Sept 29, 2012 sat September 29th, 2012 |
Question: What was President Gerald Ford’s real name?
Yesterday’s Question Answered below: What do you do with a dowsing rod?
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History for 9/29/2012
Birthdays: Roman general Pompey Magnus, Miguel de Cervantes, Admiral Horatio Nelson, Rudolph Diesel (inventor of the engine), Enrico Fermi, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Autrey, Lech Walesa, Stanley Kramer, Bryant Gumbel, Greer Garson, Michelangelo Antonioni, Ian McShane, Anita Ekberg, Andrew Dice-Clay, cartoonist Russ Heath, Tom Sizemore, Emily Lloyd is 42, Silvio Berlusconi, Stephanie Miller is 51.
In the Medieval calendar this was The Feast of Mickelmuss or MichaelMass In Old London this was the beginning of the winter lighting season when every tenth store had to maintain a candle in a street lamp, and light it after dark, until Lady Day March 25th.
440 A.D. -Pope Leo the Great consecrated. He was the pope who turned away Attila the Hun from the gates of Rome.
1066-WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR LANDS IN ENGLAND. When King Edward the Confessor died childless, he left the throne up for grabs. Earl Harold son of Godwin promised Duke William of Normandy that he would step aside and let him be king. But later Harold took the crown for himself. So Duke William invaded with 30,000 Norman knights. Duke William was an illegitimate son of Robert the Devil. He was called William the Bastard until the conquest, then he became William the Conqueror.
When William's ship landed at Pevensey Beach near Dover, Duke William leapt out into the surf to be the first to set foot in Britain. However in front of the whole army he stumbled and fell to his knees. Quickly realizing that if he didn't act fast the men would regard this as a dangerously bad omen, he grabbed two fistfuls of muddy sand in his clenched fists, raised them up and declared : "Ah Britain! Now I have you!" His men cheered and he went on to victory at Hastings on Oct. 16th.
1529- Phillip the Landgrave of Hesse got together the great Protestant leaders to try and seek a common ground for the anti-Catholic Reformation. Martin Luther met Swiss reformer Ulrich Zwingli at this conference. They couldn’t agree on anything and the meeting quickly fell apart. Even at the departure, Luther refused to shake Zwingli’s hand. “Your Spirit is not our Spirit.”
1798- At the court of Naples Admiral Horatio Nelson was given a 40th birthday party by his friend and patron, the British ambassador Sir William Hamilton. At this party Nelson first shows the signs of getting seriously turned on by Hamilton's hot young wife Emma. Sir William was 69, Emma was 30 and was known to be sleeping around. The party was broken up when Nelson's stepson, who was serving as one of his lieutenants, got so drunk he made a scene.
The love affair between Nelson and Mrs. Hamilton in defiance of all social stigmas scandalized even that notorious age. Yet Sir William Hamilton seemed more interested in his ancient Roman pottery. Hamilton got more upset at the news of a shipload of antique vases sinking, than being told that his wife was shivering the admiral’s timbers.
1829- BOBBIES- Prime Minister the Duke of Wellington had been complaining for years that the city of London needed it's own regular police force instead of relying on irregular militia like the Bow Street Runners or the Horse Guards to do with urban maintenance. At this time sections of North London were so tough they were labeled on maps “No-Go”. On this day London's reorganized police force, The Greater Metropolitan Police Force based at Scotland Yard, went on duty. The constables, because they were formed by Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel, were nicknamed "Bobbie's Boys" or "Bobbies". They’re also nicknamed Old Bill. Some called them Peelers.
1862- THE GENERAL DISTURBANCE- The Yankeee army in Tennessee had a morale problem among it's senior officers. Major General Bull Nelson got into an argument with Brigadier General Jefferson C. Davis -no relation to the President of the Confederacy. In a hotel lobby Davis confronted the 6' 5", 300 pound Nelson and flung a business card in his face. Nelson bellowed "Get outta my way you puppy !" and slapped him so hard he flew across the room. Whereupon General Davis drew a pistol and shot General Nelson in the chest." Tom, he's murdered me!" Bull Nelson cried as he died. Amazingly Gen. Davis was never tried or court-martialed because he was needed on the battlefield. I guess arguments between nations take precedence. Davis was finally cashiered out of the army when during Sherman's March through Georgia he was accused of destroying a bridge before a crowd of runaway slave families could cross, knowing they would be left at the mercy of the pursuing Confederates.
1913-Rudolph Diesel, inventor of the Diesel engine, celebrated his 55th birthday by jumping off his yacht into the English Channel and drowning himself.
1918- German ally Bulgaria requested an armistice with Britain and France to get out of World War One.
1925- Colonel Billy Mitchell testified to Congress that the air force needed to be a new independent branch of the military services because the current army and navy heads were too incompetent to grasp it’s future significance. For these remarks he was court-martialed and suspended for 5 years. He quit the army. In Germany Ernst Udet studied Mitchell’s tactics to develop the dive-bombing Stuka. In 1942 when it was obvious that World War Two was being determined by air power, Billy Mitchell was reinstated a major general- posthumously.
1929- After a summer of fierce rioting between Jews and Arabs in Jerusalem, Nablus, Hebron and Bethlehem, Palestinian leader Oudah Mousah Pasah met with the British Mandate Governor. He warned that if something wasn’t done to curb Jewish desires for nationhood in Palestine, more violence would occur.
1930-Ninety year old writer George Bernard Shaw turned down the offer of a Peerage.
1930- First day of shooting on the Tod Browning horror classic Dracula. Hungarian actor and recreational morphine addict Bela Lugosi played the lead role he had already made famous on stage. Lugosi was identified with the character Dracula for the rest of his life and when he died he was buried in the Dracula cape.
1933- The movie A Bill of Divorcement introduced the star Katherine Hepburn.
1936- Leaders of the Spanish Fascist Phalange forces vote Gen. Francisco Franco "Il Caudillo- the Leopard", their overall leader, or Generalissimo.
1938- THE MUNICH AGREEMENT- Hitler duped war weary England & France that if he ate Czechoslovakia he would be satisfied. Prime Minister Chamberlain proclaims back home :"Peace in our Time." At the conference at Bertchesgarden the British and French prime ministers never conferred, never even had lunch with each other. And no one would give a hearing to Czech Premier Benes, who’s country after all was being dissolved.
In Germany a conspiracy of top generals lead by an Admiral Canaris were poised to topple Hitler in a coup the moment the news of Britain and France had declared war came from Munich. Instead the news of Hitler bluffing his way peacefully to victory caused the conspiracy to crumble. Around this time American CBS correspondent in Berlin William Shirer reported that those close to Hitler said he had a curious ritual to cope with stress. When the Fuhrer would fly into a rage he would calm himself by dropping to the floor and chewing on the corners of his carpet.
1941 Babi Yar. The Nazis drive the Jewish population of Kiev outside city and murder them in a ravine. Thirty thousand were killed in one day. The Ukrainian population had welcomed the Nazis as liberators from the tyranny of Stalin. For years afterwards the Soviet KGB denied Babi Yar's existence until poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko made the site famous with his poem of the same name.
1953- The television show “Make Room for Daddy” premiered, making a star out of big nosed nightclub entertainer Danny Thomas. The Lebanese Thomas had tried to break into films with no luck. He burst into tears after Columbia studio chief Harry Cohn suggested he get a nose job and forget about it. Danny Thomas at one time was the richest man in Beverly Hills.
1957- A nuclear reactor explosion in Chyrbtsk Russia released more deadly radiation than Chernobyl, but it was kept secret until recently.
1959-Hanna Barbera's "Quick Draw McGraw" tv show. Ba ba Louie and El Kabong!
1961- Russian ballet star Rudolph Nureyev, acclaimed as the greatest dancer of his age, defects to the west in Paris and was granted asylum.
1962- Because of the Independence of Algeria the French Foreign Legion quits their home base at Siddi Abbes forever. They took with them relics like the glass casket containing the wooden hand of Capt. Jean Danjou, killed at Camarone Mexico fighting the Juaristas. Today the Legion's H.Q. is outside Marseilles and still operates in Chad, New Caledonia, the Gulf and the Balkans. You can still join up until age 40, they take your passport rename you Pierre or Jacques and ask no questions.
1969- The TV series Love American Style premiered.
1976- At his birthday party musician Jerry Lee Lewis accidentally shot his bass player Norman Owens in the chest with s 357 magnum. He said he was using the gun to try and open a soft drink bottle and it accidentally went off. Owens survived and sued Lewis.
1982- Tylenol recalled hundreds of thousands of bottles of capsules after a lunatic laced some with cyanide, killing seven. The killer or killers were never found.
1996- The first Nintendo Game system, NES the first 64 bit game system, debuted in the US. It sold 500,000 the first day.
2008- When congress fails to pass a bail-out bill for the economy, Wall Street drops 700 points, the most ever at one time.
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Yesterday’s Question: What do you do with a dowsing rod?
Answer: A forked stick that when used properly is supposed to point to underground ground water. Also called a divining rod.