Today in History (June 16th):
1723: Birthdays: Scottish economist Adam Smith.
1821: Birthdays: Scottish golf legend Old Tom Morris.
1829: Birthdays: American Indian leader Geronimo.
1883: The New York Giants had the first Ladies’ Day baseball game.
1890: Birthdays: British film comedian Stan Laurel (of Laurel and Hardy).
1903: The Ford Motor Company incorporated.
1917: The first Congress of Soviets was convened in Russia. Birthdays: Newspaper publisher Katharine Graham.
1937: Birthdays: Author Erich Segal.
1938: Birthdays: Author Joyce Carol Oates.
1939: Birthdays: Country singer Billy Crash Craddock.
1943: Birthdays: Actor Joan Van Ark.
1951: Birthdays: Boxer Roberto Duran.
1952: Birthdays: Singer-songwriter Gino Vannelli.
1955: Birthdays: Actor Laurie Metcalf.
1958: The leader of the unsuccessful Hungarian uprising against Soviet rule, former Premier Imre Nagy, was executed.
1963: The Soviet Union put the first woman into space, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova.
1970: Birthdays: Professional golfer Phil Mickelson.
1971: Birthdays: Rapper Tupac Shakur.
1977: Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev, first secretary of the Soviet Communist Party since 1964, was elected president of the Supreme Soviet, thereby becoming both head of party and head of state.
1987: The last dusky seaside sparrow died at Walt Disney World.
1992: U.S. President George H.W. Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin met at the White House for the first U.S.-Russian summit.
1999: U.S. Vice President Al Gore announced his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.
2005: The U.S. Army awarded the first Silver Star for bravery in combat to a female soldier in the Iraq war, Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester, 23, of Bowling Green, Ky.
2008: One month after the California Supreme Court struck down laws prohibiting same-sex marriage, couples flooded into city halls all over the state to get married. California was the second state, behind Massachusetts, to legalize same-sex marriage.
2009: U.S. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., acknowledged a nine-month extramarital affair with a former staff member. He resigned his chairmanship of the Republican Policy Committee but remained in the Senate.
2011: U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., announced he would resign after admitting he sent sexually suggestive photos on online social networks Facebook and Twitter. He left office the following week.
2012: Saudi Arabia announced the death of Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz al-Saud eight months after he became heir to the throne. He was succeeded as crown prince by Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud.
Quotes
“A woman went to a plastic surgeon and asked him to make her like Bo Derek. He gave her a lobotomy.” – Joan Rivers.
“A Father is a man with pictures in his wallet, where he used to keep his money when he was single.” – Anonymous
“Neither a borrower nor a lender be.” – Shakespeare (Hamlet)
“A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don’t need it.” – Bob Hope.
“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.” – Anonymous
“I am not cheap, but I am on special this week.” – Anonymous
“Our heads are round so that thoughts can change direction.” – Francis Picabia, painter and poet (1879-1953)
“We all have handicaps. The difference is that some of us must reveal ours, while others must conceal theirs, to be treated with mercy.” – Yahia Lababidi, author (b. 1973)
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– Mizuta Masahide, poet and samurai (1657-1723)
Barbara McClintock (1902-1992) US scientist:
“I know my corn plants intimately, and I find it a great pleasure to know them.”
“I never thought of stopping, and I just hated sleeping. I can’t imagine having a better life.”
“It might seem unfair to reward a person for having so much pleasure over the years, asking the maize plant to solve specific problems and then watching its responses.”
“I was just so interested in what I was doing I could hardly wait to get up in the morning and get at it. One of my friends, a geneticist, said I was a child, because only children can’t wait to get up in the morning to get at what they want to do.”
sobriquet
PRONUNCIATION: (SO-brih-kay; -ket; so-brih-KAY; -KET
MEANING: (noun), A nickname; an assumed name; an epithet.
ETYMOLOGY: Sobriquet is from the French, from Old French soubriquet, “a chuck under the chin, hence, an affront, a nickname.”
USAGE: “Due to an intellect seemingly encompassing the World Book and going well beyond, Jake had been lauded with the sobriquet of ‘Walking Encyclopedia.'”
rhizophagous
PRONUNCIATION: (ry-ZOPH-uh-guhs)
http://wordsmith.org/words/rhizophagous.mp3
MEANING: (adjective), Feeding on roots.
ETYMOLOGY: From Greek rhizo- (root) + -phagous (feeding on). Earliest documented use: 1832.
USAGE: “Let us pause briefly in Alsace, a good observatory and outpost in this rhizophagous European realm. … the Alsatians had very specific ways of using and preparing the tuber.” – Madeleine Ferrières; Sacred Cow, Mad Cow: A History of Food Fears; Columbia University Press; 2006
pluvial
PRONUNCIATION: (PLOO-vee-uhl)
http://wordsmith.org/words/pluvial.mp3
MEANING: (adjective), Of or relating to rain, especially much rain.
ETYMOLOGY: From Latin pluvia (rain), from pluere (to rain). Ultimately from the Indo-European root pleu- (to flow), that is also the source of flow, float, flit, fly, flutter, pulmonary, and pneumonia.
USAGE: “The inclement weather was expected to continue throughout the week, and meteorologists predict that the next few days will remain pluvial.” – Inclement Weather Sweeps Israel; The Jerusalem Post (Israel); Jan 18, 2010.
Explore “pluvial” in the Visual Thesaurus.
http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=pluvial
sanguine
PRONUNCIATION: (SANG-gwin)
http://wordsmith.org/words/sanguine.mp3
MEANING: (adjective)
1. Cheerfully optimistic or confident.
2. Having a healthy reddish color.
3. Blood-red.
ETYMOLOGY: From Old French sanguin, from Latin sanguineus (bloody), from sanguis (blood).
USAGE: “As usual, Phillips is sanguine: Michael is totally focused now, and the insurance wasn’t a problem, it was just expensive.” – Robert Sandall; Will Michael Jackson Survive His Concert Marathon? The Sunday Times (London, UK); May 31, 2009.