The Apollo 15 postal covers incident was a scandal involving the crew of
NASA's Apollo 15 lunar landing mission, who in 1971 carried about 400
unauthorized postal covers (example pictured) to the Moon's surface.
American astronauts David Scott, Alfred Worden and James Irwin agreed to
receive about $7,000 each for carrying the covers into space. These
covers were inside the lunar lander Falcon as Scott and Irwin walked on
the Moon, and were postmarked both prior to liftoff from Kennedy Space
Center and after splashdown. Though the astronauts returned the money,
they were reprimanded by NASA for poor judgment and were called before a
closed session of a Senate committee. They were removed as the backup
crew for Apollo 17 and never flew in space again; by 1977 all had left
NASA. In 1983, Worden sued for the return of those covers that had been
impounded in 1972, and the three men received them in an out-of-court
settlement. One of the covers that had been provided to West German
stamp dealer Hermann Sieger sold for over $50,000 in 2014.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_15_postal_covers_incident>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1781:
Astronomer and composer William Herschel discovered the planet
Uranus while in the garden of his house in Bath, England, thinking it
was a comet.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranus>
1920:
The Kapp Putsch briefly ousted the Weimar Republic government
from Berlin.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kapp_Putsch>
1962:
Lyman Lemnitzer, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of
Staff, presented to the Secretary of Defense a false flag conspiracy
plan, Operation Northwoods, intended to create public support for a war
against Fidel Castro and Cuba.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods>
1985:
One of England's worst incidents of football hooliganism
occurred when supporters of Luton Town and Millwall rioted before a
match at Kenilworth Road stadium.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_Kenilworth_Road_riot>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
ledger:
1. A book for keeping notes, especially one for keeping accounting
records; a record book, a register.
2. A large, flat stone, especially one laid over a tomb.
3. (accounting) A collection of accounting entries consisting of credits
and debits.
4. (construction) A board attached to a wall to provide support for
attaching other structural elements (such as deck joists or roof
rafters) to a building.
5. (fishing) Short for ledger bait (“fishing bait attached to a floating
line fastened to the bank of a pond, stream, etc.”) or ledger line
(“fishing line used with ledger bait for bottom fishing; ligger”).
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ledger>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
It may, perhaps, be true, though we cannot distinctly see it to
be so, that as all finite things require a cause, infinites admit of
none. It is evident, that nothing can begin to be without a cause; but
it by no means follows from thence, that that must have had a cause
which had no beginning. But whatever there may be in this conjecture, we
are constrained, in pursuing the train of causes and effects, to stop at
last at something uncaused.
--Joseph Priestley
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Joseph_Priestley>
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