Daily Calendar for Sunday, March 24, 2024
Question of the Day
What is the origin of the phrase βburning the candle at both endsβ?
That phrase was coined by the American poet Edna St. Vincent Millay in 1920. It comes from her poem βFirst Figβ: βMy candle burns at both ends; / It will not last the night; / But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends— / It gives a lovely light!β
Advice of the Day
When sheep collect and huddle, Tomorrow will become a puddle.
Home Hint of the Day
If a knot comes loose from the flooring you’ve laid, just glue it back in place with carpenter’s glue. If you lose a knot that’s come loose, fill the hole with wood putty and stain the area to look like a knot.
Word of the Day
Node
Either of the two points where a body’s orbit intersects the ecliptic. Ascending: The body is moving from south to north of the ecliptic. Descending: The body is moving from north to south of the ecliptic.
Puzzle of the Day
What word is that to which if you add a syllable, it will make it shorter?
Short
Died
- Queen Elizabeth I (English monarch) β
- Jules Verne (author) β
- Archbishop Oscar Romero (Salvadorian human rights activist) β
- Richard Widmark (actor) β
- Robert Culp (actor) β
- Garry Shandling (comedian) β
- Marie-Claire Kirkland-Casgrain (Canadian politician) β
Born
- Horace Gray (Supreme Court justice) β
- John Wesley Powell (explorer) β
- Harry Houdini (magician) β
- Edward Weston (photographer) β
- Fatty Arbuckle (comedian) β
- George Sisler (baseball player) β
- Ub Iwerks (animator, cartoonist) β
- Thomas E. Dewey (politician) β
- Clyde Barrow (bank robber) β
- Joseph Barbera (cartoonist, producer) β
- Steve McQueen (actor) β
- Billy Stewart (singer) β
- Tommy Hilfiger (fashion designer) β
- Jim Parsons (actor) β
- Peyton Manning (football player) β
- Keisha Castle-Hughes (actress) β
- Christopher Briney (actor) β
Events
- Roger Williams granted charter for colony Rhode Islandβ
- Clement Hardy was issued a patent for a rotary disk plowβ
- NYC Mayor Robert A. Van Wyck formally broke ground for construction of the NYC subway systemβ
- President FDR issued statement appealing to Hungarians to help Jews escape from Nazis (WWII)β
- Nicholas Alkemade survived an 18,000-foot fall from a planeβ
- The Tennessee Williams play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof opened on Broadway, with Barbara Bel Geddes as Maggie, Ben Gazarra as Brick, and Burl Ives as Big Daddyβ
- Entertainer Elvis Presley was inducted into the U.S. Armyβ
- Maser patentedβ
- Senator Robert Kennedy was first to reach summit of Mt. Kennedy in Yukon Territoryβ
- U.S. spacecraft Ranger 9 crash-landed precisely on target in the Alphonsus crater of the moon after transmitting to Earth 5,814 photographs of the crater regionβ
- The beaver became a symbol of Canadian sovereigntyβ
- French premier Jacques Chirac signed a contract to build the first Disneyland-type amusement park in Europe, on the outskirts of Parisβ
- The largest oil spill in U.S. history, initially estimated at 240,000 barrels, occurred after the Exxon Valdez struck Bligh Reef in Alaska’s Prince William Soundβ
- An 18.7-inch-long goldfish set a world record β
- Boston archbishop Sean O’Malley was elevated to cardinal at a ceremony in St. Peter’s Square in Romeβ
Weather
- Eighty-three degrees F at Plymouth, Indianaβ
- Twenty-five inches of snow, Kansas City, Missouriβ
- 92 degrees F in St. Louis, Missouriβ
- Snow in the mid-Atlantic states covered cherry blossoms, which had bloomed in the previous weekβs 80-degree temperaturesβ