The Coffin Stone is a large sarsen stone at the foot of Blue Bell Hill
near Aylesford in the south-eastern English county of Kent. Now lying
prone on the ground, the stone is a rectangular slab that measures 4.42
metres (14 ft 6 in) in length, 2.59 metres (8 ft 6 in) in breadth,
and about 0.61 metres (2 ft) in width. Another large slab now rests on
it, and two smaller stones are nearby. The megalith lies on the eastern
side of the River Medway, not far from the chambered long barrows of
Little Kit's Coty House and Kit's Coty House constructed in the fourth
millennium BCE, during Britain's Early Neolithic period. An
archaeological excavation of the site led by Paul Garwood in 2008 and
2009 found that the Coffin Stone was only placed in its present location
in the 15th or 16th centuries. The archaeologists found no evidence of a
chambered long barrow at the site. In the 1830s it was reported that
local farmers found human bones near the stone.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffin_Stone>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1708:
Queen Anne withheld royal assent from the Scottish Militia
Bill, in the most recent occasion where a British monarch vetoed an act
of Parliament.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_assent>
1845:
Māori forces, led by chiefs Te Ruki Kawiti and Hōne Heke,
attacked the British settlement of Kororāreka, New Zealand, beginning
the Flagstaff War.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagstaff_War>
1993:
The U.S. Senate unanimously confirmed Janet Reno as the
country's first female attorney general.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_Reno>
2010:
During the inauguration of Chilean president Sebastián
Piñera, an earthquake registering 6.9 MW struck the O'Higgins Region
near the city of Pichilemu, causing widespread damage.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Pichilemu_earthquake>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
jibe:
1. (transitive) To reproach with contemptuous words; to deride, to mock,
to taunt.
2. (transitive) To say in a mocking or taunting manner.
3. (intransitive) To make a mocking remark or remarks; to jeer. […]
4. (intransitive, Canada, US, informal) To accord or agree.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/jibe>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Better defence than shield or breastplate, is holy innocence to
the naked breast.
--Torquato Tasso
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Torquato_Tasso>
The bombing of Tokyo during the early hours of 10 March 1945 by the
U.S. Army Air Forces was a devastating firebombing raid on the Japanese
capital city. Bombs dropped from 279 Boeing B-29 Superfortresses burned
out much of eastern Tokyo. More than 90,000 Japanese, mostly civilians,
were killed and one million left homeless, making it the single most
destructive air attack of World War II. The Japanese air and civil
defenses proved inadequate, and only 14 American aircraft and 96 airmen
were lost. The previous, generally unsuccessful, air raids on Japan had
focused on industrial facilities. This was the first major firebombing
raid against a Japanese city, and the tactics used became a standard
part of the American strategic bombing campaign until the end of the
war. The attack is commemorated at two official memorials, several
neighborhood memorials and a privately run museum.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo_%2810_March_1945%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1916:
The last in a series of letters was written, agreeing that
Britain would recognise Arab independence in return for the Sharif of
Mecca launching a revolt against the Ottoman Empire.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMahon%E2%80%93Hussein_Correspondence>
1959:
An anti-Chinese uprising erupted in Lhasa, as thousands of
Tibetans surrounded the Potala Palace to prevent the Dalai Lama from
leaving or being removed by the Chinese army.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1959_Tibetan_uprising>
1967:
British progressive-rock band Pink Floyd released their first
single, "Arnold Layne".
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_Floyd>
1977:
Astronomers using NASA's Kuiper Airborne Observatory discovered
a faint ring system around Uranus.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rings_of_Uranus>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
audiation:
(music) The comprehension and internal realization of music by an
individual in the absence of any physical sound.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/audiation>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Search not to find how other men offend, But by that glass thy
own offences mend; Still seek to learn, yet care not much from whom,
(So it be learning) or from whence it come. Of thy own actions, others'
judgments learn; Often by small, great matters we discern: Youth what
man's age is like to be doth show; We may our ends by our beginnings
know.
--John Denham
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Denham>
Hurricane Hattie was the strongest and deadliest tropical cyclone of the
1961 Atlantic hurricane season. The ninth tropical storm and seventh
hurricane of the season, Hattie became a major hurricane on October 28
and strengthened to Category 5, with reported maximum sustained winds
of 165 mph (270 km/h). It produced hurricane-force winds and caused
one death on San Andres Island, and it dropped rainfall of up to
11.5 in (290 mm) on Grand Cayman. It weakened to Category 4 before
making landfall on October 31 in British Honduras (now Belize). In
Belize City, 70% of the buildings were damaged, leaving more than 10,000
people homeless and prompting the government to relocate the country's
capital inland to Belmopan. Across the country, 307 people were killed.
Elsewhere in Central America, Hattie killed 11 people in Guatemala and
one in Honduras. (This article is part of a featured topic: 1961
Atlantic hurricane season.).
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_topics/1961_Atlantic_hurri…>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1842:
Nabucco, an opera by Italian Romantic composer Giuseppe Verdi
that established his reputation, premiered at La Scala in Milan.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabucco>
1915:
The Panama–California Exposition (guide book cover shown),
celebrating the inauguration of the Panama Canal, opened in San Diego's
Balboa Park.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama%E2%80%93California_Exposition>
1945:
World War II: In a coup d'état, Imperial Japanese Army
officers ousted the government of French Indochina.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat_in_French_Indochi…>
2010:
The first legal U.S. same-sex marriages south of the
Mason–Dixon line took place in the District of Columbia.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage_in_the_District_of_Columbia>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
ply:
1. (transitive, obsolete) To bend; to fold; to mould; (figuratively) to
adapt, to modify; to change (a person's) mind, to cause (a person) to
submit.
2. (intransitive) To bend, to flex; to be bent by something, to give way
or yield (to a force, etc.). […]
3. (transitive) To work at (something) diligently.
4. (transitive) To wield or use (a tool, a weapon, etc.) steadily or
vigorously.
5. (transitive) To press upon; to urge persistently.
6. (transitive) To persist in offering something to, especially for the
purpose of inducement or persuasion.
7. (transitive, transport) To travel over (a route) regularly.
8. (intransitive, obsolete) To work diligently.
9. (intransitive, nautical, obsolete) To manoeuvre a sailing vessel so
that the direction of the wind changes from one side of the vessel to
the other; to work to windward, to beat, to tack.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ply>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Good government is known from bad government by this infallible
test: that under the former the labouring people are well fed and well
clothed, and under the latter, they are badly fed and badly clothed.
--William Cobbett
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Cobbett>
The Inter-Allied Women's Conference opened in Paris on 10 February 1919,
several weeks after the start of the Paris Peace Conference, the meeting
of the victorious Allies of World War I to set peace terms for the
Central Powers. The women's conference was convened after the war to
introduce women's issues to the process. On 18 January Marguerite de
Witt-Schlumberger, vice-president of the International Woman Suffrage
Alliance, asked Woodrow Wilson, the U.S. president, to allow women to
participate in the discussions that would inform the treaty
negotiations. After first being rebuffed, suffragists were allowed to
make a presentation before the Commission on International Labour
Legislation, and on 10 April a resolution was presented to the League of
Nations Commission. Though the women failed to achieve many of their
aims, they gained the right for women to serve in the League of Nations
organisation.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-Allied_Women%27s_Conference>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1655:
The court of Northampton County, Virginia, issued a ruling that
made John Casor the first person of African descent in the Thirteen
Colonies to be declared a slave for life as a result of a civil suit.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Casor>
1963:
The Ba'ath Party came to power in a coup d'état by a clique of
quasi-leftist Syrian Army officers calling themselves the National
Council for the Revolutionary Command.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1963_Syrian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat>
1978:
BBC Radio 4 began broadcasting Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's
Guide to the Galaxy, a science fiction radio series that was later
adapted into novels, a television series, and other formats.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_the_Galaxy_%28rad…>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
muliebrity:
1. (literary) The state or quality of being a woman; the features of a
woman's nature; femininity, womanhood.
2. (literary) The state of attainment of womanhood following maidenhood.
3. (physiology) The state of puberty in a female.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/muliebrity>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.
--Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Oliver_Wendell_Holmes,_Jr.>
Interstate 675 (I-675) is a 7.7-mile-long (12.4 km) auxiliary
Interstate Highway, state trunkline highway and loop route in the US
state of Michigan. Splitting from I-75 and US Highway 23, which run
north concurrently along the eastern side of Saginaw, I-675 heads west
into the downtown area and spans the Saginaw River on the Henry G. Marsh
Bridge. After an interchange with M-58, the Interstate turns northward,
then runs northeasterly to connect back to I-75. The Marsh Bridge was
constructed as an alternative to the Zilwaukee Bridge, which is just
southeast of this junction on I-75 over the Saginaw; the I-75 bridge was
until 1988 a drawbridge that would impede traffic on the freeway for up
to four hours at a time. Construction of I-675 started in 1969 and the
freeway opened in 1971. Sections near downtown were reconstructed from
2009 through 2011 to update one of the freeway's interchanges and to
rebuild the Marsh Bridge.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_675_%28Michigan%29>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1573:
A peace treaty brought the Ottoman–Venetian War to an end,
ceding Cyprus from the Republic of Venice to the Ottoman Empire.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman%E2%80%93Venetian_War_%281570%E2%80%93…>
1900:
The German ocean liner SS Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse became the
first ship to send a wireless telegraph message to an onshore receiver.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Kaiser_Wilhelm_der_Grosse>
1945:
World War II: At the beginning of the Battle of Remagen, Allied
forces unexpectedly captured the Ludendorff Bridge, which possibly
hastened the war's conclusion.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Remagen>
1965:
Unarmed civil rights activists marching from Selma to
Montgomery, Alabama, were attacked by police on "Bloody Sunday".
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selma_to_Montgomery_marches>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
nervous:
1. Easily agitated or alarmed; edgy, on edge.
2. Apprehensive, anxious, hesitant, worried.
3. Relating to or affecting the nerves.
4. (archaic) Having nerves; nervose.
5. (obsolete) Showing nervous strength; sinewy, vigorous.
6. (obsolete) Of a piece of writing: forceful, powerful.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nervous>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
A mind which has once imbibed a taste for scientific inquiry, and
has learnt the habit of applying its principles readily to the cases
which occur, has within itself an inexhaustible source of pure and
exciting contemplations. … Accustomed to trace the operation of
general causes, and the exemplification of general laws, in
circumstances where the uninformed and unenquiring eye perceives neither
novelty nor beauty, he walks in the midst of wonders.
--John Herschel
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Herschel>
The water pipit (Anthus spinoletta) is a small songbird which breeds in
the mountains of Southern Europe and Southern Asia eastwards to China.
It is a short-distance migrant; many birds move to lower altitudes or
wet open lowlands in winter. In breeding plumage it has greyish-brown
upperparts, weakly streaked with darker brown, and pale pink-buff
underparts fading to whitish on the lower belly. The head is grey with a
broad white eyebrow, and the outer tail feathers are white. The winter
colours are duller, with more brown. Water pipits construct a cup-like
nest on the ground under vegetation or in cliff crevices and lay four to
six speckled greyish-white eggs, which hatch in about two weeks with
about two more weeks until the chicks fledge. Although pipits
occasionally catch insects in flight, they feed mainly on small
invertebrates picked off the ground or vegetation, and also on some
plant material. The species population is large and stable overall.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_pipit>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1853:
Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata premiered at La Fenice in Venice,
but the performance was considered so bad that it caused him to revise
portions of the opera.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_traviata>
1930:
Organized by the Communist International, hundreds of thousands
of people in major cities around the world marched to protest mass
unemployment associated with the Great Depression.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Unemployment_Day>
1943:
World War II: National Liberation Front forces defeated Italian
occupiers in the Battle of Fardykambos, a major sign of the Greek
Resistance's growth.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Fardykambos>
1967:
Joseph Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva defected to the
United States.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svetlana_Alliluyeva>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
periodic table:
(chemistry) A tabular chart of the chemical elements according to their
atomic numbers so that elements with similar properties are in the same
group (column).
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/periodic_table>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
When everything has to be right, something isn't.
--Stanisław Jerzy Lec
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Jerzy_Lec>
J. R. Kealoha (died March 5, 1877) was a Native Hawaiian who fought in
the American Civil War at a time when the Kingdom of Hawaii was an
independent nation. He enlisted in the 41st United States Colored
Infantry (USCT), formed in Pennsylvania. Participating in the Siege of
Petersburg, he met the Hawaiʻi-born Colonel Samuel Armstrong, who
recorded their encounter. With the 41st USCT, Kealoha was present at the
surrender of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia on April 9,
1865. He returned to Hawaiʻi, where he died and was buried in an
unmarked grave in Honolulu's Oʻahu Cemetery. In 2010, Kealoha and more
than 100 other Native Hawaiian and Hawaiʻi-born "Hawaiʻi Sons of the
Civil War" were commemorated with a bronze plaque erected along the
memorial pathway at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in
Honolulu. In 2014, a grave marker (pictured) was dedicated over
Kealoha's burial site.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._R._Kealoha>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1770:
American Revolution: British soldiers fired into a crowd
(engraving shown) in Boston, killing five people.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Massacre>
1825:
Roberto Cofresí, one of the last successful Caribbean pirates,
was apprehended after his flagship sloop Anne was captured by
authorities.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_of_the_sloop_Anne>
1960:
Cuban photographer Alberto Korda took his iconic photograph
Guerrillero Heroico of Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerrillero_Heroico>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
dekulakize:
(transitive, historical) Usually with reference to the Soviet Union and
communist Eastern Europe: to dispossess (a kulak, that is, a prosperous
peasant) of his or her property and/or rights.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dekulakize>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
We shall use only peaceful means and we shall not permit any
other kind of method.
--Zhou Enlai
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Zhou_Enlai>
A Wizard of Earthsea is a fantasy novel written by American author
Ursula K. Le Guin (pictured). First published by the small press
Parnassus in 1968, it is considered a classic of fantasy and of
children's literature. Set in the fictional archipelago of Earthsea, the
story centers around a gifted mage named Ged. His prickly nature drives
him into a duel with an older pupil at a school of wizardry, during
which his spell goes awry and releases a shadow creature that attacks
him. The novel follows his journey to be free of the creature. Often
described as a coming-of-age story, the book explores Ged's process of
learning to cope with power and come to terms with death. Taoist themes
are reflected in a fundamental balance in the universe of Earthsea,
which wizards are supposed to maintain. Margaret Atwood called the novel
one of the "wellsprings" of fantasy literature. It was followed by five
other volumes sharing a setting; the six works are collectively known as
the Earthsea Cycle.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Wizard_of_Earthsea>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1890:
The Forth Bridge, a railway bridge connecting Edinburgh to Fife
over the Firth of Forth, opened, becoming an internationally recognised
Scottish landmark.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forth_Bridge>
1966:
During an interview, John Lennon of the Beatles argued that the
band had become "more popular than Jesus".
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_popular_than_Jesus>
1990:
College basketball player Hank Gathers died after collapsing
during a West Coast Conference Tournament semifinal game in Los Angeles.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_Gathers>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
not to put too fine a point on it:
(idiomatic) Used to apologize for a possibly impolite statement one is
making.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/not_to_put_too_fine_a_point_on_it>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Perfectionism is not a quest for the best. It is a pursuit of the
worst in ourselves, the part that tells us that nothing we do will ever
be good enough — that we should try again. No. We should not. Focused
on process, our creative life retains a sense of adventure. Focused on
product, the same creative life can feel foolish or barren.
--Julia Cameron
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Julia_Cameron>
Tourette syndrome is a neurodevelopmental disorder which begins during
childhood or adolescence. It is characterized by tics (video shown) such
as blinking, coughing, sniffing, or facial movements that are a somewhat
suppressible response to an unwanted urge. Once considered rare,
Tourette's occurs in about 1% of people under eighteen, although many go
undiagnosed or never seek medical care. There is no specific test for
diagnosis and Tourette's is not always correctly identified because most
cases are mild. Extreme cases in adulthood are rare and Tourette's does
not affect intelligence or life expectancy. Education is an integral
part of management of the syndrome, and explanation and reassurance are
often sufficient. The cause is believed to involve environmental and
unknown genetic factors. The condition was named for Georges Gilles de
la Tourette, who published an account of nine patients in 1885.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourette_syndrome>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1820:
The U.S. Congress passed the Missouri Compromise, which
balanced the admission of Missouri as a slave state with that of Maine
as a free state.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missouri_Compromise>
1891:
Shoshone National Forest, in the U.S. state of Wyoming, was
established as the country's first national forest.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoshone_National_Forest>
1945:
A Polish Home Army unit massacred at least 150 Ukrainian
civilians in Pawłokoma, Poland.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paw%C5%82okoma_massacre>
1972:
The British rock band Jethro Tull released Thick as a Brick, a
concept album supposedly adapted from an epic poem by an eight-year-old
boy named Gerald Bostock.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thick_as_a_Brick>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
triangulation:
1. (uncountable, surveying) A technique in which distances and
directions are estimated from an accurately measured baseline and the
principles of trigonometry; (countable) an instance of the use of this
technique.
2. (countable, surveying) The network of triangles so obtained, that are
the basis of a chart or map.
3. (countable, chess) A delaying move in which the king moves in a
triangular path to force the advance of a pawn.
4. (countable, geometry) A subdivision of a planar object into
triangles, and by extension the subdivision of a higher-dimension
geometric object into simplices.
5. (uncountable, navigation, seismology) A process by which an unknown
location is found using three known distances from known locations.
6. (uncountable, politics) The practice of repositioning one's group or
oneself on the political spectrum in an attempt to capture the centre.
7. (uncountable, qualitative research) The use of three (or more)
researchers to interview the same people or to evaluate the same
evidence to reduce the impact of individual bias.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/triangulation>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
Persuasion, indeed, is a kind of force. It consists in showing a
person the consequences of his actions. It is, in a word, force applied
through the mind.
--James Fitzjames Stephen
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Fitzjames_Stephen>
Palmyra is an ancient city in present-day Homs Governorate, Syria.
Inhabited since the Neolithic period, it entered recorded history in the
early second millennium BC. Palmyra became part of the Roman Empire in
the first century AD. Palmyrene merchants established colonies along the
Silk Road and the city grew wealthy from trade caravans. Many monumental
projects were erected, such as the Great Colonnade, the Temple of Bel,
and distinctive tower tombs. Palmyra reached the apex of its power in
the 260s, when its king Odaenathus defeated the Persian emperor
Shapur I. After Odaenathus's assassination in 267, his widow Zenobia
rebelled against Rome and conquered the Roman East. Palmyra was
destroyed in 273 by the Roman emperor Aurelian. Restored on a smaller
scale, it remained a minor trading center until it was sacked by the
Timurids in 1400 and became a small village. During the Syrian civil war
in 2015, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant destroyed large parts
of the ancient city.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmyra>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1791:
French inventor Claude Chappe and his brothers first
demonstrated the optical telegraph, a system that conveys information by
means of visual signals, using towers (replica pictured) with pivoting
crossarms.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telegraph>
1901:
U.S. Steel, the first billion-dollar corporation and once the
world's largest producers of steel, was founded by financier J. P.
Morgan.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Steel>
1943:
World War II: Australian and U.S. air forces attacked and
destroyed a large Japanese naval convoy in the Bismarck Sea, north of
Papua New Guinea.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Bismarck_Sea>
1995:
Researchers at Fermilab in Illinois announced the discovery of
the top quark, the most massive of all observed elementary particles.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_quark>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
conversely:
1. (often conjunctive) With a reversed relationship.
2. (conjunctive, loosely) From another point of view; on the other hand.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/conversely>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if
wrong, to be set right.
--Carl Schurz
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Carl_Schurz>