On This Day May 21

On May 21, 1809 the French made their first major effort to cross the Danube during the Napoleonic Wars, precipitating the Battle of Aspern-Essling. However, they were driven back by the Austrians under Archduke Charles. The result was the first defeat Napoleon suffered personally in a major set-piece battle in over a decade. The French emperor's set back caused excitement throughout many parts of Europe because it proved that he could be beaten on the battlefield.

The Battle of Aspern-Essling by Fernand Cornon

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On This Day May 11

The first, and to date only, British Prime Minister to be assassinated was Spencer Perceval. On the evening of May 11, 1812, Perceval entered the lobby of the House of Commons, when a Liverpool merchant with a grievance against the government, John Bellingham, stepped forward, drew a pistol and shot him in the chest. Bellingham was tried and convicted, and hanged at Newgate Prison.

A painting depicting the assassination of Perceval. 

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On This Day May 10

The first American transcontinental railway was completed west of the Rockies at Promontory, Utah, on May 10, 1869 when the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific Railroads met. The Central Pacific Railroad President Leland Stanford ceremonially drove the gold "Last Spike" with a silver hammer at Promontory Summit. It was a moment of vast symbolic significance as with this transcontinental link completed, the American nation was now a single unit from coast to coast.

At the ceremony for the driving of the "Last Spike" at Promontory Summit

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On This Day February 12

The phrase 'The New Look' was coined by Harper's Bazaar, the fashion monthly, for Christian Dior's first fashion collection, on February 12, 1947. His long-skirted "new look" brought Dior worldwide fame and helped Paris regain its position as the capital of the fashion world as out went fashion rations and in came masses of material, designed to suit a curvy hour-glass figure.

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On This Day February 7

Supporters of Dominican friar and preacher Girolamo Savonarola burnt Florentine luxury goods on February 7, 1497 at the carnival of Florence. Savonarola organised the “bonfire of the vanities” at the carnival celebration before Lent, in which thousands of works of art, pornographic books and gambling equipment were publicly burnt.  Such bonfires were not invented by Savonarola, but had been a common accompaniment to the outdoor sermons of San Bernardino di Siena (1380-1444).

Savonarola Preaching in Florence, painting by Nikolay Lomtev (1850s)

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On This Day June 23

1981 The Pawtucket Red Sox and the Rochester Red Wings, two teams from the Triple-A International League played the longest ever professional baseball game. The game begun at McCoy Stadium, Pawtucket, Rhode Island on April 18, 1981. It lasted for 33 innings, with eleven hours and 25 minutes of playing time. 32 innings were played, before the game was suspended at 4:00 the next morning. The final 33rd inning was played June 23, 1981. Pawtucket won the game, 3–2.

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Trivia Of The Day

The word orange ( meaning the fruit) entered the English language around 1400 — but it wasn’t used as the name of a color until the 1540s. Before then, the English speaking world referred to the orange color as geoluhread, which literally translates to “yellow-red."

The Beatles played their first proper evening gig at Liverpool’s Cavern Club on March 21, 1961. They played there 292 times between 1961 and 1963, sharing just £5 a gig between them.

Alpha Centauri is the closest star system to the Solar System, being 4.37 light-years from the Sun. A car traveling 100 mph would take more than 29 million years to reach Alpha Centuri.

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