September 23rd is

Celebrate Bisexuality Day *

Checkers/Dogs in Politics Day *

Great American Pot Pie Day

Restless Legs Awareness Day *

International Day of Sign Languages * new!

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MORE! Baroness Orczy, Julio Iglesias and Floella Benjamin, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Judaism – Sukkot begins at sundown, variously called the Feast of the Ingathering,  the Feast of Tabernacles, and the Feast of Booths; it is one of three pilgrimage festivals, which celebrates the fall harvest, but also commemorates the Exodus from Egypt to the Promised Land. The sukkah is built beforehand as a temporary walled structure covered with plant leaves, a reminder of the shelters used during the Exodus

Shinto – Shūbun no Hi – Autumnal Equinox Day

Bhutan – Thrue Bab
(Blessed Rainy Day)

India – Haryana:  Haryana Veer Evm
Shaheedi Diwas (Martyrs’ Day)

Japan – Autumnal Equinox Celebration

Maldives – Presidential Election Day

Micronesia – Chuuk Liberation Day

Puerto Rico – Grito de Lares *
(revolt against Spanish rule)

Saudi Arabia – Al-Yaom Al-Watany
(National Day)

South Korea – Chusok
(Harvest Moon Festival)

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On This Day in HISTORY

63 BC – Augustus born as Gaius Octavius Thurinus, considered the first Roman Emperor (reigned 27 BC – AD 14)

1122 – The Concorat of Worms: agreement between Pope Calixtus II and Holy Roman Emperor Henry V concerning the power struggle between the Papacy and the Holy Roman Emperors over the investing of bishops; Henry renounced the right of sovereigns to invest bishops with sacred authority, and guaranteed election by the canons of cathedral or abbey, setting up the distinction that bishops would be endowed by Kings with secular authority (“by the lance”), and by the Church with sacred authority (“by ring and staff”)

1215 – Kublai Khan born, Great Khan of the Mongol Empire (1260-1294) and founding Emperor of the Yuan dynasty in China (1271-1294)

1642 – The first commencement at Harvard College, in Cambridge MA

1642 – Giovanni Maria Bononcini born, Italian composer, father of composers Giovanni Bononcini and Antonio Maria Bononcini

1740 – Empress Go-Sakuramachi born, the last of eight women to rule Japan as Empress regnant (1762-1771) according to the traditional order of succession

1779 – American commander John Paul Jones, aboard the warship Bon Homme, says “I have not yet begun to fight!”

1780 – John Andre, a British spy, is captured with papers revealing that Benedict Arnold was going to surrender West Point

1800 – William H. McGuffey born, author of the McGuffey Readers, which sold 122 million copies between 1836 and 1960

William H. McGuffey – Eclectic First Reader – Lesson I

1806 – The Corps of Discovery, the Lewis and Clark expedition, reach St. Louis on their return trip from exploring the Pacific Northwest

1823 – Sara Jane Clarke Lippincott born, better known as by her pen-name Grace Greenwood; American author, poet, journalist and advocate for abolition and women’s rights; first woman reporter on the payroll of the New York Times; one of the first women in the Congressional press galleries

1838 – Victoria Claflin Woodhull born; first woman candidate to run for U.S. president in 1872, three years after Wyoming gave women the vote, but 48 years before the 19^th Amendment finally made it a constitutional right for women

1838 – Helen Almira Shafer born, professor of mathematics and president of Wellesley College (1887-1894)

1846 – Astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle, in collaboration with Urbain Le Verrier and John Couch Adams, discovers the planet Neptune

1853 – Princess Marie Elisabeth of Saxe-Meiningen, noted as a musician and composer; one of her best-known works is Romanze in F Major for clarinet and piano; one of her music teachers was Johannes Brahms

1861 – Robert Bosch born, German industrialist, engineer and inventor of the first commercially viable high-voltage spark plug

1863 – Mary Church Terrell born, African American author, teacher and activist; first black woman appointed to Washington DC’s school board; founding member of the NAACP; first president of the National Association of  Colored Women

1865 – Suzanne Valadon born, French painter and artists’ model; the first woman painter admitted to the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts, in 1894. Her large oils exhibited at the Salon de la Nationale that year are among the earliest examples of a woman artist using the male as an object of desire. The first person to buy drawings from her was Edgar Degas, who introduced her to other collectors. Also notable for her studies of the female nude, portraits of women and landscapes

Self-Portrait, circa 1900, by Suzanne Valadon

1865 – Emma Orczy born in Hungary, Baroness Orczy, English novelist and painter, author of The Scarlet Pimpernel

1868 – Grito de Lares * (“Cry of Lares”), Puerto Rican uprising against Spanish rule

1889 – Walter Lippmann born, American newspaper commentator and author

1899 – Louise Nevelson born, American sculptor and painter, known for monumental monochromatic wall pieces and outdoor sculptures

1905 – Karlstad Treaty: Norway and Sweden dissolve the union between them

1907 – Karl-Acel Ekborn born, Swedish neurologist who was the first to investigate Restless Legs * Syndrome

1907 – Anne Desclos born, French journalist and author, used pen-names Dominique Aury and Pauline Réage; author of Histoire d’O (Story of O)

1908 – The University of Alberta is founded in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada

1909 – French author Gaston Leroux’s novel, Le Fantôme de l’Opéra (The Phantom of the Opera), is first published, serialized in Le Gaulois, a daily newspaper

1911 – First official U.S. Post Office airmail delivery is made by pilot Earle Ovington

1913 – French aviator Roland Garros becomes the first to fly across the Mediterranean (from France to Tunisia)

1917 – Asima Chatterjee, Indian organist chemist; first woman to receive a Doctorate of Science from an Indian university

1926 – John Coltrane born, American jazz saxophonist and composer

1930 – Johannes Ostermeier patents flashbulbs

1930 – Ray Charles born, American singer-songwriter and pianist

1932 – The Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd is renamed the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

1942 – Sila María Calderón born, Puerto Rican Popular Democratic Party politician and public servant; first and to date only woman elected as Governor of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico (2001-2005); Secretary of State (1986-1988?), Chief of Staff (1985), and Mayor of San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico (1996-2000). She earned a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Puerto Rico in 1972

1943 – Julio Iglesias born, Spanish singer-songwriter

1946 – Genista McIntosh born, Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall; British arts consultant, theatre executive and Labour politician. After working in various positions at the Royal Shakespeare Company (1972-1990), she became Executive Director of the Royal National Theatre(1990-1996), then spent 5 months as Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House (resigned due to ill health), and returned to the Royal National Theatre for 1997-2002. Made a Life Peer in 1999; gave maiden speech in the House of Lords in November 1999

1946 – Anne Wheeler born, Canadian director, producer and screenwriter; she made her first film for the Film Board of Canada, 1981’s A War Story; 4-time nominee for the Genie Award for Best Achievement in Direction for her films Loyalties, Cowboys Don’t Cry, Bye Bye Blues and Suddenly Naked. Her television miniseries, The Sleep Room, won Gemini awards for best television film and best direction. Wheeler was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1995

1949 – Floella Benjamin born in Trinidad, Baroness Benjamin of Beckenham; her father emigrated to the UK, then brought his children over in 1960 when she was 11 years old; Trinidadian-British TV presenter, actress, author, and founder and chief executive of Floella Benjamin Productions Ltd., which produced television programmes (1987-2014). As the chair of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), she was made an Officer of the British Empire in 2001. In 2008, she was appointed as Deputy Lieutenant of Greater London. In 2010 she was appointed a Liberal Democrat Life Peer

1949 – “The Boss” Bruce Springsteen is born (in the U.S.A.)

1952 – The “Checkers” Speech * made by Vice Presidential candidate Richard Nixon. When he was accused of misuse of monies and gifts in a fund established by his backers, he gave a televised speech defending himself and attacking his opponents, but saying regardless of what anyone thought, he intended to keep one gift: a black-and-white dog his children had named Checkers

1954 – Cherie Booth Blair born, British barrister and lecturer; became  Queen’s Counsel in 1995, and a Recorder (permanent part-time judge) in 1999 in the County Court and Crown Court. She specialises in employment, discrimination and public law; she is married to Tony Blair, a long-time leader in the Labour Party, and former Prime Minister (1997- 2007)

1957 – Nine black students withdraw from Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas because of the white mob outside

1959 – Karen Pierce born, British diplomat; Permanent Representative of the UK to the United Nations since March 2018; British Ambassador to Kabul (2015-2016); UK Representative to the UN in Geneva (2012-2015); Foreign and Commonwealth Director for South Asia and Afghanistan (2009-2012); Acting President of the UN Security Council (2007-2008); Deputy Representative of the UK to the UN (2006-2009)

1962 – Deborah Orr born, Scottish journalist and columnist, has worked for City Limits, New Statesman, The Guardian and The Independent; she is a vocal critic of the National Health Service treatment of homeless and disadvantaged people, but blames much of it on inadequate funding, and also calls the prison service “a series of riots waiting to happen”

1962 – First phase of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Philharmonic Hall opens (later renamed Avery Fisher Hall)

1964 – The Paris Opera’s new ceiling, painted by Marc Chagall, is unveiled

1964 – Katie Mitchell born, English theatre director; member of the theatre company Classics on a Shoestring, has mounted productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company, and staged operas for the Salzburg Festival and the Royal Opera House;  was an associate director of the Royal Court Theatre; appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2009

1967 – The Doors release “People Are Strange”

1967 – Hilary Andersson born, British journalist for the BBC since 1991; served as Lagos correspondent (1996-1999), Jerusalem Correspondent (199-2001) and Africa correspondent (2001-2005)

1972 – Ferdinand Marcos issues proclamation placing the Philippines under martial law while he re-writes the constitution, silences the press, and ruthlessly uses violence and suppression against political opposition

1980 – Bob Marley plays his last concert in Pittsburgh PA

1990 – Iraq threatens to destroy Middle East oil fields and attack Israel if other nations try to force it to leave Kuwait

1993 – The South African Parliament votes for a new interim constitution which gives black South Africans the right to vote 

1999 – Celebrate Bisexuality Day * is started at the International Lesbian and Gay Association conference in Johannesburg South Africa, by U.S. activists from Maine, Florida and Texas

2008 – Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s $700 billion USD bailout of the financial industry drew a lot of fire, but still passed. Democrats wanted the bailout to include limits on its use for executive pay, which the Bush administration opposed, and questions were raised about the legality of the authority it granted to the Treasury Secretary, “non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.” Paulson was the former head of Goldman Sachs. Economists estimated the bailout cost every American about $2,300.00. Less than a year later, Bear Stearns, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley paid a record $39 billion USD in bonuses to their executives, even after their stockholders had collectively lost $74 billion USD in stock declines. When Congress forced a one-time audit of the Federal Reserve in November 2011, the audit uncovered an additional $7 trillion USD in loans between 2008 and 2011 to the many of same financial institutions, with no limits on how they used the money. Six of the biggest banks used the loans to merge: Chase with Bear Stearns, Wells Fargo with Wachovia, and Bank of America with Merrill Lynch. This allowed the 12 largest U.S. banks to control 70% of all bank assets, making them even more “too big to fail” in the next crisis

2017 – The International Day of Sign Languages is approved by the UN General Assembly in a resolution proposed by the Permanent Mission of Antigua and Barbuda as requested by the World Federation of the Deaf (WFD), and inaugurated in 2018

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