SS Montanan was a cargo ship operated by the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company. Built in 1912 by the Maryland Steel Company as one of eight sister ships, the freighter was employed in inter-coastal service, first via the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and then the Panama Canal, after it opened in 1914. The ship was 6,649 gross register tons (GRT), 428 ft 9 in (130.68 m) in length and 53 ft 7 in (16.33 m) abeam. Used by the United States Army Transport Service during World War I, USAT Montanan carried cargo and animals to France, and sailed in the first American convoy to France after the United States entered the war in April 1917. During another eastbound convoy in August 1918, Montanan was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-90 some 500 nautical miles (900 km) west of Le Verdon-sur-Mer, France. Of the 86 men aboard the ship, 81 were rescued by a convoy escort. The other five were killed, including two of the ship's Naval Armed Guardsmen, drowned when their lifeboat capsized in the heavy seas.
Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Montanan
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1437:
A Portuguese expeditionary force led by Henry the Navigator began an ultimately unsuccessful siege of Tangiers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tangier_(1437)
1541:
After three years of exile, John Calvin returned to Geneva to reform the church under a body of doctrine that came to be known as Calvinism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvinism
1848:
An explosion drove an iron rod through the head of railroad foreman Phineas Gage, making him an important early case of personality change after brain injury. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phineas_Gage
1964:
South Vietnamese Generals Lam Van Phat and Duong Van Duc staged a coup attempt after junta leader Nguyen Khanh demoted them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_1964_South_Vietnamese_coup_attempt
2006:
Kimveer Gill shot 19 people for unknown reasons, killing one, at Dawson College in Montreal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawson_College_shooting
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
Mammon: 1. The desire for wealth personified as an evil spirit or a malign influence. 2. Often mammon: wealth, material avarice, profit. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Mammon
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The life of reality is confused, disorderly, almost always without apparent purpose, whereas in the artist's imaginative life there is purpose. There is determination to give the tale, the song, the painting, form — to make it true and real to the theme, not to life. Often the better the job is done, the greater the confusion. … The confusion arises out of the fact that others besides practicing artists have imaginations. But most people are afraid to trust their imaginations and the artist is not. --Sherwood Anderson https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sherwood_Anderson