Titanic
On the night of April 14, 1912, the RMS Titantic, a ship considered virtually unsinkable was struck by an Iceberg and sank. The ship carried the minimum number of lifeboats which could only carry about 1000 people. In 1898, the novel ‘Futility’ written by Morgan Robertson was published. It’s a story about a giant ship, [...]
An Extra Day in February
February 29th. It’s the day that is added every 4 years to balance the calendar. A year is actually a little less that 365.25 days long. The actual formula for leap days is that it occurs only every four years, in years evenly divisible by 4, except century years not divisible by 400. Since the [...]
The Truths of Washington
George Washington, the leader of the Continental Army and later the first President of the United States, thought of February 22nd as his birthday. He was born on February 11, 1731 under the Julian Calendar. The Julian Calendar was used in England, in which Virginia was a colony in 1731, but the Gregorian Calendar was [...]
Presidential – Did You Know?
When James Monroe was confirmed as President by the Electoral College he received all of the Electoral votes except for one. A New Hampshire delegate would not give his vote to Monroe in honor of George Washington. Washington is the only President elected unanimously by the Electoral College. Martin Van Buren was born on December [...]
Did You Know – Presidential Trivia
When Barack Obama took the oath of office of President on January 20, 2009 he started the 56th four year term of President. Each 4 year term has 1461 days (4 years of 365 plus the leap day). Five years have had two Presidents born in them: * Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams were [...]
He Played Golf Where?
It took three swings before astronaut Alan B. Shepard finally hit the golf ball on February 6, 1971. What was amazing is when the swing was made he was suited in his space gear standing on the moon as part of Apollo 14. Shepard after a solid hit with a second ball stated that it [...]
Established: 1972
One may think that Email is a fairly new form of communications however it is credited to have been invented in 1972 by Ray Tomlinson who worked for Bolt Beranek and Newman as an ARPANET contractor. By chance he picked the @ symbol to denote sending messages from one computer to another, name-of-the-user@name-of-the-computer. The Hewlett-Packard [...]
Did You Know – Christmas
In 336 AD. Pope Julius I declared the birth and celebration of Jesus’ birthday as Christmas. He chose the day December 25th because it coincided with the pagan traditions of Winter Solstice. The idea was to bring pagans into the christian religion and selecting that day helped in this cause. No one knows the exact [...]
Did You Know – Letters, Numbers and Such
The symbol # commonly called the Number Sign is called an octothorpe. The dot over the letter ‘i’ is called a tittle. The ampersand (&) is actually a stylized version of the Latin word “et,” meaning and. The only capital letter in the Roman alphabet with exactly one endpoint is P. The letters H I [...]
Did You Know – Early American History
If you are a regular reader you do. St. Augustine Florida is the oldest continuous settlement in the United States. It was originally a Spanish settlement as well as its oldest port. St. Augustine was founded by Pedro Menéndez de Avilés on September 8, 1565. The first English child born in America was Virgina Dare [...]
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