March 1st is

Black Women in Jazz & the Arts Day

Civil Defense Day *

Peanut Butter Lover’s Day

Horse Protection Day

National Pig Day *

Zero Discrimination Day *

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MORE! Chaucer, Frédéric Chopin, and Merlie Evers-Williams, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Hinduism – Holi/Dolapurnima /Phagu Purnima begins tonight, ends Friday night– widely celebrated in India and Nepal

Judaism – Purim

Bosnia & Herzegovina – Independence Day

Israel – Purim

Marshall Islands – Nuclear Victims Memorial

Micronesia – Yap Day (Yapese Cultural Celebration)

Myanmar – Tabaung/Dha Paung Full Moon

South Korea – Samil Day (Sam II Jul) *

Spain – Balearic Islands:
Día de las Islas Baleares

Sri Lanka – Madin Full Moon Poya Day

Switzerland – Republic Day

Thailand – Makha Bucha Day (Buddhist)

Wales – St. David’s Day
(Patron Saint of Wales)

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On This Day in HISTORY

752 BC – Romulus, legendary King of Rome, is said to have celebrated the first Roman triumph after defeating neighboring Caenina, proclaiming a festival of Neptune Equester, inviting all the neighboring Sabines to attend; during the festival the Romans grabbed ‘the virgins’ (were they wearing signs?!) among the visitors, and drove the rest out of the city: The Rape of the Sabine women. The Rape (used here in the sense of abduction) was staged because Rome was very short of women, and negotiations for brides with the Caeninenses, the Crustumini, the Antemnates, and the Sabines had failed. The historian Livy makes the unlikely claim that no direct sexual assault took place, that instead, Romulus offered the women free choice and promised them civic and property rights; if such promises were made, they don’t seem to have been kept (in the early days of Rome, a girl of 15-18 went straight from a father’s control to her husband’s, while the groom was likely in his mid-to-late 20s; even though technically she could not be forced to marry, the repercussions of not consenting were too daunting for most girls to resist). Legend has it when the Sabine men marched on Rome, the captured women, now Roman brides, threw themselves between the warring armies, begging their fathers, brothers and husbands to make peace, so the Sabines merged with the Romans

The Rape of the Sabine Women by Pietro da Cortona

293 – Emperor Diocletian and Maximian appoint Constantius Chlorus and Galerius as Caesars: the Tetrarchy, Quattuor Principes Mundi (“Four Rulers of the World”)

1360 – During the siege of Rheims, English King Edward III pays ₤16 to ransom soldier Geoffrey Chaucer from French captivity

1445 – Sandro Botticelli born, Italian Early Renaissance painter

1457 – The Unitas Fratrum is established in the village of Kunvald, on the Bohemian-Moravian borderland, the second oldest Protestant denomination

1498 – Vasco de Gama lands at what is now Mozambique on his way to India

1562 – The First French War of Religion is started by the massacre of Huguenots in Wassy

1565 – The city of Rio de Janeiro is founded

1628 – Writs issued in February by Charles I of England mandate that every county in England (not just seaport towns) pay a ship tax by March 1

1692 – Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne and Tituba are brought before local magistrates in Salem Village MA, beginning the Salem witch trials

1781 – Javiera Carrera born, Chilean activist in the War of Independence, credited with sewing the first national flag, called the “Mother of Chile”

1871 – The American Continental Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation

1790 – Congress authorizes the first U.S. census

1810 – Frédéric Chopin born, Poland’s greatest composer, child prodigy

1845 – U.S. President Tyler signs Congress’ resolution to annex the Republic of Texas

1862 – Prussia formally recognizes the Kingdom of Italy

1869 – Postage stamps with scenes are issued for the first time

1869 3 cent pictorial stamp – Locomotive

1872 – U.S. Congress authorizes creation of Yellowstone National Park, the world’s first national park

1873 – E. Remington & Sons begin manufacturing the first practical typewriter

1879 – The library of Hawaii is established

1880 – Lytton Strachey born, English biographer and critic

1890 – Theresa Bernstein-Meyerowitz born in Poland, American Jewish artist and writer; co-founder of the Society of Independent Artists

1900 – In South Africa, Ladysmith was relieved by British troops after being under siege by the Boers for more than four months

1904 – Glenn Miller born, American Big Band leader

1907 – In Odessa, Russia, there are only about 15,000 Jews after forced evacuations

1907 – In Spain, a royal decree abolishes civil marriages

1907 – In New York, the Salvation Army opens an anti-suicide bureau

1912 – Captain Albert Berry makes the first parachute jump from a moving airplane

1914 – Ralph Ellison born, American novelist; wins 1952 National Book Award for The Invisible Man

1917 – Robert Lowell born, American poet

1918 – Gladys Spellman born, American teacher and Democratic politician, appointed in 1967 to President Lyndon Johnson’s Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Affairs; U.S. Congressional Representative from Maryland (1975-1981)

1919 – Samil Day* in South Korea, anniversary of the Samil Movement demonstrations across Korea rallying for independence from Japan, which had annexed on the country in 1910; a proclamation of Korea’s independence is read by movement leaders, who turn themselves into the Japanese police; days of continuing protests and marches follow, which are mostly non-violent by the Koreans, but met with deadly force and thousands of arrests by the Japanese; the opposition falters, but muted opposition continues under a new Japanese governor who rolls back some restrictions, and allows limited Korean representation; the Korean Communist Party is founded in 1920, and splits off  from the Samil movement, eventually leading to dividing the country into North and South Korea

1922 – Yitzhak Rabin born, the Israeli prime minister, works for peace with Palestinian and Arab neighbors

1927 – Harry Belafonte born, American music star, singer-songwriter and social activist

1932 – The 22-month-old son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh is kidnapped

1933 – Merlie Evers-Williams born, civil rights activist and author, wife of Medgar Evers; first woman to head the NAACP (1995-1998)

1937 – U.S. Steel raises workers’ wages to $5 a day

1937 – Connecticut issues the first permanent automobile license plates

1939 – Leo Brouwer born, Cuban composer-conductor and classical guitarist

https://youtu.be/Bkq1dRUI-60

1940 – The novel Native Son by Richard Wright is published

1941 – FM Radio begins in Nashville TN, when station W47NV goes on the air

1945 – Nancy Woodhull born, editor of USA Today (1975-1990), advocate for women in public and private sector leadership positions; founded “Women, Men and Media,” a research and outreach project, with Betty Friedan (1988)

1947 – The International Monetary Fund begins operations

1950 – Klaus Fuchs is convicted of giving U.S. atomic secrets to the Soviet Union

1952 – Nevada Barr born, American mystery novelist, noted for her national parks mystery series featuring Anna Pigeon

1954 – U.S. announces it set off a hydrogen bomb test on the Bikini Atoll

1956 – Dalia Grybauskaitė  Lithuanian politician; first woman President of Lithuania, elected in 2009, and re-elected in 2014, the first Lithuanian President reelected for a consecutive second term; previously Minister of Finance and European Commissioner for Financial Programming and the Budget (2004 – 2009)

1957 – Chuck Berry releases his hit single “School Days”

1961 – President John F. Kennedy issues an executive order creating the Peace Corps, enlisting volunteers as advisers, teachers and health workers in developing countries

1966 – The Soviet probe, Venera 3, crashes on Venus, the first unmanned spacecraft to reach the surface of another planet

1966 – Ghana orders all Soviet, East German and Chinese technicians to leave

1968 – Elton John’s first single, “I’ve Been Loving You,” is released in England

1970 – U.S. commercial whale hunting ends

1971 – A bomb explodes in a Senate restroom, but there were no injuries; a  U.S. group protesting the Vietnam War claims responsibility

1972 – National Pig Day * is started by sisters Ellen Stanley and Mary Lynne Rave, to celebrate all things porcine

1973 – Pink Floyd releases “Dark Side of the Moon”

1973 – The Robert Joffrey Dance Company debuts the Deuce Coupe Ballet, with music by The Beach Boys

1974 – Seven people, including White House aides John D. Ehrlichman and  H.R. Haldeman, and former Attorney General John Mitchell,  are indicted for conspiring to obstruct justice after the Watergate break-in

1978 – Women’s History Week is first observed in Sonoma County, California, a modest proposal by the Education Task Force of the Sonoma County Commission on the Status of Women, for the week leading up to International Women’s Day, March 8th – it inspires Women’s History events all over the country, and grows into National Women’s History Month

Molly Murphy MacGregor, one of the founders of Women’s History Week, with Eleanor Roosevelt poster in the background

1987 – U.S. Congress passes a resolution permanently designating March as National Women’s History Month

1988 – Soviet troops are sent to Azerbaijan after riots between Armenians and Azerbaijanis

1989 – In Washington DC, Mayor Barry and the City council impose a curfew on minors

1990 – Civil Defense Day * is started by the International Civil Defense Organization, commemorating the ICDO Constitution coming into force as an intergovernmental organization in 1972

1992 – Bosnian Muslims and Croats vote to secede from Yugoslavia

1993 – The U.S. government announces the number of food stamp recipients reached a record number of 26.6 million

1994 – Israel releases about 500 Arab prisoners in an effort to placate Palestinians after the Hebron massacre

1995 – The European Parliament rejects legislation that would allow biotechnology companies to patent new life forms

1995 – Yahoo! is incorporated

2002 – Allied forces begin Operation Anaconda in eastern Afghanistan against Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters

2003 – A $250,000 Salvador Dali sketch is stolen from a display case in the lobby at NY’s Rikers Island jail; later four corrections officers surrender, pleading innocent in connection to the theft

2003 – In the U.S., approximately 180,000 personnel from 22 different organizations around the government become part of the Department of Homeland Security, completing the largest government reorganization since the beginning of the Cold War

2003 – Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, suspected mastermind of the 9-11 terrorist attacks on the U.S., is captured by CIA and Pakistani agents near Islamabad

2005 –Supreme Court narrowly outlaws the death penalty for juvenile criminals

2014 – Zero Discrimination Day * is launched by UNAIDS to end all forms of discrimination in healthcare, education, employment and civil rights for all people

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In honor of Saint David’s day:

A bowl of Welsh Cawl

Welsh daffodil and leek on the Welsh flag