John Calvin (1509–1564) was an influential French theologian and pastor
during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the
development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism.
Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he suddenly broke from the
Roman Catholic Church in the 1520s. After religious tensions provoked a
violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel,
Switzerland, where in 1536 he published the first edition of his
seminal work Institutes of the Christian Religion. Calvin was mainly
based in Geneva where he promoted reforms in the church. He introduced
new forms of church government and liturgy, despite the opposition of
several powerful families in the city. Calvin's writing and preaching
provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The
Presbyterian and other Reformed churches, which look to Calvin as a
chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world.
Calvin's thought exerted considerable influence over major religious
figures and entire religious movements, such as Puritanism, and his
ideas have been cited as contributing to the rise of capitalism,
individualism, and representative democracy in the West.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Calvin>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1553:
Four days after the death of her predecessor, Edward VI, Lady Jane Grey
was officially proclaimed Queen of England, beginning her reign as the
"The Nine Days' Queen".
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Jane_Grey>
1796:
German mathematician and scientist Carl Friedrich Gauss discovered that
every positive integer is representable as a sum of at most three
triangular numbers.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Friedrich_Gauss>
1800:
Lord Wellesley, Governor-General of the British Raj, founded Fort
William College in Fort William, India, to promote Bengali, Hindi and
other vernaculars of the subcontinent.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_William_College>
1941:
The Holocaust: Approximately 40 non-Jewish ethnic Poles from around the
nearby area mass murdered hundreds of Jewish residents of Jedwabne in
occupied Poland .
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jedwabne_pogrom>
1976:
An industrial accident in a chemical manufacturing plant near Milan,
Italy, resulted in the highest known exposure to
2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin in residential populations, which
gave rise to numerous scientific studies and standardized industrial
safety regulations.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seveso_disaster>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
purport (v):
1. To convey, imply, or profess outwardly.
2. To intend
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/purport>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Science is but a perversion of itself unless it has as its ultimate
goal the betterment of humanity.
--Nikola Tesla
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla>
Gropecunt Lane was a street name found in English towns and cities
during the Middle Ages, believed to be a reference to the prostitution
centred on those areas; it was normal practice for a medieval street
name to reflect the street's function, or the economic activity taking
place within it. Gropecunt, the earliest known use of which is in about
1230, appears to have been derived as a compound of the words "grope"
and "cunt". Streets with that name were often in the busiest parts of
medieval towns and cities, and at least one appears to have been an
important thoroughfare. Although the name was once common throughout
England, changes in attitude resulted in it being replaced by more
innocuous versions such as Grape Lane. Gropecunt was last recorded as a
street name in 1561.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gropecunt_Lane>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1789:
French Revolution: The National Constituent Assembly was formed from
the National Assembly, and began to function as a governing body and a
drafter for a new constitution.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Constituent_Assembly>
1868:
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, including
the Citizenship Clause, the Equal Protection Clause and the Privileges
or Immunities Clause among others, was ratified by the minimum required
twenty-eight U.S. states.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Cons…>
1944:
World War II: American forces defeated Japanese on the island of Saipan
in the Mariana Islands.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Saipan>
1955:
The Russell-Einstein Manifesto, signed by Albert Einstein, Bertrand
Russell and nine other preeminent intellectuals and scientists, was
issued during a press conference in London in the midst of the Cold
War, calling for a conference where scientists would assess the dangers
posed to the survival of humanity by weapons of mass destruction.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pugwash_Conferences_on_Science_and_World_Affai…>
1999:
Six days of student protests began after Iranian police attacked a
University of Tehran dormitory following a peaceful student
demonstration against the closure of the reformist newspaper Salam.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_student_protests%2C_July_1999>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
cadre (n):
1. A frame or framework.
2. (military) The framework or skeleton upon which a regiment is to be
formed; the officers of a regiment forming the staff.
3. The core of a managing group
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cadre>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Nature is busy creating absolutely unique individuals, whereas culture
has invented a single mold to which all must conform. It is grotesque.
--U. G. Krishnamurti
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/U._G._Krishnamurti>
Kevin Pietersen (born 1980) is an English cricketer. He is an attacking
right-handed batsman and occasional off spin bowler who plays for
Hampshire County Cricket Club, England, and was captain of the Indian
Premier League team Royal Challengers Bangalore. He was captain of the
England Test and One Day International teams from 4 August 2008 to 7
January 2009. He resigned after just three tests and nine One Day
Internationals, following a dispute with England coach Peter Moores,
who was sacked the same day. He made his first-class debut for Natal in
1997 before moving to England after voicing his displeasure at the
racial quota system in place in South Africa, and to further his
opportunities for playing at international level. He made his
international debut in the One Day International match against Zimbabwe
in 2004, and his Test match debut in the 2005 Ashes series against
Australia the following year. Pietersen became the fastest batsman to
reach both 1000 and 2000 runs in One Day International cricket, and has
the highest average of any England player to have played more than 20
innings of one-day cricket. In July 2008, after a century against South
Africa, The Times called him "the most complete batsman in cricket".
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Pietersen>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1579:
Our Lady of Kazan , a holy icon of the Russian Orthodox Church, was
discovered underground in Kazan, present-day Tatarstan, Russia.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_Kazan>
1709:
Great Northern War: Peter I of Russia defeated Charles XII of Sweden in
Poltava, Ukraine, effectively ending Sweden's role as a major power in
Europe.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Poltava>
1859:
Charles XV became King of Sweden and Norway following the death of his
father Oscar I.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_XV_of_Sweden>
1947:
After various news agencies reported the capture of a "flying disc" by
U.S. Air Force personnel from the Roswell Army Air Field in Roswell,
New Mexico, the U.S. Military issued another press release maintaining
that what was actually recovered was debris from an experimental
high-altitude surveillance weather balloon.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_UFO_Incident>
2004:
After a 19-month trial, U.S. Marine Corps Major Michael Brown was
convicted by a court in Naha, Okinawa for an attempted indecent assault
on a Filipina bartender.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Brown_Okinawa_assault_incident>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
oilskin (n):
1. Cloth made from cotton and treated with oil and pigment to make it
waterproof.
2. A raincoat made from cotton fabric treated this way.
3. (by
extension) Foul-weather gear worn by sailors, whether of natural or
synthetic materials
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/oilskin>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
As far as service goes, it can take the form of a million things. To do
service, you don't have to be a doctor working in the slums for free,
or become a social worker. Your position in life and what you do
doesn't matter as much as how you do what you do.
--Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Elisabeth_K%C3%BCbler-Ross>
Thriller is the sixth studio album by American recording artist Michael
Jackson. The album was released on November 30, 1982, by Epic Records
as the follow-up to Jackson's critically and commercially successful
1979 album Off the Wall. Thriller explores similar genres to those of
Off the Wall, including funk, disco, soul, soft rock, R&B and pop.
However, Thriller's lyrics deal with generally darker themes, including
paranoia and the supernatural. With the release of the second single
"Billie Jean", the album topped the charts in many countries. In just
over a year, Thriller became—and currently remains—the best-selling
album of all time. Seven of the album's nine songs were released as
singles, and all reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. The album
won a record-breaking eight Grammy Awards at the 1984 Grammys. The
album was one of the first to use music videos as successful
promotional tools—the videos for Thriller, "Billie Jean" and "Beat It"
all received regular rotation on MTV. Thriller ranked number 20 on
Rolling Stone magazine's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list in 2003,
and was preserved by the Library of Congress to the National Recording
Registry, as it was deemed "culturally significant".
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thriller_%28album%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1585:
The Treaty of Nemours was first signed, forcing Henry III of France to
give in to the demands of the Catholic League and revoking all edicts
granting concessions to the Huguenots.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Nemours>
1798:
The Quasi-War, an undeclared war fought entirely at sea, began after
the United States rescinded their treaties with France.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasi-War>
1807:
Tsar Alexander I of Russia and Napoleon I of France signed the first
agreement of the Treaties of Tilsit, ending the War of the Fourth
Coalition.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaties_of_Tilsit>
1928:
The Chillicothe Baking Company in Chillicothe, Missouri, USA, first
produced sliced bread, advertised as "the greatest forward step in the
baking industry since bread was wrapped", which then led to the popular
phrase "the greatest thing since sliced bread".
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/sliced_bread>
1937:
The Imperial Japanese Army defeated the Republic of China's National
Revolutionary Army on Beijing's Marco Polo Bridge, marking the
beginning of the Second Sino-Japanese War.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_Polo_Bridge_Incident>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
tectiform (adj):
Roof-shaped; sloping downwards on two sides from a raised center
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tectiform>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Do not confuse "duty" with what other people expect of you; they are
utterly different. Duty is a debt you owe to yourself to fulfill
obligations you have assumed voluntarily. Paying that debt can entail
anything from years of patient work to instant willingness to die.
Difficult it may be, but the reward is self-respect.
--Robert A. Heinlein
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_A._Heinlein>
The fauna of Scotland is generally typical of the north-west European
part of the Palearctic ecozone, although several of the country's
larger mammals were hunted to extinction in historic times and human
activity has also led to various species of wildlife being introduced.
Scotland's diverse temperate environments support 62 species of wild
mammals, including a population of Wild Cats, important numbers of Grey
and Harbour Seals and the most northerly colony of Bottlenose Dolphins
in the world. Many populations of moorland birds, including Blackcock
and the Red Grouse, live here, and the country has internationally
significant nesting grounds for seabirds such as the Northern Gannet.
The Golden Eagle has become a national icon, and White-tailed Eagles
and Ospreys have recently re-colonised the land. The Scottish Crossbill
is the only endemic vertebrate species in the British Isles. Scotland's
seas are among the most biologically productive in the world; it is
estimated that the total number of Scottish marine species exceeds
40,000. An estimated 14,000 species of insect, including rare bees and
butterflies protected by conservation action plans, inhabit Scotland.
Conservation agencies in the UK are concerned that climate change,
especially its potential effects on mountain plateaus and marine life,
threaten much of the fauna of Scotland.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fauna_of_Scotland>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1415:
The Council of Constance executed Jan Hus , founder of the Christian
Hussite reform movement, for committing heresy.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussite>
1887:
King Kalākaua of Hawai'i was forced to sign the Bayonet Constitution,
stripping the Hawaiian monarchy of much of its authority as well as
disfranchising all Asians, most native Hawaiians, and the poor.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1887_Constitution_of_the_Kingdom_of_Hawaii>
1957:
At a concert by The Quarrymen at the St. Peter's Church Woolton Garden
fête, band member John Lennon met Paul McCartney, triggering a series
of events that led to the forming of The Beatles.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quarrymen>
1966:
Hastings Banda became the first president of Malawi, exactly two years
after the country was granted independence from the United Kingdom.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastings_Banda>
2006:
Nathu La, a mountain pass in the Himalayas connecting between India and
China, sealed during the Sino-Indian War, re-opened for trade after
more than 40 years.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathu_La>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
gurgle (v):
1. To flow with a bubbling sound.
2. To make such a sound
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gurgle>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for
I intend to go in harm's way.
--John Paul Jones
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Paul_Jones>
Portal is a single-player first-person action/puzzle video game
developed by Valve Corporation. The game was released in a bundle
package called The Orange Box for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360 on
October 9, 2007, and for the PlayStation 3 on December 11, 2007. The
Windows version of the game is also available for download separately
through Valve's content delivery system, Steam and was released as a
standalone retail product on April 9, 2008. The game consists primarily
of a series of puzzles that must be solved by teleporting the player's
character and other simple objects using the Portal Gun, a unit that
can create an inter-spatial portal between flat planes. The player
character is challenged by an AI named "GLaDOS" to complete each puzzle
using the Portal Gun with the promise of receiving cake when all the
puzzles are completed. The unusual physics allowed by the portal gun
are the emphasis of this game, and are an extension of a similar portal
concept in Narbacular Drop. Portal has been acclaimed as one of the
most original games in 2007 despite being comparatively short in
length. The game has received praise for its unique gameplay and darkly
humorous story, created with the assistance of Erik Wolpaw and Chet
Faliszek of "Old Man Murray" fame. It is also revered for the character
of GLaDOS, voiced by Ellen McLain in the English version, and the final
credits song "Still Alive" written by Jonathan Coulton for the game.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal_%28video_game%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1687:
The Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica by Isaac Newton was
first published, describing his laws of motion and his law of universal
gravitation.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophi%C3%A6_Naturalis_Principia_Mathemati…>
1946:
Named after Bikini Atoll, the site of the nuclear weapons test
Operation Crossroads in the Marshall Islands, the modern bikini was
introduced at a fashion show in Paris.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/bikini>
1950:
The Israeli Knesset enacted the Law of Return, granting Jews around the
world the right to migrate to and settle in Israel and gain
citizenship.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Return>
1996:
A cloned sheep named Dolly, the first mammal to have been successfully
cloned from an adult cell, was born at the Roslin Institute in
Midlothian, Scotland near Edinburgh.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolly_%28sheep%29>
2004:
Indonesia held its first direct presidential elections; Susilo Bambang
Yudhoyono would later be elected president during the second round of
the elections on September 20.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_presidential_election%2C_2004>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
progenitor (n):
1. Any of a person's direct ancestors; an individual from whom one or
more people are descended.
2. A predecessor of something.
3. Someone who originates or founds
something
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/progenitor>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it
produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and
spontaneity as it did originally, and you have done a poet’s job. The
rest is literature.
--Jean Cocteau
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Jean_Cocteau>
Hispanic Americans in World War II fought in every major battle in the
European Theatre, from North Africa to the Battle of the Bulge, and in
the Pacific Theater of Operations, from Bataan to Okinawa. According to
the National World War II Museum, between 250,000 and 500,000 Hispanic
Americans served in the Armed Forces during WWII, out of a total of
10,420,000, comprising 2.3% to 4.7% of the Armed Forces. Not only did
Hispanics serve as active combatants in the European and Pacific
Theatres of war, but they also served on the home front as civilians.
Hundreds of Hispanic women joined the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps and
Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service, serving as nurses and
in administrative positions. When the induction into the armed forces
was increased some Puerto Ricans from the island were assigned to units
in the Panama Canal Zone and British Caribbean islands which were made
up mostly of continental (United States mainland) soldiers as
replacements, however most Puerto Ricans and Hispanics residing in
Puerto Rico were assigned to the 65th Infantry Regiment or to the
Puerto Rico National Guard. These were the only all-Hispanic units
whose statistics were kept; hence, it is known that over 53,000 Puerto
Ricans and Hispanics who resided on the island served in the war.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_Americans_in_World_War_II>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
993:
Pope John XV became the first pope to canonize a saint, Ulrich of
Augsburg.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulrich_of_Augsburg>
1754:
French and Indian War: In the aftermath of losing the Battle of Fort
Necessity near present-day Farmington, Pennsylvania, George Washington
accepted the terms of what would become his only military surrender and
peacefully withdrew his forces.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Fort_Necessity>
1862:
In a rowing boat travelling on the River Thames from Oxford to Godstow,
author Lewis Carroll told Alice Liddell and her sisters a story that
would eventually form the basis for his book Alice's Adventures in
Wonderland.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Carroll>
1941:
German AB-Aktion operation in Poland: After capturing Lwów, the Nazis
executed approximately 45 professors of the University of Lwów.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_Lviv_professors>
1976:
Israel Defense Forces raided Uganda's Entebbe International Airport to
free hostages taken by hijackers on Air France Flight 139.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Entebbe>
2005:
The NASA space probe Deep Impact impacted the nucleus of the comet
Tempel 1 , excavating debris from its interior to study its
composition.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Impact_%28space_mission%29>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
inalienable (adj):
Incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred to another
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/inalienable>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Happiness in this world, when it comes, comes incidentally. Make it the
object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never
attained. Follow some other object, and very possibly we may find that
we have caught happiness without dreaming of it.
--Nathaniel Hawthorne
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne>
Anne of Denmark (1574–1619) was queen consort of Scotland, England, and
Ireland as the wife of King James VI and I. The second daughter of King
Frederick II of Denmark, Anne married James in 1589 at the age of
fourteen and bore him three children who survived infancy, including
the future Charles I. She demonstrated an independent streak and a
willingness to use factional Scottish politics in her conflicts with
James over the custody of Prince Henry and his treatment of her friend
Beatrix Ruthven. Anne appears to have loved James at first, but the
couple gradually drifted and eventually lived apart, though mutual
respect and a degree of affection survived. In England, Anne shifted
her energies from factional politics to patronage of the arts and
constructed a magnificent court of her own, hosting one of the richest
cultural salons in Europe. After 1612, she suffered sustained bouts of
ill health and gradually withdrew from the centre of court life. Though
she was reported to have died a Protestant, evidence suggests that she
may have converted to Catholicism at some stage in her life. Historians
have traditionally dismissed Anne as a lightweight queen, frivolous and
self-indulgent. However, recent reappraisals acknowledge Anne's
assertive independence and, in particular, her dynamic significance as
a patron of the arts during the Jacobean age.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne_of_Denmark>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1608:
French explorer Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec City, considered to
be the first European-built city in non-Spanish North America.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_de_Champlain>
1778:
American Revolutionary War: Loyalists and Iroquois killed or tortured
over 300 Patriots at the Battle of Wyoming in Pennsylvania.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Wyoming>
1844:
The last known pair of Great Auks (illustration by John Gerrard
Keulemans shown), the only species in the genus Pinguinus, were killed
in Eldey off the coast of Iceland.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Auk>
1863:
Pickett's Charge, a disastrous Confederate infantry assault against
Union Army positions, occurred during the final and bloodiest day of
fighting in the Battle of Gettysburg, marking a turning point in the
American Civil War.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickett%27s_Charge>
1988:
United States Navy warship USS Vincennes shot down Iran Air Flight 655
over the Persian Gulf, killing all 290 people aboard.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
excoriate (v):
1. To wear off the skin of; to chafe or flay.
2. To strongly denounce or censure
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/excoriate>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Youth is happy because it has the ability to see beauty. Anyone who
keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.
--Franz Kafka
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Franz_Kafka>
Bruce Castle is a Grade I listed 16th-century manor house in Lordship
Lane, Tottenham, London. It is named after the House of Bruce who
formerly owned the land on which it is built. Believed to lie on the
site of an earlier building, about which little is known, the current
house is one of the oldest surviving English brick houses. It was
remodelled in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. The house has been
home to Sir William Compton, Richard Sackville, the Barons Coleraine
and Sir Rowland Hill, among others. After serving as a school during
the 19th century, when a large extension was built to the west, it was
converted into a museum exploring the history of the areas which
constitute the present London Borough of Haringey and the history of
the postal service. The building also houses the archives of the London
Borough of Haringey. Since 1892 the grounds have been a public park,
Tottenham's oldest.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Castle>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
626:
Forces led by Li Shimin, a son of Emperor Gaozu of Tang China, ambushed
and killed his rival brothers Li Jiancheng, the Crown Prince, and Li
Yuanji at the imperial palace in Chang'an.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incident_at_Xuanwu_Gate>
1644:
The combined forces of the Scottish Covenanters and the English
Parliamentarians defeated the Royalists at the Battle of Marston Moor,
one of the decisive encounters of the English Civil War, near York.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marston_Moor>
1937:
Aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared
over the Pacific Ocean during an attempt to make a circumnavigational
flight.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amelia_Earhart>
1964:
U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, outlawing
segregation in schools, public places, and employment by circumventing
limitations imposed by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil Rights
Cases.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964>
1997:
The Thai baht rapidly lost half of its value, marking the beginning of
the Asian Financial Crisis.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Asian_Financial_Crisis>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
whodunit (n):
A novel or drama concerning a crime (usually a murder) in which a
detective solves clues to determine the perpetrator
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/whodunit>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
There are gains for all our losses,
There are balms for all our pain:
But when youth, the dream,
departs,
It takes something from our hearts,
And it never comes again.
--Richard Henry Stoddard
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Richard_Henry_Stoddard>
The Hardy Boys, Frank and Joe Hardy, are fictional teenage brothers and
amateur detectives who appear in various mystery series for children
and teens. The characters were created by Edward Stratemeyer, the
founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, a book-packaging firm, and the
books have been written by many different ghostwriters over the years.
The books are published under the collective pseudonym Franklin W.
Dixon. The Hardy Boys have evolved in various ways since their first
appearance in 1927. Beginning in 1959, the books were extensively
revised, largely to eliminate racist stereotypes; the books were also
written in a simpler style in an attempt to compete with television.
Some critics argue that in the process the Hardy Boys changed, becoming
more respectful of the law and simultaneously more affluent, "agents of
the adult ruling class" rather than characters who aided the poor. A
new Hardy Boys series, the Hardy Boys Casefiles, was created in the
1980s, and featured murders, violence, and international espionage. The
original Hardy Boys Mystery Stories series ended in 2005. A new series,
Undercover Brothers, was launched the same year, featuring updated
versions of the characters who narrate their adventures in the first
person. Through all these changes, the characters have remained
popular. Critics have offered many explanations for the characters'
longevity, suggesting variously that the Hardy Boys embody simple
wish-fulfillment, homoerotic desire, or American ideals of masculinity.
Read the rest of this article:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hardy_Boys>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1569:
The Union of Lublin was signed, merging the Kingdom of Poland and the
Grand Duchy of Lithuania into a single state, the Polish–Lithuanian
Commonwealth.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_of_Lublin>
1867:
The British North America Act came into effect, uniting the Province of
Canada, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia into the Canadian Confederation.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_Act%2C_1867>
1916:
World War I: The first day of the Battle of Albert , the opening phase
of the Battle of the Somme, became the bloodiest day in the history of
the British Army, with 57,470 casualties of which 19,240 were killed or
died of wounds.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/first_day_on_the_Somme>
1979:
Sony introduced the Walkman portable audio player, changing music
listening habits by allowing people to carry their own choice of music
with them.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkman>
1997:
The United Kingdom transferred sovereignty of Hong Kong to the People's
Republic of China, ending over 150 years of British colonial rule.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transfer_of_sovereignty_of_Hong_Kong>
2002:
The Rome Statute entered into force, establishing the International
Criminal Court to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against
humanity, war crimes, and crimes of aggression.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rome_Statute_of_the_International_Criminal_Cou…>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
metrology (n):
1. The science of weights and measures or of measurement.
2. A system of weights and measures
<http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/metrology>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
We're on a mission from God.
--w:Dan Aykroyd
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/w%3ADan_Aykroyd>