Time is a circus, always packing up and moving away. ~Ben Hecht
1902 – Walter Houser Brattain, Chinese-American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate is born.
Walter Houser Brattain was an American physicist at Bell Labs who, along with John Bardeen and William Shockley, invented the transistor. They shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics for their invention. He devoted much of his life to research on surface states.
1942 – The first gold record is presented to Glenn Miller for “Chattanooga Choo Choo“.
The 78-rpm was recorded on May 7, 1941, for RCA Victor’s Bluebird label and became the first to be certified a gold disc on February 10, 1942, for 1,200,000 sales. The transcription of this award ceremony can be heard on the first of three volumes of RCA’s “Legendary Performer” compilations released by RCA in the 1970s. In the early 1990s a two-channel recording of a portion of the Sun Valley Serenade soundtrack was discovered, allowing reconstruction of a true-stereo version of the film performance.
1962 – Roy Lichtenstein‘s first solo exhibition opened, and it included Look Mickey, which featured his first employment of Ben-Day dots, speech balloons and comic imagery sourcing, all of which he is now known for.
Roy Fox Lichtenstein was an American pop artist. During the 1960s, along with Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and James Rosenquist among others, he became a leading figure in the new art movement. His work defined the basic premise of pop art through parody. Favoring the comic strip as his main inspiration, Lichtenstein produced hard-edged, precise compositions that documented while it parodied often in a tongue-in-cheek humorous manner. His work was heavily influenced by both popular advertising and the comic book style. He described pop art as “not ‘American’ painting but actually industrial painting”. His paintings were exhibited at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York City.
Whaam! and Drowning Girl are generally regarded as Lichtenstein’s most famous works, with Oh, Jeff…I Love You, Too…But… arguably third. Drowning Girl, Whaam! and Look Mickey are regarded as his most influential works. Woman with Flowered Hat has held the record for highest Lichtenstein auction price since May 15, 2013.
1989 – Ron Brown is elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee becoming the first African American to lead a major American political party.
Ronald Harmon “Ron” Brown was the United States Secretary of Commerce, serving during the first term of President Bill Clinton. He was the first African American to hold this position.
1996 – The IBM supercomputer Deep Blue defeats Garry Kasparov in chess for the first time.
On February 10, 1996, Deep Blue became the first machine to win a chess game against a reigning world champion (Garry Kasparov) under regular time controls. However, Kasparov won three and drew two of the following five games, beating Deep Blue by a score of 4–2 (wins count 1 point, draws count ½ point). The match concluded on February 17, 1996.
Deep Blue was then heavily upgraded (unofficially nicknamed “Deeper Blue”) and played Kasparov again in May 1997, winning the six-game rematch 3½–2½, ending on May 11. Deep Blue won the deciding game six after Kasparov made a mistake in the opening, becoming the first computer system to defeat a reigning world champion in a match under standard chess tournament time controls.
2011 – Open Hardware Definition 1.0 RELEASED!
Open Source Hardware (OSHW) Statement of Principles 1.0
Open source hardware is hardware whose design is made publicly available so that anyone can study, modify, distribute, make and sell the design or hardware based on that design. The hardware’s source, the design from which it is made, is available in the preferred format for making modifications to it. Ideally, open source hardware uses readily-available components and materials, standard processes, open infrastructure, unrestricted content, and open-source design tools to maximize the ability of individuals to make and use hardware. Open source hardware gives people the freedom to control their technology while sharing knowledge and encouraging commerce through the open exchange of designs.
Open Source Hardware (OSHW) Definition 1.0
OSHW Draft Definition 1.0 is based on the Open Source Definition for Open Source Software and draft OSHW definition 0.5. The definition is derived from the Open Source Definition, which was created by Bruce Perens and the Debian developers as the Debian Free Software Guidelines. Videos and Documentation of the Opening Hardware workshop which kicked off the below definition are available here. Please join the conversation about the definition here.
2014 – How it’s made – Ladyada and Micah Scott manufacturing Fadecandy at Adafruit #manufacturing
How it’s made – Ladyada and Micah Scott manufacturing Fadecandy at Adafruit. Read more.
