Category: Practice

1811 A lady published ‘Sense and Sensibility;’ she was Jane Austen. It was her first published novel.

1838 Oberlin College (Ohio) admitted women, the first higher education institute in the US to do so. The sky did not fall. It remains an excellent school.

1938 Halloween. Twenty-three year old wunderkind Orson Welles broadcasted his fake news adaptation of H. G. Wells’s ‘War of the Worlds’ on CBS radio to the consternation of millions. See Hardly Cantril, ‘The Invasion from Mars, a Study in the Psychology of Panic’ (1940). This radio broadcast is discussed elsewhere on this blog.

1973 The first bridge over the Bosporus opened, linking Europe and Asia. There are three now and a tunnel. We saw this one from a ferry in 2015.

1995 Quebec voters whispered ‘Non’ (50.6% to 49.4%) to sovereignty in a turnout of 94% of eligible voters, i.e., about 5,000 votes from nearly 4 million. It was the third referenda on this theme since 1980 and the closest vote. Polling beforehand indicated ‘Oui’ would win comfortably and that prediction galvanised more voters to the polls to vote ‘Non.’ Another referendum must be overdue.

1863 The Red Cross was founded at a meeting in Geneva, stimulated by businessman Jean-Henri Durant and lawyer Gustave Moynier. There were eighteen government delegations from Europe and many individuals. These two men influenced the Swiss government to host and sponsor this and future meetings. We donate blood whenever we have any to spare.

1923 Mustafa Kemal Atatürk declared Turkey a republic (Türkiye Cumhuriyeti). I discussed a biography of this remarkable man elsewhere on this blog. We spent a fascinating two weeks in this museum of the world.

1945 Gimbel’s department store in New York City (1897-1987) sold first Biro ballpoint pen for $12. About $170 today. In Argentina Hungarian refuge László József Bíró found a way to get the ink to flow yet be dry on paper. It first went on sale in Buenos Aires as advertised below. A version of this was the (Milton) Reynolds Rocket sold by Gimbels. Its sales matched its name, selling a thousand in one day. (Marcel Bich bought the patent and now we have BICs.)

1969 First computer-to-computer link was established in ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), forerunner to the internet. The aim was to combine computers to magnify the computing power available at any one place for research. Below is the log of the first successful message. Contrary to legend it was not designed in the hope of withstanding a nuclear war.

1982 Alice Lynne Chamberlain was convicted of the murder of her child with circumstantial evidence. The media frenzy was a grotesque tsunami of bile. The dingo had more defenders than Ms Chamberlain. The stronger she was in the face of adversity, the more the media attacked. Decades later the conviction — produced as much by trial by media, as by evidence — was quashed, and she was paid compensation for a ruined life. Meanwhile, the mediaistas gave each other awards for their unscrupulous sensationalism.

1636 Harvard College was founded. It was the first institution of higher learning in United States. Spent a semester there, deep in the basements of Widener Library.

1793 Eli Whitney applied for a patent for the cotton gin, ushering in the planation and slave economy of the south in the United States. He got the idea from seeing a cat scratch at its fur to get burrs out. When cotton could be cleaned efficiently and effectively, then large scale production made sense.

1916 First Australian referendum on conscription for military service in the Great War was defeated. The event is so encrusted with later appropriations and self-serving distortions it is hard now to grasp the issues as they were seen at the time.

1919 United States Congress passed the Volstead Act to enforce the 18th Amendment which had been ratified by 36 States. President Woodrow Wilson had vetoed the act earlier and it took Congress but three hours to override with a two-thirds votes. It was repealed in 1933.

1998 Glen Murray was elected mayor of Winnipeg, population 600,000+. He was homosexual and said so. He later held several provincial cabinet portfolios until retiring in 2017. The sky did not fall. Been there for a conference once upon a time.

1275 First recorded mention of the village of Amsterdam. Been there many times and read Geert Mak’s ‘Amsterdam: a Biography’ (2001).

1659 Quakers William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevens who fled England in 1656 to escape religious persecution were executed in the Massachusetts Bay Colony for heresy. Good Christians everyone.

1838 State of Missouri ordered the extermination of all Mormons in the Missouri Mormon War. The survivors went upriver to Nauvoo and there followed the Illinois Mormon War. They then went west to Utah, where followed the Utah Mormon War. Good Christians everyone. N.B. Etienne Cabet bought Nauvoo from the Mormons for his Icarian followers. Been there a couple of times on the very Big Muddy.

1938 DuPont Corp announced the new synthetic fibre, nylon. It was used for toothbrushes at the start, replacing hog bristles. Shortly thereafter it went into stockings, and it had a patriotic patina because the silk for silk stockings came through Japan. Choosing nylon rather than silk was the American choice in that trade war.

1954 ‘Disneyland’ premiered on television, which included Frontierland and Tomorrowland. Watched it every Sunday night for years. Read a biography Walt Disney which is reviewed elsewhere on this blog: Michael Barrier, ‘The Animated Man’ (2007).

1825 The Erie Canal of 363 miles opened, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean via the Hudson River. It produced an economic boom along its route and made Buffalo a sea major port for products from Chicago and points west as well as from Canada. It is often forgotten that the United States has northern and southern sea coasts. I have been to Syracuse and Utica on the route.

1905 Sweden conceded independence to Norway in a peaceful though rather fraught conclusion to tensions. Pictured below is a monument to that event. Been to Sweden a couple of times but want to go to Norway to see the giant paper clip. Yep.

1922 Gertrude Bell (1868-1926) was appointed Head of Antiquities in Baghdad, one of her very many claims to fame. In this job she organised the systematic identification, documentation, and preservation of the human heritage to be found there. She also did some of the finding. She was here, there, and everywhere in the Middle East.

1958 Pan Am began flying passenger jets from New York City non-stop to Paris in a Boeing 707 which made the world smaller, and smaller. There was a brass band send-off. I flew with Pan Am once.

1986 Bill Bruckner entered Baseball’s Hall of Infamy. Mookie Wilson ran out the ground ball, as few millionaire players do today while the white ball eluded Bruckner’s glove and the Red Sox found another way to lose. Members of the Red Sox nation have forgiven but not forgotten this error. Seen the Green Monster with my own eyes.

1415 Henry V at Agincourt prevailed over a French force five times larger with the long bow made from Welsh Yew wood. The elasticity of the yew gave the bow a range greater than anything else, making it the artillery of the day. Its arrows struck with sufficient force to penetrate a knight’s armour. It was good night for the knights. Hundreds were killed before they came within range of their weapons. Hundreds more were killed after surrendering.

1616 Dutch sailor Dirk Hartog became the first recorded European to set foot on Australia’s western coast, and he left a message at Cape Inscription, Western Australia.

1854 At Balaclava the Light Brigade by mistake charged into death and legend.

1955 The Tappan Stove Company sold the first microwave oven. It was wall mounted and in today’s US dollars cost about $12,000. It weighted about 700 pounds. The wall and the weight were insulation.

1971 United Nations seated People’s Republic of China and to expel the Nationalist government of Taiwan.

1861 Western Union sent the first telegram coast-to-coast in the United States from San Francisco to Washington D.C. The message had to be repeated along the way.

1889 New South Wales Premier Sir Henry Parkes called for federation of the Australian colonies at Tenterfield in NSW. He continued to argue the case for unity thereafter. He was the first, loudest, and most consistent advocate of Australia as a single entity on economic, defence, and moral grounds.

1897 First newspaper comic strip appeared in the New York Journal, ‘The Yellow Kid.‘ This rag was a Hearst newspaper printed on yellow paper, as the Financial Times today is printed on pink paper, leading the Hearst press being called Yellow Journalism as short hand for the Fox News of the day.

1929 Black Thursday – the first day of the stock market crash which began the Great Depression. Thus began the Great Depression that lasted for a decade. So far Hillary has not been blamed for this.

1946 The U.N. charter was ratified by the then 5 permanent members and 46 member states. The agencies of the UN have done much good since then.

When What
1760 The first Jewish prayer book was published in North America. A milestone in religious tolerance.

1915 25,000 women marched down Fifth Avenue in NYC for the vote, this gathering became the League of Women Voters. I worked for the local branch of the League a few times when in high school and then college.

1956 The Hungarian revolt against Soviet domination began with a large and peaceful protest. The peaceful protest led to reaction, reprisal, and repression and a Hungarian diaspora. There were many in Edmonton.

1963 Dr Who aired with William Hartnell. Still airing. Who’d a thunk it!

2001 Apple released the iPod. [Words fail me.]

1721 Peter the Great became emperor of all the Russians, and a quite few others. I once found this statue referred to as depicting Catherine the Great in a book by two journalists. Thus was confirmed many of my suspicious of the fourth estate. Seen it with my own eyes.

1884 Twenty-six countries adopted Greenwich Mean Time as longitude zero, with 24 time zones, at conference in Washington D.C. Greenwich was the focal point of a great many nautical charts and maps and was chosen because of that.

1938 Chester Carlson (1906-1968) invented the photocopier in the family kitchen. He tried to sell the machine to IBM, RCA, Kodak and others, but they see no use for a gadget that makes nothing but copies. He called it xerography meaning literally dry writing as distinct from the wet process of mimeograph. He made several fortunes out of it and gave most of it away, including a good deal to the United Nations. Below is the first exposure he made.

1975 USAF gave Sergeant John Matlovich a General Discharge because he had publicly declared his homosexuality. This charge denied Matlovich pension and health entitlements. A court later found for Matlovich. The medals were for killing, and the GD was for loving, he said.

1978 Pope John II was inaugurated. Polish born, he held on until 2005. He galvanised the papacy like few others and became a world leader in more than name.

When What
2137 BC Two Chinese court stargazer, Hi and Ho, made the first extent record of a solar eclipse. Hi and Ho? Irresistible.

1790 The French Revolutionary Government chose the Tricolor to replace Bourbon standard as the national flag. Red and Blue were the colours of the patron saints of Paris, Denis and Martin. The Marquis de Lafayette suggested adding the white as a traditional colour of France. Seen many of them.

1854 Florence Nightingale went to Crimea with 38 nurses during the Crimean War. We passed by one of her hospital sites in Istanbul once upon a time.

1879 Thomas Edison demonstrated the first commercial light bulb.

1944 The Provisional Government of Charles DeGaulle enfranchised French women.