This day in History

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 7.
321. Roman Emperor Constantine I decrees that the dies Solis Invicti (sun-day) is the day of rest in the Empire.

1530. English King Henry VIII's divorce request from Catherine of Aragon is denied by Pope Clement VII.

1778. Captain James Cook 1st sights Oregon coast at Yaquina Bay.

1854. Charles Miller patents 1st US sewing machine to stitch buttonholes.

1857. Baseball decides 9 innings constitutes an official game, not 9 runs.

1872. -8°F (-22°C) in Boston, Massachusetts.

1876. Alexander Graham Bell receives a patent for the telephone in the US.

1908. Cincinnati Mayor Mark Breith stands before city council and announces that, "women are not physically fit to operate automobiles".

1935. Malcolm Campbell sets world land speed record speed of 276.71 mph driving his famous Blue Bird car; last record set at Daytona Beach, Florida.

1941. 3rd largest snowfall then in NYC history (18.1").

1962. Ground-breaking report "Smoking and Health" published by the British Royal College of Physicians, first major report to warn of the dangers of smoking.

1967. Clark Gesner's musical "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown", based on characters from Charles M. Schulz's' "Peanuts", and starring Gary Burghoff, opens at Theatre 80 in the East Village, NYC; runs for 1597 performances.

1967. Teamster president Jimmy Hoffa begins 8-year jail sentence for defrauding the union & jury tampering (commuted Dec 23, 1971).

1968. The BBC broadcasts the news for the first time in color on television.

1986. Wayne Gretzky breaks his own NHL season record with 136th assist.

1994. US Navy issues 1st permanent order assigning women on combat ship.

2011. Charlie Sheen is fired from the CBS sitcom "Two and a Half Men.

2019. Chinese telecommunications company Huawei sues the US government over a federal ban on its products.

2022. Global death toll from Covid-19 passes 6 million according to Johns Hopkins figures, with 57% of the world's population fully vaccinated.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 11. Not a great day for some.
1669. Mt Etna in Sicily erupts in its largest recorded eruption, killing 15,000.

1864. The Great Sheffield Flood: the largest man-made disaster ever to befall England kills over 250 people in Sheffield.

1918. One of the most devastating pandemics in human history reached the United States as the country reported its first cases of the Spanish flu.

1935.  Hermann Goering officially creates the Luftwaffe (German Air Force).

1942. 1st deportation train leaves Paris for Auschwitz Concentration Camp.

1958. American B-47 accidentally drops nuclear bomb 15,000 ft on a family home in Mars Bluff, South Carolina; creates crater 75 ft across.

1978. Terrorists attack mail truck at Tel Aviv, 45 killed.

2004. Terrorists explode simultaneous bombs on Madrid's rail network ripping through a commuter train and rocking three stations, killing 190.

2011. 9.0 magnitude earthquake strikes 130 km (80 miles) east of Sendai, Japan, triggering a tsunami killing thousands of people and causing the second worst nuclear accident in history at Fukushima nuclear plant.

2020. COVID-19 declared a pandemic by the head of the World Health Organization after 121,564 cases worldwide and 4,373 deaths

[The Green Barbarian]

That Tsunami was amazing in that it was filmed in real time, I remember watching it online.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 17.
45 BC. In his last victory, Julius Caesar defeats the Pompeian forces of Titus Labienus and Pompey the Younger in the Battle of Munda.

180. Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius dies leaving his son Commodus aged 18 as sole emperor.

432. Saint Patrick, aged about 16 is captured by Irish pirates from his home in Great Britain and taken as a slave to Ireland (traditional date).

1190. Crusades complete massacre of Jews of York England.

1762. 1st St Patrick's Day parade in NYC.

1845. Bristol man Henry Jones patents self-raising flour.

1893. Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup (Stanley Cup): Montreal Hockey Club claim inaugural trophy after finishing top of final Amateur Hockey Association of Canada standings with a 7–1–0 record.

1901. At a show in Paris, 71 Vincent van Gogh's paintings cause a sensation, 11 years after his death.

1905. Albert Einstein finishes his scientific paper detailing his Quantum Theory of Light, one of the foundations of modern physics.

1930. Construction begins of the Empire State Building, the world's 1st skyscraper of 100+ stories, on 5th Avenue in New York City.

1942. Bełżec Concentration Camp opens with the transport of 30,000 Lublin Polish Jews.

1955. The Richard Riot breaks out in Montreal following the suspension of Maurice (Rocket) Richard by NHL president Clarence Campbell for the rest of the season.

1957. Dutch ban on Sunday driving lifted.

1961. Jaguar head William Lyons debuts the first E-Type model at the Geneva International Motor Show, creating a sensation.

1969. Golda Meir becomes Israel's 4th Prime Minister, the first and only female to hold the office.

1992. Islamic Jihad car bombing of Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina kills 29.

2020. European Union announces a 30-day ban on entering its 26 countries for almost all travelers as it struggles to contain COVID-19.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 18.
1190. Crusaders kill 57 Jews in Bury St. Edmunds, England.

1314. Jacques de Molay, the 23rd and the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, is burned at the stake by King Philip IV of France.

1781. French astronomer Charles Messier rediscovers global cluster M92.

1881. Barnum & Bailey Circus, travelling as "The Greatest Show on Earth", debuts at Madison Square Garden in New York City following the merger of two existing circus groups.

1892. Lord Stanley presents silver challenge cup for hockey (Stanley Cup).

1920. Greece adopts the Gregorian calendar.

1925. Great Tri-State Tornado: Monstrous F5 (over 300MPH) tornado roars 219 miles across southeast Missouri, southern Illinois, and southwest Indiana; kills 695, injures over 2000, and destroys 15,000 homes.

1931. 1st electric shavers go on sale in US (Schick).

1945. Montreal Canadien Maurice "Rocket" Richard becomes the 1st NHLer to score 50 goals.

1965. Rolling Stones fined £5 each for public urination.

1965. Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov leaves his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes and becomes the first person to conduct a spacewalk.

1967. Beatles' "Penny Lane" single goes #1.

1987. Gerber survey find most popular names for newborns are Jessica and Matthew.

1992. American businesswoman Leona Helmsley sentenced to 4 years for tax evasion "We don't pay taxes; only the little people pay taxes".

2018. First fatal accident involving an Uber self-driving car hitting a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona.

2018. Vladimir Putin is elected to a new six-year term as Russian President with 76% of the vote, his fourth term.

2020. Canada and America agree to close the US-Canada border, the world's longest, to non-essential travel to curb COVID-19.

[Catsumi]

Damn… this must have hurt!

1925. Great Tri-State Tornado: Monstrous F5 (over 300MPH) tornado roars 219 miles across southeast Missouri, southern Illinois, and southwest Indiana; kills 695, injures over 2000, and destroys 15,000 homes.

And klimate Change nowhere spoken of.

If it happened today the death toll would be at least 10x worse

[Babba_not_Gump]

Damn… this must have hurt!

1925. Great Tri-State Tornado: Monstrous F5 (over 300MPH) tornado roars 219 miles across southeast Missouri, southern Illinois, and southwest Indiana; kills 695, injures over 2000, and destroys 15,000 homes.

And klimate Change nowhere spoken of.

If it happened today the death toll would be at least 10x worse

It would only be worse in America as they don't have a Karbon Tax. Canada is now safe from F5s.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 20.
141. 6th recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet.

1345. Conjunction of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, thought by scholars at the University of Paris to be the "cause of the plague epidemic" known as the Black Death.

1800. Alessandro Volta reports his discovery of the electric battery in a letter to Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society of London.

1819. London’s famous Burlington Arcade opens, the world’s 1st shopping arcade.

1854. Anti-slavery activists within the US Whig political party opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act form a new Republican Party.

1886. 1st AC power plant in US begins commercial operation in Massachusetts.

1930. American engine builder Clessie Cummins sets diesel engine speed record of 80.4 mph (129.39 kph).

1930. American fast food restaurant chain "KFC" [Kentucky Fried Chicken] is founded as Sanders Court & Café by Colonel Harland Sanders in North Corbin, Kentucky.

1933. Dachau the first Nazi concentration camp, is completed.

1944. 2,500 women trample guards and floorwalkers to purchase 1,500 alarm clocks announced for sale in a Chicago Illinois department store.

1967. The Supremes release their single "The Happening".

1976. American publishing heiress Patty Hearst convicted of armed robbery for her part in a 1974 California heist.

1982. Joan Jett & Blackhearts' "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" goes #1 for 7 weeks.

1995. Members of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo release sarin gas on three lines of the Tokyo subway, killing 13 people and injuring over 1,000.

2016. Barack Obama becomes the first US President to visit Cuba since 1928, arriving for a 3 day tour.

2021. Overseas spectators will not be allowed to attend the Tokyo Summer Olympics due to the pandemic.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 23.
1066. 18th recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet.

1490. First dated edition of Maimonides "Mishneh Torah", a code of Jewish religious law is published.

1752. Canada's first newspaper "Halifax Gazette" published in Halifax by John Bushell.

1839. 1st recorded use of "OK" [all correct] (Boston's Morning Post).

1857. Elisha Otis installs his 1st elevator at 488 Broadway in New York City.

1882. The Edmunds Act (Edmunds Anti-Polygamy Act) is adopted by the US to suppress polygamy. 1300 men are later imprisoned under the act.

1901. Australian opera star Dame Nellie Melba reveals secret of her now famous toast.

1933. German Reichstag hastily passes the Enabling Act and President Paul von Hindenburg signs it the same day, granting Adolf Hitler dictatorial powers.

1942. 2,500 Jews of Lublin massacred or deported.

1945. The Swallow Sidecar Company headed by William Lyons agrees to change its name to Jaguar.

1952. NY Rangers blow 6-2 lead, lose 7-6 to Chicago Black Hawks; Bill Mosienko scores fastest hat trick in NHL history, 21 seconds.

1957. US army sells last homing pigeons.

1977. Elvis Presley begins his final concert tour.

1981. US Supreme Court rules states could require, with some exceptions, parental notification when teen-age girls sought abortions.

1985. David Bowie is special surprise guest at Tina Turner concert at NEC arena in Birmingham, England; they perform duets of Bowie's "Tonight" and a medley of Chris Montez' "Let's Dance" and Bowie's song of the same name.

1998. 70th Academy Awards: "Titanic", Jack Nicholson & Helen Hunt win.

2010. US President Barack Obama signs the Affordable Care Act (ACA), nicknamed 'Obamacare', expanding the availability and affordability of health care insurance.

2020. WHO says the COVID-19 pandemic is accelerating, 1st 100,000 cases took 67 days, 2nd 100,000 cases 11 days, 3rd 100,000 cases 4 days.

[Catsumi]

When I hear Let’s Dance by Bowie, I always do.

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 26.
1147. Jewish community in Cologne fasts to commemorate anti-Jewish violence.

1484. William Caxton prints his translation of Aesop's Fables.

1812. Earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale destroys 90% of Caracas, Venezuela and kills an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 people.

1885. 1st modern, legal cremation held in England at Woking, Surrey .

1898. Sabi Game Reserve opens in South Africa, the world's 1st officially designated game reserve; now part of Kruger National Park.

1910. US forbids immigration to criminals, anarchists, paupers and the sick. (What a brilliant idea......)

1915. Stanley Cup Final, Vancouver, BC: Barney Stanley scores 5 goals as Vancouver Millionaires beat Ottawa Senators, 12-3 for a 3-0 sweep of first non-challenge series.

1917. Stanley Cup Final, Seattle, WA: Seattle Metropolitans (PCHA) beat Montreal Canadiens (NHL), 9-1 for a 3-1 series victory; first US team to win the Stanley Cup.

1937. Spinach growers of Crystal City, Texas, erect statue of Popeye.

1942. First "Eichmann transport" to Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps.

1945. Allies led by US Marine Corps secure island of Iwo Jima from Imperial Japanese Army, after 18,000 Japanese & 6,000 Americans killed.

1953. Dr. Jonas Salk announces that he has successfully tested a vaccine to prevent polio, clinical trials began the next year.

1969. "Marcus Welby, M.D.", starring Robert Young and James Brolin debuts as a TV movie on ABC-TV, prior to becoming a weekly series.

1979. Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat sign the Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty in Washington, D.C.

1992. Mike Tyson sentenced to 10 years in rape of Desiree Washington.

2006. In Scotland the prohibition of smoking in all substantially enclosed public places comes into force.

2016. US primary elections: Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders wins Washington, Hawaii and Alaska.

2017. Anti-corruption protests in Russia result in hundreds arrested including opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

2018. Porn star Stormy Daniels claims she had an affair with Donald Trump in an interview with CBS's 60 Minutes and was later threatened to keep quiet.

[The Green Barbarian]

March 28, 1979:

The Three Mile Island accident was a nuclear meltdown of the Unit 2 reactor (TMI-2) of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station on the Susquehanna River in Londonderry Township, near the capital city of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The reactor accident began at 4:00 a.m. on March 28, 1979, and released radioactive gases and radioactive iodine into the environment.[2][3] It is the worst accident in U.S. commercial nuclear power plant history.[4] On the seven-point logarithmic International Nuclear Event Scale, the TMI-2 reactor accident is rated Level 5, an "Accident with Wider Consequences".[5][6]

The accident began with failures in the non-nuclear secondary system,[7] followed by a stuck-open pilot-operated relief valve (PORV) in the primary system,[8] which allowed large amounts of water to escape from the pressurized isolated coolant loop. The mechanical failures were compounded by the initial failure of plant operators to recognize the situation as a loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA). TMI training and operating procedures left operators and management ill-prepared for the deteriorating situation caused by the LOCA. During the accident, those inadequacies were compounded by design flaws, such as poor control design, the use of multiple similar alarms, and a failure of the equipment to clearly indicate either the coolant-inventory level or the position of the stuck-open PORV.[9]

The accident crystallized anti-nuclear safety concerns among activists and the general public and led to new regulations for the nuclear industry. It accelerated the decline of efforts to build new reactors.[10] Anti-nuclear movement activists expressed worries about regional health effects from the accident.[11] Some epidemiological studies analyzing the rate of cancer in and around the area since the accident did determine that there was a statistically significant increase in the rate of cancer, while other studies did not. Due to the nature of such studies, a causal connection linking the accident with cancer is difficult to prove.[12][13][14][15][16][17][18] Cleanup at TMI-2 started in August 1979 and officially ended in December 1993, with a total cost of about $1 billion (equivalent to $2 billion in 2022).[19] TMI-1 was restarted in 1985, then retired in 2019 due to operating losses. Its decommissioning is expected to be complete in 2079 at an estimated cost of $1.2 billion.[20]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mil ... d_accident

Due to this accident, the US, and other parts of the world, veered away from nuclear power and ramped up coal burning as a main source of electricity, which in turn led to a dramatic rise in air pollution - not the "fake pollution" as touted by enviro-lunatics (CO2 etc) but real air pollution.

Imagine if this accident hadn't happened, and nuclear power was allowed to proliferate - how much different and better our world would be right now. Nuclear power producing tons of cheap power, and not a bit of CO2 in sight for any idiot government to tax. I still don't get why the greenies hate nuclear so much, it's the answer to the green little prayers!

[Babba_not_Gump]

March 30.
240 BC. 1st recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet.

1842. Ether used as an anaesthetic for 1st time by Dr Crawford Long (Georgia).

1858. Pencil with attached eraser patented (Hyman L Lipman of Philadelphia).

1867. The United States buys Alaska from Russia for $7,200,000 (109 million in 2018 dollars), roughly 2 cents an acre.

1911. Lötschberg tunnel in Switzerland (13,735 m) completed.

1916. Stanley Cup Final, Montreal Arena, Westmount, Quebec: Montreal Canadiens (NHA) beat Portland Rosebuds (PCHA), 2-1 for a 3-2 series victory.

1918. Stanley Cup, Mutual Street Arena, Toronto, ON: Toronto Arenas (NHL) beat Vancouver Millionaires (PCHA), 2-1 for a 3-2 series victory; first series contested by the new NHL.

1925. Stanley Cup Final, Patrick Arena, Victoria, BC: Victoria Cougars (WCHL) beat Montreal Canadiens (NHL), 6-1 for a 3-1 series win; last non-NHL team to win trophy.

1942. SS murders 200 inmates of Trawniki concentration camp.

1949. Riot breaks out in Austurvöllur square in Reykjavík, when Iceland joins NATO.

1959. Dalai Lama flees China and is granted political asylum in India.

1981. US President Ronald Reagan is shot and wounded in an assassination attempt by John Hinckley, three others are also wounded.

1984. New York police detective Robert Cunningham offers waitress Phyllis Penzo half of $1 lottery ticket, next day they win $6 million.

1992. 64th Academy Awards: "The Silence of the Lambs", Anthony Hopkins & Jodie Foster win.

2023. Former US President Donald Trump is indicted by a Manhattan Grand Jury on charges over hush payments paid to porn star Stormy Daniels - 1st US President to face criminal charges.

2024. Veterans Affairs wishes current members of the @CanadianForces and @rcmpgrcpolice and their families a happy March holiday season!

[steven lloyd]

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[Babba_not_Gump]

And now for some serious news.
April 2.
1792. The Coinage Act is passed establishing the United States Mint and authorizing the $10 Eagle, $5 half-Eagle & 2.50 quarter-Eagle gold coins & silver dollar, ½ dollar, quarter, dime & half-dime.

1877. 1st Easter egg roll held on White House lawn.

1877. 1st human cannonball act performed by 14-year-old Rossa Matilda Richter known as Zazel at the Royal Aquarium in London.

1912. Titanic undergoes sea trials under its own power.

1921. Albert Einstein lectures in New York City on his new "Theory of Relativity".

1932. "Tarzan the Ape Man" released starring Olympic swimmer Johnny Weissmuller in the first of his 12 Tarzan films.

1954. Ed Wood's cult classic film "Glen or Glenda?", initially screened as "I Changed My Sex" premieres in San Francisco, California.

1958. Wind speed reaches a record 450 kph in tornado, Wichita Falls, Texas.

1968. 2001 A Space Odyssey" directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood, premieres at the Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C.

1977. Montreal Canadiens rout the Washington Capitals, 11-0 at the Montreal Forum to set an NHL record of 34 straight home games without a loss.

1978. TV show "Dallas" starring Larry Hagman and Barbara Bel Geddes premieres on CBS as a 5 week mini-series; ratings success leads to a 13 year run.

1980. Montreal right wing Guy Lafleur scores twice to become the first player in NHL history to record 6 straight 50-goal seasons, as the Canadiens beat the Red Wings, 7-2 at Detroit.

1982. Several thousand Argentine troops invade and seize the Falkland Islands from the United Kingdom.

1992. Mafia boss John Gotti is found guilty of 5 murders, plus conspiracy to murder, loansharking, illegal gambling, obstruction of justice, bribery and tax evasion.

2020. New study shows western Antarctica once swampy with temperate forests 93-83 million years ago during Cretaceous period.

2024. There are 141 more billionaires in the world in 2024, 2,781 in total, according to Forbes, including Taylor Swift for the first time.