September 19th is

Butterscotch Pudding Day

National Gymnastics Day

International Talk Like a Pirate Day *

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MORE! George Cadbury, Sarah Louise Delany and Frank Zappa, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Chile – Armed Forces Day

Italy – St. Januarius Feast Day

India – Teja Dasami
(Regional – Hindu folk deity)

Nepal – Constitution/National Day

Saint Kitts and Nevis – Independence Day

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On This Day in HISTORY

634 – The Siege of Damascus ends with the Rashidun Arabs under Khalid ibn al-Walid capturing Damascus from the Byzantine Empire

1356 –The English army of Edward, the Black Prince, wins the Battle of Poitiers against the French, and captures French King John II

Edward, Prince of Wales as Knight of the Order of the Garter, 1453,
illustration from the Bruges Garter Book

1676 – 500 Virginia settlers, led by Nathaniel Bacon, rebel against Colonial governor William Berkeley in Jamestown, angry about Berkeley’s slow response to attacks upon them by local Indian tribes; most of Jamestown burns, but the rebellion is quickly crushed. The Virginia legislature has to move its meetings to Governor Berkeley’s plantation

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

1749 – Jean Baptiste Delambre born, French mathematician, astronomer and author of books on the history of astronomy; Director of the Paris Observatory (1804-1822)

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 – English chocolatier who, with his brother Richard, built their father’s small chocolate business into a major chocolate manufacturer; as Quakers, they were concerned with the quality of life of their employees and provided an alternative to grimy city life. They acquired several acres of land, and moved the factory to a new country location, where they built a factory town, which was not exclusive to the employees of the factory. This village became known as Bournville after the nearby river and French word for “town.” The houses were never privately owned, but the costs stayed low and affordable. Bournville was a marked change from the poor living conditions of the urban environment. Here, families had houses with yards, gardens, and fresh air. 

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

1868 – La Gloriosa, the Glorious Revolution, begins in Spain. Queen Isabella II will be deposed because her vacillation between the liberal and conservative sides, palace intrigues, and favoritism, united all the political factions – the liberals, the conservatives, the moderates, and the progressives – against her

1878 – Charles Mauguin born, French mineralogist and crystallographer; pioneer in the study of silicate minerals

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

1881 – President James A. Garfield dies, after two months of suffering from gunshot wounds inflicted by an assassin

1883 – Mabel Vernon born, American Quaker pacifist and national leader in the U.S. suffragist movement; a principal member of the Congressional Union for Women Suffrage, with major figures like Inez Milholland and Alice Paul, she helped organize the 1913 Woman Suffrage Parade and the Silent Sentinels, a daily picket of Woodrow Wilson in front of the White House

1887 – Lovie Austin born, American bandleader, pianist, and composer-arranger

1889 – Sarah Louise Delany born, African American civil rights pioneer; the first black NY public schools teacher of high-school-level domestic science; she and her sister are the subjects of the oral history, Having Our Say, by journalist Amy Hill Hearth

1893 – All New Zealand women over age 21, including the Māori, are granted the right to vote by Royal Assent of the governor to the Electoral Act of 1893, the first independent country in modern times to enfranchise women. However, women were not allowed to run for office until 1920

1894 – Rachel Field born, American novelist, poet and children’s author; best known for Hitty, Her First Hundred Years, winner of the 1930 Newbery Award, and also named to the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, for books considered worthy of placement “on the same shelf” as Carroll’s Alice; Time Out of Mind won an inaugural National Book Award in 1935, for Most Distinguished Novel

1903 – King Leopold II of Belgium denies accusations of brutality in the Congo Free State, and warns foreign powers not to interfere in the running of his private country, which he controlled and exploited from 1865 to 1909. The Congo was Leopold’s “private project” to strip all the area’s rubber and ivory for the sole benefit of himself, while pretending to be a benevolent philanthropist bringing Christianity and ‘civilization’ to the heathens. In truth he was using his merciless personal army to enslave, starve, maim and kill millions of Africans

1909 – Ferdinand Porsche, Austrian engineer, automotive designer, and automaker

1911 – William Golding born, author; notable for his classic novel Lord of the Flies; winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in Literature

1915 – Elizabeth Stern born in Canada, American pathologist; noted for work tracking cell progression from normal to cancerous

1917 – Amalia Hernández Navarro born, Mexican ballet choreographer; founder of the world-renowned Ballet Folklórico de México

1918 – Pablita Velarde born Tse Tsan (Tewa for ‘Golden Dawn’), American Santa Clara Pueblo ‘flat style’ painter; at age fourteen, she was one of the first female artists accepted to Dorothy Dunn’s Santa Fe Studio Art School. Velarde learned to prepare paints from natural pigments for her later work, which she called ‘earth paintings.’ She was commissioned in 1939 by the U.S. National Park Service, under a grant from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), to depict scenes from Pueblo life for the Bandalier National Monument. In 1953, she was the first woman recipient of the Grand Purchase Award at the Philbrook Museum’s annual Exhibition of Contemporary Indian Painting, and in 1954, Velarde was among the twelve Native American artists and craftsmen honored by the government of France with the Palmes Académiques, the first foreign honors ever paid to Native American artists. She published Old Father the Story Teller, featuring six Tewa tribal stories, in 1960. Honored as a Santa Fe Living Treasure in 1988, and by the National Women’s Caucus for Art with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990

Deer Dancer – Pablita Velarde

1922 – Damon Knight born, American science fiction writer and editor; his short story “To Serve Man” was adapted as a classic episode of television’s The Twilight Zone

1930 – Bettye Lane born, American photojournalist who covered the American feminist movement, donating over 1700 images and her collection of ephemera, all documenting the women’s movement from the 196os to the 1980s, to the Schlesinger Library; some of her work is also preserved at the Library of Congress and the NY Public Library

Top: Left – Women electricians, 1981 — Right – Bella Abzug’s 1977 NY mayoral campaign
Bottom: 1970 Women’s Equality demonstration — photographs by Bettye Lane

1932 – Stefanie Zweig born, German Jewish writer and journalist; best known for her novel Nirgendwo in Afrika (Nowhere in Africa), a bestseller in Germany, based on her early life in Kenya, where her family had fled to escape persecution by the Nazis

1934 – Over two years after the kidnapping and murder of Charles and Anne Lindburgh’s 20-month-old son, Bruno Hauptmann is arrested in New York

1936 – Nelson Eddy and Jeannette MacDonald record “Indian Love Call”

1940 – Zandra Rhodes born, English fashion designer, noted for her 1977 collection, a take on punk which she called Conceptual Chic, featuring beaded safety pins and dresses with holes; founded the Fashion and Textile Museum, which opened in London in 2003

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

1945 – Kate Adie born, English BBC television and radio journalist; as chief news correspondent for BBC News (1980-2003), she frequently covered war zones and terrorist attacks; since 2003, presents From Our Own Correspondent on BBC Radio

1946 – Winston Churchill, speaking at the University of Zurich in Switzerland, calls for a Council of Europe, which is founded in 1949 by the Treaty of London

1947 – Tanith Lee born, prolific British scifi, horror and fantasy author of over 90 novels and 300 short stories; first woman to win the British Fantasy Award for Best Novel for Death’s Master in 1979, which is part of her Flat-Earth Cycle, won several World Fantasy Awards for Best Short Story, and 2009 World Horror Grand Master Award

1950 – Joan Lunden born, American television news correspondent and co-host of ABC’s Good Morning America (1980-1997)

1952 – The U.S. bans Charlie Chaplin from re-entering the country

1957 – The U.S. conducts its first underground nuclear test in Nevada

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

1965 – Sunita Williams born, U.S. astronaut and Naval officer; assigned to the International Space Station as a member of Expeditions 14 and 15, flight engineer on Expedition 32, and commander of  Expedition 33

1966 – Soledad O’Brien born, American broadcast journalist and executive producer; anchor for the syndicated weekly program Matter of Fact with Soledad O’Brien; founder and chair of Starfish Media Group since 2013

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

1970 – The Mary Tyler Moore Show debuts on CBS

1975 – Eric Clapton receives a gold record for “I Shot the Sheriff”

1980 – The South African government hands over Mafeking to the Republic of Bophuthatswana, three years after it gained independence. The spelling of the town’s name was changed from the British ‘Mafeking’ to the Tswana ‘Mafikeng’ (‘place of stones’). Mafikeng becomes the seat of the Bophuthatswana government until the new capital in Mmabatho is ready. The republic lasts until 1994, when it is reintegrated into South Africa, as the new constitution takes effect, and South Africa’s first non-racial democratic elections are held

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

1985 – Tipper Gore and other political wives form the Parents Music Resource Center as Frank Zappa and other musicians testify at U.S. Congressional hearings on obscenity in rock music

1985 – In the early morning hours, a violent earthquake, 8.0 on the Richter Scale,  collapses buildings and kills at least 5,000 people in the Greater Mexico City area. The epicenter is 220 miles (350 kilometres) away, off the western coast of Mexico. However, the capital was built on an ancient lake bed, which becomes the consistency of pudding during the impact of the shaking. Rescue efforts are complicated by the collapse of the building of the Secretaría de Comunicaciones y Transportes (Ministry of Communication and Transportation), severely hampering communication with the rest of the country and the world. Much of the downtown area is destroyed, a major television station is hit by its own ten-ton antenna, and the tower of the Hospital Juárez collapses unto lower sections of the complex. Heavy machinery cannot get through to the hospital for five days, but most of the newborn babies in the hospital’s nursery are saved, even though they aren’t reached by rescuers until seven days later. The “Miracle Babies” become a rare positive story to come out of the disaster. Almost six million people are suddenly without potable water, 70% of the population is without telephone service, and 40% without electricity. 1,687 schools are damaged, and almost a third of the Metro stations remain closed for weeks afterwards because of surface debris and ongoing search-and-rescue efforts

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

2001 – U.S. combat aircraft are sent to the Persian Gulf in response to the 9-11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the NY’s World Trade Center

2002 – George W. Bush asks Congress for authority to use military force if necessary to disarm and overthrow Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein if he doesn’t abandon weapons of mass destruction

2004 – Hu Jintao becomes the undisputed leader of China

2008 – The Bush administration asks Congress for $700 billion to buy mortgage-related assets from U.S. financial institutions to stave off financial catastrophe

2010 – A bronze bust of Frank Zappa is dedicated outside an east Baltimore MD library

2014 –Pakistani protesters clash with police in Islamabad, calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. All schools in the capital are closed because of the unrest and outbreaks of violence. Sharif, a wealthy businessman, Leader of the Opposition to the government of Benazir Bhutto from 1993 to 1996, has been Prime Minister of Pakistan three times, 1990 to 1993, 1997 to 1999, and 2013 until 2017, when he will be removed from office, and disqualified from holding any public office, by the Supreme Court of Pakistan. Links between his family’s businesses and eight offshore oil companies involving money laundering and corruption are revealed among the ‘Panama Papers’ –millions of secret documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, which the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists will make public in 2016

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