Today in History

[Tamrin]

23 May
Bahá'í: Declaration of Bab (festival) ('Azamat 7, 1)

1617 - Birth of Elias Ashmole, antiquary

1707 - Birth of Carolus Linnæus, Swedish botanist/"Father of Taxonomy" (naming plants & animals)

1734 - Birth of Friedrich Anton Mesmer, Austria, physician/hypnotist (Mesmerism)

1799 – Birth of Thomas Hood, English poet/composer (Song of the Shirt)

1810 – Birth of Margaret Fuller, writer/critic 1st pro book review column (New York Tribune)

1906 - Henrik Johan Ibsen, Norwegian playwright (Doll House), dies at 78

1992 - Giovanni Falcone, anti-mafia judge (Palermo), murdered

Bro. Elias Ashmole
(Born this day 1617)

I was made a Free-Mason at Warrington in Lancashire
with Coll. Henry Mainwaring of Karincham in Cheshire.
The names of those that were of the Lodge, Mr Rich: Penkett Warden.
M James Collier, Mr Rich Sanchey, Henry Littler, John Ellam, Rich: Ellam, Hugh Brewer

(16 October 1647, 4:30 pm)

[Tamrin]

24 May
France: La Fete des Saintes Maries

1543 - Nicolas Copernicus astronomer, dies in Poland

1743 - Birth of Jean-Paul Marat, France, revolutionist

1794 - Birth of William Whewell, British philosopher (History of Inductive Science)

1879 - William Lloyd Garrison, abolitionist (Liberator), dies at 73

1918 - Birth of Coleman A Young, civil rights leader (Mayor-D-Detroit)

1930 - 1st woman to fly from England to Australia solo, lands (Amy Johnson)

1940 - Birth of Joseph Brodsky, USSR, author (Less than 1, Nobel 1987)

Coleman A Young
(Born this day 1918)

We need to dream big dreams, propose grandiose means if we are
to recapture the excitement, the vibrancy, and pride we once had

[Tamrin]

25 May

1787 - Constitutional convention opens at Philadelphia, George Washington presiding

1803 - Birth of Ralph Waldo Emerson, US, essayist/philosopher (Concord Hymn)

1868 - Australian Aboriginal Cricket tour of England begins vs Surrey Gentlemen

1907 - Birth of Rachel Carson, conservationist/writer (Silent Spring)

1908 – Birth of Theodore Roethke, US, poet (Words for the Wind)

1985 - Robert Nathan, US writer/poet (Portrait of Jennie), dies at 91

1991 - Israel evacuates 14,000 Ethiopian Jews

Robert Nathan
(Died this day 1985)

God of pity and love, return to this earth. Go not so far
away, leaving us to evil. Darkness is loose upon the
world, the Devil walks in the land, and there is nothing
worth. Death like a dog runs howling from his lair; His
bite has Made men mad, they follow after all howling
too, and their demoniac laughter drowns like a sea
our solitary prayer. Return, 0 Lord, return. Come with
the day, Come with the light, that men may see once
more across this earth's uncomfortable floor the kindly
paths, the old and loving way. Let us not die of evil in
the night. Let there be God again. Let there be light

[Tamrin]

26 May
Australia: National Sorry Day (Stolen Generation)

0735 - Beda Venerabilis [the Venerable Bede], English speaking church historian, dies at about 62

1700 – Birth of Count Nikolaus L earl von Zinzendorf und Pottendorf, [Order of the Mustard Seed]

1703 - Samuel Pepys, English marine expert (Diary)/composer, dies at 70

1759 – Birth of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, writer/mother of Mary Shelley

1907 - Birth of John "Duke" Wayne [Marion Michael Morrison], Winterset IA, actor (True Grit)

1938 - House Committee on Un-American Activities begins work

1976 - Martin Heidegger, German philosopher (Holzweg), dies at 86

The Venerable Bede
(Died this day 735)

He alone loves the Creator perfectly who manifests a pure love for his neighbour

[Tamrin]

27 May
(Lutheran: Commemoration of John Calvin, renewer of the church)

1564 - Jean Caulvin [John Calvin], priest/church reformer, dies at 54

1815 – Birth of Henry Parkes, British journalist/premier of NSW (“Father of Federation”)

1818 – Birth of Amelia Jenks Bloomer, suffragette known for her pantaloons

1819 – Birth of Julia Ward Howe, US, author/lecturer (Battle Hymn of the Republic)

1867 – Birth of Arnold Bennett, England, novelist/playwright/critic (Great Babylon)

1923 – Birth of Henry Kissinger, Nobel Peace Prize / [alleged war criminal]

1964 - Jawaharial Nehru, Independent India's 1st PM, dies at 74

Sir Henry Parkes
(Born this Day 1815 — Portrait by Tom Roberts, 1892)

The Australian continent needs an Australian government

[Tamrin]

28 May

1731 - All Hebrew books in Papal State are confiscated

1739 - Bro. Rev. Dr. James Anderson, authored Book of Constitutions, died

1807 – Birth of Louis Agassiz, Switzerland, naturalist/geologist/teacher

1851 - Sojourner Truth attends Women's Rights Conventions

1912 - Birth of Patrick White, Australia, novelist (Happy Valley, Nobel 1973)

1937 - Alfred Adler, Austrian psychiatrist (Individual Psychology), dies at 67

1961 - Amnesty International is founded (Nobel Peace Prize 1977)

Louis Agassiz
(Born this day 1807)

Every scientific truth goes through three states:
first, people say it conflicts with the Bible;
next, they say it has been discovered before;
lastly, they say they always believed it

[Tamrin]

29 May

1453 - Constantinople, the capital of Eastern Christianity from A.D. 324, fell to the Turks.

1736 - Birth of Patrick Henry, US, patriot "Give me liberty or give me death"

1874 - Birth of Gilbert Keith Chesterton, England, journalist/poet/critic/novelist

1880 – Birth of Oswald Spengler, Germany, philosopher (Decline of the West)

1903 - Birth of Bob Hope [Leslie Townes], Kent England, entertainer/comedian (famous profile)

1906 – Birth of Terence Hanbury White, Bombay India, novelist (The Once and Future King)

1953 - Edmund P Hillary & Tensing Norkay are 1st to reach summit of Mount Everest

Oswald Spengler
(Born this day 1880)

The press today is an army with carefully organized
weapons, the journalists its officers, the readers its
soldiers. But, as in every army, the soldier obeys
blindly, and the war aims and operating plans change
without his knowledge. The reader neither knows nor is
supposed to know the purposes for which he is used and
the role he is to play. There is no more appalling caricature
of freedom of thought. Formerly no one was allowed to
think freely; now it is permitted, but no one is capable of it
any more. Now people want to think only what they are
supposed to want to think, and this they consider freedom

[Tamrin]

30 May
Roman Catholic : Commemoration of St Jeanne d'Arc, Maid of Orleans, patroness of France
US: Memorial Day

1431 - Joan of Arc burned as a witch by the English at Rouen at 19

1593 - Christopher Marlowe, British dramatist (Tamburlaine the Great), murdered

1835 - Birth of Alfred Austin, Leeds England, poet laureate of England (Garden)

1868 - Memorial Day 1st observed when 2 women placed flowers on both Confederate & Union graves

1901 - Birth of Cornelia Otis Skinner, Chicago IL, writer (When Our Hearts Were Young & Gay)

1903 - Birth of Countee Cullen, Baltimore MD, poet (Black Christ & Other Poems)

1960 - Boris Pasternak, Russian poet (Dr Zhivago), dies at 70

Joan of Arc
(Died this day 1431)

Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong;
it means something flaming, like Joan of Arc

G.K. Chesterton
(Born yesterday 1874)

[Tamrin]

31 May
Lutheran, Anglican, Roman Catholic: Feast of the Visitation [Queenship] of Mary

0070 - Rome captures 1st wall of the city of Jerusalem

1678 - Lady Godiva rides naked through Coventry in a protest of taxes

1819 - Birth of Walt Whitman, West Hills NY, poet (Leaves of Grass)

1838 - Birth of Henry Sidgwick, English philosopher (Wife at University)

1898 - Birth of Norman Vincent Peale, Ohio, clergyman (Power of Positive Thinking)

1910 - Elizabeth Blackwell, Hastings, 1st [US] woman doctor of medicine

1962 - Adolf Eichmann, war criminal, hanged for crimes against Jews in WWII at Ramie Prison in Israel at 56

Henry Sidgwick
(Born this day 1838)

What anyone has to do who is convinced himself
of the reality of any alleged marvel, is first to try, if he can,
to diminish the improbability of the marvel by offering an explanation
which harmonises it with other parts of our experience; and secondly,
to increase the improbability of the testimony being in error],
by accumulating experiences and varying conditions and witnesses

[Tamrin]

1 June

1801 - Birth of Brigham Young, religious leader (Mormon church)/polygamist

1843 - Sojourner Truth leaves NY to begin her career as antislavery activist

1878 – Birth of John Masefield, England, 15th poet laureate (Salt-Water Ballads)

1907 - Birth of Frank Whittle, inventor (jet engine)

1926 - Birth of Marilyn Monroe, [Norma Jean Baker], actress (Some Like It Hot)

1941 - Germany bans all Catholic publications

1968 - Helen Keller, blind & deaf, dies at 87

Sojourner Truth
(Began activist career this day 1843)

I am glad to see that men are getting their rights, but I want women
to get theirs, and while the water is stirring I will step into the pool