it is 7:30
the daylight has nearly faded
it is fading…and soon…gone
the sky is gray
outside my window
lavender dusted
and shifting into dark
the news is on the radio
NPR, slow and reasonable
in the last twenty-words
that were spoken, I heard
execute, ice, arrest
On this day in the years 843 of the common era (CE), the veneration of religious icons is officially reinstated at Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (modern Istanbul), after one hundred and twenty-five years of being forbidden, for being a violation the commandment against the worship of graven images, false idols and misrepresentations of the deity; three hundred and seventy years later, Giovanni de' Medici chosen pope, taking the name Leo X. One hundred and fifty-two years after that, in 1665 CE, New York approves a new legal code guaranteeing protestants religious rights.
On this day in the year 1669 CE, Mount Etna in Sicily, Italy erupts, it is the volcano’s second largest recorded eruption and kills fifteen thousand people; one hundred and five years later, it erupts again.
On this day 1708 CE. queen Anne of England withholds royal assent from the Scottish Militia Bill, it is the last time a British monarch vetoes legislation from parliament; three hundred and five years later, in a referendum vote on sovereignty, the Falkland Islands choose to remain an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom.
In 1779 CE the United States Army Corps of Engineers is established; ten years later Benjamin Banneker and Pierre Charles L'Enfant begin to lay out the street plan for Washington, D.C.
In 1791 CE Samuel Mulliken receives four patents on the same day and is the first to obtain more than one patent in the United States, they are for: a machine that threshes grain and corn, a machine for breaking and swingling hemp, a machine for cutting and polishing marble and a machine for raising a nap on cloths.
In 1824 CE the United Stats Department of War creates the Bureau of Indian Affairs; one hundred and twenty-nine years later, the U.S. Army commissions its first female doctor, F.M. Adams. One year after that, in 1954 CE, the Army charges that senator Joseph McCarthy had used undue pressure tactics while leading his Committee on Un-American activities; nine years later, the U.S. Defense Secretary Robert MacNamara orders the adoption by the M16 assault rifle, designed by Eugene Stoner as the official rifle of the U.S. military.
In 1848 CE, Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine and Robert Baldwin become the first Prime Ministers of the Province of Canada to be democratically elected under a system of responsible government; one hundred and fifty-eight years later, Michelle Bachelet is inaugurated as the first female president of Chile.
In 1855 CE the Bowery Boys gang leader William Poole, a.k.a. "Bill the Butcher" is buried in Brooklyn with six thousand mourners attending and one-hundred-fifty-five horse drawn carriages; seventy-two years later, the first Golden Gloves boxing tournament in New York, New York.
In 1861 CE Confederate traitors hold their convention in Montgomery and adopt their treasonous constitution; one year later, United States (U.S.) president Abraham Lincoln removes George McClellan as General-in-Chief of the U.S. Army.
In 1872 CE the Meiji government of Japan officially annexes the Ryukyu Kingdom into what would become the Okinawa prefecture; one hundred and fourteen years later, Japanese probe Sakigake flies by Halley's Comet at distance of 6.8 million km; twenty five years later, in 2011 CE, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake strikes 130 km (80 miles) east of Sendai, Japan, triggering a tsunami that kills thousands and causes the second worst nuclear accident in history at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant…My friend Erik was there teaching English.
In 1882 CE, Norwegian scientist and explorer Fridtjof Nansen sets out on his first expedition on a sea voyage to study Arctic zoology, he spent a good deal of time in Minneapolis, Minnesota with his friend and Companion, the author and teacher, Brenda Ueland.
In 1892 CE the first public basketball game is held in Springfield, Massachusetts; three years later the city of Boston opens its "palace for the people," otherwise known as the McKim Building in Copley Square of the Boston Public Library, designed by Charles Follen McKim. It is the first major Beaux Arts building in the United States.
In 1920 CE after the country fights off the threat of French domination in the post-World War I era, the nation of Syria proclaims emir Feisal king.
In 1926 CE, Eamon da Valera ends his leadership of Sinn Féin; sixty-nine years later, Sinn Féin party leader Gerry Adams arrives in the United States.
In 1927 CE the first armored-commercial-car hold-up in United States takes place in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
In 1935 CE, Hermann Goering officially creates the Luftwaffe, three years later, Artur Seyss-Inquart replaces Kurt von Schuschnigg as Chancellor of Austria as Nazi troops entered the country. Six years after that, in 1943 CE, a Nazi Militia forms in the Netherlands; one year later Dutch resistance fighter Joop Westerweel is arrested; two years later one thousand allied bombers harass the city of Essen, Germany, dropping four thousand, six hundred and sixty-two bombs. On this same day in 1945 CE, Flemish nazi collaborator Maria Huygens is sentenced to death.
In 1958 CE, a United States AirForce B-47 bomber accidentally drops a nuclear bomb from a height of fifteen thousand feet (without it nuclear capsule) on a family home in Mars Bluff, South Carolina, creating a crater seventy-five feet across and thirty-five deep. A nuclear explosion did not occur, but the high explosives (6000 lbs. of TNT equivalent) blasted the hole; seventeen years, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) performs nuclear test at the Semipalatinsk Test Site in northeast Kazakhstan.
In 1958 CE, as Major League Baseball begins the season, American League batters are required to wear batting helmets.
In 1964 CE, Gene Roddenberry brings together a sixteen-page pitch-deck for the original Star Trek series; three years later Pink Floyd releases their first single titled, Arnold Layne. One year after that, in 1968 CE, an episode of The Monkees television show features musician Frank Zappa posing as Mike Nesmith and vice versa, each debating the qualities of the other's music; also on this day, Otis Redding becomes the first person in the United States to posthumously receive a gold record for his single Sittin' On The Dock of the Bay. Three years after that, in 1971 CE, Jim Morrison leaves for France to re-orient himself emotionally and creatively, and to avoid the jail sentence given to him in Miami, Florida…he dies in Paris, never returning to the United States; three years later, at the Rhino Records store in Claremont, California customers are offered five cents to take home Danny Bonaduce's debut solo album after his role on the Partridge Family. Twenty-three years after that, in 1997 CE, Paul McCartney is knighted by queen Elizabeth II.
In 1977 CE the Hanafi Siege comes to end in Washington D.C., a thirty-nine-hour terrorist standoff in which twelve Hanafi Muslim gunmen took one hundred and forty-nine hostages across three buildings: the District Building, B'nai B'rith headquarters and the Islamic Center. The action was led by Hamaas Abdul Khaalis, whose men killed two people, including Maurice Williams, a radio reporter and a security guard, while injuring several more, including D.C. councilman (and future mayor) Marion Barry. They had three demands: to handover the killers of Khaalis’ family, which he blamed on the Nation of Islam, the halting of the movie Mohammad: Messenger of God and reimbursement of a $750 court fine. The siege ended after when Muslim ambassadors from Egypt, Iran and Pakistan negotiated the release of the hostages and surrender of the gunmen.
In 1985 CE, Mikhail Gorbachev replaces Konstantin Chernenko as the leader of the U.S.S.R.; five years later, Lithuania declares its Independence from the Soviet Union.
On this day in the year 1986 of the common era, it has been one million days since the foundation of Rome, which occurred in 753 before the common era (BCE), on the 21st of April, on the cusp of Aries and Taurus…I was born 2,722 years, and one day later, at West Point Army Hospital, New York.
In 2003 CE the International Criminal Court holds its inaugural session in The Hague; ten years later the European Union bans the sale of cosmetics that have been tested on animals. On this same day, North Korea cuts the phone line with South Korea, breaching the 1953 armistice; fifteen years later, in 2018 CE, China's National People's Congress approves the removal of term limits for a leader, allowing for the possibility that Xi Jinping will be president for life; seven years later former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte is arrested in Manila after an International Criminal Court issues a warrant accusing him of crimes against humanity during his presidency in connection with his "war on drugs."
In 2020 CE, COVID-19 is declared a pandemic by the head of the World Health Organization Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, after 121,564 cases worldwide and 4,373 deaths are recorded; on this same day, an eleven year bull market ends as the Dow Jones Industrial Average falls more than 20%, becoming a bear market. Also on this day, in 2020 CE, former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein is sentenced to twenty-three years in prison for criminal sex and rape in New York, New York.
In 2025 CE astronomers announce the discovery of one hundred and twenty-eight new moons orbiting the planet Saturn, bring the planet's lunary total to two hundred and seventy-four moons; on this same day the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's space telescope, the Spherex observatory, is launched by SpaceX from California to study how galaxies are formed by observing their cosmic glow.
