110px|Shackleton as a young man

Ernest Shackleton (1874–1922) was an Anglo-Irish polar explorer, one of the principal figures of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. His first experience of the polar regions was as third officer on Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s Discovery Expedition, 1901–04, from which he was sent home early on health grounds. Determined to make amends for this perceived personal failure, he returned to Antarctica in 1907 as leader of the Nimrod Expedition. In January 1909 he and three companions made a southern march which established a record Farthest South latitude at 88° 23′ S, 190 km from the South Pole. For this achievement, Shackleton was knighted by King Edward VII on his return home. After the race to the South Pole ended in 1912 with Roald Amundsen's conquest, Shackleton turned his attention to what he said was the one remaining great object of Antarctic journeying—the crossing of the continent from sea to sea, via the pole. To this end he made preparations for what became the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, 1914–17. Disaster struck this expedition when its ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice and was slowly crushed before the shore parties could be landed. There followed a sequence of exploits, and an ultimate escape with no lives lost, that would eventually assure Shackleton's heroic status. (more...)

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_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1776:

American Revolutionary War: The British Army garrison in Boston, Massachusetts, withdrew from the city, ending the 11-month Siege of Boston. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Boston

1950:

The synthesis of californium, a radioactive transuranium element, was announced. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/californium

1963:

The most recent eruption of Mount Agung on Bali, Indonesia, killed approximately 1,500 people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Agung

1988:

Eritrean War of Independence: The Eritrean People's Liberation Front encircled a Soviet–Ethiopian force and gained a decisive victory in the Battle of Afabet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Afabet

2000:

Over 700 followers of the Ugandan sect Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God perished in a fire and a series of poisonings and killings, considered either a cult suicide or an orchestrated mass murder by its leaders. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movement_for_the_Restoration_of_the_Ten_Commandments_of_God

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

greenwash (n): A false or misleading picture of environmental friendliness used to conceal or obscure damaging activities http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/greenwash

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

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That truth-is-stranger-than-fiction factor keeps getting jacked up on us on a fairly regular, maybe even exponential, basis. I think that's something peculiar to our time. I don't think our grandparents had to live with that. --William Gibson http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Gibson