The 1968 Illinois earthquake was the largest recorded earthquake in the "Prairie State", measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale. Although there were no fatalities, the earthquake caused considerable structural damage to buildings, including the toppling of chimneys. The earthquake was one of the most widely felt in U.S. history, affecting 23 states over an area of 580,000 square miles (1,500,000 km2). In studying its cause, scientists discovered the Cottage Grove Fault in the Southern Illinois Basin. Within the region, millions felt the rupture. Reactions to the earthquake varied: some people near the epicenter did not react to the shaking, while others panicked. A future earthquake in the region is extremely likely; seismologists and geologists estimate a 90% chance of a magnitude 6–7 tremor before 2055, likely originating in the Wabash Valley seismic zone on the Illinois–Indiana border, or the New Madrid fault zone.
Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_Illinois_earthquake
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1520:
Following a successful invasion of Sweden by Danish forces under Christian II of Denmark, scores of Swedish leaders were executed despite Christian's promise of general amnesty. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_Bloodbath
1576:
The provinces of the Habsburg Netherlands signed the Pacification of Ghent, a peace treaty with the rebelling provinces Holland and Zeeland, and also an agreement to form an alliance to drive the occupying Spanish out of the country. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacification_of_Ghent
1861:
American Civil War: The USS San Jacinto stopped the British mailship Trent and arrested two Confederate envoys enroute to Europe, sparking a major diplomatic crisis between Great Britain and the United States. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trent_Affair
1895:
German physicist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen produced and detected electromagnetic radiation in a wavelength range that is known today as X-rays . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Conrad_R%C3%B6ntgen
1987:
A Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb exploded during a Remembrance Sunday ceremony in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, killing at least eleven people and injuring sixty-three others. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrance_Day_bombing
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
psychosomatic (adj): 1. Pertaining to physical diseases, symptoms, etc. which have mental causes. 2. (now rare) Pertaining to both the mind and the body http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/psychosomatic
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
Once and for all
the idea of glorious victories won by the glorious army must be wiped out
Neither side is glorious On either side they're just frightened men messing their pants
and they all want the same thing Not to lie under the earth but to walk upon it
without crutches --Peter Weiss http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Peter_Weiss