Arthur Sullivan (13 May 1842 – 22 November 1900) was an English composer best known for his operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert. Among his early works were a ballet, a symphony, a cello concerto and a one-act comic opera, Cox and Box, which is still widely performed. He wrote his first opera with Gilbert, Thespis, in 1871. In 1875 the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte engaged Gilbert and Sullivan to create a one-act piece, Trial by Jury. Its box-office success led the partners to collaborate on 12 full-length comic operas, including H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado. Sullivan's only grand opera, Ivanhoe, though initially successful in 1891, has rarely been revived. His works include 24 operas, 11 major orchestral works, 10 choral works and oratorios, 2 ballets, incidental music to several plays, and numerous church pieces, songs, and piano and chamber pieces. His hymns and songs include "Onward, Christian Soldiers" and "The Lost Chord".

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Sullivan

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1909:

The ferry SS Penguin struck a rock in Wellington Harbour and sank, killing 75 people in New Zealand's worst maritime disaster of the 20th century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Penguin

1946:

African-American U.S. Army veteran Isaac Woodard was severely beaten by a South Carolina police officer, losing sight in both eyes, an incident that galvanized the civil rights movement. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Woodard

1968:

Vietnam War: Unarmed citizens in the villages of Phong Nhị and Phong Nhất were massacred, allegedly by South Korean Marines. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phong_Nh%E1%BB%8B_and_Phong_Nh%E1%BA%A5t_massacre

2016:

In the first meeting between the leaders of the Catholic Church and the Russian Orthodox Church, Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill of Moscow signed the Havana Declaration at José Martí International Airport in Cuba. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Declaration_of_Pope_Francis_and_Patriarch_Kirill

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

living fossil: 1. (evolutionary theory) Any species discovered first as a fossil and believed extinct, but which is later found living; an organism that has remained unchanged over geological periods. 2. (evolutionary theory) Any living species which very closely resembles fossil relatives in most anatomical details. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/living_fossil

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose, and you allow him to make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power in this respect, after having given him so much as you propose. If, to-day, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, "I see no probability of the British invading us" but he will say to you, "Be silent; I see it, if you don't." The provision of the Constitution giving the war making power to Congress was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us.   --Abraham Lincoln https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln