October 29^th is

National Cat Day *

National Hermit Day *

Hug a Sheep Day *

National Oatmeal Day

International Internet Day *
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MORE! Walter Raleigh, Cloud Seeding and Maria Callas, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Hindu – Diwali/ Deepavali (Festival of Lights)

Cambodia –
King Norodom Sihamony’s Coronation

Dominica – Creole Day

Guyana – Deepavali

India – Deepavali/Diwali,
Naraka Chaturdashi
(avoidance of hell ritual)
Bengal: Kali Puja

Liberia – National Youth Day

Tanzania – Naming Day

Turkey & Turkish Republic
of Northern Cyrpus – Republic Day

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On This Day in HISTORY

539 BC – Cyrus the Great, founder of the Persian Empire, entered the capital of Babylon and allowed the Jews to return to their land

632 AD – Saint Colman dies in Ireland, after seven years as a hermit in the Burren Forest – remembered by Irish-Catholic Americans on National Hermit Day, *  it’s also a good day for spending some quiet ‘alone time’ in the midst of a busy life

1390 –Witch trials in a secular court in Paris – three people are killed – two of them women, burned for ‘afliction [sic] of illness, manipulation of affections’ and diabolism

1618 – English adventurer, writer, and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh is beheaded for allegedly conspiring against James I of England

1675 – Leibniz makes the first use of the long s (∫) as a symbol of the integral in calculus

1787 – Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni receives its first performance in Prague

1792 – Mount Hood in Oregon is named after Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood by Lt. William E. Broughton who sighted the mountain near the Willamette River mouth

1808 – Caterina Scarpellini, Italian astronomer and meteorologist, is born – on April 1, 1854, she discovered a comet, in 1856, she established a meteorological station in Rome

1863 – Eighteen countries meet in Geneva, agreeing to form the International Red Cross

1888 – The Convention of Constantinople is signed, guaranteeing free maritime passage through the Suez Canal during war and peace

1901 – Rudyard Kipling’s novel Kim, which had been serialized in the U.S. in McClure’s Magazine, and in the U.K. in Cassell’s Magazine, is published for the first time, in book form, quickly becoming a bestseller 

1922 – King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy appoints Benito Mussolini as Prime Minister

1923 – Turkey becomes a republic following the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

1929 – The New York Stock Exchange crashes in what will be called Crash of ’29 or “Black Tuesday”, ends the Great Bull Market of the 1920s, starts the Great Depression

1934 – First day of the International Conference of Musicology in Madrid, sponsored by the League of Nations to encourage the musical arts

1947 – First successful cloud seeding, using dry ice, took place at Concord NH

1948 – Safsaf massacre: Israeli soldiers capture Palestinian Arab village of Safsaf in the Galilee and massacre villagers

1956 – Maria Callas makes her debut at the NY Metropolitan Opera in Norma

1969 – ‘L’ ‘O’ – first letters transmitted on the Internet, which crashes before the rest of the message is sent – honored on International Internet Day *

1970 – Neil Diamond receives a gold record for “Cracklin’ Rosie”

1977 – Meat Loaf releases Bat “Out of Hell”

1982 – Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson release “Girl is Mine”

1986 – The M25, or London Orbital Motorway, is officially opened – almost immediately, traffic levels are double the maximum design capacity

1991 – NASA’s Galileo spacecraft makes its closest approach to 951 Gaspra, becoming the first probe to visit an asteroid

1998 – In South Africa, after four years of hearings, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission presents its report, which condemns both sides for committing atrocities

2004 – First Hug a Sheep Day * honoring Punkin the sheep, the founding member of the Equinox Farms herd, made famous by the ‘Crazy Sheep Lady’ blog

2005 – First National Cat Day,* started by animal welfare advocate Colleen Paige

2015 – China announces the end of One-Child Policy after 35 years, and institutes a new Two-Child Policy

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Visuals

• National Cat Day logo
• International Flags
• Cyrus the Great enters Babylon
• Sir Walter Raleigh with quote
• Mount Hood reflected in Mirror Lake
• Rudyard Kipling’s Kim, first page and cover of first edition
• New York Times front page story on 1929 Stock Market Crash
• Hug a Sheep Day logo

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