This day in history: Earthquake and Port Royal

Pirate lover? Yeah, me too. Then you know all about this, but here's a bit anyway from The History Channel.

Earthquake destroys Jamaican pirate haven

On this day in 1692, a massive earthquake devastates the infamous town of Port Royal in Jamaica, killing thousands. The strong tremors, soil liquefaction and a tsunami brought on by the earthquake combined to destroy the entire town.

Time

I was going to post a brief bit on time, how there's never enough and how it seems to fly entirely too quickly for my liking. Or my sleep habits for that matter! But when I looked on Today in History, I saw that today in 2004 the National World War 2 Memorial opened.

Got me thinking about time and the passage of in a whole new way. How it'll be 70 years this December since the bombing of Pearl Harbor (72 this September since the official start of the war). How it took 59 years before there was even a monument devoted to those who served in that war. (I'm obviously not counting the years it took to build the beautiful monument.)

And how of the 16,112,566 individuals were members of the United States armed forces during the war, as of September 2010 approximately 1,981,000. [wiki article]

If you have the opportunity to visit, take the time to do so.

On April 29, 2004, the National World War II Memorial opens in Washington, D.C., to thousands of visitors, providing overdue recognition for the 16 million U.S. men and women who served in the war. The memorial is located on 7.4 acres on the former site of the Rainbow Pool at the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. The Capitol dome is seen to the east, and Arlington Cemetery is just across the Potomac River to the west.

The granite and bronze monument features fountains between arches symbolizing hostilities in Europe and the Far East. The arches are flanked by semicircles of pillars, one each for the states, territories and the District of Columbia. Beyond the pool is a curved wall of 4,000 gold stars, one for every 100 Americans killed in the war. An Announcement Stone proclaims that the memorial honors those "Americans who took up the struggle during the Second World War and made the sacrifices to perpetuate the gift our forefathers entrusted to us: A nation conceived in liberty and justice."

Though the federal government donated $16 million to the memorial fund, it took more than $164 million in private donations to get it built. Former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who was severely wounded in the war, and actor Tom Hanks were among its most vocal supporters. Only a fraction of the 16 million Americans who served in the war would ever see it. Four million World War II veterans were living at the time, with more than 1,100 dying every day, according to government records.

The memorial was inspired by Roger Durbin of Berkey, Ohio, who served under Gen. George S. Patton. At a fish fry near Toledo in February 1987, he asked U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur why there was no memorial on the Mall to honor World War II veterans. Kaptur, a Democrat from Ohio, soon introduced legislation to build one, starting a process that would stumble along through 17 years of legislative, legal and artistic entanglements. Durbin died of pancreatic cancer in 2000.

The monument was formally dedicated May 29, 2004, by U.S. President George W. Bush. Open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it received some 4.4 million visitors in 2005.

April Fool's Day

Because what else would I talk about other than the history April's Fool Day? This from History.com's This Day in History:

On this day in 1700, English pranksters begin popularizing the annual tradition of April Fools' Day by playing practical jokes on each other.

Although the day, also called All Fools' Day, has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures, its exact origins remain a mystery. Some historians speculate that April Fools' Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes. These included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as "poisson d'avril" (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.

Historians have also linked April Fools' Day to ancient festivals such as Hilaria, which was celebrated in Rome at the end of March and involved people dressing up in disguises. There's also speculation that April Fools' Day was tied to the vernal equinox, or first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, when Mother Nature fooled people with changing, unpredictable weather.

April Fools' Day spread throughout Britain during the 18th century. In Scotland, the tradition became a two-day event, starting with "hunting the gowk," in which people were sent on phony errands (gowk is a word for cuckoo bird, a symbol for fool) and followed by Tailie Day, which involved pranks played on people's derrieres, such as pinning fake tails or "kick me" signs on them.

In modern times, people have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools' Day hoaxes. Newspapers, radio and TV stations and Web sites have participated in the April 1 tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences. In 1957, the BBC reported that Swiss farmers were experiencing a record spaghetti crop and showed footage of people harvesting noodles from trees; numerous viewers were fooled. In 1985, Sports Illustrated tricked many of its readers when it ran a made-up article about a rookie pitcher named Sidd Finch who could throw a fastball over 168 miles per hour. In 1996, Taco Bell, the fast-food restaurant chain, duped people when it announced it had agreed to purchase Philadelphia's Liberty Bell and intended to rename it the Taco Liberty Bell. In 1998, after Burger King advertised a "Left-Handed Whopper," scores of clueless customers requested the fake sandwich.

In other news on April 1: Jane Austen declines royal writing advice (1816) and Marvin Gaye's father shoots and kills him (1984). I never knew and love his voice! General Hospital premiers (1963) and Hitler is sentenced to Landsberg jail (1924).

What do you know? Quizes

Don't ask how I found these, but if you're interested in testing yourself try them out. The faster the better!

History.com's Ultimate History Quiz
TLC.com's Citizenship Quiz

State Capital Quiz (I sucked at this!)

I have no idea what Lizard Point is, but their quiz site is nifty. Click the location, don't type in the box. WARNING: Some quizes are HARD!

Tuesday Comings and Goings

First day of February? I can't keep up with these quickly passing days.

Today in history:

1587 – The Colony of Roanoke Island is established by the landing of Sir Walter Raleigh. This Colony would become known as the "Lost Colony"
1790 – In New York City, the Supreme Court of the United States attempts to convene for the first time.

I like the attempts to convene...I can't find out why that is. Looks like it did convene on February 2, 1790.

1793 – French Revolutionary Wars: France declares war on the United Kingdom and the Netherlands.
1796 – The capital of Upper Canada is moved from Newark to York.
1884 – The first volume (A to Ant) of the Oxford English Dictionary is published.
1893 – Thomas A. Edison finishes construction of the first motion picture studio, the Black Maria in West Orange, New Jersey.
1942 – World War II: Josef Terboven, Reichskommissar of German-occupied Norway, appoints Vidkun Quisling the Minister President of the National Government.

Why is that last interesting? Every heard of a quisling? It's not really used anymore, but a quisling is a snitch: a person who betrays his or her own country by aiding an invading enemy, often serving later in a puppet government. I learned it ages ago by watching Errol Flynn's Edge of Darkness. I guess sometimes Hollywood really can teach you something, huh.

2003 – Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates during reentry into the Earth's atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

I remember watching this on TV because I had off for a snow day.

English Language and all its idiosyncrasies

I love the blog, The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotations. It's amusing to see what people put in quotes. And what running commentary people will make up for those unnecessary quotations.

I have my own copy (I think this one was published in the 1960s) of Strunk & White's Elements of Style. I hadn't read through it, it's not one of those read from cover to cover books. But now that I'm published, I am about half-way through it. Just a refresher course, can't hurt.

At the ungodly hour of 7am on Sunday mornings on History International they run a program called Adventures in English where the host (I don't know his name) takes us through the many evolutions of the English language and why there are more than one name for different things. Like jail and gaol and prison. Saxon, Celtic, and Norman. (I may have that mixed up but did try to check the origins before posting this blog.)

I just started the new book, Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language. It's a great book on the origin of words in the English language. Like fiery: makes no sense since fire is spelled, well, f-i-r-e. Apparently, it's a hold over from the 13th century when fire was spelled f-i-e-r.

I never considered myself SUCH a grammar person until I realized how often I gravitated toward these shows/books. OK, not such a...I am a stickler, and I do judge when you use poor grammar, but not SUCH A stickler...

Sex & politics

Sunday March 15 The History Channel is showing Beltway Unbuckled. I love sex scandals as I'm sure many of you do, come on, don't be shy. I know you do!

Sex has played a role throughout America's history. Did you know an
extramarital affair was one of the causes of the Civil War? Or that one of the
things that made George Washington so appealing as a presidential choice was his
sterility? This special takes a serious but highly entertaining look at the
fascinating ways the sex lives of our nation's leaders have impacted American
history and shaped the country we live in today.

Some of the stories uncovered: how J. Edgar Hoover used his secret sex
files to become one of the most powerful figures in Washington; although Woodrow
Wilson may have won World War I, his wife Edith may have caused World War II;
why FDR's dreams for the post World War II world were contained in the long lost
diary of one of the women who was with him when he died; and how JFK's fling
with an East German beauty nearly ended his administration.

Sounds great doesn't it! I know, I'm a nerd. What does it have to do with Ravenous' Power Plays, anthology very little but the theme is the same!

My story, Whispers, is in it:

Olivia Adair is a junior senator having an affair with the Department of Justice liason, Ryan Granger. Neither want to give up their careers, but aren't willing to give up each other, either. Leaving her senate office late one night, Ryan overhears an aide talking about the death of a senior senator. He investigates, but when Olivia is hurt in a car accident, he wonders if the aide is now after her. Will he give up his position to save her life or is already it too late?

POWER PLAYS is a collection of twelve stories that explore the timeless connection between sex and political power. As Henry Kissinger famously said, "power is the ultimate aphrodisiac", and the twelve authors contributing their hot stories to this anthology know that better than anyone. In POWER PLAYS, the intersection of sex and political power takes many forms-----including a threesome in Congressional chambers, a female President-elect who finds a boy-toy while traveling abroad, and a den of urban werewolves who fight to restore their rightful alpha male leader. These and many other erotic tales of sex and power make up this red-hot collection, which will capture your imagination and leave you thirsty for more.