Daily Calendar for Thursday, November 14, 2024
Question of the Day
Where did the phrase “rain check” originate?
This phrase originally referred to a voucher given to spectators at a baseball game that was rained out. The “rain check” allowed them to watch another game for free. Our sources indicate that the term came into being around 1884 and gradually came to refer to vouchers for other sports and eventually to vouchers you get at, say, the drugstore, when it runs out of sale-priced toothpaste.
Advice of the Day
Experience teaches you to recognize a mistake when you’ve made it again.
Home Hint of the Day
You can repair large cracks and holes in plaster by stuffing wadded newspaper in them, then applying drywall joint compound over the surface.
Word of the Day
Stinkpot
An earthen jar charged with powder, grenades, and other materials of an offensive and suffocating smell, — sometimes used in boarding an enemy’s vessel.
Puzzle of the Day
Why has the shoemaker wonderful powers of endurance?
Because he holds on to the last.
Born
- Robert Fulton (inventor) –
- Claude Monet (artist) –
- Frederick Jackson Turner (historian) –
- Sonia Delaunay (artist) –
- Mamie Doud Eisenhower (U.S. First Lady) –
- Astrid Lindgren (author) –
- Sherwood Schwartz (writer & producer) –
- Veronica Lake (actress) –
- Brian Keith (actor) –
- Edward White (astronaut) –
- King Charles III of England –
- Condoleezza Rice (U.S. Secretary of State) –
- Willie Hernandez (baseball player) –
- Curt Schilling (baseball player) –
- Josh Duhamel (actor) –
- Chip Gaines (home improvement expert) –
Died
- Booker T. Washington (educator & activist) –
- Eddie Bracken (actor) –
Events
- First Western theatrical production in North America, Le Theatre de Neptune, performed –
- Louis Timothee became the first salaried librarian in the U.S.”“ –
- Moby Dick, by Herman Melville, was first published in the U.S. –
- Journalist Nellie Bly left N.Y.C. for tour around the world in 72 days –
- Eugene Ely piloted the first airplane take-off from a ship –
- Yale University announces that it will begin admitting women as undergraduate students in 1969 –
- Apollo 12 spacecraft successfully launched from Cape Kennedy –
- Princess Anne married Captain Mark Phillips at Westminster Abbey –
- Second successful landing of space shuttle Columbia –
- Jean Drapeau became mayor of Montreal for 8th time –
- First cabooseless Canadian Pacific train left Winnipeg, Manitoba, bound for Thunder Bay, Ontario –
Weather
- Violent, easterly gales in New York City flooded cellars and spoiled wharves –
- 36 seconds into its flight to the Moon, Apollo 12 was struck by lightning, and again 20 seconds later, knocking out its electronic navigation system, and nearly forcing the mission to be “scrubbed” –