Elizabeth Needham was an English procuress and brothel-keeper of 18th-century London, who has been identified as the bawd greeting Moll Hackabout in the first plate of William Hogarth's series of satirical etchings, A Harlot's Progress. Although Needham was notorious in London at the time, little is recorded of her life, and no genuine portraits of her survive. Her house was the most exclusive in London and her customers came from the highest strata of fashionable society, but she eventually fell foul of the moral reformers of the day and died as a result of the severe treatment she received after being sentenced to stand in the pillory.
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_________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1065:
London's Westminster Abbey, built by Edward the Confessor between 1045 and 1050, was consecrated. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westminster_Abbey)
1836:
At the Old Gum Tree near present-day Adelaide, Royal Navy Rear–Admiral John Hindmarsh read a proclamation establishing the British province of South Australia. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Australia)
1879:
The Tay Bridge, spannning the Firth of Tay in Scotland between Dundee and the Wormit, collapsed as a train passed over it, killing all on board. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tay_Rail_Bridge)
1895:
History of film: Using their cinematograph in Paris, the Lumière brothers showed motion pictures to a paying audience for the first time. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auguste_and_Louis_Lumi%C3%A8re)
1948:
The Douglas DC-3 airliner NC16002, en route from San Juan, Puerto Rico to Miami, Florida, USA, inexplicably disappeared in the area known as the Bermuda Triangle. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NC16002_disappearance)
_______________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
querulously (adv) With grumbling, complaining, or whining. (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/querulously)
______________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The forces of moderation and democracy must, and will, prevail against extremism and dictatorship. I will not be intimidated. ... Despite threats of death, I will not acquiesce to tyranny, but rather lead the fight against it. --Benazir Bhutto (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benazir_Bhutto)