1789 Washington, D.C., Politics: Pierre Charles L’Enfant began to layout the District of Columbia. Among the surveyors who worked closely with him was Benjamin Banneker, a free black man from Baltimore. While Enfant’s name is everywhere in DC, Banneker is all but forgotten. There is an entry for Banneker on Wikipedia which seems to be contested in the culture wars.
1818 London, Literature: Mary Shelly at age twenty-one published ‘Frankenstein, or, the Modern Prometheus.‘ It is credited as the first science fiction novel. While the creature is gentle and intellectually gifted, he is hideous in appearance and then as now appearance is all. Pitchforks, anyone?
1893 Buenos Aires, Music: Carlos Gardel arrived in Argentina, a babe in arms. A baritone, he become the single most famous exponent of the songs of the tango. The dramatic phrasing of his lyrics made miniature masterpieces of his hundreds of three-minute tango recordings. Many tango tunes were written specifically for him. He had started his career by singing on street corners, cafes, bars, and private parties. In 1944 while on tour, he was killed in a plane crash, and Buenos Aires went into mourning for a week. There are recordings on the Wikipedia entry. Carlos Saura’s insightful history of Argentina called ‘Tango’ (1998) features Gardel’s songs.
1918 Moscow, Politics: To leave behind the Tsarist heritage, the new revolutionary government declared Moscow once again the capital of Russia. There was also concern that St Petersburg was vulnerable to attack from the sea by the foreign powers supporting the Whites.
1935 Ottawa, Economics: The Bank of Canada began issuing paper money in matching unilingual forms, some in English, some in French. As remains true of much in Canada, the French and the English are seldom on the same page. Some sources say the Canadian dollar went into use a little later.
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