯F (43.2¯C) in Cordoba Spain
August 20, 1994 Archbishop Quarracino wants all homosexuals to leave Argentina
August 20, 1994 Ferry boat sinks at Chandpur Bangladesh, 300-350 killed
August 20, 1993 Colin Jackson runs world record 110m hurdles (12.91)
August 20, 1993 Howard Stern is fired from WLUP-AM, Chicago
August 20, 1993 Mother Teresa hospitalized with malaria
August 20, 1992 England get 7-363 in 55 overs vs Pakistan, then world ODI record
August 20, 1992 Rocker Sting weds Trudie Styler
August 20, 1991 After the attempted coup in the Soviet Union, Estonia declares
August 20, 1991 Norbert Rosza swims world record 100m breast stroke (1:01.29)
August 20, 1991 Dolphin Dan Marino surpasses Joe Montana as the highest paid NFL player with a 5-year extension for $25 million
August 20, 1991 Estonia declares it's independence from USSR itself independent
August 20, 1990 Gene Michael names NY Yankee VP/GM replacing Harding Peterson
August 20, 1990 George Steinbrenner steps down as NY Yankee owner
August 20, 1990 Iraq moves Western hostages to military installations (human shields)
August 20, 1990 NY Yankee Kevin Mass is quickest to reach 15 HRs (approx 132 at bat)
August 20, 1989 Aak crashes into pleasure boat The Margin on the Thames, 51 killed
August 20, 1989 Howard Johnson joins B Bonds & W Mays to hit 30 HRs & steal 30 bases
August 20, 1989 Janet B Evans swims female world record 800m freestyle (8:16.22)
August 20, 1989 Said Aouita runs world record 3000 m (7:29.45)
August 20, 1988 6.5 earthquake strikes India/Nepal, 1,000s killed
August 20, 1988 Yordanka Donkova of Bulgaria sets 100m hurdle woman's record (12.21)
August 20, 1986 Mail carrier Patrick Sherrill, Edmond Ok, shot 14 fellow workers dead
August 20, 1986 Phils Don Carmen perfect game bid is broken in 9th
August 20, 1985 1st NL pitcher to strike out 200+ in 1st 2 seasons (Dwight Gooden)
August 20, 1985 Israel ships 96 TOWs to Iran on behalf of US
August 20, 1985 Libya throws out 1000s Tunisian/Egyptian gas workers
August 20, 1985 Met Dwight Gooden strikes out 16 on way to his 13th consecutive win
August 20, 1985 Hanspeter Beck of South Australia, finishes a 3,875 mile, 51 day trip from Western Australia to Melbourne on a unicycle
August 20, 1983 Miss National Teen-Ager
August 20, 1982 Don Lever becomes 1st captain of NJ Devils
August 20, 1982 US marines land in Beirut Lebanon
August 20, 1980 Mt Everest climbed by Italian Reinhold Messner, alone
August 20, 1980 NY Yankee Bob Watson hits Seattle Kingdome speaker, 2nd straight day
August 20, 1980 Pitts Omar Moreno steals record 70 bases for 3rd consecutive season
August 20, 1980 Reinhold Messner of Italy is 1st to solo ascent Mt Everest
August 20, 1980 Cleve Dan Spillner, 545 ERA, is 2 outs from a no-hitter when White Sox rookie Leo Sutherland singles
August 20, 1980 UN Security Council condemns (14-0, US abstains) Israeli declaration that all of Jersualem is it's capital
August 20, 1979 India premier Charan Singh resigns
August 20, 1979 Singer Vikki Carr & Michael Nilsson wed
August 20, 1978 Gunmen open fire on an Israeli El Al Airline bus in London
August 20, 1978 Mark Vinchesi of Amherst Mass keeps a frisbee aloft 15.2 seconds
August 20, 1978 Sandra Post wins LPGA Lady Stroh's Golf Open
August 20, 1978 Tatyana Providokhina runs female world record 1k (2:30.6)
August 20, 1977 NASA launches Voyager 2 towards Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus & Neptune
August 20, 1975 Il-62 crashes south of Damascus, Syria, killing 126
August 20, 1975 Viking 1 launched to orbit around Mars, soft landing
August 20, 1974 Brooklyn pitcher Dan Bankhead is 1st black to homer in his 1st at bat
August 20, 1974 Nelson Rockefeller becomes VP
August 20, 1974 Nolan Ryan pitch measured at record 161.6 kph (100.4 mph)
August 20, 1974 Pres Gerald Ford, assumes office after Richard Nixon's resignation
August 20, 1972 Kathy Whitworth wins LPGA Southgate Ladies Golf Open
August 20, 1972 USSR performs underground nuclear test
August 20, 1971 FBI begins covert investigation of journalist Daniel Schorr
August 20, 1970 Hurricane Dorothy, kills 42 in Martinique
August 20, 1969 69 cm rainfall in Nelson Co., Virginia (state record)
August 20, 1968 650,000 Warsaw Pact troops invade Czechoslovakia
August 20, 1968 USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
August 20, 1967 Alvin Dark (52-69) is fired, rehired, & fired again as manager of A's
August 20, 1967 Kathy Whitworth wins LPGA Women's Western Golf Open
August 20, 1966 Beatles pelted with rotten fruit during Memphis concert
August 20, 1965 Rolling Stones release "Satisfaction" (their 1st #1 US hit)
August 20, 1965 Eddie Mathews & Hank Aaron (1954-65) pass Babe Ruth-Lou Gehrig hitting 772 HRs while playing together on the same team
August 20, 1964 LBJ signs anti-poverty measure totaling nearly $1 billion
August 20, 1964 President Johnson signs Economic Opportunity Act
August 20, 1964 Rex Sellers bowls 5-1-17-0 v India in only Test Cricket innings
August 20, 1964 Yankee Phil Linz plays harmonica on bus despite Yogi Berra's orders
August 20, 1962 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR
August 20, 1961 Phillies set then dubious record of 23 straight loses, beat Braves
August 20, 1961 East Germany begins erecting 5' high wall along the border with the west to replace the barbed wire put up Aug 13
August 20, 1960 Senegal breaks from Mali federation, declaring independence
August 20, 1960 USSR recovers 2 dogs, 1st living organisms to return from space
August 20, 1959 Belgium shortens conscription to 12 months
August 20, 1958 Cubs use 1st baseman Dale Long as their 1st lefty catcher since 1906
August 20, 1958 Dale Long becomes 1st major league lefty catcher in 52 years
August 20, 1958 Detroit Tiger Jim Bunning no-hits Boston Red Sox, 3-0
August 20, 1957 "Simply Heavenly" opens at Playhouse Theater NYC for 62 performances
August 20, 1957 Chic White Sox Bob Keegan no-hits Wash Senators, 6-0
August 20, 1957 USAAF ballon breaks an altitude record at 102,000' (310,896 m)
August 20, 1957 White Sox Bob Keegan no-hits Senators 6-0
August 20, 1956 Republicans convene at Cow Palace
August 20, 1955 1st airplane to exceed 1800 mph (2897 kph)-HA Hanes, Palmdale Ca
August 20, 1955 Hundreds killed in anti-French rioting in Morocco & Algeria
August 20, 1953 General Fazlollah Zahedi arrests premier Mossadeq of Persia
August 20, 1953 Russia publicly acknowledges hydrogen bomb test detonation
August 20, 1952 Stalin meets Chou Enlai
August 20, 1949 78,382 watch White Sox play Indians at Cleveland
August 20, 1949 Hungary (Magyar People's Republic) accepts constitution
August 20, 1948 15th NFL Chicago All-Star Game: Chi Cards 28, All-Stars 0 (101,220)
August 20, 1948 US expels Soviet Consul General in New York, Jacob Lomakin
August 20, 1947 Boston Braves hit a million attendance for 1st time
August 20, 1947 Turner Caldwell in D-558-I sets aircraft speed record, 1131 kph
August 20, 1945 Dodgers Tommy Brown, 17, is youngest player to hit a HR
August 20, 1945 Robert Hamilton wins PGA golf tournament
August 20, 1945 Russian troops occupy Harbin & Mukden
August 20, 1945 Tommy Brown, Bkln Dodger becomes youngest HR hitter (17)
August 20, 1944 "Anna Lucasta," opens on Broadway
August 20, 1944 26th PGA Championship: Bob Hamilton at Manito G & CC Spokane Wash
August 20, 1944 Gen de Gaulle returns to France
August 20, 1944 Russian offensive at Jassy & Kisjinev
August 20, 1944 US & British forces destroy German 7th Army at Falaise-Argentan Gap
August 20, 1942 Dim-out regulations implemented in SF
August 20, 1941 Police raid 11th district of Paris, takes 4,000+ Jewish males
August 20, 1940 1st Polish squadrons fight along in the Battle of Britain
August 20, 1940 Leon Trotsky, revolutionary, icepicked by Frank Jackson, dies Aug 21
August 20, 1940 British PM Churchill says of Royal Air Force, "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few"
August 20, 1939 1st black bowling league formed (National Bowling Assoc)
August 20, 1939 Russ offensive under gen Zjoekov against Jap invasion in Mongolia
August 20, 1938 Lou Gehrig hits record 23rd & last grand slam
August 20, 1935 Milt coup by General Pons & president Ibarra in Ecuador
August 20, 1934 Ponsford out for 266 in his final Test Cricket match
August 20, 1931 45th US Womens Tennis: Helen Moody beats Eileen Whitingstall (64 61)
August 20, 1930 Bradman scores 232 in 5th Test Cricket at The Oval
August 20, 1930 Dumont's 1st TV broadcast for home reception (NYC)
August 20, 1929 1st airship flight around Earth flying eastward completed
August 20, 1926 Uprising against Reza Shah Pahlawi in Persia
August 20, 1925 WJR-AM in Detroit MI begins radio transmissions
August 20, 1923 London harbor strike ends
August 20, 1922 1st world championship athletics for women, held in Paris
August 20, 1921 35th US Womens Tennis: Molla B Mallory beats M Browne (46 64 62)
August 20, 1920 1st US coml radio, 8MK (WWJ), Detroit began daily broadcasting
August 20, 1920 Allen Woodring wins Oympic 200 m dash wearing borrowed shoes
August 20, 1920 Israel publishes it's 1st medical journal "Ha-Refuah"
August 20, 1920 Preliminary meeting in Akron to form American Pro Football League
August 20, 1920 Red Sox-Indians game postponed in Boston to allow Indian players to attend Ray Chapman's funeral in Cleveland
August 20, 1919 Wichita outfielder Joe Wilhoit (Western League) fails to get a hit, ending a 69-game streak (155 hits in 299 at bats for a .505 avg)
August 20, 1918 Britain opens offensive on Western front during WW I
August 20, 1915 Italy declares war on Turkey
August 20, 1915 White Sox obtain Joe Jackson from Cleve in exchange for Robert Roth, Larry Chappell, Ed Klepfer, & $31,500
August 20, 1914 Battle of Bounderies: Lorraine, Ardennen, Sambre & Meuse, Mons
August 20, 1914 Battle at Gumbinnen, East-Prussia: Russian beat Germans
August 20, 1914 Battle at Morhange: German troops chase French, killing 1000s
August 20, 1914 Bavarian troops kill 50 inhabitants of Nomeny France
August 20, 1914 German army captured Brussels as the Belgian army retreated to Antwerp
August 20, 1913 1st pilot to parachute from an aircraft (Adolphe PÇgoud-France)
August 20, 1913 Piotr Nesterow 1st flight (Kiev Ukraine)
August 20, 1912 Plant Quarantine Act goes into effect
August 20, 1912 Wash Senator Carl Cushion no-hits Cleve Indians, 2-0 in 6 innings
August 20, 1910 US supported opposition brings down Madriz in Nicaragua
August 20, 1908 Congo Free State becomes Belgian Congo
August 20, 1901 Fawcett committee visits Mafeking concentration camp in Cape Colony
August 20, 1900 Great Britain beats France in cricket in Olympic Games
August 20, 1896 Dial telephone patented
August 20, 1895 Start of Sherlock Holmes "Adventure of Norwood Builder" (BG)
August 20, 1893 Shechita (ritual slaughtering) prohibited in Switzerland
August 20, 1888 Longest US men's single tournament match Palmer Presbrey defeats T S Tailer, 19-21, 8-6, 6-1, 6-4, an 80-game 1st-round contest
August 20, 1882 Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" opens in Moscow
August 20, 1879 Govt Kappeijne of Coppello resigns
August 20, 1866 Pres Andrew Johnson formally declares Civil War over
August 20, 1865 Pres Johnson proclaims an end to "insurrection" in Tx
August 20, 1864 8th/last day of battle at Deep Bottom Run Va (about 3900 casualties)
August 20, 1861 Skirmish at Jonesboro MO
August 20, 1856 Wilberforce University forms in Ohio
August 20, 1852 Steamer "Atlantic" collided with fishing boat, sinks with 250 aboard
August 20, 1795 Joseph Haydn returns to Vienna from England
August 20, 1794 Gen Mad Anthony Wayne defeated the Indians at Fallen Timbers Ohio
August 20, 1791 Danish navigator Vitus Jonas Bering discovers Alaska
August 20, 1781 George Washington begins to move his troops south to fight Cornwallis
August 20, 1745 Bonnie Prince Charlie reaches Blair Castle Scotland
August 20, 1741 Alaska discovered by Danish explorer Vitus Bering
August 20, 1648 Battle of Lens: French duke d'Enghien defeats Spaniards
August 20, 1641 Britain & Scotland sign Treaty of Pacification
August 20, 1619 1st Black slaves brought by Dutch to colony of Jamestown Virginia
August 20, 1604 Spanish garrison of Sluis surrenders to count Maurice
August 20, 1597 1st Dutch East India Company ships returned from Far East
August 20, 1585 English queen Elizabeth I signs Treaty of Nonsuch: aid to Netherland
August 20, 1566 Iconoclasm reaches Antwerp Belgium
August 20, 1534 Turkish Admiral Chaireddin"Barbarossa" occupies Tunis
August 20, 1191 Crusader King Richard I kills 3,000 muslim prisoners in Akko
August 20, 917 Battle at Anchialus: Bulgaria army counter attacks Byzantines
August 20, 636 Battle at Yarmuk: Moslems beat Byzantines [or August 15]
August 20, 573 Gregory of Tours selected bishop of Tours
August 20, 2 Venus-Jupiter in conjunction-Star of Bethlehem(?)

Offline Drew

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Event of the Day
« Reply #7 on: August 20, 2004, 07:49:43 PM »
Okay we get it, you know how to use google.  Oh and on topic:

August 20, 2004:  Drew makes various sarcastic posts on www.humpfest.ca
Now if you'll excuse me, I have some death to defy.

Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #8 on: August 21, 2004, 04:08:05 PM »
1911 The Mona Lisa is stolen :ph34r:  :batman:


In perhaps the most brazen art theft of all time, Vincenzo Peruggia walks into the Louvre, in France, heads straight for the infamous Mona Lisa, removes it from the wall, hides it beneath his clothes, and escapes. When an amateur painter set up his easel a few minutes later, he noticed that Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece was missing and notified the guards.

While the entire nation of France was stunned, theories abounded as to what could have happened to the invaluable artwork. Most believed that professional thieves could not have been involved because they would have realized that it would be too dangerous to try to sell the world's most famous painting. A popular rumor in Paris was that the Germans had stolen it to humiliate the French.

Investigators and detectives searched for the painting for more than two years without finding any decent leads. Then, in November 1913, Italian art dealer Alfredo Geri received a letter from a man calling himself Leonard. It indicated that the Mona Lisa was in Florence and would be returned for a hefty ransom. When Peruggia attempted to receive the ransom, he was captured. The painting was unharmed.

Peruggia, a former employee of the Louvre, claimed that he had acted out of a patriotic duty to avenge Italy on behalf of Napoleon. But prior robbery convictions and a diary with a list of art collectors led most to think that he had acted solely out of greed. Peruggia served seven months of a one-year sentence and later served in the Italian army during the First World War. The Mona Lisa is back in the Louvre, where better security measures now protect it.
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #9 on: August 23, 2004, 03:11:20 PM »
1979 Aleksandr Godunov defects to United States


Russian ballet star Aleksandr Godunov defects to the United States after a performance in New York City. He became the first dancer to defect from the prestigious Bolshoi Ballet.

Godunov was the latest in a string of Soviet ballet dancers to defect to the United States in the 1960s and 1970s. Rudolf Nureyev (1961), Natalia Makarova (1970), and Mikhail Baryshnikov (1974) had all sought and received asylum in the United States and went on to pursue successful dance careers in America and around the world. Godunov was in a different class, however. A New York Times article discussing his defection stated that "with his mane of long blond hair and powerful tall build, Mr. Godunov may well be the premier danseur of the rock generation. ...Young audiences identify with him totally." That may have been the problem for Godunov. Beginning in 1974, he was banned from performing anywhere outside of Russia for four years because his "hippie-like demeanor both on and offstage may have been too flamboyant." Godunov's defection in August 1979 was also noteworthy because he was the first dancer from the prestigious Bolshoi Ballet to seek asylum in America. The previous defectors had been from the Kiev opera company. For decades, the Bolshoi had been Russia's cultural jewel, touring the world numerous times. Godunov's departure was a serious blow. His wife, Ludmila Vlasova, did not join her husband in defecting and returned with the Bolshoi Company to Russia.

For the next three years, Godunov danced with some of the most impressive dance companies in America, including the American Ballet Theater and the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater. He also pursued an acting career in Hollywood, appearing in many films, including Die Hard and Witness. Godunov died in 1995.
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #10 on: August 24, 2004, 08:08:59 PM »
VESUVIUS ERUPTS:
August 24, 79 A.D.   :burn:  :flamed:


After centuries of dormancy, Mount Vesuvius erupts in southern Italy, devastating the prosperous Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum and killing thousands. The cities, buried under a thick layer of volcanic material and mud, were never rebuilt and largely forgotten in the course of history. In the 18th century, Pompeii and Herculaneum were rediscovered and excavated, providing an unprecedented archaeological record of the everyday life of an ancient civilization, startlingly preserved in sudden death.

The ancient cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum thrived near the base of Mount Vesuvius at the Bay of Naples. In the time of the early Roman Empire, 20,000 people lived in Pompeii, including merchants, manufacturers, and farmers who exploited the rich soil of the region with numerous vineyards and orchards. None suspected that the black fertile earth was the legacy of earlier eruptions of Mount Vesuvius. Herculaneum was a city of 5,000 and a favorite summer destination for rich Romans. Named for the mythic hero Hercules, Herculaneum housed opulent villas and grand Roman baths. Gambling artifacts found in Herculaneum and a brothel unearthed in Pompeii attest to the decadent nature of the cities. There were smaller resort communities in the area as well, such as the quiet little town of Stabiae.

At noon on August 24, 79 A.D., this pleasure and prosperity came to an end when the peak of Mount Vesuvius exploded, propelling a 10-mile mushroom cloud of ash and pumice into the stratosphere. For the next 12 hours, volcanic ash and a hail of pumice stones up to 3 inches in diameter showered Pompeii, forcing the city's occupants to flee in terror. Some 2,000 people stayed in Pompeii, holed up in cellars or stone structures, hoping to wait out the eruption.

A westerly wind protected Herculaneum from the initial stage of the eruption, but then a giant cloud of hot ash and gas surged down the western flank of Vesuvius, engulfing the city and burning or asphyxiating all who remained. This lethal cloud was followed by a flood of volcanic mud and rock, burying the city.

The people who remained in Pompeii were killed on the morning of August 25 when a cloud of toxic gas poured into the city, suffocating all that remained. A flow of rock and ash followed, collapsing roofs and walls and burying the dead.

Much of what we know about the eruption comes from an account by Pliny the Younger, who was staying west along the Bay of Naples when Vesuvius exploded. In two letters to the historian Tacitus, he told of how "people covered their heads with pillows, the only defense against a shower of stones," and of how "a dark and horrible cloud charged with combustible matter suddenly broke and set forth. Some bewailed their own fate. Others prayed to die." Pliny, only 17 at the time, escaped the catastrophe and later became a noted Roman writer and administrator. His uncle, Pliny the Elder, was less lucky. Pliny the Elder, a celebrated naturalist, at the time of the eruption was the commander of the Roman fleet in the Bay of Naples. After Vesuvius exploded, he took his boats across the bay to Stabiae, to investigate the eruption and reassure terrified citizens. After going ashore, he was overcome by toxic gas and died.

According to Pliny the Younger's account, the eruption lasted 18 hours. Pompeii was buried under 14 to 17 feet of ash and pumice, and the nearby seacoast was drastically changed. Herculaneum was buried under more than 60 feet of mud and volcanic material. Some residents of Pompeii later returned to dig out their destroyed homes and salvage their valuables, but many treasures were left and then forgotten.

In the 18th century, a well digger unearthed a marble statue on the site of Herculaneum. The local government excavated some other valuable art objects, but the project was abandoned. In 1748, a farmer found traces of Pompeii beneath his vineyard. Since then, excavations have gone on nearly without interruption until the present. In 1927, the Italian government resumed the excavation of Herculaneum, retrieving numerous art treasures, including bronze and marble statues and paintings.

The remains of 2,000 men, women, and children were found at Pompeii. After perishing from asphyxiation, their bodies were covered with ash that hardened and preserved the outline of their bodies. Later, their bodies decomposed to skeletal remains, leaving a kind of plaster mold behind. Archaeologists who found these molds filled the hollows with plaster, revealing in grim detail the death pose of the victims of Vesuvius. The rest of the city is likewise frozen in time, and ordinary objects that tell the story of everyday life in Pompeii are as valuable to archaeologists as the great unearthed statues and frescoes. It was not until 1982 that the first human remains were found at Herculaneum, and these hundreds of skeletons bear ghastly burn marks that testifies to horrifying deaths.

Today, Mount Vesuvius is the only active volcano on the European mainland. Its last eruption was in 1944 and its last major eruption was in 1631. Another eruption is expected in the near future, would could be devastating for the 700,000 people who live in the "death zones" around Vesuvius.
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Offline Bob

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Event of the Day
« Reply #11 on: August 26, 2004, 02:58:16 PM »
August 26

1980 A 1,000-pound bomb is discovered in a Nevada casino   :help:


Workers at Harvey's Resort and Casino in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, discover a 1,000-pound bomb disguised as a copy machine in an executive suite. A ransom note that had been attached to the massive explosive demanded $3 million to be paid in return for instructions on how to defuse the bomb.

As experts from the bomb squad examined the complex, handmade explosive containing a control box with 28 switches, the hotel was evacuated and the adjoining streets shut down. However, the nearby casino remained open to the skeptical gamblers who refused to leave.

The extortionist demanded that a helicopter fly $3 million in cash to an area south of the Lake Tahoe airport where a strobe light would give further coded instructions. But when the FBI violated the ransom instructions by contacting the helicopter by radio, the plan went awry and the bomb squad was left to dismantle the bomb.

From the Sahara Tahoe Hotel, experts tried to disassemble the bomb with robots. Unfortunately, they were unsuccessful: The bomb exploded, demolishing the hotel. Luckily, none of the gamblers were killed.

After remaining at large for nearly a year, the four perpetrators were arrested by FBI agents in 1981. John Waldo Birges, who had lost a large amount of money at the casino in the months before the bomb exploded, orchestrated the plan with the help from his girlfriend, Ella Williams, and two other men. His sons later testified that he stole the TNT from a construction site. Birges was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Harvey's Resort and Casino was eventually rebuilt
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Offline Bob

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« Reply #12 on: August 27, 2004, 04:51:00 PM »
1963 A 15-year-old murders his grandparents  :evilhappy:  :evilhappy:  :evilhappy:


Fifteen-year-old Edmund Kemper kills his grandparents with a rifle. Kemper, whose later crimes would be even more horrific, then called his mother and told her, "I just wondered how it would feel to shoot Grandma."

Seriously disturbed from an early age, Kemper chopped off the heads of his sister's dolls and tortured his family's cats. He buried one cat alive, then dug up the body, decapitated it, and displayed the head in his bedroom. Rather than seek professional care for the child, his mother shipped him off to live with his grandparents.

Following the murder of his grandparents, Kemper was sent to the Atascadero State Hospital, where he tried to convince psychiatrists that he should never be released. However, for reasons never explained, Kemper was released in 1969, then standing 6 feet, 9 inches tall and weighing over 300 pounds.

Three years later, Kemper picked up two college girls who were hitchhiking in northern California. He stabbed them to death and then mutilated their bodies. Over the next year, Kemper found four more young female victims. He cut off each of their heads and kept some of them at his home. He often committed unspeakable acts with the dead bodies, and purportedly ate parts of his victims.

When police began looking for the "Coed Killer," Kemper was so bold as to befriend some of them. On Easter in 1973, he went back to his mother's house and beat her to death with a hammer before having sex with her body. He then called her friend and invited her over to dinner. She, too, met the same fate.

After this double murder, Kemper drove to Colorado and called the Santa Cruz police department to confess. They hung up on him at first, not believing his tale. But he persisted until his story was checked out. In 1973, Kemper was convicted of eight counts of murder and sentenced to life in prison, despite his own testimony that "death by torture" was the most appropriate punishment.

Interviewers looking for a glimpse into Kemper's twisted mind found some disturbing evidence. When asked what he thought when he saw a pretty girl, he said, "One side of me says, I'd like to talk to her, date her. The other side of me says, I wonder how her head would look on a stick."
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Offline Bob

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« Reply #13 on: August 28, 2004, 02:27:57 PM »
KING'S "I HAVE A DREAM" SPEECH:   :blahblah:
August 28, 1963


On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the African American civil rights movement reaches its high-water mark when Martin Luther King, Jr., speaks to more than 200,000 people attending the March on Washington. The demonstrators--black and white, poor and rich--came together in the nation's capital to demand voting rights and equal opportunity for African Americans and to appeal for an end to racial segregation and discrimination.

The peaceful rally was the largest assembly for a redress of grievances that the capital had ever seen, and King was the last speaker. With the statue of Abraham Lincoln--the Great Emancipator--towering behind him, King evoked the rhetorical talents he had developed as a Baptist preacher to articulate how the "Negro is still not free." He told of the struggle ahead, stressing the importance of continued action and nonviolent protest. Coming to the end of his prepared text (which, like other speakers that day, he had limited to seven minutes), he was overwhelmed by the moment and launched into an improvised sermon.

He told the hushed crowd, "Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettoes of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed." Continuing, he began the refrain that made the speech one of the best known in U.S. history, second only to Lincoln's 1863 "Gettysburg Address":

"I have a dream," he boomed over the crowd stretching from the Lincoln Memorial to the Washington Monument, "that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.' I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today."

King had used the "I have a dream" theme before, in a handful of stump speeches, but never with the force and effectiveness of that hot August day in Washington. He equated the civil rights movement with the highest and noblest ideals of the American tradition, and for many Americans--white and black--the importance of racial equality was seen with a new and blinding clarity. He ended his stirring, 16-minute speech with his vision of the fruit of racial harmony:

"When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!'"

In the year after the March on Washington, the civil rights movement achieved two of its greatest successes: the ratification of the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished the poll tax and thus a barrier to poor African American voters in the South; and the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited racial discrimination in employment and education and outlawed racial segregation in public facilities. In October 1964, Martin Luther King, Jr., was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. On April 4, 1968, he was shot to death while standing on a motel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee; the gunman was escaped convict James Earl Ray.
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Offline Bob

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« Reply #14 on: August 30, 2004, 12:19:57 AM »
1949 Soviets explode atomic bomb


At a remote test site at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, the USSR successfully detonates its first atomic bomb, code name "First Lightning." In order to measure the effects of the blast, the Soviet scientists constructed buildings, bridges, and other civilian structures in the vicinity of the bomb. They also placed animals in cages nearby so that they could test the effects of nuclear radiation on human-like mammals. The atomic explosion, which at 20 kilotons was roughly equal to "Trinity," the first U.S. atomic explosion, destroyed those structures and incinerated the animals.

According to legend, the Soviet physicists who worked on the bomb were honored for the achievement based on the penalties they would have suffered had the test failed. Those who would have been executed by the Soviet government if the bomb had failed to detonate were honored as "Heroes of Socialist Labor," and those who would have been merely imprisoned were given "The Order of Lenin," a slightly less prestigious award.

On September 3, a U.S. spy plane flying off the coast of Siberia picked up the first evidence of radioactivity from the explosion. Later that month, President Harry S. Truman announced to the American people that the Soviets too had the bomb. Three months later, Klaus Fuchs, a German-born physicist who had helped the United States build its first atomic bombs, was arrested for passing nuclear secrets to the Soviets. While stationed at U.S. atomic development headquarters during World War II, Fuchs had given the Soviets precise information about the U.S. atomic program, including a blueprint of the "Fat Man" atomic bomb later dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, and everything the Los Alamos scientists knew about the hypothesized hydrogen bomb. The revelations of Fuchs' espionage, coupled with the loss of U.S. atomic supremacy, led President Truman to order development of the hydrogen bomb, a weapon theorized to be hundreds of times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped on Japan.

On November 1, 1952, the United States successfully detonated "Mike," the world's first hydrogen bomb, on the Elugelab Atoll in the Pacific Marshall Islands. The 10.4-megaton thermonuclear device instantly vaporized an entire island and left behind a crater more than a mile wide. Three years later, on November 22, 1955, the Soviet Union detonated its first hydrogen bomb on the same principle of radiation implosion. Both superpowers were now in possession of the so-called "superbomb," and the world lived under the threat of thermonuclear war for the first time in history.
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