November 22nd is

Cranberry Relish Day

Humane Society Day *

Start Your Own Country Day *

National Stop the Violence Day *

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MORE! Clara Lemlich, Terry Gilliam and Denise Epoté, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Albania – Day of the Albanian Alphabet

Azerbaijan – Day of Justice

British Virgin Islands – Arbour Day

Canada – Vaughan: WinterFest

Costa Rica – Teachers Day

Czechia – Prague: Imagination Festival

France – Nancy: St. Nicolas Festival & Market

Ghana – Accra: Ghana Architecture
and Design Festival

Italy – Asti: Bagna Cauda Day  (food festival)

South Korea – Seoul: Yongsan
International School Fall Book Fair

Lebanon – Independence Day

Macau – Macau Food Festival

New Zealand – Greymouth:
Loudmouth Performing Arts Festival

Philippines – Binangonan:
Higantes Festival (giant puppets)

Sierra Leone – Makeni: Sustainable
Agriculture Food Security Festival

St. Lucia –St. Cecilia Feast of Musicians

Uganda – Bweyale:
Mizizi Sounds of the Nike Festival

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On This Day in HISTORY

845 – Franco-Breton Wars: Battle of Ballon – Nominoe, first Duke of Brittany, defeats West Francia King Charles the Bald, in a dispute over borders and Charles’ attempts to impose Frankish authority over Brittany

1307 – Pope Clement V issues the papal bull Pastoralis Praeeminentiae which instructed all Christian monarchs in Europe to arrest all Knights Templar and seize their properties on behalf of the church. Clement was forced to support the campaign against the Templars by Philip IV of France, who owed them a great deal of money and initiated the first arrests of Templars in October 1307

1515 – Mary of Guise born, a noblewoman of the House of Guise, who became Queen consort of Scotland in 1540 when she married James V of Scotland. She ruled Scotland as regent (1554-1560) during the minority of her daughter, Mary, Queen of Scots. The regency became increasingly difficult to maintain for Mary of Guise, a Catholic, as the Protestant Scottish ‘Lords of the Congregation,” and Scottish Reformation leader John Knox, gained power. They were opposed the betrothal of her daughter to the Dauphin of France. Mary of Guise died in 1560, at age 44, from dropsy, an accumulation of excessive fluids in the body

Mary of Guise – attributed to Corneille de Lyon

1532 – Anne of Denmark born, Danish princess of the House of Oldenburg, who married Augustus of Saxony in 1548, and became Electress of Saxony when he succeeded his brother in 1553. She gave birth to 15 children, but only four of them reached adulthood. She was notable for her knowledge of plants and her skill in the preparation of herbal remedies, and had her own large laboratory and library. Augustus entrusted her with the management of all of his estates, and she contributed to Saxony agriculture by introducing new crops, and new species of livestock. She was also a major influence on the introduction of orthodox Lutheranism to Saxony.  Anne died in 1585 at age 52, after a long period of declining health

1574 – Spanish sailor Juan Fernández finds a group of small islands off the coast of Chile, which are now collectively called Archipiélago Juan Fernández. The islands were home to marooned sailor Alexander Selkirk for more than four years (1704-08), which probably inspired Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe

1602 – Elisabeth of France born, daughter of Henry IV of France and Marie de’ Medici. She became Queen consort of Spain and Portugal as the first wife of King Philip IV of Spain. At first, the machinations of the Count-Duke of Olivares, who had much influence over her husband, kept her from being involved in state affairs. After the fall from favor of Olivares (which she was reputed to have engineered in a “women’s conspiracy” with other ladies of the court), she became one of the king’s most trusted advisers, and served as Regent (1640-1642 and 1643-1644) during the Catalan Revolt. She endured 11 pregnancies, but suffered three miscarriages, and only two of her children survived to adulthood. She died in 1644 at the age of 41, after a miscarriage

Elisabeth of France, painted by Rodrigo de Villandrando

1699 – Treaty of Preobrazhenskoye signed by Denmark, Russia, Saxony and Poland calling for the partitioning of the Swedish Empire, which launched the Great Northern War, ultimately won by the anti-Swedish alliance

1710 – German Composer Wilhelm Friedemann Bach born, oldest son of J.S. Bach

1718 – Off North Carolina’s coast, British pirate ‘Blackbeard’ (Edward Teach) is killed during battle with a boarding party led by Royal Navy Lieutenant Robert Maynard

Blackbeard the pirate, with twists of smoking gunpowder added to his hair

1819 –Mary Ann Evans born, better known as George Eliot, British author

1869 – André Gide born, French novelist, essayist, and dramatist; Nobel Prize laureate

1861 – Queen Ranavalona III born Princess Razafindrahety, last sovereign of the Kingdom of Madagascar (1883-1897). Her reign was marked by ongoing resistance to the colonial designs of the French. She was in a political marriage with Rainilaiarivony, a member of the Hova caste elite, who served as Prime Minister. She strengthened trade and diplomatic relations with the U.S. and Great Britain, but French attacks on coastal port towns and their assault on Anatananarivo, the capital city, led to the capture of the royal palace in 1895, ending the sovereignty and political autonomy of the century-old kingdom. France’s newly installed colonial government promptly exiled Rainilaiarivony to Algiers. Ranavalona and her court were initially permitted to remain as symbolic figureheads, but the outbreak of a popular resistance movement – the menalamba rebellion – and discovery of anti-French political intrigues at court led the French to exile the queen to the island of Réunion in 1897. Rainilaiarivony died that same year and shortly thereafter Ranavalona was relocated to a villa in Algiers, along with several members of her family. The queen, her family and the servants accompanying her were provided an allowance and enjoyed a comfortable standard of living, but in spite of her repeated requests, she was never  allowed to return home to Madagascar. She died in 1917 at the age of 55, and was buried in Algiers, but 21 years later, her remains were disinterred and shipped to Madagascar, then placed within the tomb of Queen Rasoherina (reign: 1863-1868)

1869 – In Dumbarton, Scotland, the clipper sailing ship Cutty Sark is launched, one of the last ever built, and the only surviving one today

1880 – Lillian Russell, American actress-singer, makes her NYC vaudeville debut

1898 – Wiley Post born, American aviator, the first pilot to fly solo around the world, and also noted for high-altitude flying, helping to develop one of the first pressure suits, and discovering the jet stream. He and humorist Will Rogers were killed in an airplane crash on takeoff from a lagoon near Point Barrow in the Alaska Territory in 1935

1899 – The Marconi Wireless Company of America is incorporated in New Jersey

1899 – Hoagy Carmichael born, American composer, pianist and bandleader

1900 – Helena Pantaleoni born, Polish-American actress, humanitarian and co-founder of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF; grandmother of Téa Leoni

1901 – Joaquín Rodrigo born, Spanish pianist and composer

1906 – The SOS distress signal is adopted at the International Radio Telegraphic Convention in Berlin

1909 –  The “Uprising of the 20,000,” aka the New York Shirtwaist Strike, begins when Clara Lemlich, tired of hearing male speakers talk about the disadvantages to striking, takes the podium, moving that the shirtwaist workers strike. She receives a standing ovation and two days later thousands of workers walk off their jobs

1910 – Arthur F. Knight patents a steel shaft to replace wood shafts in golf clubs

1912 – Doris Duke born, American heiress, horticulturalist, advocate for wildlife conservation and historic building preservation; most of her over $1 billion fortune was put into a charitable Foundation which funds medical research, ecology, and prevention of cruelty to children and animals

1913 –Benjamin Britten born, British Composer

1913 – Cecilia Muñoz-Palma born, Filipino jurist, first woman appointed to the Supreme Court of the Philippines (1973-1978); after leaving the Supreme Court, she became a leading figure in the political opposition to Ferdinand Marcos; chair of the 1986 Constitutional Commission that drafted the 1987 Constitution

1919 –  Máire McAteer Drumm born, Northern Irish civil rights leader, orator, and a figure in the republican movement; vice president (1972-1976) of Sinn Féin, and a commander in Cumann na mBan (The Irishwomen’s Council, a paramilitary auxiliary of the Irish Volunteers); involved with the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association and helped Catholics forced from their homes by loyalist intimidation to find new housing; She was jailed twice for seditious speeches, and raids on her home by security forces became frequent. She was admitted to Belfast’s Mater Hospital in 1976 for an eye operation, and was shot to death in her hospital bed by the Ulster loyalist group Red Hand Commando, six days after her 57^th birthday

1927 – Carl J. Eliason patents the snowmobile

1928 – In Paris, the premier performance of Ravel’s Boléro to great acclaim

1935 – First trans-Pacific airmail flight begins in Alameda CA; the flying boat ‘China Clipper’ leaves for Manila, carrying over 110,000 pieces of mail

1940 – Terry Gilliam born in the U.S., British screenwriter, film director, animator, cartoonist and comedian; member of the Monty Python comedy troupe; his feature films include Time Bandits, Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, The Fisher King, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus; he is a naturalized British subject, formally renouncing his U.S. citizenship in 2006 

1943 – Billie Jean King born, U.S. tennis champion who won 39 Grand Slam titles

1943 – In Cairo, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek meet to discuss the defeat of Japan

1945 – Elaine Weyuker born, American computer scientist, engineer; elected to the National Academy of Science; received the Harlan D. Mills Award from IEEE Computer Society for leading research on rigorous software testing, and the Association for Computing Machinery’s 2010 Presidential Award for “her tireless efforts in the development and growth of the ACM Women’s Council”

1947 – Valerie Wilson Wesley born, African-American novelist and children’s book author; noted for the Tamara Hale mystery series

1954 – Humane Society * is founded by journalist Fred Myers and Helen Jones, Larry Andrews, and Marcia Glaser, to lobby for humane slaughter, regulation of the use of  animals in laboratory experimentation, and in later years, exposing dog trafficking, regulation of pet shops, and ending puppy mills

1954 – Denise Epoté born, Cameroonian journalist who heads the Africa management of the French pay television network, TV5 Monde; the first journalist in Cameroon to present the news in French on Cameroon Television; worked for Radio Cameroon (1981-1993), becoming the first woman to present the news on Radio Cameroon in 1985

1961 – The film of A Man for All Seasons opens in New York City

1963 – U.S. President John F. Kennedy is assassinated while riding in a motorcade with Texas Governor John B. Connally who is seriously wounded. Vice-President Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in as the 36th U.S. President

1965 – The musical Man of La Mancha opens on Broadway

1967 – The U.N. Security Council approves resolution 242 calling for Israel to withdraw from territories it captured in the Six Day War, and for adversaries to recognize Israel’s right to exist

1968 – The Beatles release The White Album

1968 – Sarah MacDonald born, Canadian conductor and organist, living in the UK since 1992; Fellow and Director of Music at Selwyn College, Cambridge, and Director of Ely Cathedral Girls’ Choir; the first woman to hold such a post at an Oxbridge Chapel

1969 – Marjane Satrapi born in Iran, Iranian-French graphic novelist, cartoonist,  illustrator, film director, and children’s book author; noted for her autobiographical graphic novels, first published in French, and her novel Poulet aux prunes (Chicken with Plums), which won the Fauve d’Or/Prix du meilleur (Best Album) from the Angoulême International Comics Festival

1970 – Operação Mar Verde/‘Operation Green Sea’ an amphibious attack on Guinea (former French colony) by Portugal fails to overthrow the government of Guinea; or capture the leader of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (Portuguese colony struggling for independence) or destroy its military assets; but does succeed in rescuing Portuguese POWs taken during the Guinea-Bissau War of Independence. Portugal is condemned by the U.N. Security Council for invading the nation of Guinea, and also called upon Portugal to respect the rights to self-determination and independence of Portuguese Guinea (Guinea-Bissau since 1973)

1972 – U.S. President Nixon lifts ban on American travel to Cuba, in place since 1963

1974 – The U.N. General Assembly gives the Palestine Liberation Organization observer status

1975 – Juan Carlos I proclaimed King of Spain when General Francisco Franco dies

1977 – Passenger service on the Concorde begins between NYC and Europe

1983 – Bundestag approves NATO deploying U.S. nuclear missiles in West Germany

1984 – Fred Rogers (Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood) presents one of his iconic sweaters to the Smithsonian Museum

1985 – 38,648 immigrants become U.S. citizens in largest swearing-in ceremony yet

1986 – Attorney General Meese’s office discovers a memo in Colonel Oliver North’s office that showed money was to be sent to the Contras from profits of weapons sales to Iran

1988 – Pink Floyd releases The Delicate Sound of Thunder

1989 – Lebanese President Rene Moawad is assassinated three weeks after taking office when a bomb explodes next to his motorcade in West Beirut

1990 – The longest-serving British Prime Minister in the 20^th century (1979-1990), Margaret Thatcher, signals the end of her leadership of the Conservative Party, then formally announces the end of her tenure as Prime Minister on November 28, 1990

1993 – Start Your Own Country Day * – I couldn’t find who came up with this, but wiki’s ‘How to Start Your Own Country’ page is very entertaining – from buying your own island to creating a virtual country in cyberspace, they cover all the basics –http://www.wikihow.com/Start-Your-Own-Country

map of Neverland

2004 – Tens of thousands of demonstrators jam downtown Kiev, denouncing Ukraine’s presidential runoff election as fraudulent and chanting the name of reform candidate Viktor Yushchenko

2005 – Angela Merkel elected as Germany’s first female chancellor

2012 – Ceasefire begins between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip after eight days of violence and 150 deaths

2013 – The discovery of Siats meekerorum is announced, a dinosaur skeleton over 30 feet long found in eastern Utah 

2017 – In the Netherlands, at The Hague, Bosnian Serb Ratko Mladic, the ‘Butcher of Bosnia,’ is convicted on ten charges, one of genocide (the Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 Bosniaks), five of crimes against humanity and four of violations of the law or customs of war during the Bosnian War, and sentenced to life in prison

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