John Glenn (July 18, 1921 – December 8, 2016) was a United States Marine Corps aviator, astronaut, and politician. Before joining NASA, Glenn was a distinguished fighter pilot in World War II, the Chinese Civil War and the Korean War. In 1957, he made the first supersonic transcontinental flight across the United States. He was one of the Mercury Seven, military test pilots selected in 1959 by NASA as the nation's first astronauts. On February 20, 1962, Glenn flew the Friendship 7 mission, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth, and the fifth person and third American in space. After retiring from NASA, he served from 1974 to 1999 as a Democratic U.S. senator from Ohio. In 1998, Glenn flew on the Space Shuttle Discovery mission STS-95, making him the oldest person to enter Earth orbit and the only person to fly in both Project Mercury and the Space Shuttle program. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.

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

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1841:

Pedro II, the last emperor of Brazil, was crowned (depicted) at the Old Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_II_of_Brazil

1949:

Francisco Javier Arana, the chief of the Guatemalan armed forces, was killed in a shootout with supporters of President Juan José Arévalo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francisco_Javier_Arana

1984:

A gunman massacred 21 people and injured 15 others at a McDonald's restaurant in the district of San Ysidro of San Diego, California. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Ysidro_McDonald%27s_massacre

2019:

An arson attack at the studio of Kyoto Animation in Japan led to the deaths of 36 people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Animation_arson_attack

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

carrion: 1. (uncountable) 2. Rotting flesh of a dead animal or person. 3. (figurative) Corrupt or horrid matter. 4. (obsolete, figurative) Filth, garbage. 5. (obsolete, figurative, derogatory) The flesh of a living human body; also (Christianity), sinful human nature. 6. (countable, obsolete) 7. A dead body; a carcass, a corpse. 8. (figurative) An animal which is in poor condition or worthless; also, an animal which is a pest or vermin. 9. (figurative, derogatory) A contemptible or worthless person. 10. (chiefly derogatory) Pertaining to, or made up of, rotting flesh. 11. (figurative) 12. Disgusting, horrid, rotten. 13. (derogatory) Of the living human body, the soul, etc.: fleshly, mortal, sinful. 14. (obsolete) 15. Very thin; emaciated, skeletonlike. Synonyms: see Thesaurus:scrawny 16. Of or pertaining to death. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/carrion

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

The importance of Liking Yourself is a notion that fell heavily out of favour during the coptic, anti-ego frenzy of the acid era — but nobody guessed back then that the experiment might churn up this kind of hangover; a whole subculture of frightened illiterates with no faith in anything.   --Hunter S. Thompson https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hunter_S._Thompson