Category Archives: Today

November 14 is:

World Diabetes Day

Operating Room Nurse Day

National Guacamole Day

Birthday of Robert Fulton (November 14, 1765), American engineer and inventor who is widely credited with developing a commercially successful steamboat; the first was called North River Steamboat. In 1807 that steamboat traveled on the Hudson River with passengers, from New York City to Albany and back again, a round trip of 300 miles, in 62 hours.

Publication of Federalist Paper #6: Concerning Dangers from Dissensions Between the States written by Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton moves the discussion from threats from foreign powers to threats from internal factions. He uses the example of Greece and the Peloponnesian wars, the intrigue of the court of Henry VIII, and history of Holland and Venice as warnings.

Death of Georg Wilhelm Hegel (Nov 14, 1831), German philosopher, and a major figure in German Idealism. He achieved recognition in his day and—while primarily influential in the continental tradition of philosophy—has become increasingly influential in the analytic tradition as well. His dying words were “Only one man understood me and he didn’t understand.”

Birthday of Claude Monet (November 14, 1840), French landscape painter. In almost every sense he was the founder of French Impressionist painting, the term itself coming from one of his paintings, Impression, Sunrise. His paintings can be viewed at Wikiart.

“Moby Dick,” by Herman Melville, was published in 1851.

In 1889, pioneering female journalist Nellie Bly (aka Elizabeth Cochrane) began a successful attempt to travel around the world in less than 80 days. She completed the trip in 72 days.

Birthday of Mamie Eisenhower (November 14, 1896), wife of Dwight Eisenhower; First Lady 1953-1961.

Birthday of King Charles II (November 14, 1948), (Charles Philip Arthur George), is the eldest child and heir of Queen Elizabeth II. He married Lady Diana Spencer in 1981 and they had two sons: Prince William, Duke of Cambridge (born 1982), and Prince Harry (born 1984). In 1996, the couple divorced. Diana died in a car crash the following year. In 2005, Charles married Camilla Parker Bowles, who now uses the title Queen Consort.

Birthday of Condoleezza Rice, (November 14, 1954) American political scientist and diplomat; former Secretary of State in the George W. Bush administration.

Birthday of Curt Schilling, (November 14,1966), baseball pitcher. He helped lead the Philadelphia Phillies to the World Series in 1993 and won World Series championships in 2001 with the Arizona Diamondbacks and in 2004 and 2007 with the Boston Red Sox.

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November 13 is:

National Indian Pudding Day; Indian Pudding is made with cornmeal, milk and molasses.

World Kindness Day; to remember that little acts of kindness can have a big impact.

Sadie Hawkins Day, invented by Alfred Gerald Capp for his comic strip “Li’l Abner” on which day the spinsters of Dogpatch might pursue the unattached males. Sadie was said to be “the homeliest gal in them hills”.

On November 13, 1553, Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer and four others, including Lady Jane Grey, were accused of high treason and sentenced to death under Catholic Queen “Bloody” Mary I. Thomas Cranmer was the Archbishop of Canterbury during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and, for a short time, Mary I. He supported the principle of royal supremacy, in which the king was considered sovereign over the Church within his realm. When Edward came to the throne, Cranmer was able to promote major reforms. He wrote and compiled the first two editions of the Book of Common Prayer, a complete liturgy for the English Church. He changed doctrine or discipline in areas such as the Eucharist, clerical celibacy, the role of images in places of worship, and the veneration of saints. After the accession of the Catholic Mary I, Cranmer was put on trial for treason and heresy. His legacy lives on within the Church of England through the Book of Common Prayer and the Thirty-Nine Articles, an Anglican statement of faith derived from his work.

Birthday of Robert Louis Stevenson (November 13, 1850), Scottish novelist and poet famous for writing “Treasure Island”, “A Child’s Garden of Verses”, “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and many more. Treasure Island is in the public domain and is available at our other website Nextdoorestore.com. A Child’s Garden of Verses is also available at Nextdoorestore.com.

Stevenson had always wanted his ‘Requiem’ inscribed on his tomb:

Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.

1851 – The Denny Party landed at Alki Point, the first settlers of what would become Seattle, Washington.

War on Terrorism 2001: In the first such act since World War II, US President George W. Bush signed an executive order allowing military tribunals against foreigners suspected of connections to terrorist acts or planned acts on the United States.

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November 10 is:

Forget-Me-Not Day, get in touch with family and friends that you haven’t seen in awhile. The Forget-Me-Not is the state flower of Alaska.

National Vanilla Cupcake Day

Birthday of Martin Luther (November 10, 1483), German religious reformer, born in Eisleben, Germany, beginner of the Protestant Reformation.

Birthday of Oliver Goldsmith (November 10, 1730), Irish author of “She Stoops to Conquer” and “The Vicar of Wakefield”.

United States Marine Corps Birthday, founded in 1775.

Publication of Federalist Paper #5: Concerning Dangers From Foreign Force and Influence, written by John Jay. In this article Jay uses examples from European countries to emphasize the importance of a unified nation.

The U.S. Marine Corps Memorial, depicting the raising of the American flag on Iwo Jima in 1945, was dedicated in Arlington, Virginia in 1954.

The Marine Corp Hymn from: benneynlinda.com

From the Halls of Montezuma
To the Shores of Tripoli;
We will fight our country’s battles
In the air, on land and sea;
First to fight for right and freedom
And to keep our honor clean;
We are proud to claim the title
Of United States Marine.

Our flag’s unfurled to every breeze
From dawn to setting sun;
We have fought in ev’ry clime and place
Where we could take a gun;
In the snow of far-off Northern lands
And in sunny tropic scenes;
You will find us always on the job–
The United States Marines.

Here’s health to you and to our Corps
Which we are proud to serve
In many a strife we’ve fought for life
And never lost our nerve;
If the Army and the Navy
Ever look on Heaven’s scenes;
They will find the streets are guarded
By United States Marines.

In 1871, journalist-explorer Henry M. Stanley found missing Scottish missionary David Livingstone in central Africa and delivered his famous greeting:

“Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”

From Today in Science
In 1885, the world’s first motorcycle, designed by Gottlieb Daimler, made its first significant test-run. Daimler’s 17-year-old son, Paul, travelled from Cannstatt to Unterturkheim and back. Their “Reitwagen” had a wooden frame and wheels. A leather drive belt ran between the engine and large brass gears on the rear wheel. With no suspension on the wheels, the leather saddle gave a very uncomfortable ride, at a speed up to 12 km/hr. The single cylinder engine had a bore of 58mm, stroke of 100mm and a displacement of 264cc’s. The engine gave 0.5hp at 700 rpm. Two very much smaller, spring-mounted outrigger wheels provided some stability. This was built as an experimental vehicle to test the new Daimler engine in a proof of concept, which was to power Daimler’s first motorized carriage the following year.

Kate Smith first sang Irving Berlin’s “God Bless America” on network radio in 1938.

1942 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, discussing the recent victory over Rommel at El Alamein, Egypt, said “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”

“Sesame Street” debuted on PBS in 1969.

November 9 is: .

Schicksalstag (Day of Fate) commemorates 5 events in German history: the execution of Robert Blum in 1848; the end of the monarchies in 1918 and the start of the Weimar Republic; the Hitler putsch attempt in 1923; the Nazi antisemitic pogroms in 1938; and the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989.

Crystal Night, the anniversary of the street riots of Nov 9 and 10, 1938 when Nazi storm troopers raided Jewish homes and synagogues. Called Kristallnacht in German (the “night of broken glass”). Per Wikipedia , “Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November Pogrom(s), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by SA paramilitary forces and civilians throughout Nazi Germany on 9–10 November 1938. The German authorities looked on without intervening. The name Kristallnacht (“Crystal Night”) comes from the shards of broken glass that littered the streets after the windows of Jewish-owned stores, buildings and synagogues were smashed. The pretext for the attacks was the assassination of the German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan, a 17-year-old German-born Polish Jew living in Paris.”

“Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”

From Today in Science
In 1825, Thomas Drummond made the first practical use of limelight while surveying in Ireland to enable work through misty days and night. He created an intense light from a lump of lime (calcium oxide) heated to incandescent by an oxygenated alcohol flame in front of a reflector. He attempted to adapt it for lighthouses, but found operation too costly. The bright light given off by heated metal oxides was first investigated in the 1820s by Goldsworthy Gurney who created the oxyhydrogen blowpipe. Limelight was first used for indoor stage illumination in the Covent Garden Theatre in London in 1837 and enjoyed widespread use in theatres around the world in the 1860s and 1870s. Limelight was also used for microscope illumination.

Birthday of Carl Sagan, (November 9, 1934,), the astronomer whose books and television show informed millions of Americans.

The Berlin Wall fell in 1989, in a significant event towards the end of the Cold War. East Germany lifted restrictions on emigration or travel to the West, and within hours tens of thousands of East and West Berliners swarmed across the infamous Berlin Wall for a boisterous celebration.

In 1998, brokerage houses were ordered to pay 1.03 billion USD to cheated NASDAQ investors to compensate for their price-fixing. This was the largest civil settlement in United States history.

November 5 is

National Doughnut Day

Guy Fawkes Day, the anniversary of the 1605 Gunpowder Plot” to blow up Parliament and the king.

On this date in 1781 John Hanson was elected first “President of US in Congress assembled”. See Presidents before Washington

Suffragist Susan B. Anthony was fined $100 for attempting to vote in the presidential election of 1872. She tried to vote for Ulysses S Grant.

Parker Brothers began marketing the board game “Monopoly”in 1935.

From Today in Science
In 1963, archaeologists found Viking ruins in Newfoundland predating Columbus by 500 years. Leif Ericson, Icelandic explorer, second son of Eric the Red, is believed by most historians to have been the first European to reach the North American mainland. About the year 1000 he landed at a place that he called Vinland. Vinland was identified as Newfoundland in 1963 when archaeologists uncovered the remains of a Viking-type settlement at L’Anse-aux-Meadows at the extreme northern tip of the island. His countryman, Bjarni Herjólfsson, had earlier sighted North America and reported that the land was rich in timber. Thus, Ericson had a clear economic motive for his journey. Icelanders needed wood for houses and ships, but their country is entirely treeless.

The 1968 United States presidential election was the 46th quadrennial U.S. presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 5, 1968. The Republican nominee, former Vice President Richard Nixon, defeated the Democratic nominee, incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey.

November 5, 2009 A shooting rampage at the Fort Hood Army post in Texas left 13 people dead and more than 30 injured; Maj. Nidal Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, was charged in the worst mass killing on a U.S. military base. A jury panel of 13 officers in August, 2013 convicted him of 13 counts of premeditated murder, 32 counts of attempted murder, and unanimously recommended he be dismissed from the service and sentenced to death. Hasan is incarcerated at the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas awaiting execution while his case is reviewed by appellate courts. It is estimated the appeals process will take 10-15 years and will then require authorization from the President.

Hasan’s former defense lawyer, retired Col. John P. Galligan, told Army Times that they spoke last week (July 19, 2019) on the day in which the new DOJ guidance was announced.

“[Hasan’s] case hasn’t even really gotten through the initial stages of the appeal,” Galligan said. “The case is still being litigated on post-trial discovery issues … I think it’d be a long time before that [the death penalty] becomes one of the pertinent issues to be addressed on appeal.”

Hasan congratulated the Taliban for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan in August, 2021.