On This Day:
Saturday December 20, 2014 This is the 354th day of the year, with 11 days remaining in 2014. Fact of the Day: snow Light is reflected in all directions when it hits snow -- that's why the snow looks white. Snow is not frozen rain. Snow forms by sublimation of water vapor -- the turning of water vapor directly into ice, without going through the liquid stage. So, high above the ground, chilled water vapor turns to ice when its temperature reaches the dew point. These tiny hexagonal ice crystals gather more water, causing them to grow. The larger crystals fall to the ground as snowflakes. A snowflake is made of between 2 and 200 separate snow crystals.
Holidays Feast day of St. Dominic of Silos, St. Ammon and his Companions, St. Ursicinus, and St. Philogonius.
Events 1790 - The first successful cotton mill in the U.S. began operating at Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
1803 - The Louisiana Purchase was completed as ownership of the territory was formally transferred from France to the United States during ceremonies in New Orleans. The massive land purchase, nearly doubled the size of the young republic, and was Thomas Jefferson's most notable achievement as President.
1860 - South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union.
1879 - Thomas A. Edison privately demonstrated his incandescent light at Menlo Park, New Jersey.
1880 - Electric lights were installed throughout Broadway's theater section in New York City.
1892 - The pneumatic tire was patented.
1922 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was formed when 15 eastern European republics merged to form the USSR.
1924 - Adolf Hitler was released from prison after serving less than one year of a five-year sentence for treason.
1938 - The kinescope, now known as the cathode-ray tube, was patented by Russian immigrant Vladimir Zworykin.
1965 - "The Dating Game" premiered on television.
1989 - U.S. armed forces invaded Panama to overthrow military dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega, who had been indicted in the United States on drug trafficking charges and accused of suppressing democracy in Panama.
1999 - The Vermont Supreme Court ruled that homosexual couples were entitled to the same benefits and protections as wedded couples of the opposite sex.
1999 - Macau reverted to Chinese rule; it had been a Portuguese colony since 1557.
Births 1868 - Harvey Firestone, American industrialist and tire maker.
1895 - Suzanne K. Langer, American philosopher and author.
1901 - Irene Dunn, American actress.
1901 - Robert Van de Graaff, American physicist and inventor.
Deaths 1968 - John Steinbeck, American novelist, who wrote "The Grapes of Wrath" and other works.
1973 - Bobby Darin, American singer, and teen idol of the late 1950s.
1982 - Artur Rubenstein, Polish pianist.
1996 - Carl Sagan, American astronomer and science writer.
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