Today in History (October 28th):
Scorpio (October 23rd to November 21st)
Plush Animal Lover’s Day
312: In a battle that marked the beginning of the Christian era in Europe, Constantine’s army, wearing the cross, defeated the forces of Maxentius at Mulvian Bridge in Rome.
1466: Birthdays: Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus.
1636: Harvard College, now Harvard University, was founded in Massachusetts.
1793: Birthdays: Rifle maker Eliphalet Remington.
1818: Birthdays: Russian writer Ivan Turgenev.
1846: The pioneering Donner Party of 90 people set out from Springfield, Ill., for California.
1886: The Statue of Liberty, a gift of friendship from the people of France to the United States, was dedicated in New York Harbor by U.S. President Grover Cleveland.
1897: Birthdays: Movie costumer Edith Head.
1902: Birthdays: Actor Elsa Lanchester.
1903: Birthdays: English novelist Evelyn Waugh.
1914: Birthdays: Dr. Jonas Salk, a developer of the polio vaccine.
1919: The U.S. Congress passed the Volstead Act, over President Woodrow Wilson’s veto, enforcing the constitutional amendment prohibiting the use of alcoholic beverages.
1926: Birthdays: Former baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn.
1936: Birthdays: Country musician Charlie Daniels.
1937: Birthdays: Basketball Hall of Fame member Lenny Wilkens.
1939: Birthdays: Actor Jane Alexander.
1944: Birthdays: Actor Dennis Franz.
1945: Birthdays: Rock singer Wayne Fontana.
1948: Birthdays: Singer/actor Telma Hopkins.
1949: Birthdays: Olympic decathlon champion-turned-sportscaster Bruce Jenner.
1952: Birthdays: Actor Annie Potts.
1955: Birthdays: Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.
1956: Birthdays: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
1962: Russian chief Nikita Khrushchev announced that all Soviet offensive missiles would be removed from Cuba.
1963: Birthdays: Actor Lauren Holly.
1965: Birthdays: Actor Jami Gertz.
1966: Birthdays: Actor Andy Richter.
1967: Birthdays: Actor Julia Roberts.
1974: Birthdays: Actor Joaquin Phoenix.
1985: The leader of the so-called Walker family spy ring, John Walker, pleaded guilty to giving U.S. Navy secrets to the Soviet Union.
1989: The Oakland A’s wrapped up an earthquake-delayed sweep of the World Series over the San Francisco Giants.
2001: The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed a third New Jersey postal worker had an anthrax inhalation infection, bringing the number to eight, including three people who died from the most serious form of the disease.
2002: U.S. diplomat John Foley was killed in Amman, Jordan. An unknown group called the Honest People of Jordan claimed it was a response to U.S. support of Israel and actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
2004: Insurgents executed 11 Iraqi soldiers in what they said was revenge for women and children killed in U.S. strikes on the guerrilla stronghold of Fallujah.
2005: Lewis Scooter Libby, chief of staff and national security adviser to the vice president, resigned after he was indicted on multiple counts in the CIA leak case in which an operative’s name was revealed to the media.
2007: U.S.-led forces killed nearly 80 Taliban fighters during a fierce six-hour air and ground battle in southern Afghanistan. Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner became the first woman to be elected president of Argentina. She succeeded her husband, Nestor Kirchner.
2009: More than 100 people, most of them women and children, were killed when a car bomb tore through a busy market in Peshawar, Pakistan, on a day U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Islamabad for talks with Pakistani leaders.
2010: Officials reported breaking up an alleged plot in which explosives rigged as bombs and hidden in printer cartridges were shipped from Yemen addressed to Chicago synagogues. China announced it had built what experts said was the world’s fastest supercomputer, capable of a sustained performance 40 percent greater than the previous record holder built in Oak Ridge, Tenn.
2011: Unusually heavy monsoon rains that began in the summer and stretched into the fall drenched Thailand producing its worst flooding in half a century with about one-third of the country ultimately under water. Damage to homes, factories and crops was widespread and the death toll topped 400.
Quotes
“I have nothing new to teach the world. Truth and non-violence are as old as the hills. All I have done is to try experiments in both on as vast a scale as I could.” – Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948)
“You can sometimes count every orange on a tree but never all the trees in a single orange.” – A. K. Ramanujan, poet (1929-1993)
“Next to knowing when to seize an opportunity, the most important thing in life is to know when to forego an advantage.” – Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881); English politician, novelist.
“Words are things; and a small drop of ink
Falling like dew upon a thought, produces
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think.”
– Lord Byron, poet (1788-1824)
“Fall is my favorite season in Los Angeles, watching the birds change color and fall from the trees.” – David Letterman
Many of us know about the popular drug purchased that viagra buy cheap kamagra. Direction pdxcommercial.com cheap levitra of Use: For quality erection take one or two capsules two times a day either with milk or water. Moreover, each man should be aware that health and a very active sexual life are sexually active as compared to unhealthy sexual life viagra without prescription usa of a person. Impotence is a sex dysfunction in guys of a specific age. levitra on line pdxcommercial.com 100mg works much like another pharmaceutical which is utilized inside the administration of feebleness, by improving the blood flow to your private part. “Election time is that period when politicians get free speech mixed up with cheap talk.” – James Walker
“The whole art of the political speech is to put ‘nothing’ into it. It is much more difficult than it sounds.” – Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953) English writer, poet “A Conversation with an Angel.”
“I know they are all environmentalists. I heard a lot of my speeches recycled.” – Jesse Jackson (1941-) US civil rights leader, minister, politician about 1991 Democratic hopefuls
“If it is not erotic, it is not interesting.” – Fernando Arrabal
“It’s not true that nice guys finish last. Nice Guys are winners before the game even starts.” – Mort Walker
“I’ll tell you how the sun rose —
A Ribbon at a time –”
– Emily Dickinson, poet
Jonas Salk (1914-1995) US microbiologist:
“There is hope in dreams, imagination, and in the courage of those who wish to make those dreams a reality.”
“Intuition will tell the thinking mind where to look next.”
“Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors.”
“I have had dreams and I have had nightmares, but I have conquered my nightmares because of my dreams.”
“I feel that the greatest reward for doing is the opportunity to do more.”
“Life is an error-making and an error-correcting process, and nature in marking man’s papers will grade him for wisdom as measured both by survival and by the quality of life of those who survive.”
“It is always with excitement that I wake up in the morning wondering what my intuition will toss up to me, like gifts from the sea. I work with it and rely on it. It’s my partner.”
obviate
PRONUNCIATION: (AHB-vi-yeyt)
MEANING: verb: To make unnecessary or prevent (an action).
ETYMOLOGY: Latin obviare “meet, withstand, prevent” from the preposition-prefix ob “to, toward” and via-re “go, travel”. Related to via “road, way” and derived from the same Indo-European source as German “Wag-en”, English “wag-on” and “way”, as well as the veh- of “vehicle”.
USAGE: “Jason was rather upset after Lana’s introductory remarks obviated most of his speech”
obambulate
PRONUNCIATION: (o-BAM-byuh-layt)
http://wordsmith.org/words/obambulate.mp3
MEANING: verb intr.: To walk about.
ETYMOLOGY: From Latin ob- (to) + ambulare (to walk). Earliest documented use: 1614.
USAGE: “We have often seen noble statesmen obambulating (as Dr. Johnson would say) the silent engraving-room, obviously rehearsing their orations.” – The Year’s Art; J.S. Virtue & Co.; 1917.
litterateur
PRONUNCIATION: (lit-uhr-uh-TUR, lit-ruh-)
MEANING: noun: One who is devoted to the study or writing of literature.
ETYMOLOGY: French, from Latin litterator, critic, lettered person, from littera, letter.
Dunkirk
PRONUNCIATION: (DUN-kurk)
MEANING: noun:
1. A desperate retreat.
2. A condition in which a desperate last effort is the only alternative to total defeat.
ETYMOLOGY: After Dunkirk (also Dunkerque), a city of northern France on the North Sea. In World War II more than 330,000 Allied troops were evacuated from its beaches in the face of enemy fire (May-June 1940).
agelast
PRONUNCIATION: (AY-jel-ast)
MEANING: noun: Someone who never laughs.
ETYMOLOGY: From Greek agelastos (not laughing), ultimately from gelaein (to laugh).
obsequious
PRONUNCIATION: (ob SEE qwee us)
MEANING: adjective: Showing a great willingness to serve or obey; fawning.