Roekiah (1917–1945) was a kroncong singer and film actress from the
Dutch East Indies. Born to two actors, she began her career at the age
of seven, and by 1932 had become well-known in Batavia. Around this time
she met her husband Kartolo. The two acted in the 1937 hit Terang
Boelan, with Roekiah starring alongside Rd Mochtar; after the film's
commercial success, Roekiah, Kartolo, and most of the cast and crew of
Terang Boelan were signed to Tan's Film. They appeared in three films
for the company, beginning with Fatima in 1938, before Mochtar left in
1940; his departure ended a partnership which had spawned numerous
imitators. Mochtar's replacement, Djoemala, acted with Roekiah in four
films, beginning with Sorga Ka Toedjoe, although these were less
successful. During the peak of her career, Roekiah was a fashion and
beauty icon, featuring in advertisements and drawing comparisons to
Dorothy Lamour and Janet Gaynor. After the Japanese invaded the Indies
in 1942, Roekiah took only one more film role before her death. Of her
five children with Kartolo, one – Rachmat Kartolo – entered
acting. Roekiah has often been cited as one of Indonesia's film
pioneers.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roekiah>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1864:
American Civil War: Union Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Overland
Campaign in Virginia began with the Battle of the Wilderness (centennial
stamp pictured) in Spotsylvania County.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Wilderness>
1936:
Second Italo-Abyssinian War: Italian troops captured Addis
Ababa, Ethiopia, unopposed.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_of_the_Iron_Will>
1981:
After sixty-six days without food, Irish republican Bobby Sands
died of starvation in HM Prison Maze.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Sands>
1994:
American teenager Michael P. Fay was caned in Singapore for
theft and vandalism, a punishment that the United States deemed to be
excessive for a teenager committing a non-violent crime.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_P._Fay>
2010:
A series of demonstrations in Athens and general strikes across
Greece began in response to austerity measures imposed by the government
as a result of the debt crisis.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010%E2%80%9312_Greek_protests>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
Stakhanovite:
An extremely productive or hard-working worker, especially in the former
USSR, who may earn special rewards; a workaholic.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Stakhanovite>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
 Printer's ink has been running a race against gunpowder
these many, many years. Ink is handicapped, in a way, because you can
blow up a man with gunpowder in half a second, while it may take twenty
years to blow him up with a book. But the gunpowder destroys itself
along with its victim, while a book can keep on exploding for centuries.
--Christopher Morley
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Christopher_Morley>