November 10th is

Sesame Street Day *

Area Code Day *

Forget-Me-Not Day *

Vanilla Cupcake Day

U.S. Marine Corps Day *

World Science Day for Peace and Development *

______________________________________________________

MORE! Oliver Goldsmith, Marilyn Bergman and Joseph Heller, click

______________________________________________________

WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Bhutan – Lhabab Duechen
(Lord Buddha Descends)

Mozambique –
Maputo: Maputo City Day

Panama –
Los Santos Cry of Independence *

Poland – Katowice:
MAYDAY Poland Festival

Russia – Police Day

______________________________________________________

On This Day in HISTORY

1202 – Fourth Crusade: The Siege of Zara is the first major action of the crusade – an attack on a Catholic city by Catholic crusaders, who need the transport that the city of Venice could provide, but the city’s price is beyond what they can pay. They strike a deal to help the Venetians capture Zara, a constant battleground between Venice and Croatia/Hungary; Pope Innocent III forbids the attack, threatening excommunication, but the Crusader-Venetian coalition takes and sacks Zara by November 24

1483 – Martin Luther born, German leader of the Protestant Reformation

1565 – Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, English general and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; in 1601, he led an abortive coup d’état against the Crown, and was executed for treason, the last person to be beheaded in the Tower of London

Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger

1620 – Ninon de l’Enclos born, French author, freethinker and arts patron; her salon attracted the literati of Paris, including a young Molière; she had a series of love affairs with prominent and wealthy men, but they did not support her; however, her lack of discretion and outspoken opinions on religion got her in trouble, and she was imprisoned in the Madelonnettes Convent in 1656, but released when Queen Christina of Sweden interceded on her behalf; in her will, she left money for the 9-year-old son of her accountant so he could buy books – he grew up to be known as Voltaire

1668 – François Couperin born, French organist and composer

1697 – William Hogarth born, English painter and illustrator

The Bench, 1758, by William Hogarth

1728 – Oliver Goldsmith born, Irish-English playwright, poet and novelist; noted for play, She Stoops to Conquer, and novel, The Vicar of Wakefield

1759 – Friedrich Schiller born, German poet, playwright, and historian

1766 – William Franklin, last colonial governor of New Jersey, signs the charter for Queen’s College (renamed Rutgers University in 1825, after Henry Rutgers who bond donation got the school out of financial difficulties)

1775 – The U.S. Continental Marines (predecessor to the U.S. Marine Corps) is founded by Samuel Nicolas, who had just been commissioned by the Second Continental Congress as a “Captain of Marines” – he set up a recruiting headquarters at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia, and had enough recruits by January 1776 to man the vessels of the Continental Navy

1793 – A ‘Goddess of Reason’ is proclaimed by the French Convention at the urging of  Pierre Gaspard Chaumette, a radical enragés of the French Revolution who wanted to replace Roman Catholicism with the Cult of Reason

1821 – Cry of Independence * by Rufina Alfaro at La Villa de Los Santos, Panama, setting into motion a revolt which led to Panama’s independence from Spain, becoming part of Colombia

1865 – Major Henry Wirz, superintendent of the infamous Andersonville prison camp in Georgia, is hanged, one of three American Civil War soldiers  executed for war crimes

1871 – Henry Morton Stanley locates missing explorer and missionary, Dr. David Livingstone near Lake Tanganyika, greeting him, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”

1873 – Henri Rabaud born, French Composer and conductor

1874 – Idabelle Smith Firestone born, American composer and songwriter

1879 – Vachel Lindsay born, American poet; his poem “The Congo” caused a stir in its day, but seems really racist now

1884 – Zofia Nałkowska born, Polish novelist, dramatist, and essayist; executive member of the Polish Academy of Literature (1933-1939); Granica  and Medaliony

1887 – Elisa Leonida Zamfirescu born, Romanian who was one of the first female engineers; at the Geological Institute of Romania, she started as an assistant, but later led several geology laboratories and participated in various field studies, including some that identified new resources of coal, shale, natural gas, chromium, bauxite and copper. She also taught physics and chemistry

1893 – John P. Marquand born, American author of the Mr. Moto spy stories; won the Pulitzer Prize for The Late George Apley

1911 – California Proposition 4, the most elaborate campaign ever mounted for woman suffrage, succeeds by just 3,587 votes

1916 – Billy May born, American trumpet player, band leader, TV/film composer

1918 – The North Sydney Nova Scotia Western Union Cable Office receives a top-secret coded message from Europe (forwarded to Ottawa and Washington, D.C.) saying  on November 11, 1918, all fighting would cease on land, sea and in the air.

1919 – The American Legion’s first national convention is held in Minneapolis

1928 – Ennio Morricone born, Italian composer noted for film scores

1929 – Marilyn Bergman born, lyricist and songwriter with her husband Alan Bergman, they have three Academy Awards for Best Song

1931 – Lilly Pulitzer born, American fashion designer

1944 – Tim Rice born, English Composer

1947 – The North American Numbering Plan assigns telephone area codes *– large cities are assigned lower numbers for the first and third numbers because with rotary dialers, the higher the number, the longer it takes to dial – giving direct-dial, coast-to-coast service to the U.S.

1951 – Direct-dial, coast-to-coast telephone service begins with a call between the mayors of Englewood NJ, and Alameda CA

1954 – U.S. President Eisenhower dedicates the USMC War Memorial (Iwo Jima memorial) in Arlington National Cemetery

1958 – New York diamond merchant Harry Winston donates the Hope Diamond the Smithsonian Institution

1961 – The satirical anti-war novel Catch-22 by Joseph Heller is published

1967 – The Moody Blues release “Knights in White Satin”

1969 – National Educational Television (the predecessor to the Public Broadcasting Service) in the United States debuts Sesame Street *

1975 – The 729-foot-long freighter SS Edmund Fitzgerald sinks a Lake Superior storm, killing all 29 crew on board

1982 – The newly completed Vietnam Veterans Memorial opens to visitors

1983 – Bill Gates introduces Windows 1.0

1989 – Germans begin tearing down the Berlin Wall

1995 – In Nigeria, playwright and environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others from the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), are hanged by government forces

1997 – WorldCom and MCI Communications announce a $37 billion merger (the largest merger in US history at the time)

2001 – The UNESCO General Conference proclaims World Science Day for Peace and Development * to stress responsible use of science and raise awareness of its importance

2006 – The National Museum of the Marine Corps in Quantico, Virginia is dedicated by U.S. President George W. Bush, who announces that Marine Corporal Jason Dunham will posthumously receive the Medal of Honor

2008 – Over five months after landing on Mars, NASA declares the Phoenix mission concluded after communications with the lander are lost

2009 – The first Sesame Street Day * celebrates the 40^th anniversary of its original broadcast in 1969

______________________________________________________