July 4^th is:

Happy Fourth!

Barbecued Spareribs Day

Caesar Salad Day

Sidewalk Egg Frying Day

Country Music Day

Independence from Meat Day

________________________________________________________________

MORE! Nathaniel Hawthorne, Zdzisława Donat and Rube Goldberg, click

________________________________________________________________

WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Cayman Islands – Constitution Day

Italy – Lucca:
Lucca Summer Festival (ongoing)

Latvia –
Jewish Genocide in Latvia Remembrance

Norway – Queen Sonja’s Birthday

Philippines – Philippine Republic Day

Rwanda – Liberation Day

South Sudan – Mother’s Day

Tonga – Birthday of King Tupou VI

United States – Independence Day

Zambia – Unity Day
________________________________________________________________

On This Day in HISTORY:

362 BC – The Thebans, led by Epaminondas, defeat the Spartans at the Second Battle of Mantinea, but Epaminondas is hit in the chest with a spear, which broke, leaving its iron
point in his body, and he collapses. The Thebans fight fiercely to keep their wounded ruler from falling into Spartan hands, but he dies of the wound just after hearing that the Thebans are victorious. The loss of Epaminindas far outweighs the value of the victory – neither side can create a strong enough collation to unite the city-states, which eases the way for Philip II of Macedon’s conquest much of Greece by 346 BC

1054 – Chinese of the Song dynasty and Arab observers record supernova – remnants form the Crab Nebula

1636 – The City of Providence, Rhode Island, is founded

1776 – Continental Congress adopts Declaration of Independence

1789 – The Tariff Act of 1789, the first substantial Congressional legislation, is signed into law by President George Washington; together with the Collection Act of 1789, they protect American trade and raise revenues for the federal government

1802 – The U.S. Military Academy opens at West Point NY

1803 – President Jefferson announces the Louisiana Purchase to the American people

1804 – Nathaniel Hawthorne born, major 19^th century American author; House of the Seven Gables, The Scarlet Letter

1807 – Giuseppe Garibaldi born, Italian nationalist, military leader of the unification of Italy, a founding father with Camillo Cavour, Victor Emmanuel II, and Giuseppe Mazzini of the Kingdom of Italy

1817 – Erie Canal Construction begins, to connect Lake Erie with the Hudson River

1826 – Thomas Jefferson and John Adams die on the same day

1826 – Stephen Foster born, American songwriter of over 200 songs

1827 – Slavery is abolished in New York state

1845 – Henry David Thoreau begins his two-year experiment in simple living at Walden Pond near Concord MA

1855 – Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass is published

1868 – Henrietta Swan Leavitt born, American astronomer; discoverer of relationship between luminosity and variables associated with Cepheid stars, which allows astronomers to measure the distance between Earth and other galaxies

1883 – Rube Goldberg born, cartoonist, 1948 Pulitzer Prize

1903 – Dorothy Levitt becomes first English woman to compete in a ‘motor race’

1905 – Lionel Trilling born, American author and major literary critic

1910 – “America the Beautiful” is published; lyrics from the poem “America” (title changed from “Pikes Peak” for publication) by Katherine Lee Bates, and music by Samuel A. Ward, originally written for a hymn called “O Mother Dear, Jerusalem” published in 1895

1917 – Manuel Laureano Rodríguez Sánchez born, known as Manolete, one of the greatest Spanish bullfighters

1918 – Esther and Pauline Friedman born, twin sisters better known as Ann Landers and Abigail Van Buren, American syndicated advice columnists

1927 – First Flight of the Lockheed Vega 1, at Mines Field

1927 – Neil Simon born, American playwright; has more combined Tony and Oscar nominations than any other writer, and only playwright ever to have four plays running on Broadway at the same time

1934 – Yvonne B. Miller born, first African-American woman to serve in both Virginia state legislative house, first woman chair of a Virginia Senate committee

1936 – Zdzisława Donat born, Polish coloratura soprano, notable as the Queen of Night in Die Zauberflöte, Professor Emeritus at Frédéric Chopin University of Music

1938 – Bill Withers, American singer-songwriter; Three Grammy wins, and four additional nominations; inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015

1942 – Irving Berlin’s musical This is the Army opens on Broadway

1946 – The Philippines becomes independent

1950 – The first program is aired by U.S. government-funded Radio Free Europe, an anti-communist propaganda broadcast aimed at Central Europe and the Soviet Union

1959 – The new 49-star U.S. flag honoring Alaska statehood is unfurled

1966 – President Lyndon Johnson signs the Freedom of Information Act into law

1966 – The Lovin’ Spoonful release “Summer In The City”

1969 – The Rolling Stones U.K. release of “Honky Tonk Women”

1976 – The U.S. celebrates its Bicentennial – in New York, 225 sailing ships under 31 flags parade up the Hudson River

1997 – The Mars Pathfinder deploys Sojourner on Mars

2005 – A NASA space probe, Deep Impact, hits its comet target as planned in a mission to learn how the solar system formed

2010 – General David Petraeus formally assumes command of the 130,000 troops of the international force in Afghanistan

2011 – Adele releases her single “Set Fire to the Rain” in the U.K.

________________________________________________________________