September 19th is

International Talk Like a Pirate Day *

National Butterscotch Flavor Day

National Gymnastics Day

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MORE! Cadbury Chocolate, Charlie Chaplin and Frank Zappa, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Chile – Armed Forces Day

Ireland – National Coffee Day

Italy – St. Januarius Day

Japan – Respect for Elders Day

Russia – Moscow Day

St. Kitts and Nevis – Independence Day

United States – Pittsburgh PA:
Pittsburgh Pierogi Festival

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On This Day in HISTORY

1692 – Giles Corey, aged 81, pressed to death while refusing to enter a guilty or not guilty plea to charges of witchcraft, during the Salem witch trials

1783 – The Montgolfier brothers send live animals up in a hot air balloon, including a sheep and a rooster

1819 –   John Keats writes “Ode to Autumn”

1839 – George Cadbury born – he built his father’s small chocolate business into a major chocolate manufacturer

1862 – At the Battle of Iuka in Mississippi, Union troops defeat Confederate forces under General Sterling Price, while he and his second-in-command passed messages back and forth to each other through an aide since they were not on speaking terms. (A member of my family I am not proud of, except that his bullheadedness did help the Northern cause)

1879 – In the UK, the Blackpool Illuminations are switched on for the first time

1893 – New Zealand women are granted the right to vote by Royal Assent of the governor to the Electoral Act of 1893

1942 – The first advertisement announcing the ‘Little Golden Books’ appears in Publishers Weekly

1946 – Winston Churchill, speaking at University of Zurich in Switzerland, calls for Council of Europe, founded by 1947 Treaty of London signers

1952 – Charlie Chaplin, coming back from a promotion tour of England for his film Limelight, is banned from re-entering the country for his “anti-Americanness” – he only comes back once, in 1972, to receive a Lifetime Achievement Academy Award

1959 – Soviet Premier Nikita Krushchev is told ‘nyet’ – Disneyland, ‘the happiest place on Earth’, will not allow him to visit

1960 – “The Twist” by Chubby Checker hits #1 on the charts

1968 – Steppenwolf won its first gold record for “Born to be Wild”

1970 – The Mary Tyler Moore Show debuts on CBS

1984 – China and Britain complete a draft agreement to transfers Hong Kong from British to Chinese rule by 1997

1986 – The FDA accelerates approval of AZT for use against HIV and AIDS

1995 – John Bauer and Mark Summers decide on June 6 that what the world needs is Talk Like a Pirate Day * – but June 6 is D-Day, so they choose Mark’s ex-wife’s birthday, September 19, instead, but their friend Brian Rhodes has to keep reminding them about it until 2002 when John chances upon Dave Barry’s email, and they send him their great idea, asking him to be the spokesperson for TLAP day. Dave Barry writes a really funny column (of course) about the idea, and it’s now an international holiday

1998 – National Gymnastics Day is created

2010 – On the 25th anniversary of Frank Zappa’s Senate testimony, when he compared labeling explicit records to censorship, a bronze bust of this Baltimore native son is dedicated outside the Southeast Anchor Branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library, donated to the city of Baltimore by the Lithuanian nonprofit organization ZAPPART

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Visuals

• Talk Like a Pirate Day Logo
• International Flags
• Montgolfier Brothers, by Derek Roberts
• Blackpool Floral Arch ilumination, 1920s postcard
• Charlie Chaplin, 1952 BBC radio interview about Limelight
• Frank Zappa bust in Baltimore

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