The State of the Union Address is a speech the president of the United States of America gives every year, usually in January. The address is given to a joint session of the United States Congress. In the speech the president gives a budget message, an economic report of the nation and an outlining of what plans he will be proposing for that year.
The first State of the Union address was delivered by President George Washington on January 8, 1790, in New York City, the then-provisional capital of the United States. He addressed the first session of the newly convened 1st United States Congress at the Senate Chamber of Federal Hall. It was only 833 words long, making it the shortest State of the Union address in history.
George Washington's handwritten notes for the first State of the Union Address,
President Warren G Harding was the first president to have his State of the Union Address delivered over the radio waves on December 8, 1922; however, it was broadcast locally, not nationally, as would be the case in the following year with President Calvin Coolidge's address.
It was Franklin Roosevelt who dubbed the annual message the "State of the Union Address" in 1934. Before then, it was just known as the president's annual message. President Harry Truman's 1947 State of the Union was the first broadcast on television. President Lyndon Johnson's 1965 State of the Union Address was the first one given in the evening rather than the then-traditional midday time. The decision was made to deliver the speech in prime time so as to maximize the television audience.
Jimmy Carter's last State of the Union – which was a written message rather than a speech– weighed in at 33,667 words long. Bill Clinton gave the longest State of the Union address, both in words (his 1995 speech was 9,190 words – and nearly half of them were extemporized) and minutes (his 2000 speech was one hour, 28 minutes and 49 seconds long.)
State of the Union Address
George W. Bush's 2002 speech (famous for his "axis of evil" line) was the first livecast online. Source Usnews
The starling is a bird common in North Europe, North America and Asia. More than 100 species of starling are found in the Old World.
Thai starling Pixibay
DISTRIBUTION
Starlings are the world's most abundant wild bird species with a population of 1,000 million.
Native to North Europe and Asia, in the 1890s an eccentric pharmacist named Eugene Schifflin hatched a plan to introduce every bird mentioned in Shakespeare's plays to New York's Central Park. The 200 million or more starlings now in the USA are descendants of the 80 released by Schifflin.
They gather in vast numbers – the largest recorded flock of starlings, in Norfolk, England in 1958, was 3 million.
In 1979 starlings were in such large numbers in London that they stopped Big Ben by landing on the hands.
The collective noun for starlings is a murmuration. The name may come from the sound their wings make when a vast cloud of them sweeps through the skies.
Murmuration of starlings preparing to roost, in Scotland. By Walter Baxter
MOZART'S STARLING
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart once bought a starling, but when he brought it home he was astonished to hear it singing a fragment of his most recent piano concerto, which he hadn't yet published. The explanation was that the bird had picked it up on those few occasions when Mozart, an inveterate whistler, had popped into the shop.
Mozart grew very fond of his starling. When it died, he gave it a full funeral, with all the guests in solemn attire, and the composer recited a poem he had written specially for the occasion over its grave.
BEHAVIOR
European starlings abhor making eye contact with other creatures or being watched through binoculars and camera lenses.
The starling's call is a bright whistle, but it also mimics the sounds of other birds.
Strikingly gregarious in feeding, flight, and roosting, the starling often becomes a pest in large cities.
Starlings are believed to cause $800 million of damage to U.S. agriculture each year as they binge-feed in cattle troughs.
A flock of starlings brought down a passenger aircraft in 1960, killing 62 people, when hundreds of their bodies were sucked into its engine shortly after take-off from Boston — the worst ‘bird strike' in aviation history.
ANATOMY
The starling's black, speckled plumage is glossed with green and purple.
Common starling By Tim Felce (Airwolfhound)
Starlings may get their name from the star-like white spots that appear on their feathers in winter.
The shortest-bodied species is Kenrick's starling (Poeoptera kenricki), at 15 centimetres (6 in).
The largest starling is the Nias hill myna (Gracula robusta). This species can measure up to 36 cm (14 in) and, in domestication they can weigh up to 400 g (14 oz).
Starfish are star-shaped echinoderms with arms radiating from a central body. Typically they have five arms, but some species have more.
Pixiebay
There are about 1,500 living species of starfish to be found on the seabed in all the world's oceans. The sunflower seastar is the largest starfish and has an arm-span of 1 meter (3.3 ft). It has 16 to 24 arms with powerful suckers Starfish may shed their own arms in order to keep cool in extreme temperatures. Some starfish can regenerate their entire body from a single arm from just 1cm (0.4in) long. In some species of starfish, a large female can split in half, each half becoming male which changes back into female once they grow big enough. Starfish can see with compound eyes at the ends of their arms. The upper surface of the starfish may be smooth, granular or spiny, and is clad in overlapping plates. Many species are brightly colored in shades of red or orange, while others are blue, grey or brown.
Astropecten aranciacus starfish. By Rpillon
Starfish have tube feet operated by a hydraulic system and a mouth at the center of the lower surface. Starfish open up clams or oysters by using their tiny, suction-cupped tube feet. Most starfish are voracious predators, either swallowing their prey whole or turning their stomachs inside out to engulf it. A starfish does not have the capacity to plan its actions. If one arm detects an attractive odor, it becomes dominant and temporarily over-rides the other arms to initiate movement towards the prey.
A Pisaster ochraceus starfish consuming a mussel in central California. Wikipedia
The starfish is one of the only animals who can turn it's stomach inside-out. Starfish do not have blood. Instead they use seawater in their vascular system to circulate nutrients. Starfish have complex life cycles and can reproduce both sexually and asexually. Two million eggs a year are produced by the female starfish, but 99 per cent of them get eaten by other marine animals.
The Starbucks store at 1912 Pike Place. By Diego Delso
By 1986, the Starbucks company operated six stores in Seattle. In 1987, Baldwin, Siegl and Bowker sold the Starbucks chain to former manager Howard Schultz, who rebranded his Il Giornale coffee outlets as Starbucks and quickly began to expand. Later in 1987, Starbucks opened its first locations outside Seattle at Waterfront Station in Vancouver, and also in Chicago. At the time of its initial public offering (IPO) on the stock market in June 1992, Starbucks had 140 outlets.
The first Starbucks location outside North America opened in the Ginza area of Tokyo, Japan in 1996.
Starbucks entered the Australian market in 2000 with high hopes, but the company quickly realized that it had made a number of mistakes. First, Starbucks failed to understand the Australian coffee culture. Australians are known for being discerning coffee drinkers, and they were not impressed by Starbucks' sugary coffee drinks. Second, Starbucks overpriced its products. Australians are used to paying less for coffee, and they were not willing to pay a premium for Starbucks' coffee. Third, Starbucks expanded too quickly. By 2008, Starbucks was losing millions of dollars in Australia. The company closed 61 of its 87 stores, and it has been struggling to regain a foothold in the market ever since.
As of November 3, 2023, the Starbucks company operates 35,704 locations worldwide. Starbucks is now the largest coffeehouse company in the world, and it has a presence in over 80 countries.
FUN STARBUCKS FACTS
The company's headquarters is located in Seattle, Washington, where 3,501 people worked as of January 2015.
Starbucks Center in Seattle . Photographed by user Coolcaesar
There are over 87,000 different drink combinations at Starbucks. If you order a Starbucks Grande Coffee, you are drinking over 320 milligrams of caffeine. That is four times more than inside a Red-Bull. Starbucks uses round tables to make solo coffee drinkers feel less alone.
Starbucks
The first non-coffee product sold at Starbucks was the game Cranium. Starbucks pays more for employee health insurance than it pays for coffee. Starbucks employees are asked not to wear perfume or cologne so that customers can smell the coffee brewing. One in five of Starbucks customers visit the store at least 16 times a month. Every scene of the filmFight Club has a Starbucks coffee cup hidden in it somewhere.
The character in the Starbucks logois actually a twin tailed siren, a mythical creature that lured sailors in order to attack and devour them. Starbucks has a different logo for Saudi Arabia because the normal logo showed too much female flesh.
Pixiebay
The highest elevation Starbucks is in Breckenridge, Colorado at 9,600 feet. At the Starbucks located inside of the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia, customer names cannot be called out or written on cups due to security concerns.There are also no frequent-customer award cards. Mike Doughty wrote the majority of his "Busting Up a Starbucks" song after he saw a picture of a man kicking the window of a Starbucks location in Seattle, during the 1999 WTO Ministerial Conference protests. Even Taylor Swift's mom thought the "Got a long list of ex-lovers" lyric from "Blank Space" was "All the lonely Starbucks lovers." There are stealth Starbucks locations, which are operated by the coffee giant, but do not advertise the Starbucks brand like 15th Avenue E Coffee and Tea in Seattle or the second floor of Macy's in New York City. They serve as a "laboratory" to conduct market research on how customers react to new drinks.
The original Star Wars movie was a science fantasy film written and directed by American filmmaker George Lucas. He began writing a 13-page film treatment that later formed the basis of Star Wars on April 17, 1973.
Wikipedia
Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger) auditioned for the role of Han Solo and after he got back from the audition, he pushed his close friend Mark Hamill, who was sleeping on Englund's couch at the time, to audition for Luke Skywalker. In 1977, 20th Century Fox had so little faith in the "Star Wars" franchise that they gave away all of the movie licensing and merchandising rights to George Lucas in exchange for his $500,000 directorial fee.
THE MOVIES
The Star Wars movies are said to have been inspired by Akira Kurosawa's films Yojimbo and The Hidden Fortress. The franchise began with the release on May 25, 1977 of the film Star Wars (later subtitled Episode IV: A New Hope in 1981), which became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon.
Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher), and Han Solo (Harrison Ford)
If it weren't for the unexpected blockbuster status of Star Wars, production company 20th Century Fox likely would have gone bankrupt. Instead, at peak popularity, the franchise earned them $1.2 million a day. Marcia Lucas, George Lucas' then wife, was the reason for major changes to the original Star Wars film. Princess Leia's good luck kiss, Obi Wan's death and re-editing the trench run to increase tension were all her ideas. She won the Academy Award for editing the film while George did not for directing. Star Wars was followed by the successful sequels The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983); these three films constitute the original Star Wars trilogy. By the time filming on Return of the Jedi started in 1982, Star Wars was a gigantic pop culture phenomenon. To maintain secrecy, producers claimed to be shooting a horror movie called "Blue Harvest" and even had caps and T-shirts made for the crew. According to the documentary Empire of Dreams: The Story of the Star Wars Trilogy, Steven Spielberg was Lucas' first pick to direct Return of the Jedi. Spielberg declined because of his Directors Guild of America membership. (Lucas had left the guild over disagreements about "The Empire Strikes Back.") Lucas hired Welsh director Richard Marquand, who was non-union at the time. Return of the Jedi was once titled "Revenge of the Jedi." George Lucas changed the name because he thought a Jedi wouldn't seek revenge. Posters were distributed bearing the "Revenge" logo but were ultimately pulled. Return of the Jedi was the first film to use the THX sound-system standard in theaters. A prequel trilogy was released between 1999 and 2005 and a sequel trilogy began in 2015 with the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
On May 19, 1999 when Star Wars: The Phantom Menace was released into theaters, an estimated 2.2 million full time employees missed work in America to watch the movie. it cost the US an estimated $293 million dollars from lose of productivity.
THE CHARACTERS
The first character to speak in 1977's Star Wars is C3PO.
James Earl Jones recorded all of his Darth Vader lines for Star Wars in 2.5 hours. He was paid $7,500
The name of R2-D2 was taken from the parlance of sound men in the film industry. It means the second reel of the second dialogue track.
The name Jedi is said to have come from “Jidai Geki” (“period dramas”) which was the name given in Japan to films about samurai. The little green Jedi knight Yoda's name comes from the Sanskrit word 'yoddha' meaning warrior. Yoda's face (and particularly his eyes) are said to have been modelled after the appearance of Albert Einstein. In The Phantom Menace Yoda has three toes. But in three later films he has four. In early drafts of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Yoda was actually named "Buffy."
Yoda, as depicted in The Empire Strikes Back. (WP:NFCC#4)
Darth Vader’s name was partially inspired by one of George Lucas’ high school classmates, Gary Vader.
Darth Vader's breathing was recorded by putting a microphone inside a regulator on a scuba tank. Jabba's slithery noises when he moves were made by sound designer Ben Burtt running his hands through a cheese casserole. The growls and snarls of the rancor creature in Return of the Jedi were actually made by a dachshund. Bodyguards were hired to protect the Chewbacca actor from Bigfoot hunters while shooting in the Pacific Northwest. Carrie Fisher complained her Princess Leia outfits in the first two Star Wars films didn't show "she was a woman." That led to the famous gold bikini Leia wears as Jabba's prisoner in Return of the Jedi.
Carrie Fisher had never met James Earl Jones (the voice of Darth Vader) had never personally met until in 2014 when they both appeared in an episode of The Big Bang Theory. Anthony Daniels (as C-3PO, a humanoid protocol droid in the service of General Leia Organa) is the only actor to have appeared in all the episodic films in the Star Wars series.
FUN STAR WARS FACTS
During the scene in which Luke Skywalker gets out of his X-wing fighter after blowing up the Death Star, he accidentally calls Princess Leia 'Carrie' (her real first name). Alec Guinness agreed to play Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars only after his initial salary was doubled, and that he would receive 2.25% of all gross royalties paid to George Lucas, and never have to make a publicity appearance. Star Wars was released in the Navajo Language, the first motion picture to be translated into a Native Americanlanguage. Having "a bad feeling about this" is a popular phrase that's popped up in all the Star Wars films.
George Lucas was dissatisfied with the inconsistent and poor sound quality in movie theaters at the time. He co-founded THX (Tomlinson Holman eXperiment), a high-fidelity audio/video reproduction standard for movie theaters, in order to ensure that the audio in Return of the Jedi would be heard as it was intended. THX helped to set a new standard for movie theater sound quality and continues to be used in theaters today. Ackbar's famous line in Return of the Jedi "It's a trap!" was originally "It's a trick!" The line was changed in post-production after a negative test-screening. The word Ewok is never said in Return Of The Jedi. The design of the Millennium Falcon spacecraft was based on a hamburger.
George Lucas approved of Mel Brooks’ 1987 Star Wars parody Spaceballs and signed off on a fair use agreement. The only condition was that no Spaceballs merchandise would be made to compete with Star Wars merchandise. This is why there’s never been any Spaceballs figures, cereal, or flamethrower. George Lucas made the working title of Star Wars Episode II "Jar Jar's Great Adventure" to troll the cast and crew, even labeling the script as such in the original drafts. Multiple Star Wars lead actors have struggled with a habit of making their own sound effects for fight scenes. When, for instance, Ewan McGregor was cast as Obi-Wan Kenobi in The Phantom Menace, he found himself unable to stop mimicking the sounds of his lightsaber to the point where multiple takes needed to be re-shot. The world's first organised Star Wars Day was celebrated at a cinema in Toronto, Canada on May 4, 2011. The reason for choosing that particular date was the pun: "May the 4th be with you", in reference to the popular phrase in Star Wars: "May the Force be with you." May 4th has since been embraced by Lucasfilm as an annual celebration of Star Wars. The Star Wars theme was written purposely on the same key as the 20th Century Fox fanfare (that used to appear before the movie started) so that there will be a continuous feeling and a smooth entry to the film for the viewers.
Lin-Manuel Miranda, creator of Hamilton, once wrote an entire song in the Huttese language from Star Wars. It was the song that played in Maz's Kantina in The Force Awakens. In 2013, Star Wars was dubbed in Navajo, making it the first major film to be dubbed in a Native American language. Sources: IMDb, My San Antonio, Daily Express
Star Trek was created as a TV series in 1966 by Gene Roddenberry. He sold it as a western, but in space, and modeled it on Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, with each episode combining an adventure with a morality tale.
Title used for the first season Wikipedia
Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry first wrote for the series Highway Patrol under the pseudonym "Robert Wesley" as he was still in the LAPD at the time.
The original name for the starship in Star Trek was "Yorktown," not "Enterprise".
THE SHOWS
The first episode of Star Trek aired on September 8, 1966, was titled "The Man Trap." In the episode, the crew visit an outpost to conduct medical exams on the residents, only to be attacked by a shapeshifting alien creature seeking to extract salt from their bodies.
Many of the pipes seen in the starship on the original Star Trek series had the label "G.N.D.N." which stood for "Goes Nowhere, Does Nothin…"
The Star Trek Transporter (teleportation) was created due to save money and episode length on showing the ship land on the planet as the original plan.
In the first Star Trek series, stardates were bogus—the writers were told to pick any combination of four numbers plus a percentage point.
Because of TV censorship, actress Mariette Hartley was not allowed to show her belly button on Star Trek [episode #78 "All Our Yesterdays" in 1969] but later Gene Roddenberry got even when he gave Hartley "two" belly buttons in the 1973 sci-fi movie Genesis II.
The original Star Trek ran for only three series from 1966-69 before it was cancelled. In only became cult viewing when it was repeated after the 1969 moon landing.
After the first series was cancelled William Shantner, who played Captain James Kirk, was out of work and had to live in a camper van.
"Spock's Brain" was the first episode of the third season.
Reruns and syndication from 1969 were a huge success creating a cult following which led to Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987.
The canonical reason for most of the alien races to be humanoid in Star Trek is an ancient humanoid species seeding the oceans of many worlds with DNA codes 4.5 billion years before the start of the series, directing the evolution of life towards a physical pattern similar to their own.
The Star Trek theme has lyrics. Gene Rodenberry exercised an option to write lyrics for composer Alexander Courage's instrumental theme because he wanted half of the royalties. The lyrics were never used on the TV series.
THE CHARACTERS
Spock was originally supposed to be a Martian, but Gene Roddenberry changed his home to the fictional Vulcan because he feared humans will already land on Mars during the show‘s runtime and make it look outdated.
Vulcan was a fictional planet that Roddenberry created specifically for Spock. He wanted to create a planet that was similar to Earth in many ways, but also had some key differences. For example, Vulcans are logical and rational, while humans are often emotional and irrational. This contrast between Vulcans and humans was one of the things that made Star Trek so popular.
Initially, NBC asked Gene Roddenberry to get rid of the "guy with the pointy ears" because they were worried about his "satanic" appearance. Luckily, Roddenberry refused to cut Spock from the show.
Spock was originally going to have red skin, but the idea was scrapped because the makeup looked like blackface on a monochrome television.
Spock's famous Vulcan salute, ‘Live long and prosper', was inspired by a priestly blessing Leonard Nimroy saw as a child, when he attended a synagogue service with his father.
Leonard Nimoy released multiple albums, including a two sided record titled Two Sides of Leonard Nimoy. One side featured him singing songs as Spock; the other side featured songs related to his personal interests.
Spock, as played by Leonard Nimoy, as seen in the pilots of Star Trek
Contrary to common belief, Captain Kirk (William Shatner) never uttered "Beam me up, Scotty" in Star Trek.
Gene Roddenberry never gave Captain Kirk a birthplace more specific than the state of Iowa. In 1985, when trying to find a theme for its annual festival, the town of Riverside voted to proclaim itself the future birthplace of the Starfleet officer. Roddenberry gave the town his blessing.
Lieutenant Uhura's name means “freedom” in Swahili. When Nichelle Nichols read for the part of a communications officer in Star Trek, she had a copy of Robert Ruark's Uhuru with her. When Gene Roddenberry heard what the word meant, he changed the character's name to Uhura.
James "Scotty" Doohan was badly wounded during World War II losing fingers on one hand. To hide this Star Trek used a hand double but his injury can be seen when he carries Tribbles in the famous episode.
Because the character of Montgomery Scott in Star Trek inspired so many students to pursue careers in engineering, the Milwaukee School of Engineering presented James Doohan with an honorary degree in engineering.
Sir Patrick Stewart (Captain Jean-Luc Picard) is an anagram of “I scrap Star Trek wit”.
Michael Dorn (Worf) has appeared more times as a regular cast member than any other Star Trekactor in the franchise's history, spanning 5 films and 272 television episodes.
The Klingons were created by screenwriter Gene L. Coon, and first appeared in the 1967 Star Trek episode "Errand of Mercy". They were named after Lieutenant Wilbur Clingan, who served with Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry in the Los AngelesPolice Department.
Majel Barrett was the voice of most onboard computer interfaces throughout the Star Trek. series. Barrett died on December 18, 2008, aged 76, as a result of leukemia. She recorded an entire library of phonetic sounds before her passing which allowed her voice to be used as the computer for future generations.
In 1993, Stephen Hawking became the only person to portray himself on Star Trek when he appeared in "Descent," the 26th episode of the sixth season of The Next Generation, He features in a scene playing poker with Newton, Einstein and Data.
THE MOVIES
Star Trek: The Motion Picture was the first movie set in the Star Trek universe. It was made in 1979 by Paramount Pictures.
Star Trek: The Motion Picture's final production cost was approximately $46 million. It earned $139 million at the worldwide box office, falling short of studio expectations, but enough for Paramount to propose a less expensive sequel.
"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" is not a quote from some ancient philosopher or legal code. It is a quote from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
Kim Cattrall, while filming Star Trek IV: The Undiscovered Country, posed for photos on the Enterprise bridge wearing nothing but Vulcan ears. Fearing harm to the franchise, Leonard Nimoy had the pictures destroyed.
FUN STAR TREK FACTS
The majority of Star Trek takes place within the Milky Waygalaxy, however there are some episodes and movies that feature characters traveling to other galaxies.
Enthusiastic Star Trek fans are usually called Trekkies. The word was first used by science fiction editor Arthur W. Saha when he saw people wearing fake Vulcan ears at a convention in 1967.
By pop culture geek - Flickr: Star Trek Federation Officers,
English comic actor and writer Stephen Fry's dissertation in his final year at Cambridge University was titled "Apollonian And Dionysian Themes In The Plots Of Star Trek." He once said: “Most of human history and art can be expressed in Star Trek plots.”
There is no word for “hello” in Klingon. The nearest is nuqneH, meaning “What do you want?”
The UK group T'Pau, best known for their 1987 hit "Heart and Soul", was named after a Vulcan high priestess on Star Trek. Their frontwoman Carol Decker was watching an episode when the character appeared, and when she suggested the name, the band went for it.
The phrase "It's life, Jim, but not as we know it" did not originate in Star Trek, but instead in the parody song "Star Trekkin'",
The first man to have his ashes taken into space was Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry in 1992. Those ashes were brought back to earth but 7gm of them were scattered in space five years later.
The story behind "The Star Spangled Banner" began in August 1814, during the War of 1812 when British forces set fire to the Capitol and other buildings in Washington, DC. When they were returning to their ships they took with them as prisoner Dr William Beanes, the elderly and popular town physician of Upper Marlboro, Maryland.
The 15-star, 15-stripe "Star-Spangled Banner" that inspired the poem
The following month the British fleet, commanded by General Ross, was anchored off Baltimore where Dr William Beanes was a prisoner in the flagship "Surprise." A young lawyer who wrote verse as a hobby, Francis Scott Key, was a friend of the doctor and felt it was his duty to come to his rescue. With President Madison's permission, he set out from Baltimore in the Minden, flying a flag of truce. With him went John S. Skinner, a government agent. The pair reached the British fleet and General Ross agreed they could take Beanes home - but not yet. The British were about to shell Fort McHenry, which guarded Baltimore, and Key and Skinner would have to stay under guard on the ship till the fortress had been captured.
An artist's rendering of the battle at Fort McHenry
Key and Skinner were compelled to witness from afar the terrific bombardment. Anxiously throughout the day they observed the "Stars and Stripes" flag flying on top of the fortress. During the night, they continued to look out for it, and at the dawn of the morning of September 14, 1814 with grateful hearts they could see that the American flag was still waving in the breeze over the fortress. Obviously, the attack had failed. It was then that Key composed the poem, which he originally titled "Defence of Fort M'Henry", writing down its words on the back of an envelope. He finished all the verses on the way to shore, but some of the lines were only in his memory. As soon as he reached his hotel room Key wrote out the complete song as it now stands.
Francis Scott Key's original manuscript copy of his "Defence of Fort M'Henry" poem.
"Defence of Fort M'Henry" was immediately read by Key's friends who, equally deeply moved, had it printed at once and distributed as a handbill. Baltimore's daily newspaper printed the poem in its first issue after the city's liberation. "Defence of Fort M'Henry" fitted the meter of an old English drinking song "To Annacreon in Heaven," which had been used for the opening hymn at meetings of The Anacreontic Society. an 18th-century gentlemen's club of amateur musicians in London, American soldiers celebrating their victory were joined in a city tavern by Francis Key who read them his poem. On the spur of the moment, Baltimore actor Ferdinand Durang led them singing the poem, choosing the melody of “To Annacreon in Heaven.” Within four days all Baltimore was singing "The Star Spangled Banner" and it quickly spread throughout the land.
The earliest surviving sheet music of "The Star-Spangled Banner", from 1814.
The Secretary of War, Daniel E. Lamont issued an order in the 1890s that it "be played at every Army post every evening at retreat." and in 1899, the US Navy officially adopted "The Star-Spangled Banner" as its anthem. In 1916 President Woodrow Wilson issued an executive order making "The Star-Spangled Banner" the US national anthem. The order was confirmed by a congressional resolution on March 3, 1931 which was signed by President Herbert Hoover. Before 1931, the US national anthem was "My Country 'Tis Of Thee." It is against the law to use "The Star Spangled Banner" as dance music in Massachusetts. The original manuscript of the poem was sold for $24,000 at an auction in New York in 1933.
American operatic soprano Lucy Monroe was noted for her performances of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at sporting and military events, which earned her the nickname of "The Star-Spangled Soprano". Monroe estimated that she performed "The Star-Spangled Banner" over 5,000 times.
In America, before TV was broadcast 24 hours a day, there was a nightly sign off where the Star Spangled Banner was played and an image of the American flag was shown before the TV cut to static. The full version of "The Star Spangled Banner" consists of four verses, but it is very rare to hear any but the first performed.
Despite the fact that millions sing "The Star Spangled Banner" before sporting events, civic club meetings and other public gatherings, it is still ranked as the most difficult national anthem on earth to sing. Sources From: Europress Family Encyclopedia, Compton's Encyclopedia
Before the telescope was invented, various ancient and medieval scientists counted the number of stars. Tycho Brahe counted 777, Johannes Kepler reached 1005 and Ptolemy put the number at 1,056.
A supernova is when a huge star explodes. It usually happens when its nuclear fusion cannot hold the core against its own gravity. This causes the sudden appearance of a "new" bright star, before slowly fading from sight over several weeks or months.
The supernova SN 1006 first appeared in the constellation Lupus and was widely seen on Earth beginning in the year 1006. It occurred 7,200 light years away. It was, in terms of apparent magnitude, the brightest stellar event in recorded history. The supernova's remnant was not identified until 1965.
SN 1006 supernova remnant
William Cranch Bond and John Adams Whipple took the first photograph of a star other than the Sun on July 17, 1850. The star was Vega, and the photograph was taken at Harvard College Observatory. The photograph was a daguerreotype, which is a type of early photographic process. Daguerreotypes are made by exposing a silver-plated copper plate to light. The light causes the silver to react and create a negative image. The negative image is then developed and fixed, creating a positive image.
The photograph of Vega is very faint, but it is still visible. It is a significant achievement, as it was the first time that a star other than the Sun had been photographed.
American astronomer Annie Jump Cannon (December 11, 1863 – April 13, 1941) manually classified more stars in a lifetime than anyone else, around 350,000 stars. She could classify a single star, fully, in approximately 20 seconds, and used a magnifying glass for the majority of the (faint) stars.
On May 9, 1922, the International Astronomical Union formally adopted Annie Jump Cannon’s stellar classification system. With only minor changes having been made since, it is still the primary system in use today.
RECORDS
The Sun, at apparent magnitude of −27, is the brightest object in the sky.
Sirius (sometimes called the Dog Star) is the brightest star in the night sky. It is a binary star system in Canis Major, near Orion. It has an apparent magnitude of −1.46. Sirius is about twice as massive as the Sun and has an absolute magnitude of 1.42. It is 25 times more luminous than the Sun.
American astronomer Alvan Graham Clark first observed the faint white dwarf companion of Sirius on January 31, 1862. The white dwarf can be seen to the lower left in the picture below.
Hubble Space Telescope image of Sirius. By By NASA, ESA, H. Bond , and M. Barstow
HD 140283 is a subgiant star about 190 light years away from the Earth in the constellation Libra. It is thought to be the oldest known star, being nearly as old as the universe itself. Once dubbed the "Methuselah Star" by the popular press due to its age, the star must have formed soon after the Big Bang.
Earendel, discovered in 2022 is the most distant individual star detected at 12.9 billion years from Earth. However, due to the expansion of the universe, the star is now 28 billion light-years away.
MACS J1149+2223 Lensed Star-1, also known as Icarus, is a blue supergiant observed through a gravitational lens is the second most distant individual star detected, at 9 billion light-years from Earth (redshift z=1.49; comoving distance of 14.4 billion light-years; lookback time of 9.34 billion years). The light observed from the star was emitted when the universe was about 30% of its current age of 13.8 billion years.
Alpha Centauri is the closest star system to the Solar System, being 4.37 light-years from the Sun. It consists of three stars: Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, which form the binary star Alpha Centauri AB, and a small and faint red dwarf, Alpha Centauri C.
Alpha Centauri (left) and Beta Centauri (right) . By Skatebiker
A car traveling 100 mph would take more than 29 million years to reach Alpha Centuri.
UY Scuti is a red supergiant and pulsating variable star in the constellation Scutum approximately 9,500 light-years from Earth. It is the largest known star by radius with an estimated radius of 1,708 solar radii (1.188×109 kilometres); thus a volume nearly 5 billion times that of the Sun. If placed at the center of the Solar System, its photosphere would at least engulf the orbit of Jupiter. Light takes 110 minutes to travel from one side to the other.
It would take 1,200 years to fly around UY Scuti in a 900km/h regular passenger airplane. If Earth was in its habitable zone, it would take 10.000 years for one full rotation, each season lasting 2500 years.
Neutron star PSR J1748-2446 is the fastest spinning celestial object in the universe. The star rotates 716 times every second, so its equator moves at about 25% the speed of light. It is also 50 trillion times the density of lead and has a magnetic field a trillion times stronger than the Sun’s.
The star Kepler 11145123 is so perfectly spherical that it's the roundest natural object ever measured.
FUN STAR FACTS
The average number of stars we can see with the naked eye is around 10,000. This number is only the 0.000004% of all stars in the Milky Waygalaxy.
There are more stars in space than there are grains of sand on every beach on Earth.
Because it takes so long for their light to reach Earth, many of the stars you see at night are long gone.
A white dwarf is the final evolutionary stage of a star like our sun, where it has exhausted all its nuclear fuel and lost most of its mass. White dwarfs are extremely dense, with a mass similar to that of the sun but with a radius of only a few thousand kilometers (or a few thousand miles). They cool over time and eventually become black dwarfs.
A black dwarf is a theoretical stellar remnant, which no longer emits significant heat or light. But none are known to exist, because the universe is not old enough for any white dwarfs to have cooled to the point of becoming black dwarfs. The age of the universe, estimated to be around 13.8 billion years, is not sufficient for any star to complete the process of cooling and becoming a black dwarf.
Over time, theoretically, a white dwarf star will dwindle to a black dwarf – but given the time this takes to happen and the age of the universe this shouldn't have actually happened to any yet.
NASA discovered 14 stars that were cool enough to touch in 2010.
Henry Morton Stanley was born January 28, 1841 as John Rowlands in Denbigh, Denbighshire, Wales.
Stanley in 1872
John was the illegitimate and unloved son of a promiscuous housemaid and John Rowlands senior, an indulgent alcoholic. His mother Elizabeth Parry was 18 years old at the time of his birth. John never knew his father, who died within a few weeks of his birth. As a toddler, John was shuttled between various relatives, before being eventually sent to the St. Asaph Union Workhouse for the Poor at the age of 5. John spent a miserable childhood in the workhouse, then at the age of 18 he took a job as a cabin boy on a sailing ship bound for New Orleans.
EARLY CAREER
After arriving at New Orleans, Rowlands asked a wealthy trader called Henry Stanley — who had in fact long wished he had a son — "do you need a boy?", meaning hired help. Rowlands was adopted by Stanley and out of admiration, he took the trader's name. Stanley enlisted in the Confederate Army at the outset of the American Civil War, enrolling in the Confederate States Army's 6th Arkansas Infantry Regiment. Stanley fought in the 1862 Battle of Shiloh and was captured. He was a prisoner of war until he decided to switch sides to the Union Army in exchange for his release. Stanley was discharged from the Union army 18 days later because of severe illness. After recovering, Stanley served on several merchant ships before joining the US Navy in July 1864. He became a record keeper on board the USS Minnesota, which led him into freelance journalism. Stanley and a junior colleague jumped ship on February 10, 1865 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and set out to tour the world. They got as far as Turkey where robbed, beaten, broke they had to rely on the generosity of the American consul for their passage home. After the Civil War, Stanley turned to journalism first with the Missouri Democrat then the St Louis Weekly. In 1867 Stanley was taken on by James Gordon Bennett Jr. the owner of the New York Herald as their special correspondent for the Abyssinian War.
SEARCH FOR DAVID LIVINGSTONE
In 1869 Stanley received instructions from The New York Herald to undertake a roving commission in the Middle East, which was to include the relief of Dr. David Livingstone, of whom little had been heard since his departure for Africa in 1866 to search for the source of the Nile.
1872 Carte de visite – Stanley and Kalulu.
According to Stanley's no doubt romanticized account, he asked James Gordon Bennett, Jr, how much he could spend. The reply was "Draw £1,000 now, and when you have gone through that, draw another £1,000, and when that is spent, draw another £1,000, and when you have finished that, draw another £1,000, and so on — BUT FIND LIVINGSTONE!" Stanley traveled to Zanzibar and outfitted an expedition with the best of everything, including 111 porters. As he hacked his way across the African continent, Stanley spent six months pondering how he ought to greet the object of his quest. He located Livingstone on November 10, 1871, in Ujiji near Lake Tanganyika in present-day Tanzania. On meeting Livingstone Stanley said "Dr Livingstone, I presume". ("Hello" wasn't in use at the time).
Stanley was given a sextant by Livingstone for finding him, while Queen Victoria rewarded him with a gold snuff box.
LATER CAREER
In 1874, the New York Herald and Britain's Daily Telegraph financed Stanley on another expedition to Africa. His objective was nothing less than to complete the exploration and mapping of the central African lakes and rivers, in the process circumnavigating Lakes Victoria and Tanganyika and locating the source of the Nile. When Stanley visited King Mutesa I of Buganda he found Islam had preceded him. He wrote a letter to the Daily Telegraph appealing for Christian missionaries. Seven months later volunteers arrived at Zanzibar sent by the Church Mission Society. This led to the eventual establishment of a British protectorate in Uganda. During Stanley's 999 day journey from East to West Africa between 1874-77, he explored Lake Tanganyika and traced the course of the River Congo to the sea, thus opening up the heart of Africa for the first time. He also established conclusively the source of the Nile, circumnavigated Lake Victoria for the first time and mapped the course of the Lualaba River. Only half of Stanley's party survived the daunting dangerous trans-Africa trek. Between 1879-84, Stanley worked for King Leopold II of Belgium as his agent with the aim of establishing the Congo Free State. He succeeded in opening up the Congo river for sea traffic by bludgeoning his way up the river and building roads through the jungle. Stanley was called by the Africans "Sula Maturi" (The smasher of the rocks).
Henry M. Stanley in 1884
Stanley built 22 garrisoned stations along the Congo, established a fleet of steamboats and put in place a political and commercial infrastructure to allow the new nation of Congo to function. In 1886, Stanley headed an expeditionary force to relief the besieged Emin Pasha, the governor of Equatoria in the southern Sudan. To relief Emin Pasta he had to cross Africa again, this time west to east, Congo to Ethiopia. Stanley succeeded in relieving Emin Pasha and safely escorted him to Zanzibar. However, there was controversy when Stanley's relief column, a group of English officers, were left behind at the Congo to die, whilst Stanley forged on through the Ituri forest. His incident tarnished his reputation. The deaths, dementia and paranoia of the unfortunate rear column left behind in the Congo inspired Joseph Conrad to write Heart of Darkness. On return from Africa, Stanley entered Parliament as a Liberal Unionist member for Lambeth North, serving from 1895 to 1900.
Henry Morton Stanley 1890
He lived in considerable comfort after his return from Africa and became Sir Henry Morton Stanley when he was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath in the 1899 Birthday Honors, in recognition of his service to the British Empire in Africa. Stanley retired in 1900 on account of his failing health.
WRITING
On his return from finding Livingstone, Stanley cashed in by publishing How I Discovered Livingstone in 1873. Following his return from his second African expedition, Stanley published in 1878 Through the Dark Continent thus introducing the custom of referring to Africa as the “dark continent”. In 1890, he published In Darkest Africa or the Quest Rescue and Retreat of Emin, Governor of Equatoria.
Stanley secretly became an American citizen in 1885 to protect his royalties for his books but in 1892 reassumed his British citizenship.
APPEARANCE AND CHARACTER
Stanley was 5ft 5ins. According to Queen Victoria he was, "a determined ugly little man-with a strong American twang." Pugnacious, intelligent and determined, Stanley had a vain glorious and corrupt nature. Manically diligent, he was prone to violent rages.
RELATIONSHIPS
After his return from Africa, Stanley married the Welsh neoclassicist artist, Dorothy Tennant (March 22, 1855 – October 5, 1926) at Westminster Abbey in 1890. They adopted a child named Denzil.
Portrait of Lady Dorothy Stanley, by George Frederick Watts
Dorothy Tennant edited her husband's autobiography, reportedly removing any references to other women in Stanley's life. After Stanley's death, Dorothy married, in 1907, Henry Jones Curtis, a pathologist, surgeon and writer.
DEATH
Stanley died of pleurisy at his Richmond, London terrace home on May 10, 1904. His grave, in the graveyard of St. Michael's Church in Pirbright, Surrey, is marked by a large piece of granite.
