Today in History (April 9th):
1413: Henry V was crowned king of England.
1816: The first all-black U.S. religious denomination, the AME church, was organized in Philadelphia.
1821: Birthdays: French poet Charles Baudelaire.
1865: Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia, bringing the Civil War to a close.
1866: The U.S. Congress passed the Civil Rights Bill of 1866, which granted African-Americans the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship and formed the basis for the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
1898: Birthdays: Actor/singer Paul Robeson; Football Hall of Fame member Curly Lambeau.
1903: Birthdays: Birth control pill inventor Gregory Pincus; Actor Ward Bond.
1905: Birthdays: Former U.S. Sen. James William Fulbright, D-Ark.
1926: Birthdays: Playboy publisher Hugh Hefner.
1928: Birthdays: Singer/songwriter Tom Lehrer.
1932: Birthdays: Rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Carl Perkins.
1933: Birthdays: Actor Jean-Paul Belmondo.
1935: Birthdays: Comedian Avery Schreiber.
1939: On Easter Sunday, African-American contralto Marian Anderson gave a free open-air concert before more than 75,000 people from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington after the Daughters of the American Revolution denied her use of Constitution Hall because of her race. Birthdays: Actor Michael Learned.
1940: Germany invaded Norway and Denmark.
1945: Birthdays: Journalist Peter Gammons.
1947: A tornado roared through at least 12 towns in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, killing 169 people. The twister traveled 221 miles across the three states.
1954: Birthdays: Actor Dennis Quaid.
1957: Birthdays: Golf Hall of Fame member Seve Ballesteros.
1959: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration introduced America’s first astronauts to the public. The seven men, all military test pilots, were carefully selected from a group of 32 candidates to take part in Project Mercury.
1963: By an act of the U.S. Congress, British statesman Winston Churchill became an honorary U.S. citizen. Birthdays: Political commentator Joe Scarborough.
1965: The Astrodome opened in Houston for the first indoor major league baseball game. Birthdays: Model Paulina Porizkova.
1966: Birthdays: Actor Cynthia Nixon.
1967: The first Boeing 737 took its maiden flight.
1976: The United States and the Soviet Union agreed on the size of nuclear tests for peaceful use.
1979: Birthdays: Actor Keshia Knight Pulliam.
1990: Birthdays: Actor Kristen Stewart.
1991: The Soviet republic of Georgia declared independence.
1992: A federal jury in Miami convicted deposed Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega on cocaine trafficking charges.
1996: Former U.S. Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, D-Ill., pleaded guilty to mail fraud and was sentenced to 19 months in prison.
1997: A government of unity was launched in Angola, three years after the end of the country’s 19-year civil war, with the seating of 70 members of the rebel UNITA party in Parliament.
1998: Tornadoes and storms took 39 lives in Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi. Birthdays: Actor Elle Fanning.
1999: The president of Niger was assassinated, reportedly by members of his own guard. A military junta led by the commander of the presidential guards took over.
2000: Peru’s President Alberto Fujimori failed to win a first-round election victory, forcing a runoff in May, which he won. However, a vote-fraud scandal forced him to step down later in the year.
2003: The mood in Iraq became exuberant as Iraqis, with help from Americans, toppled a 20-foot statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad’s Firdos Square.
2005: Prince Charles, heir to the British throne, married Camilla Parker Bowles, his long-time companion, at Windsor Castle. She took the title duchess of Cornwall. Authorities in Lusaka, Zambia, said more than 40 schoolchildren, on their way home at the end of the term, were killed near Lusaka when the truck in which they were riding overturned.
2007: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that his country could produce nuclear fuel on an industrial scale.
2008: The World Bank reported that worldwide food prices had risen 83 percent over the three-year period preceding February 2008.
2009: The Obama administration asked Congress for $83.4 billion, of which $75.8 billion was intended for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in additional funds for the balance of the 2009 fiscal year.
2010: U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, 11 days shy of 90, announced he would retire after 35 years on the court where he was widely regarded as leader of the court’s liberal bloc.
2011: Arab Spring hostilities escalated in Libya, Yemen and Syria and flared anew in Egypt. Meanwhile, an African Union cease-fire proposal for Libya was accepted by Moammar Qaddafi but rejected by the rebels because it didn’t call for Gaddafi’s ouster. A bombing that killed 11 people and severely injured 26 others marred the first of three elections in Nigeria.
2012: South Korea’s national police chief, Cho Hyun-oh, resigned amid criticism of how police handled an emergency call from a woman later killed by her kidnapper. Cho apologized for the carelessness of the police and the horrendous results it led to.
Quotes
“If words are to enter men’s minds and bear fruit, they must be the right words shaped cunningly to pass men’s defenses and explode silently and effectually within their minds.” – J.B. Phillips, writer and clergyman (1906-1982)
“Advice is like snow; the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon and the deeper it sinks into the mind.” – Samuel Taylor Coleridge
“Flatter me, and I may not believe you. Criticize me, and I may not like you. Ignore me, and I may not forgive you. Encourage me, and I will not forget you.” – William Arthur Ward, college administrator, writer (1921-1994)
“We have not passed that subtle line between childhood and adulthood until we move from the passive voice to the active voice – that is, until we have stopped saying ‘It got lost,’ and say, ‘I lost it.'” – Sydney J. Harris, journalist (1917-1986)
Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) French poet and critic:
A book is a garden, an orchard, a storehouse, a party, a company by the way, a counselor, a multitude of counselors.”
“A breath of wind from the wings of madness.”
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“A frenzied passion for art is a canker that devours everything else.”
“A sweetheart is a bottle of wine, a wife is a wine bottle.”
“Always be a poet, even in prose.”
“Any healthy man can go without food for two days – but not without poetry.”
“Everything considered, work is less boring than amusing oneself.”
“Everything that is beautiful and noble is the product of reason and calculation.”
“Evil is done without effort, naturally, it is the working of fate; good is always the product of an art.”
“For the merchant, even honesty is a financial speculation.”
“I am unable to understand how a man of honor could take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust.”
“I have cultivated my hysteria with delight and terror. Now I suffer continually from vertigo, and today, 23rd of January, 1862, I have received a singular warning, I have felt the wind of the wing of madness pass over me.”
toboggan
PRONUNCIATION: (teh-BAH-gehn)
MEANING: (noun), A long, flat-bottomed sled without runners made of slats curled up in front.
ETYMOLOGY: Today’s word may also be used as a verb signifying the use of a toboggan, as to toboggan down a snowy hill. However, if you are in the Southeastern US where snow is a rarity, be careful using today’s word. In the US South it more usually refers to the knitted, stretchable hat that you might pull over your head to toboggan. You are a tobogganer if you toboggan. Borrowed by French Canadians from an Algonquian language. It was originally spelled tabaganne (Le Clercq ‘Nouvelle Relation de la Gaspesie,’ 1691, p. 70). The word was probably borrowed from Micmac (Lower Canada, Nova Scotia) “tobakun,” a word related to Abnaki (Quebec and Maine) “udabagan,” Montaignais “utapan,” Cree “otabanask,” and Ojibwe “odaban-ak.”
USAGE: “With the economy tobogganing heaven knows where, Jean was convinced that it was better to keep your money in a sock under your mattress.”
suborn
PRONUNCIATION: (suh-BORN)
http://wordsmith.org/words/suborn.mp3
MEANING: (verb tr.), To induce another to perform an unlawful act or give false testimony.
ETYMOLOGY: From Latin subornare, from sub- (secretly) + ornare (to equip). Other words that derive from ornare are adorn and ornate. Earliest documented use: 1534.
USAGE:
“Would a senior lawyer, proven in a court of law to attempt to suborn a witness, be allowed to continue to practice law?” – TSR Subramanian; It’s Imperative to Free CBI and ED from Government Control; The New Indian Express (Chennai, India); Mar 3, 2013.
“Regulators were suborned by lobbyists and ministers.” – Simon Jenkins; Ignore Their Howls of Protest; The Guardian (London, UK); Mar 5, 2013.
Explore “suborn” in the Visual Thesaurus.
http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=suborn
scupper
PRONUNCIATION: (SKUP-uhr)
http://wordsmith.org/words/scupper.mp3
MEANING:
(noun), An opening for draining water, as on the side of a ship.
(verb tr.),
1. To prevent from succeeding.
2. To overwhelm, disable, or destroy.
ETYMOLOGY:
(noun), From Old French escopir (to spit). Earliest documented use: 1485.
(verb), Perhaps from the noun form of the word. Earliest documented use: 1885.
USAGE: “Three possible misfortunes could scupper recovery.” – Inside the Miracle; The Economist (London, UK); Mar 13, 2010.
Explore “scupper” in the Visual Thesaurus.
http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=scupper
Pickwickian
PRONUNCIATION: (pik-WIK-ee-uhn)
http://wordsmith.org/words/Pickwickian.mp3
MEANING: (adjective)
1. Marked by generosity, naivete, or innocence.
2. Not intended to be taken in a literal sense.
ETYMOLOGY:
After Samuel Pickwick, a character in the novel Pickwick Papers (serialized 1836-1837) by Charles Dickens. Mr Pickwick is known for his simplicity and kindness. In the novel Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Blotton call each other names and it appears later that they were using the offensive words only in a Pickwickian sense and had the highest regard for each other.
Another term that arose from the book is Pickwickian syndrome, which refers to a combination of interlinked symptoms such as extreme obesity, shallow breathing, tiredness, sleepiness, etc. The character with these symptoms was not Mr. Pickwick, but Fat Joe, so the term is really coined after the book’s title. The medical term for the condition is obesity-hypoventilation syndrome.
USAGE:
“I kept a happiness diary, after the discovery by Professor Sonia Lyubomirsky that collating one’s daily blessings resulted in Pickwickian good cheer.” – Hannah Betts; The Pursuit of Happiness is Driving Me to Despair; The Daily Telegraph (London, UK); Apr 3, 2009.
“Mr. Tribe: Now, anybody reading that would realize that’s a deadline only in a kind of Pickwickian sense. It’s not a real deadline.” – A Transcript of Arguments in the Supreme Court Over the Florida Recount; The New York Times; Dec 2, 2000.
“A Pickwickian chairman, rosy-cheeked, in frock coat and old-fashioned cravat, adopted the role of Santa Claus.” – Mungo MacCallum; Growing Up: The Day Had Come; Sydney Morning Herald (Australia); Jan 21, 1987.