1823 Jame Monroe declared the eponymous doctrine of hemispheric independence. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams wrote it. At the time both France and Germany had designs on parts of Latin America. With the silent approval of Great Britain, President Monroe warned them off the hemisphere. Later the Doctrine became a cloak for all manner of ignoble purposes. A study of Monroe’s presidency is discussed elsewhere on this blog.
1929 The skull of Peking Man – homo erectus – was found by Davidson Black. It led to breakthroughs in understanding evolution.
1942 In a tent on a squash court at (Alonzo) Stagg Field (University of Chicago) Enrico Fermi engendered the first controlled nuclear fission. ‘The Italian navigator has landed in the New World’ was the coded message send to the White House. Football fans will realise that Alonzo Stagg was himself an innovator in his domain, football. He devised the huddle, the forward pass, and end sweeps.
1867 Charles Dickens did his first public reading of an American tour. We have been full of the Dickens at many times.
1950 Isaac Asimov published ‘I, Robot.’ Read them all and published an article called ‘I. Burocrat’ once. It was struggle to get that spelling through the process.
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