Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
~William Shakespeare
753 BC – Romulus founds Rome (traditional date).
During the Roman Republic, several dates were given for the founding of the city between 753 BC and 728 BC. Finally, under the Roman Empire, the date suggested by Marcus Terentius Varro, 753 BC, was agreed upon, but in the Fasti Capitolini the year given was 752. Although the proposed years varied, all versions agreed that the city was founded on April 21, the day of the festival sacred to Pales, goddess of shepherds; in her honour, Rome celebrated the Par ilia (or Palilia). (The Roman a.u.c. calendar, however, begins with Varro’s dating of 753 BC.)
1934 – The “Surgeon’s Photograph”, the most famous photo allegedly showing the Loch Ness Monster, is published in the Daily Mail (in 1999, it is revealed to be a hoax).
The “Surgeon’s Photograph” (pictured above) is purported to be the first photo of a “head and neck”, and is one of the most iconic Nessie photos. Supposedly taken by Robert Kenneth Wilson, a London gynaecologist, it was published in the Daily Mail on 21 April 1934. Wilson’s refusal to have his name associated with the photograph led to it being nicknamed the “Surgeon’s Photograph”. He claimed that he was looking at the loch when he saw the monster, so he grabbed his camera and snapped four photos. Only two exposures came out clear: the first one shows what was claimed to be a small head and back, while the second one shows a similar head in a diving position. The first one was more iconic one, while the second attracted little publicity because it was difficult to interpret what was depicted, due to its blurry quality.
1952 – Secretary’s Day (now Administrative Professionals’ Day) is first celebrated.
The idea began with Mary Barrett, president of the National Secretaries Association, now called IAAP (International Association of Administrative Professionals), and C. King Woodbridge, president of Dictaphone Corporation. They served on a council addressing a national shortage of skilled office workers. The account executives at Young & Rubicam originated the idea for a National Secretaries Week.
1992 – The first discoveries of extrasolar planets are announced by astronomers Alexander Wolszczan and Dale Frail. They discovered two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12.
On 9 January 1992, radio astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail announced the discovery of two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12. This discovery was confirmed, and is generally considered to be the first definitive detection of exoplanets. Followup observations solidified these results, and confirmation of a third planet in 1994 revived the topic in the popular press. These pulsar planets are believed to have formed from the unusual remnants of the supernova that produced the pulsar, in a second round of planet formation, or else to be the remaining rocky cores of gas giants that somehow survived the supernova and then decayed into their current orbits.
2010 – Introducing Resisty the Resistor CAPTCHA – solve the resistor values to post a comment!
We are thrilled to release a solve-the-resistor CAPTCHA plugin for WordPress! This plugin will draw a random 5% or 10% resistor and four color band sliders beneath it. The commenter needs to match the colors on the sliders to the colors on the resistor. Commenters don’t actually need to know how to read resistors, but this will help them as they post comments on site that use this plugin. Random resistors are generated from E12 and E24 decade values (so there’s never something like a 4.6K Ohm resistor. Plugin created by: Adafruit Industries – Daigo Kawasaki, Limor Fried and Phillip Torrone. It’s open source, so please feel free to use it and improve upon it!
