The flag of Lithuania is a horizontal tricolor of yellow, green and
red. The flag was adopted on March 20, 1989 on the event of
Lithuania's break from the Soviet Union. Before its readoption, the
flag was used from 1918 until 1940, when Lithuania was occupied in
turn by Nazi Germany and by the Soviet Union. From 1945 until 1989,
the Soviet Lithuanian flag consisted first of a generic red flag with
the name of the republic, then changed to the more familiar red flag
with white and green bars at the bottom. The most recent change to the
flag occurred in 2004 when the aspect ratio changed from 1:2 to 3:5.
Read the rest of this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Lithuania
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1249:
Louis IX of France dispatched Andrew of Longjumeau as his ambassador
to the Mongols.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_of_Longjumeau)
1804:
Lt. Stephen Decatur led a raid to destroy the captured USS
Philadelphia in Tripoli of the Barbary States, denying her use to the
enemy in the First Barbary War.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Decatur)
1923:
Howard Carter unsealed the burial chamber of Tutankhamun, a Pharaoh of
the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Carter_(archaeologist))
1978:
The first computer bulletin board system, CBBS, was established by
Ward Christensen during a blizzard in Chicago, Illinois.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBBS)
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Wikiquote of the day:
The counsels of impatience and hatred can always be supported by the
crudest and cheapest symbols; for the counsels of moderation, the
reasons are often intricate, rather than emotional, and difficult to
explain. And so the chauvinists of all times and places go their
appointed way: plucking the easy fruits, reaping the little triumphs
of the day at the expense of someone else tomorrow, deluging in noise
and filth anyone who gets in their way, dancing their reckless dance
on the prospects for human progress, drawing the shadow of a great
doubt over the validity of democratic institutions. And until people
learn to spot the fanning of mass emotions and the sowing of
bitterness, suspicion, and intolerance as crimes in themselves — as
perhaps the greatest disservice that can be done to the cause of
popular government — this sort of thing will continue to occur. --
George F. Kennan
(
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_F._Kennan)