Archive for September, 2009

On this day in 1978, Pope John Paul I died after 33 days as Pope. If he had known, do you think he would have taken out some term life insurance?

Pope John Paul I (Latin: Ioannes Paulus PP. I, Italian: Giovanni Paolo I), born Albino Luciani, (17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978), reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church and as Sovereign of Vatican City from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later. His reign is among the shortest in papal history, resulting in the most recent Year of Three Popes. John Paul I was the first Pope born in the 20th century.

In Italy he is remembered with the affectionate appellatives of “Il Papa del sorriso” (“The smiling Pope”) and “Il sorriso di Dio” (“God’s smile”).

You can find out more about this day in history at Those Were The Days, and InfoPlease.

On this day in 1969, my sister was born. That makes her 40! Wow. Happy birthday sis! Also on this day, in 1960, Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy took part in the first televised presidential debate.

Look how far we’ve come in 50 years. From the first television debate to the first youtube debates in the previous election. From black and white ads on tv to free online auctions. Where will be in the next 50 years?

On this day in 1987, the famous letter from Virginia O’Hanlon appeared in the New York Sun. I used to have this on a usb backup drive, which has since been lost. It’s just one of the many things I will keep on my new Logo usb drive when it arrives.

In 1897, Dr. Philip O’Hanlon, a coroner’s assistant on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, was asked by his then eight-year-old daughter, Virginia (1889-1971), whether Santa Claus really existed. Virginia O’Hanlon had begun to doubt there was a Santa Claus, because her friends had told her that he did not exist.

Dr. O’Hanlon suggested she write to the New York Sun, a prominent New York City newspaper at the time, assuring her that “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” While he may have been passing the buck, he unwittingly gave one of the paper’s editors, Francis Pharcellus Church, an opportunity to rise above the simple question, and address the philosophical issues behind it.

Church was a war correspondent during the American Civil War, a time which saw great suffering and a corresponding lack of hope and faith in much of society. Although the paper ran the editorial in the seventh place on the editorial page, below even an editorial on the newly invented “chainless bicycle,” its message was very moving to many people who read it. More than a century later it remains the most reprinted editorial ever to run in any newspaper in the English language.

On this day in 1876, Melville R. Bissell patented the carpet sweeper. You remember those don’t you?

A carpet sweeper or Ewbank[1], as it is colloquially known to some in the UK, is a mechanical device for the cleaning of carpets in situ. These were popular before the introduction of the vacuum cleaner and have been largely superseded by them.

The carpet sweeper made life easier for everyone, in fact it was also the best fat burner around until we all started hiring people to clean our houses, sitting in front of the television and forgetting we needed to keep fit.

On this day in 1881 , President James Garfield died from the gunshot wound he suffered months before. There wasn’t much medical travel back then, but he was moved to make him more comfortable before he died.

The President had been walking through the Sixth Street Station of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad (a predecessor of the Pennsylvania Railroad) Washington, D.C., on his way to his alma mater, Williams College, where he was scheduled to deliver a speech, accompanied by Secretary of State James G. Blaine, Secretary of War Robert Todd Lincoln (son of Abraham Lincoln) and two of his sons, James and Harry. The station was located on the southwest corner of present day Sixth Street Northwest and Constitution Avenue in Washington, D.C., a site that is now occupied by the National Gallery of Art. As he was being arrested after the shooting, Guiteau repeatedly said, “I am a Stalwart of the Stalwarts! I did it and I want to be arrested! Arthur is President now!” which briefly led to unfounded suspicions that Arthur or his supporters had put Guiteau up to the crime. (The Stalwarts strongly opposed Garfield’s Half-Breeds; like many vice presidents, Arthur was chosen for political advantage, to placate his faction, rather than for skills or loyalty to his running-mate.) Guiteau was upset because of the rejection of his repeated attempts to be appointed as the United States consul in Paris—a position for which he had absolutely no qualifications.

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Garfield died of a massive heart attack or a ruptured splenic artery aneurysm, following blood poisoning and bronchial pneumonia, at 10:35 p.m. on Monday, September 19, 1881, in the Elberon section of Long Branch, New Jersey. The wounded President died exactly two months before his 50th birthday. During the eighty days between his shooting and death, his only official act was to sign an extradition paper.

On this day in 1787, the founding fathers signed the U.S Constitution.

On September 17, 1787, the Constitution was completed in Philadelphia at the Federal Convention, followed by a speech given by Benjamin Franklin who urged unanimity, although they decided only nine states were needed to ratify the constitution for it to go into effect. The Convention submitted the Constitution to the Congress of the Confederation, where it received approval according to Article 13 of the Articles of Confederation.

And as they say, the rest is history. Our constitution is the shortest and oldest written constitution in the history of the world. Back in a time when our leaders were more concerned with the fate of our nation and the kids were working the fields regardless of any acne treatment, there’s no doubt they worked hard to build the foundation of our great nation.

On this day in 1965, Green Acres debuted on CBS in an age of television free of wall-to-wall commercials and fast paced speakers trying to push the latest deal at the electronics store. The commercials were friendlier and actually contained products people would actually want to buy. Too bad they weren’t advertising, because we could have used some Medifast coupons back then too. The again, we can use them now, can’t we?

After the success of The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction, CBS offered producer Paul Henning another half-hour on the schedule with no pilot required. Lacking the time to commit to another project himself, he encouraged colleague Jay Sommers to create the series. Sommers used his 1950 radio series, Granby’s Green Acres, as the basis for the new television series. The 13-episode radio series had starred Gale Gordon and Bea Benaderet (who also appeared in the TV version) as a big-city family who move to the country.

In pre-production, two proposed titles were Country Cousins and The Eddie Albert Show.[1] Green Acres was about Oliver Wendell Douglas (Eddie Albert), an accomplished and erudite New York attorney who was acting on his lifelong dream to be a farmer, and Lisa Douglas (Eva Gabor), his glamorously bejeweled Hungarian wife, dragged unwillingly from the privileged city life she adored to a bucolic life on a ramshackle farm. The debut episode was a mock documentary about this big-city attorney’s decision to move to a rural area, narrated by CBS newscaster (and host of the popular game show What’s My Line) John Charles Daly. A few weeks after the show’s debut, Albert and Gabor returned the favor by appearing on What’s My Line as that episode’s Mystery Guests, and afterward publicly thanked Daly for helping to successfully launch their series.

On this day in 1878, the first female telephone operator was hired and the sales of women shoesskyrocketed once again.

Emma Mills Nutt became the world’s first female telephone operator on 1 September 1878 when she started working for the Edwin Holmes Telephone Dispatch Company (or the Boston Telephone Dispatch company) in Boston, Massachusetts.

In January 1878 the Boston Telephone Dispatch company had started hiring boys as telephone operators, starting with George Willard Croy. Boys (including reportedly Emma’s husband) had been very successful as telegraphy operators, but their attitude (lack of patience) and behaviour (pranks and cursing) was unacceptable for live phone contact, so the company began hiring women operators instead. Thus, on September 1 1878, Emma was hired, starting a career that lasted 33 or 37 years, retiring in 1911 or 1915. A few hours after Emma started work her sister Stella Nutt became the world’s second female telephone operator, although, unlike Emma, she only stayed for a few years.