On This Day - January 31st

On this day in the year 1871 of the common era (CE), millions of birds dark the skin while flying over western San Francisco; three years later the Jesse James gang robs a train at Gads Hill, Missouri.

On this day in the year 1928 CE, Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company (3M) begins marketing Scotch Tape; one year later Leon Trotsky is expelled from Russia and sent to Turkey. Sixty-one years after that, the first McDonalds opens in the Soviet Union and Moscow celebrates arrival of the American hamburger.

On this day in 2020 CE the United Kingdom formally withdraws from the European Union in a geopolitical disaster known as Brexit.

 

On This Day - January 30th

On this day in the year 1661 of the common era (CE), on the twelfth anniversary of the execution of King Charles I by forces under the command of Oliver Cromwell, which was intended to bring about the end of the Monarchy and the beginning of the short-lived Commonwealth of Free States (otherwise known as the Puritan Republic of England, Ireland and Scottland), the body of Cromwell was exhumed from Westminster Abbey. Cromwell, the onetime Lord Protector of the Commonwealth, was subjected to a mock trial and execution at Tyburn, where his corpse was beheaded and hung in chains outside of Westminster Hall, where it remained for over twenty years with his severed head on a pole...a symbol of the monarchy restored.

On this day in the year 1815 CE the United States Library of Congress is re-established after being destroyed by fire, with the donation of Thomas Jefferson's 6,500 volumes from his personal estate; twenty years later Richard Lawrence misfires while attempting to assassinate president Andrew Jackson in Washington, D.C.; it is the first attempted assassination of a United States president.

On this day in 1862 CE the U.S.S. Monitor is launched; it is the United States Navy's first ironclad warship.

In 1873 CE, Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne, is published in France by Pierre-Jules Hetzel; sixteen years later, according to written notes, the Archduke Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria, kills his mistress, the Baroness Marie Vetsera, and then himself in a murder/suicide pact.

In 1894 CE the Pneumatic Hammer is patented by Charles King of Detroit, Michigan.

In 1933 CE President Paul von Hindenburg appoints Adolf Hitler as Reich Chancellor of Germany who forms a government with Franz von Papen, after which, Hindenburg’s former colleague General Erich Ludendorff sends him a letter stating that Hitler, "this accursed man, will cast our Reich into the abyss and bring our nation to inconceivable misery;" six year years later Hitler threatens Jews during his speech to the German Reichstag and the fire of the holocaust were list.

In 1956 CE the home of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. is bombed; five years later, I Fall to Pieces, is released by Patsy Cline, becoming Billboard’s “Song of the Year.” Fourteen years after that Ernő Rubik patents his Magic Cube, later to be marketed as the Rubik's Cube.

In 2025 CE, global planetary defense procedures were triggered for the first time after the 100-meter asteroid named: 2024 YR4 is found to have a 1.3% chance of hitting Earth in the year 2032 CE.

 

On This Day - January 29th

On this day in the year 474 of the common era (CE), Zeno is crowned co-emperor of the Byzantine Empire along with his son Leo II, aged six at the time; one hundred and eighty-seven years later, the Rashidun Caliphate, then the largest empire in history, comes to an end with the death of its leader, Ali ibn Abi Talib who the cousin and son in law of the prophet Muhammad and the First Imam of the Shia tradition. Rasidun was succeeded by the Umayyad Caliphate. Two hundred and forty-three years after that, in 904 CE, Sergius III comes out of retirement to take over the papacy from the deposed antipope Christopher…and the terrible condition that afflicts the human race with religious fervor hypocrisy and duplicity continues.

On this day in the year 1845 CE the American writer Edgar Allan Poe's poem "The Raven" is first published in The Evening Mirror newspaper in New York, New York.

In the year 1907 CE, republican Charles Curtis of Kansas becomes the first Native American to become a member of the United States Senate.

In 1924 CE the ice cream Cone Rolling Machine is patented by Carl Taylor of Cleveland, Ohio; twenty years later, the USS Missouri is launched, the last battleship commissioned by the United States Navy…decommissioned in the 1992.

In 1936 the first players are elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame: Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson, Christy Mathewson, Babe Ruth and Honus Wagner.

 

On This Day - January 28th

On this day in the year 1724 of the common era (CE) Peter the Great of Russia founds the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg; one hundred and twenty-seven years later Northwestern University is chartered in Chicago, Illinois. Fifty-one years after that the Carnegie Institute is founded in Washington, D.C..

On this day in the year 1807 CE, London's Pall Mall becomes the first street to be lit by gaslight; forty-eight years later the first locomotive runs from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean on the Panama Railway.

In the year 1959 CE the Soviet Union defeats the United States in a basketball game, 62-37; it is the first ever loss for the United States in international competition. Ten years later, at the NFL draft, O.J. “The Juice” Simpson from the University of Southern California, is the first pick by the Buffalo Bills.

In 1985 CE the charity single "We Are the World" is recorded by the supergroup, USA for Africa; eighteen years later, in his State of the Union address, United States President George W. Bush announces (PEPFAR) the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, which will go on to save twenty-five million lives worldwide (as of Jan 2023).

In 1986 CE the Space Shuttle Challenger explodes seventy-three seconds after liftoff from Cape Canaveral, killing all seven crew members, including Christa McAuliffe, who was to be the first teacher in space.

 

On This Day - January 27th

On this day in the year 1591 of the common era (CE) Scottish schoolmaster Dr. John Fian was burned for witchcraft at Castle Hill, Edinburgh by order King James VI as a part of the gruesome display of Christian savagery and human sacrifice known as the Berwick Witch Trials; two years later the Vatican opens a blasphemy and theological heresy trial against Italian scholar and friar Giordano Bruno. The proceedings drag on for over seven years.

On this day in the year 1853 CE the U.S S Levant, a sealing and whaling vessel captained by Mercator Cooper, makes the first known landing on mainland Antarctica at Oates Coast, Victoria Land.

On this day in 1880 CE, Thomas Edison patents the electric-incandescent lamp.

In 1894 CE the first college basketball game is played between the University of Chicago and the Chicago YMCA, the University of Chicago wins 19-11.

In 1924 CE Vladimir Lenin is laid to rest in a mausoleum in Red Square, Moscow, Russia; twenty years later the siege of Leningrad is lifted by the Soviet army after 880 days and more than two million Russians killed. One year after that Soviet troops liberate the Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps in Poland…this day is now commemorated as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Twenty-one years later, in 1966 CE Germany commemorates its First Holocaust Remembrance Day.

In 1926 CE Physicist Erwin Schrödinger publishes his theory of wave mechanics and presents what becomes known as the Schrödinger equation in quantum mechanics; twenty-five years later the United States begins a series of one hundred and twenty-six above ground (open-air) nuclear war head tests at the Nevada Nuclear Test site. Fourteen years after that the first ground station-to-aircraft radio communication via satellite is performed; two years later a fire breaks out in NASA's Apollo One command module, killing astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger B. Chaffee during a launch rehearsal. On this same day in 1967 CE the United States becomes signatory to a treaty banning the military use of nuclear weapons in space.

In 1948 CE the first tape recorder is sold.

In 1973 CE the Paris Peace Accords are signed by United States Secretary of State William P. Rogers, (North) Vietnam Minister for Foreign Affairs Nguyen Duy Trinh, Republic of South Vietnam Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyễn Thị Bình, and Republic of Vietnam Minister for Foreign Affairs Trần Văn Lắm, ending America's then longest war and it's military draft, though it would take two years and the fall of Saigon to complete the withdraw of all U.S. troops, .

In 1984 CE, Michael Jackson, the king of pop suffers severe burns to the face while filming a television commercial for Pepsi Cola.

 

On This Day - January 26th

In the year 1564 of the common era (CE), at the Council of Trent, the Catholic Church issues its (mostly non-sensical) conclusions in the Tridentinum, establishing with the power of semantics and rhetoric a distinction between the Roman tradition of Christianity and various other traditions that had developed in protest to it, and beginning a period of reformation that, five hundred years later, is still to be completed…but hey, we’re getting there. Three hundred and ninety-eight years later bishop Burke of the Catholic diocese of Buffalo, New York declares the dance craze named for Chubby Checker's song The Twist to be impure and bans it from all Catholic schools.

In the year 1784 CE, Benjamin Franklin expresses his unhappiness over the election of the American Bald Eagle, a bird of prey and a scavenger, as the simple of the newly formed nation, preferring the voluptuous fecundity of the turkey instead.

In 1926 CE John Logie Baird gives the first public demonstration of television in his laboratory in London, England.

In 1972 CE, Vesna Vulovic, a flight attendant from Serbia, survives a fall of 10,160 meters without a parachute; eleven years later, Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is arrested in Bolivia.

In 1978 CE Frank Herbert completes his novel: Destination Void, in which he examines the dangers of the quest for artificial intelligence, the social, ethical and spiritual implications, set in a comparative context with Mary Shelly’s novel Frankenstein.

 

On This Day - January 25th

On this day in the year 1918 of the common era (CE), Russia is declared a Soviet Republic, and the Union of Soviet Socialists Republics is born.

On this day in the year 1939 CE the first nuclear fission experiment (splitting of a uranium atom) is conducted in the United States, in basement of Pupin Hall, by a team of researchers that included Enrico Fermi at Columbia University in New York, New York.

On the day in 1945 CE the New York Yankees are sold by the Ruppert estate to construction magnate Del Webb and partners: Dan Topping and Larry MacPhail for $2.8 million dollars; fifty-four years later the owner of the New York Yankees, George Steinbrenner. meets with pope John Paul II.

In 1959 CE, pope John XXIII opens the second Vatican full ecumenical council of the Catholic Church.

In 1971 CE, Charles Manson and three female followers are convicted of the Tate-La Bianca murders; eight years later the first documented case of a robot killing a human occurs in the United States.

On This Day - January 24th

On this day in the year 41 of the common era Claudius succeeds his nephew Caligula to the curial throne, making him the fourth Roman Emperor after the latter's assassination by officers of the Praetorian Guard, and the first to be proclaimed emperor by the military rather than the senate. He governed for thirteen years until he was poisoned by his wife Agrippina.

Claudius expanded the empire into Britain, North Africa and the Middle East; he was the last known speaker and translator of the Etruscan language, he was an effective and scholarly administrator who improved the judicial system and infrastructure of the empire, its provinces and protectorates.

On this day in the year 1764 CE, a fire at Harvard University destroys governor Winthrop's Telescope; the Harvard library consisting of 5,000 books is mostly lost.

In the year 1890 CE the world's oldest wooden sculpture is discovered in a peat bog near Kaltay, Russia in the Ural mountains. The Shigir Idol was radiocarbon dated to 12,500 years old; twenty-three years later Franz Kafka stops working on Amerika…it will never be finished. Twenty-two years after that, sales of Krueger’s Cream Ale begin in Richmond, Virginia…the first canned beer.

In 1958 CE After warming to 100,000,000 degrees, two photons are bashed together to create a heavier atom, resulting in the first example of man-made nuclear fusion; fourteen years later Japanese Sergeant Shōichi Yokoi is found hiding in the jungles of Guam, where he had been observing his duty and keeping vigilant watch since the end of World War II, not knowing that it had ended. Twelve years after that Apple unveils the Macintosh personal computer in a Super Bowl commercial directed by Ridley Scott.

 

 

Zen-sufi, Big Sugar Buddha, Zen Syndicate, Sid Gateaux, Neighborhood Buddha, Pure Land Ministries, People's History Project, On This Day

On This Day - January 23rd

On this day in the year 1789 of the common era (CE), Georgetown in founded; it is the first Catholic college in the United States.

On this day in the year 1849 (CE), Elizabeth Blackwell becomes the first woman in the United States to earn a medical degree, graduating from Geneva Medical College in Geneva, New York; forty years later, Daniel Hale Williams forms the Provident Hospital in Chicago, the first non-segregated hospital in the United States.

On this day in 1862 CE. Agoston Haraszthy imports 10,000 grapevine cuttings to Sonoma Valley, California, making him the region’s first vintner.  

In 1943 CE Duke Ellington plays at Carnegie Hall in New York City for the first time; thirty-four years later the television miniseries Roots, based on the biographical novel detailing the family origins of author, Alex Haley (played by James Earl Jones), premiers on ABC.

In 1973 CE, United States president Richard Nixon announces that an accord has been reached to end the Vietnam War…it would take two years to complete the withdraw.

In 1986 CE the inductees for the inaugural class of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame are named: Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, The Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Robert Johnson, Jimmie Rodgers, Jimmy Yancey, Alan Freed, John Hammond and Sam Phillips.

In 2025 CE, United States president Donald Trump issues pardons to twenty-three anti-abortion activists convicted of illegally blocking access to clinics; one year later his justice department applies the same law used to convict them to three protesters in Minneapolis, Minnesota who entered a church to protest one of its pastors, who happens to also work as the regional head of the ICE field office.

On this day in the year 3268 of the common era (CE) the second Julian Period begins.

 

 

On This Day - January 22nd

On this day in the year 1506 of the common era (CE), the first contingent of Swiss Guards, one hundred-fifty men-at-arms, arrives at the Vatican to begin their centuries long tradition of service as the private security of the pope, the bishop of Rome and head of the Catholic Church; three hundred and thirty six years later, author Charles Dickens and his wife Catherine arrive in Boston, Massachusetts.

On this day in the year 1877 CE, Anglican clergyman Arthur Tooth is taken into custody after being prosecuted for using ritualist practices; thirty-one years later Katie Mulcahey is taken into custody for lighting a cigarette in violation of the one-day-old "Sullivan Ordinance" banning women from smoking in public. She says to tells the judge, “I’ve got as much right to smoke as you;” he fines her five dollars.

On this day in 1951 CE. Fidel Castro, suiting up with the Washington Senators, is ejected from a Winter League baseball game after intentionally hitting a batter, bringing his prospects as a major league baseball player to an end, allowing him to devote the rest of his life to the Cuban Revolution and politics; eight years later Buddy Holly makes his last recordings in his NYC apartment including "Peggy Sue" and "Crying, Waiting, Hoping", which were embellished, overdubbed, and released posthumously by Coral Records.

In 1973 CE, the United States Supreme Court legalizes most abortions through its opinion in the case Roe v. Wade. Writing for majority, Justice Harry Blackmun states that the criminalization of abortion does not have "roots in the English common law tradition."

 

 

Ursula K. Le Guin – Author, Hero, Sage

It has been eight years since the sage was translated from this life into the world beyond…she was and remains a hero of mine.

The first book of hers I ever read was a novella titled: The Lathe of Heaven. The genre was science-fiction, but the book was much more; in her slim masterpiece the author spoke to me about the nature of reality, the function of consciousness and most importantly what it means to be human.

She took the title for this book from the writings of the Taoist, Chuang Tzu (book 23, paragraph 7), which says:

 

~ To let understanding stop at what cannot be understood is a high attainment. Those who cannot do so will be destroyed on the lathe of heaven ~

 

Her book dramatized this sentiment while recapitulating its warning, the consideration of which took me outside of myself and allowed me to see the world…the whole of it, in an entirely new way.

I was fifteen years old at the time, and without realizing it, through Le Guin’s writing, I had been introduced to Taoism (the esoteric tradition) of Lao Tzu, which provided me with a perspective that would subsequently shape the future-history of my life.

Some years later, when I was in the Navy, I found comfort in the Earthsea Chronicles, a series of four novellas in the fantasy genre, complete with wizards and dragons; in book one of this series: A Wizard of Earthsea, she introduces a hero named Sparrowhawk, whose greatest enemy is himself, which forces him to address the existential dilemma expressed in the question:

How do we live with ourselves?

For better or worse, in sickness and in health…how do we do it?

To be clear, Sparrowhawk’s enemy is not exactly himself, rather it is the shadow of the specter of guilt which he carries, a shadow that most if not all human beings carry throughout their lives, shame and guilt which we nurture insofar as we are unable to ask for, and accept forgiveness for the things we have done to hurt or harm those near to us.

The Earthsea Chronicles are written in a simple narrative structure with clear and unpretentiousness prose, and they are so brief that they are more akin to fairy tales than epics and sagas, they can be read to children (which is why I found them comforting…I think). Yet, Ursula Le Guin’s writing is so masterful that sophisticated readers may also find them engaging. They communicate a depth of insight into the human condition that lies just below the surface of the narrative…just as it does beneath the surface of our own minds.

If we liken civilization to a garden, we would have to admit that it is unkempt and wild, and long under shadow; the fruit of our progress has been wilting on the vine, fellowship and common purpose have suffered accordingly. Such themes of discontent are the ideas that she explores in her collection on the Hainish cycle, beginning with the fifth book in the series, The Dispossessed.

Read it!

Eight years ago this luminary departed planet earth, leaving a legacy of literature to light the way for us...and, we need this light more than ever.

We need heroes and teachers like Ursula K. Le Guin, we need them to light the way for us, to guide us into the cloud of unknowing…I miss her.

 

 

On This Day - January 21st

On this day in the year 1793 of the common era (CE), king Louis XVI of France is executed by guillotine in Paris; one hundred and forty-nine years later a magistrate in the Bronx, New York rules that all pinball machines are illegal.

On this day in 1974 CE, the price of gold hits a record $161.31 per ounce, silver hits a record $3.97 per ounce in London; sixteen years later the price of gold peaks briefly at over $870 per ounce before closing at a record $850 per ounce…today the price of gold is $4,845 per ounce

In 1977 CE, United States president Jimmy Carter pardons draft evaders from the Vietnam War that had officially ended two years earlier.

In 1994 CE Lorena Bobbitt was found to be temporarily insane when she cut off her husband's penis; four years later pope John Paul II makes the first papal visit to Cuba, strengthening the Catholic Church and leading to the restoration of Christmas as a public holiday; on this same day there was breaking news from the office of the independent counsel Kenneth Starr that, United States president Bill Clinton had an extra marital affair with intern Monica Lewinsky while working in the White House, which led to the Clinton’s impeachment.

 

 

On This Day - January 20th

On this day in the year 1920 of the common era (CE) the American Civil Liberties Union is founded.

On this day, from the year 1953 to the year 2025 CE, every president of the United States has been sworn into office: from Dwight Eisenhower the 34^th, through Donald Trump the 47^th, with the exceptions of Lyndon Johnson who succeeded, John Kennedy after his assassination on November 22^nd, 1963, becoming the 36^th president of the United States, and Gerald Ford who succeeded Richard Nixon to the office after his resignation, to become the 38^th.

In this day in 2020 CE the Center for Disease Control (CDC) reports the first laboratory-confirmed case of COVID in the United States.

In 2025 CE, Donald Trump is inaugurated as the 47th President of the United States; he is the oldest person to be sworn into the office and joins Grover Cleveland as only the second person to be elected to non-consecutive presidential terms…the event is held indoors due to inclement weather. On this same day he issues pardons to over 1500 of his supporters charged in connection with the attack on the US Capitol, in an attempted coup intended to upset the peaceful and orderly transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden on January 6, 2021. Trump had intended to stay in power despite having been voted out of office. The newly sworn in 47^th president declares a national emergency at the southern border, and withdraws the US from the World Health Organization and the Paris Agreement on Climate, issuing executive orders halting all foreign aid programs for 90 days, with some ill-defined exceptions for humanitarian aid, and he orders federal agencies to slash diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives throughout the government leading to mass chaos and layoffs in the civil service.

 

 

On This Day - January 19th

On this day in the year 1883 of the common era (CE) the first electric lighting system built by Thomas Edison begins service at Roselle, New Jersey; distributing light through a network of over head wires.

 

 

Zen-sufi, Big Sugar Buddha, Zen Syndicate, Sid Gateaux, Neighborhood Buddha, Pure Land Ministries, People's History Project, On This Day

Martin Luther King Day - MLK...Hero and Prophet, an American Saint

Today we celebrate the life and work of the Reverend Doctor, Martin Luther King Jr., the sainted-prophet of our time; his was a voice of conscience, and like so many prophets before him, he was he was murdered for speaking the truth, assassinated in service to the good. 

Martin Luther King Jr. wore the mantle of a prophet, not in the sense that he saw the future (though he did foresee his assassination); prophecy is not prognostication, assessing likely probabilities may be a tool of the prophet, looking to the future and expressing one’s convictions with the certainty of hope…these may be a part of the prophets stock-in-trade, but a prophet is not a seer or an augur, a diviner, a fortuneteller or a soothsayer.

A person is a prophet who delivers the word of God, and Martin Luther King did just that; he was not a prophet in the sense that he had a unique channel to the creator of the universe, or because God spoke to him in a privileged way. The Reverend Doctor made no pretensions to being that sort of person. He was an ordinary man who answered and extraordinary call, and in so doing he became transformed. Through his transformation he pointed out the way for us to follow,  presenting a key for transformation of ourselves and thereby society-at-large, for taking Hobbesian world we have inherited, with nature red in tooth and claw, and making it into something new…the community of the beloved, as Martin Luther called it, though he was called away early and left the left the greater portion of that work for the rest of to do.

God speaks to all of us in the same way as God spoke to the Reverend Doctor, this is one of the things that the he spoke to us about, he clarified the responsibility we each bear, to listen to the demands of our conscience when we hear it speaking in our hearts; he called on us to do more than listen…the sainted-prophet called on us to act.

Martin Luther had no more and no less access to supernatural powers than any of us; he was not a medium nor a mediator, what made him different than most (human beings) was the choice he made to comply with the demands of his conscience, which was in fact the voice of God speaking in his heart, he clove to those demands even to the point at which it cost him his life…if he hesitated he did not show he it, he carried the grief of it with the strength of resolve.

Like Jesus whom he followed, the Reverend Doctor loved mercy, strove for justice, and walked humbly through the days of his life; he set an example for the rest of us to follow.

Today we are given countless opportunities to reflect on Martin Luther King Jr.’s likeness, to consider the wisdom of his words, carried in the baritone-tremulo of his golden-prose, to reflect on the life of an American Saint…and its meaning; we are wise to do so.

We are wise to remember the man, Martin Luther King Jr., a rare person, a man whose measure in our society exceeded the ordinary flaws that mark us all as human; he was flawed like the rest of us, and he lived with his flaws even while reaching beyond them.

The Reverend Doctor has transcended death; though he was taken by the assassin’s bullet he lives now in our collective consciousness, in our collective-conscience; he lives in the global psyche, speaking to us from the dimension of myth, a human being who was more than human, a child of God overflowing with grace and wisdom.

Today MLK calls us to service, to share his cup, so that upon drinking from it we may aspire to do the same as he did in our own small way, to live the same as he did and encourage others to do the same.

He spoke truth to power and offered hope to the powerless, and for that he was shot down. He was once considered by the director of the F.B.I. to be the most dangerous man in America and from that status he became our most beloved hero, the prime-exemplar of what it means to be an American, a radical-freedom-fighter, unparalleled and unforgotten.

He was beaten and arrested dozens of times for the crime of seeking justice; his life was threatened daily. His reputation was smeared without regard for the truth, or appreciation for his selfless works. He was killed for his efforts on behalf of the poor and the marginalized, but he was not destroyed…he was and continues to be an example to us all.

The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr., our prophet; he still points the way, lighting the long journey along the arc-of-justice.

 

 

On This Day - January 18th

On this day in the year 1591 of the common era (CE), king Naresuan of Siam kills crown prince Minchit Sra of Burma in single combat, the date is now observed as Royal Thai Armed Forces Day.

On this day in the year 1788 CE the First Fleet, carrying 736 convicts from England to Australia, arrives at Botany Bay to establish a penal colony,

In 1871 CE the Second German Empire is proclaimed by Kaiser Wilhelm I and Otto von Bismarck.

In 1974 CE the Six Million Dollar Man, starring Lee Majors, premieres on ABC.

In 1980 CE Pink Floyd's double album, The Wall reaches number one

 

 

On This Day - January 17th

On this day in the year 1775 of the common era (CE) in Kalisk Poland, nine elderly women are sentenced to death and burnt at the stake for practicing witchcraft resulting in bad harvests; one hundred and seventy-three years later, the trial of the “New York Eleven,” a small group of communist party members and leaders, begins in New York, New York. All members of the group were convicted and sentenced to prison for plotting to overthrow the United States government, though they did not plan any concrete steps to do so. The United States Supreme Court upheld their convictions in 1951 in what was seen as landmark case in the curtailment of free speech.

On this day in the year 1893 CE, queen Liliuokalani of Hawaii is deposed by an American coup; the kingdom of Hawaii becomes a republic. Six years later the United States takes possession of Wake Island in the Pacific; eighteen years after that the United States purchases the Virgin Islands from Denmark for twenty-five million dollars.

In 1928 CE the first fully automatic photographic film-developing machine is patented.

In 1929 CE Popeye makes his first appearance in the comic strip Thimble Theatre; twenty-five years later, Jacques Cousteau's first network telecast airs on Omnibus, produced by CBS. Twenty-two years after that, Blondie releases the debut single X Offender, written by Debbie Harry and Gary Valentine; one year later the Sex pistols announce that they have broken up.

In 1994 CE, Patrick Ewing becomes first New York player to reach the 15,000-point mark in his NBA career; he scores a game-high 34 points in the Knickerbockers' 106-94 win over the visiting Minnesota Timberwolves.

 

 

On this Day - January 16th

On this day in the year 27 before the common era (BCE), Gaius Julius Caesar Octavian is granted the title Augustus by the Senate and the people of Rome; five hundred and seventy-seven years, in the year 550 of the common era (CE), king Totila of the Ostrogoths conquers Rome after a long and deadly siege. Bribery was the means he used to achieve his end.

In the year 1412 CE the Medici family is appointed the official banker of the Papacy.

In 1547 CE, Ivan the Terrible, at the age seventeen, crowns himself the first Tsar (Caeser) of Russia.

In 1572 CE, Thomas Howard, the fourth Duke of Norfolk is tried and convicted of high treason for his part in the Ridolfi plot to restore Catholicism in England; nine years later the English Parliament passes laws restricting Catholicism.

In 1605 CE the first edition of El Ingenioso Hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha (Part One of Don Quixote), by Miguel de Cervantes is published in Madrid, Spain.

In 1865 CE, General William T. Sherman issues Field Order #15, redistributing confiscated Southern land to newly freed Black families in forty-acre plots. This commitment to redistribution of Southern wealth to the families that generated it was only partially fulfilled before being mostly rescinded. The unfilled promise sometimes referred to as Forty Acres and a Mule, plank in the valid legal argument for restitution to be paid to the families of formerly enslaved people.

In 1919 CE the 18th Amendment to the US Constitution is ratified, authorizing the prohibition of alcohol.

In 1940 CE my mother was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

In 1944 CE, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, future president of the United States, takes command of Allied Invasion Force in London; one year later Adolf Hitler moves into the Fuhrer-Bunker, his underground headquarters in Berlin where he lives until his suicide seventy-five day later, cowardly denying the world justice even while ridding it of a great evil...himself.

In 1962 CE shooting begins on Dr. No, the first film in the James Bond franchise based on books written by Ian Fleming, with Sean Connery in the starring role as Agent 007; three years later the Outer Limits airs its last episode on ABC.

In 2016 CE a zinnia is grown in space aboard the International Space Station, the first flower.

 

On This Day - January 15th

On this day in the year 588 before the common era (BCE) the great-king Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon, having invaded Judea nine years earlier, begins the siege of Jerusalem. It lasts until July 23, 586 BCE, at which time the exilic-period begins, followed by the first great diaspora. Nebuchadnezzar kills or removes the leading families of Jerusalem and Judea, including those connected to the Royal House, along with about twenty-five percent of the population. In the year 539 BCE, after the Babylonian Dynasty is overthrown by king Cyrus of Persia, the Jewish people who had been taken into captivity, and their descendants were granted the right of return.

On this day in the year 1535 of the common era (CE) king Henry VIII, the second Tudor king, declares himself head of the Church of England; twenty-four years later his daughter by Anne Bolyn (whom Henry had beheaded) is crowned Elizabeth I, Queen of England at Westminster Abbey in London.

On this day in 1846 CE, Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky's first novel Poor Folk is published in the St Petersburg Collection Almanac.

In 1892 CE the rules of basketball are first published in Triangle magazine, James Naismith.

In 1919 CE, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, two prominent German socialists are tortured and murdered by the Freikorps, on this same day in Boston, Massachusetts, two million gallons of molasses flood the streets in the “Great Molasses Flood” when a storage tank bursts; one hundred and fifty people were injured and twenty-one died by drowning. Fifteen years after that, while robbing the First National Bank in East Chicago, Indianapolis, John Dillinger is shot several times by officer William O'Malley, but survives because he is wearing a bullet proof vest; twelve years later the brutalized corpse of Elizabeth Short, the “Black Dahlia," is found in Leimert Park, in Los Angeles, California

1945 CE the Manhattan Project's G-5 Group, headed by Physicist's Donald Kerst and Seth Neddermeyer, take their first betatron pictures of a nuclear implosion at the Los Alamos Laboratory; thirty-two years later the Coneheads debut on Saturday Night Live.

In 2019 CE the Kumbh Mela Hindu festival began (humanity’s largest gathering) with fifteen million people bathing at the joining of Ganges and Yamuna rivers, and an additional one hundred million people attending the Hindu religious festival as observers over next 49 days; thirty people were crushed death in a human stampede, and sixty others were injured.

On This Day - January 14th

On this day in the year 1129 of the common era (CE), at the Council of Troyes Pope Honorius II pens the Bull: Omne Datum Optimum granting formal approval to the Order of Templars. The Poor Knights of Christ proceeded to run amuck through Europe and the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Near East until it was dissolved on March 22^nd, 1312 CE by Pope Clement V with his Bull: Vox in Excelso. With the aid of King Phillip IV of France its members were arrested and tried for heresy, its leaders including the last Grand Master, Jacques de Molay, were burned at the stake on March 18^th, 1314 CE.

On this day in the year 1699 CE Massachusetts holds a day of fasting to acknowledge its fault for wrongly persecuting "witches." Between 1692 and 1693, over two-hundred people were accused of practicing witchcraft, leading to thirty convictions and twenty people put to death by the state.

In 1814 CE with the Treaty of Kiel, King Frederick VI of Denmark cedes the Kingdom of Norway to King Charles XIII of Sweden

In 1938 CE the National Society for Legalization of Euthanasia is founded in the State of New York; twenty-two years later the United States Army promotes Elvis Presley to the rank of Sergeant.

In 1963 CE George Wallace is sworn in as Governor of Alabama; in his acceptance address he coins the phrase: "segregation now; segregation tomorrow; segregation forever!" On this same day The Bell Jar is published by Heinemann in the United Kingdom (UK); its author, Sylvia Plath, commits suicide on the eleventh day of the following month.

In 1972 CE the television show Sanford & Son starring Redd Foxx premieres on NBC.

In 1977 CE, RCA releases David Bowie's 11th studio album, Low; the album is the first collaboration with Brian Eno, in what becomes known as his “Berlin trilogy”; one year later the Sex Pistols hold their final concert at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, California.

 

 

On This Day - January 13th

On this day in the year 1882 of the common era (CE), Richard Wagner completes his final opera Parsifal, a knight of the Round Table, who together with Sir Galahad and Sir Bors completed the quest for the Holy Grail, the Celtic and Teutonic imagery set in its mythological landscape were put to evil use by Nazi propagandists in the mid twentieth century.

On this day in the year 1928 CE the Swedish-American inventor E.F.W. Alexanderson, of General Electric, demonstrates the first television receiver at Proctors Theatre in Schenectady, New York; one year later the Humanist Society is established in Hollywood, California, and in the following year the first Mickey Mouse comic strip appears.

 

 

On This Day - January 12th

On this day in the year 1913 of the common era (CE) Josef Dzhugashvili, after using other pseudonyms over the years, signs his name as Josef Stalin for the first in a letter to the newspaper Social Democrat, given himself the nom de plume – The Man of Steel.

In the year 1957 CE the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) is founded with Martin Luther King Jr. as its leader and headquartered at Ebenezer Church in Atlanta, Georgia; fourteen years later the Congressional Black Caucus is organized. Twenty-four years after that James Orenthal Simpson goes on trial for the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown and their friend Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles, California.

On this day in the year 1939 CE, Timely Comics (too becomes Marvel Comics) is founded by American publisher Martin Goodman in New York, New York; twenty-seven years later Batman, starring Adam West debuts on ABC

In the year 1967 Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with the intent of future resuscitation; his remains are stored at the Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, Arizona. Since 1967 approximately two-hundred and fifty people have been frozen by Alcor, at a cost that ranges up to $220,000 dollars for whole body freezing (80,000 for just the head); no one has been successfully revived. Thirty-one years later, nineteen European nations agree to forbid human cloning, another popular scheme to preserve and prolong human life but with far more potentially helpful medical technologies being adapted from it; banned by nineteen countries in 1998, research into human cloning continues unabated. 

 

On This Day - January 11th

On this day in the year 1765 of the common era (CE), Frisia bans Voltaire's book Traité sur la tolerance, A Treatise on Tolerance in which he called for religious toleration and targeted religious fanaticism as an affront to humanism, with special  attention being given to the pernicious and socially destructive work of the Jesuits.

 

Observation - January 11th, 2026, Sunday

it is dark and the air is dry

my studio is illuminated

with lamplight

 

soft-yellow above my desk

blending with the blue shift

            of computer screens

 

I am typing, clickety-clack

 

the scent of curry lingers in the air

lentils in the crockpot thickening

 

the comforts of home

On This Day - January 10th

On this day in the year 49 before the common era (BCE), Julius Caesar defies the Roman Senate and crosses the Rubicon, commemorating the moment with the famous words alea iacta est, meaning the die is cast and signaling the start of civil war which culminated in his appointment as Roman dictator for life…which was shorter than he expected on account of the way in which he seized power. Four hundred and thirty years later, in the year 381 of the common era (CE), the Roman Emperor Theodosius I issues an edict ordering all churches to be surrendered to bishops of the Catholic faith…as he sees it, and the folly of imperialism continued to wreak havoc on the lives of ordinary people.

In the year 1776 CE, Thomas Paine publishes his political pamphlet "Common Sense" advocating for American independence from the British Empire, ninety-four years later John D. Rockefeller, his brother and other Partners form the company, Standard Oil of New York (SONY) and it controls ten percent of the global oil reserves.

In 1920 CE the inauguration of the League of Nations occurs in Paris; seven years later, Fritz Lang's silent film "Metropolis" premieres in Berlin, and one year after that Leon Trotsky is exiled by the Soviet Union.

In 1949 CE, RCA introduces the 45 RPM record.

In 1951 CE, the United Nations headquarters opens in Manhattan; one year later Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show on Earth, premieres in New York, my mother was cast as extra during the filming near Sarasota, Florida.

 

On This Day - January 9th

On this day in the year 1839 of the common era (CE) Louis Daguerre demonstrates his daguerreotype photographic process to the French Academy of Sciences; one hundred and forty years later, after losing a court battle with Polaroid over its patents, Kodak is ordered to give up its instant camera business.

On this day in 2007 CE, Apple CEO Steve Jobs announces the iPhone.

Thirty years earlier, in 1977, the Oakland Raiders beat the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl XI. It is the Viking’s fourth straight Super Bowl loss and their last trip to the championship game.

On This Day - January 8th

On this day in the 1656 of the common era (CE), the oldest surviving commercial newspaper, "Weeckelycke Courante van Europa", now known as "Haarlems Dagblad" (still in print), begins publication in Haarlem, The Netherlands.

In 1790 CE the first United States President George Washington delivers the first State of the Union address, two hundred and two years later the forty-first President of the United States, George H. W. Bush while attending a state dinner in Japan, vomits in the Japanese Prime Minister’s lap.

In the year 1835 CE, the United States national debt reaches $0 for the first and only time in history.

In the year 1902 CE, New York state assemblyman Francis G. ​Landon gets a bill passed to criminalize the behavior of men who turn around on a public street and "look at a woman in that way." Two years later Pope Pius X bans the wearing of low cut dresses by women in the presence of churchmen.

In 1968 CE Jacques Cousteau's first undersea special airs on a United States television network.

In 2016 CE David Bowie's 26th and final studio album "Blackstar" is released, it is Bowie’s 69th birthday; the album enters the charts at #1…David Bowie passed away two days later.

 

 

On This Day - January 7th

On this day of the year 49, before the common era (BCE), the Roman Senate declares Julius Caesar to be an enemy of the Republic, stating that it is the duty of all Roman citizens “to do him harm.”

On this day in the years 1785 of the common era (CE) Jean Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries become the first humans since pre-historic times, to fly a hot air balloon across the English Channel.  

On this day in 1927 CE the Harlem Globetrotters play their first game, losing to the Hinckley Merchants 43-34, in Hinckley, Illinois. It was an inauspicious start for the winningest sport franchise of all time. Seven years later the "Flash Gordon" comic strip debuts, created and drawn by Alex Raymond

On this day in 1953 CE, United States President, Harry Truman announces the development of the hydrogen bomb. Nineteen years later a team of astrophysicists discover Cygnus X-1 lurking in the Cygnus “The Swan” Constellation, also known as the Southern Cross. It is the first finding of a black hole, theretofore merely a theoretical structure, the possibility of which had been theorized by Einstein in his Special Theory of Relativity; the research of Louise Webster and Paul Murdin was published in the journal Nature.