On This Day:

On This Day:
Friday July 26, 2013

This is the 207th day of the year, with 158 days remaining in 2013.

Fact of the Day: teeth

Each adult jaw contains 16 teeth: four incisors, two canines, four premolars, and six molars. Incisors are cutting teeth; canines grip and tear food; premolars and molars have flattened crowns to crush and grind food.

Holidays

Feast day of St. Anne, St. Simeon the Armenian, St. Joachim, and St. Bartholomea Capitanio.
Cuba: National Day.
Liberia: Independence Day.
Maldives: Independence Day.

Events

1775 - The Continental Congress established a postal system for the colonies with Benjamin Franklin as the first postmaster general.
1788 - New York became the eleventh state to ratify the Constitution of the United States of America. 
1847 - The Republic of Liberia, formerly a colony of the American Colonization Society, declared its independence. It was the first African colony to secure independence.
1908 - U.S. Attorney General Charles J. Bonaparte established the Office of the Chief Examine, which was the forerunner of the FBI.
1945 - In the 11th hour of World War II, Winston Churchill was forced to resign as British prime minister following his party's electoral defeat by the Labour Party. He became leader of the opposition and in 1951 was again elected prime minister. 
1947 - President Harry Truman signed the National Security Act, creating the Department of Defense, the National Security Council, theCentral Intelligence Agency and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. President Truman unified the Army and Navy under the Department of Defense .
1948 - U.S. President Harry Truman signed Executive Order 9981, officially integrating the Armed Forces many years before the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
1953 - Fidel Castro and his brother Raúl led a group of approximately 160 rebels in the Moncada Barracks attacks, widely accepted as the beginning of the Cuban Revolution.
1956 - The Suez Crisis began when Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the British- and French-owned Suez Canal.
1974 - The U.S. House Judiciary Committee recommended impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon.
1990 - U.S. President George H.W. Bush signed into law the Americans with Disabilities Act.
2000 - A federal judge approved a $1.25 billion settlement between Swiss banks and more than a half million plaintiffs who alleged the banks had hoarded money deposited by Holocaust victims.

Births

1856 - George Bernard Shaw, Irish playwright.
1875 - Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist.
1892 - Pearl Buck, American Nobel Prize-winning author.
1894 - Aldous Huxley, American philosopher, satirist, author.
1895 - Gracie Allen, American actress, wife and foil of George Burns.
1902 - William Lear, American engineer and industrialist who founded the Lear Jet Corporation.
1912 - Vivian Vance, American Emmy Award-winning actress.
1922 - Blake Edwards (McEdwards), American film director.
1928 - Stanley Kubrick, American film director.
1943 - Mick Jagger, British singer, member of the rock group Rolling Stones.
1964 - Sandra Bullock, film actress born in Arlington County, Virginia.
1980 - Dave Baksh, Canadian guitarist.

Deaths

1863 - Samuel Houston, American lawyer, politician, and president of the Republic of Texas.
1925 - William Jennings Bryan, American lawyer, statesman, and politician.
1952 - Eva Perón, Argentinian populist leader and wife of Argentina president Juan Perón.
1984 - George Gallup, statistician and opinion pollster, born in Jefferson, Iowa.
1995 - George Romney, Mexican-born American businessman and politician.

On This Day:

Thursday July 25, 2013

This is the 206th day of the year, with 159 days remaining in 2013.

Fact of the Day: sushi

Sushi, the Japanese specialty, consists of rice mixed with a dressing that not only adds flavor but makes the rice shapeable in a mold or by rolling. Additional ingredients include raw or cooked fish or seafood and vegetables. Layers of sushi rice and prepared ingredients are pressed into a mold to form little cakes, or wrapped in a sheet of nori seaweed and served in slices. Dipping sauce, mustard, and pickled ginger are typical accompaniments.

Holidays

Feast day of St. Christopher, Saints Thea, Valentina and Paul, St. James the Greater, and St. Magnericus.
Spain: St. James Day.
Costa Rica: Guanacaste Day.
Puerto Rico: Constitution Day.
Tunisia: Republic Day.

Events

1832 - The first recorded railroad accident in U.S. history occurred, on the Granite Railway near Quincy, Massachusetts.
1866 - Ulysses S. Grant was named General of the Army, the first officer to hold the rank.
1868 - The U.S. Congress passed an act creating the Wyoming Territory. 
1898 - During the Spanish-American War, U.S. forces launched their invasion of Puerto Rico.
1909 - Louis Bleriot first crossed the English Channel in an airplane.
1917 - Margaretha Zelle, the Dutch spy known as Mata Hari, was sentenced to death.
1943 - Benito Mussolini was forced to resign as Dictator of Italy, bringing an end to the Fascist regime.
1952 - Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth of the United States. 
1956 - The Italian liner Andrea Doria sank after colliding with the Swedish ship Stockholm, 45 miles south of Nantucket Island; 51 people died. 
1978 - Louise Joy Brown, the first test-tube baby, was born in Oldham, England; she'd been conceived through in-vitro fertilization.
1984 - Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to walk in space.
2000 - A New York-bound Air France Concorde crashed outside Paris shortly after takeoff, killing all 109 people on board and four people on the ground.
2004 - Lance Armstrong won a record sixth Tour de France bicycle race, in an amazing comeback after his bout with cancer.
2007 - Pratibha Patil is sworn in as India's first woman president.
2007 - Jeremy Clarkson and James May become the first people to reach the magnetic North Pole in a car.

Births

1844 - Thomas Eakins, American painter.
1937 - Colin Renfrew, British archaeologist.
1954 - Walter Payton, American football player.
1958 - Thurston Moore, American musician.
1967 - Matt LeBlanc, American actor.

Deaths

1843 - Charles Macintosh, Scottish chemist and inventor.
1973 - Louis Stephen St. Laurent, 12th Prime Minister of Canada.
1997 - Ben Hogan, American golfer.
2003 - John Schlesinger, British film director.

On This Day:
Wednesday July 24, 2013

This is the 205th day of the year, with 160 days remaining in 2013.

Fact of the Day: college and university

A university is an institution of higher education, usually comprising a liberal arts and sciences college and graduate and professional schools and having the authority to confer degrees in various fields of study. A university differs from a college in that it is usually larger, has a broader curriculum, and offers graduate and professional degrees in addition to undergraduate degrees. In Europe, the first modern-style universities were set up in Italy (Bologna) in the 11th century, and in France and England (University of Paris and University of Oxford respectively) in the 12th century.

Holidays

Feast day of St. Christina the Astonishing, St. Boris or Romanus, St. Declan, St. Christina of Bolsena, St. Lewinna, and St. Gleb or David.
Utah, western U.S. states: Pioneer Day.
Venezuela: Bolivar's Birthday.

Events

1701 - Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac established Fort Ponchartrain for France at present-day Detroit.
1847 - Brigham Young arrived with 148 Mormon pioneers at Utah's Valley of the Great Salt Lake.
1866 - Tennessee became the first state to be readmitted to the Union after the Civil War. 
1911 - Machu Picchu was discovered by Hiram Bingham.
1974 - The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Richard Nixon had to turn over subpoenaed White House tape recordings to the Watergate special prosecutor. 
1990 - Iraqi forces start massing on the Kuwait/Iraq border.
2005 - Lance Armstrong wins his seventh consecutive Tour de France.

Births

1783 - Simón Bolivar, Latin American revolutionary.
1802 - Alexander Dumas (Davy de La Pailleterie) (Dumas PÈre), French playwright, novelist.
1897 - Amelia Earhart, American aviator.
1920 - Bella Abzug, American feminist, U.S. Congresswoman.
1935 - Pat Oliphant, Australian political cartoonist.
1946 - Gallagher (born Leo Anthony Gallagher) is an American comedian and prop comic, most popularly known for smashing watermelons as part of his act.
1957 - Pam Tillis, country music singer and songwriter, born in Plant City, Florida.
1963 - Karl Malone, retired American basketball player.
1969 - Jennifer Lopez, actress and singer, born in South Bronx, New York.

Deaths

1240 - Konrad von Thüringen, fifth Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights.
1862 - Martin van Buren, 8th President of the United States of America.
1980 - Peter Sellers, English comic actor.
1991 - Isaac Bashevis Singer, Nobel Prize-winning Polish-born American author, and one of the leading figures in the Yiddish literarymovement.
1997 - William J. Brennan, U.S. Supreme Court Justice.