[guide.chat] Fact of the day
- From: "Carol O'Connor" <missbossyboots33@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "guide Chat List" <guide.chat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 10 Nov 2011 08:41:54 -0000
Fact of the Day: bamboo
The Bamboo plant is a member of the grass family, which has been used for years
to make houses, furniture, boats, piping, baskets, and musical instruments. The
plant looks like a tree and its most striking feature is that most produce
seeds only once in their lifetime -- but a bamboo plant can live for more than
100 years. In 1990, scientists announced that they are developing a way of
producing bamboo flowers more rapidly, which may be very important to its
cultivation. The woody, hollow aerial stems (culms) of bamboo grow in branching
clusters from a thick underground stem (rhizome). The culms often form a dense
undergrowth that excludes other plants. Bamboo culms can attain heights ranging
from about 4 to 6 inches in the smallest species to more than 130 feet in the
largest.
Holidays.
Cambodia: National Day/Independence Day (from France 1949).
Feast day of St. Theodore the Recruit, St. Vitonus or Vanne, and St. Benignus
or Benen.
Morocco: Wax Festival.
Events.
1799 - Napoleon Bonaparte pulled off a coup and declared himself dictator of
France.
1872 - A fire spread in windy weather, destroying nearly 800 buildings in
Boston.
1906 - U. S. President Theodore Roosevelt departed for Panama aboard the
battleship Louisiana, on the first official foreign trip in history by a U. S.
President.
1918 - Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II announced he would abdicate, then fled to
the Netherlands just two days before the signing of the Armistice.
1925 - The SS (Schutzstaffel or "Protection Squad)" was formed in Germany.
1935 - United Mine Workers president John L. Lewis and other labor leaders
formed the Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO).
1938 - Bands of Nazis destroyed Jewish shops, synagogues, and beat, or arrested
thousands of Jews (and kill 35) in Germany, Austria, and other Nazi-controlled
areas. The attack, became known as Kristallnacht or "Crystal Night" for all the
broken glass in the streets.
1965 - The Great Northeast Blackout took place in all of New York State,
portions of seven neighboring states, and parts of eastern Canada, as they were
hit by a series of power failures lasting up to 13.5 hours.
1972 - Bones discovered by the Leakey family of anthropologists set human
origins 1 million years earlier than previously determined.
1983 - Alfred Heineken, beer brewer from Amsterdam, was kidnapped and held for
a ransom of more than $10 million.
1988 - Gary Kasparov became world chess champion after beating Anatoly Karpov,
the titleholder for 10 years, in Moscow.
1989 - East Germany opened it borders to West Germany and allowed thousands of
its citizens to pass freely through the Berlin Wall. The next day, East German
troops began dismantling the wall, and less than a year later, East Germany and
West Germany were formally reunited.
2004 - Houston Astros pitcher Roger Clemens won his record seventh Cy Young
award.
Births.
1731 - Benjamin Banneker, American mathematician, clockmaker, surveyor, almanac
author, and astronomer.
1841 - Edward VII, King of England, who succeeded his mother Victoria in 1901.
1853 - Stanford White, American architect of Madison Square Garden and
Washington Arch.
1886 - Ed Wynn, American Emmy Award-winning actor.
1889 - Claude Rains, British actor.
1891 - Clifton Webb (Webb Hollenbeck), American actor.
1905 - J. William Fulbright, U. S. Senator and creator of Fulbright
scholarships.
1913 - Hedy Lamarr (Hedwig Kiessler), Austrian-born actress.
1918 - Spiro Agnew, 39th Vice President of the United States.
1934 - Carl Sagan, American Pulitzer Prize-winning author and astronomer.
1941 - Tom Fogerty, American musician, best known as the guitarist in Creedence
Clearwater Revival.
Deaths.
1880 - Edwin Drake, drilled the first oil well near Titusville, Pennsylvania.
1940 - Neville Chamberlain, British statesman and prime minister.
1953 - Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet.
1970 - Charles de Gaulle, French soldier and statesman.
2003 - Art Carney, American comedian and actor.
2005 - K. R. Narayanan, President of India.
2006 - Ed Bradley, American television journalist.
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