Joseph Desha (1768–1842) was a U.S. Representative and the ninth
Governor of Kentucky. After serving in the Northwest Indian War, he
moved to Mason County, Kentucky and parlayed his military record into
several terms in the state legislature. In 1807, he was elected as a
Democratic-Republican to the first of six consecutive terms in the U.S.
House. He was a war hawk, supporting the War of 1812, and commanded a
division at the Battle of the Thames. Leaving the House in 1818, he lost
to John Adair in the 1820 gubernatorial election. In 1824, he made a
second campaign for governor based on promises of relief for the state's
debtor class. He was elected by a large majority, and debt relief
partisans captured both houses of the General Assembly. When the
Kentucky Court of Appeals struck down debt relief legislation he
favored, he lobbied the legislature to replace it with a new court. His
reputation was damaged when he issued a pardon for his son, who was
accused of murder. He also hastened the resignation of Transylvania
University president Horace Holley, whom he considered too liberal.
Desha retired from public life in 1828.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Desha>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1775:
American Revolutionary War: After their loss in the Battle of
Great Bridge, British authorities were forced to evacuate from the
Colony of Virginia.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Great_Bridge>
1917:
First World War: Hussein al-Husayni, the Ottoman mayor of
Jerusalem, surrendered the city to the British.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Jerusalem_(1917)>
1968:
Douglas Engelbart gave what became known as "The Mother of All
Demos", publicly debuting the computer mouse (pictured), hypertext, and
the bit-mapped graphical user interface using the oN-Line System (NLS).
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Engelbart>
1979:
A World Health Organization commission of scientists certified
the global eradication of smallpox, making it the only human infectious
disease to date to have been completely eradicated from nature.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox>
2008:
Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich was arrested for a number
of corruption crimes, including attempting to sell the U.S. Senate seat
that was being vacated by then-U.S. President-elect Barack Obama.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rod_Blagojevich_corruption_charges>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
pass muster:
1. (idiomatic) To meet or exceed a particular standard.
2. (idiomatic) To adequately pass a formal or informal inspection.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pass_muster>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
I neither oblige the belief of other person, nor overhastily
subscribe mine own. Nor have I stood with others computing or collating
years and chronologies, lest I should be vainly curious about the time
and circumstance of things, whereof the substance is so much in doubt.
By this time, like one who had set out on his way by night, and
travelled through a region of smooth or idle dreams, our history now
arrives on the confines, where daylight and truth meet us with a clear
dawn, representing to our view, though at a far distance, true colours
and shapes.
--John Milton
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Milton>