The British hydrogen bomb programme was the ultimately successful British effort to develop thermonuclear weapons. The successful test of an atomic bomb in Operation Hurricane in 1952 made Britain a nuclear power, but hopes that the United States would be sufficiently impressed to restore the Special Relationship were soon disappointed. In 1954, Cabinet agreed to proceed with the development of the hydrogen bomb. The scientists at the Atomic Weapons Establishment did not know how to build one, but produced three designs: Orange Herald, a large boosted fission weapon; Green Bamboo, an interim design; and Green Granite, a true thermonuclear design. The first series of Operation Grapple tests (newsreel featured) were hailed as a success, but Green Granite was a failure. In November 1957, they successfully tested a thermonuclear design. Subsequent tests demonstrated a mastery of the technology. Together with the Sputnik crisis, this resulted in the 1958 US–UK Mutual Defence Agreement, and the Special Relationship was restored.

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

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1775:

American Revolution: The Committee of Safety of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, adopted the Mecklenburg Resolves, which annulled and vacated all laws originating from the authority of the King or Parliament. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecklenburg_Resolves

1902:

The Second Boer War came to an end with the signing of the Treaty of Vereeniging in Pretoria, South Africa. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Vereeniging

1935:

An earthquake registering 7.7 Mw struck Balochistan in the British Raj, now part of Pakistan, killing between 30,000 and 60,000 people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1935_Quetta_earthquake

2005:

An article in the magazine Vanity Fair revealed that the secret informant known as "Deep Throat", who had provided information about the Watergate scandal, was former FBI associate director Mark Felt (pictured). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Felt

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

ether: 1. (uncountable, literary or poetic) The substance formerly supposed to fill the upper regions of the atmosphere above the clouds, in particular as a medium breathed by deities. 2. (by extension) The medium breathed by human beings; the air. 3. (by extension) The sky, the heavens; the void, nothingness. 4. (uncountable, physics, historical) Often as aether and more fully as luminiferous aether: a substance once thought to fill all unoccupied space that allowed electromagnetic waves to pass through it and interact with matter, without exerting any resistance to matter or energy; its existence was disproved by the 1887 Michelson–Morley experiment and the theory of relativity propounded by Albert Einstein (1879–1955). 5. (uncountable, colloquial) The atmosphere or space as a medium for broadcasting radio and television signals; also, a notional space through which Internet and other digital communications take place; cyberspace. 6. (uncountable, colloquial) A particular quality created by or surrounding an object, person, or place; an atmosphere, an aura. 7. (uncountable, organic chemistry) Diethyl ether (C4H10O), an organic compound with a sweet odour used in the past as an anaesthetic. 8. (countable, organic chemistry) Any of a class of organic compounds containing an oxygen atom bonded to two hydrocarbon groups. 9. (transitive, slang) To viciously humiliate or insult. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ether

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

Roaming in thought over the Universe, I saw the little that is Good steadily hastening towards immortality, And the vast that is evil I saw hastening to merge itself and become lost and dead.   --Leaves of Grass https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Leaves_of_Grass#BY_THE_ROADSIDE