⅏Did You Know - The Oldest Dog to Have Ever Lived was "Bluey"?

Did You Know...

The oldest dog to have ever lived was "Bluey", an Australian Cattle Dog. 



Australian Cattle Dog - mature blue male
pic by Wiki user Zingpix

Bluey(7 June 1910 – 14 November 1939) owned by Les and Esma Hall of Victoria, Australia, which, according to an anecdotal report, lived 29 years, 6 months and 12 days, but the record is unverified. Bluey holds the world record for the oldest dog, which has been verified by Guinness World Records.

Did You Know?  For the month of

back in.....

• 1360, Hail killed English troops.  On so-called "Black Monday" in 1360, a hail storm kills an estimated 1,000 English soldiers in Chartres, France. The storm and the devastation it caused also played a part in the Hundred Years' War between England and France.
• 1742, Handel's Messiah premiered in Dublin.  Nowadays, the performance of George Friedrich Handel's Messiah oratorio at Christmas time is a tradition almost as deeply entrenched as decorating trees and hanging stockings.  Messiah received its world premiere on April 13, 1742, during the Christian season of Lent, and in the decidedly secular context of a concert hall in Dublin, Ireland.
• 1841, President Harrison died after one month in office.  Only 31 days after assuming office, William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the United States, dies of pneumonia at the White House.  Ironically, the man with the shortest White House tenure delivered the longest inaugural address in history, which may have been his undoing. This first presidential speech, delivered on a bitterly cold March morning, clocked in at one hour and 45 minutes. Harrison went to bed at the end of inauguration day with a bad cold that soon developed into a fatal case of pneumonia.
• 1882, Jesse James was murdered.  One of America's most famous criminals, Jesse James, is shot to death by fellow gang member Bob Ford, who betrayed James for reward money. For 16 years, Jesse and his brother, Frank, committed robberies and murders throughout the Midwest. Detective magazines and pulp novels glamorized the James gang, turning them into mythical Robin Hoods who were driven to crime by unethical landowners and bankers. In reality, Jesse James was a ruthless killer who stole only for himself.
• 1919, The Amritsar Massacre.  In Amritsar, India's holy city of the Sikh religion, British and Gurkha troops massacre at least 379 unarmed demonstrators meeting at the Jallianwala Bagh, a city park. Most of those killed were Indian nationalists meeting to protest the British government's forced conscription of Indian soldiers and the heavy war tax imposed against the Indian people.
• 1936, Bruno Hauptmann executed.  Richard Bruno Hauptmann, convicted in the 1932 kidnapping and murder of the 20-month-old son of Charles A. Lindbergh, is executed by electrocution.
• 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.  Martin Luther King Jr. is shot to death at a hotel in Memphis, Tennessee. A single shot fired by James Earl Ray from over 200 feet away at a nearby motel struck King in the neck. He died an hour later at St. Joseph's Hospital. The death of America's leading civil rights advocate sparked a wave of rioting in the black communities of several cities around the country.
• 1970, Paul McCartney announced the breakup of the Beatles.  The legendary rock band the Beatles spent the better part of three years breaking up in the late 1960s, and even longer than that hashing out who did what and why. And by the spring of 1970, there was little more than a tangled set of business relationships keeping the group together. Each of the Beatles was pursuing his musical interests outside of the band, and there were no plans in place to record together as a group. But as far as the public knew, this was just a temporary state of affairs. That all changed on April 10, 1970, when an ambiguous Paul McCartney "self-interview" was seized upon by the international media as an official announcement of a Beatles breakup.
• 1970, Appollo 13 oxygen tank exploded.  On April 13, 1970, disaster strikes 200,000 miles from Earth when oxygen tank No. 2 blows up on Apollo 13, the third manned lunar landing mission. Astronauts James A. Lovell, John L. Swigert, and Fred W. Haise had left Earth two days before for the Fra Mauro highlands of the moon but were forced to turn their attention to simply making it home alive.
• 1984, Mass murderer Wilder commited suicide.  Christopher Wilder dies after a month-long crime spree involving 11 young women who have disappeared or been killed. Police in New Hampshire attempted to apprehend Wilder, who was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List, but Wilder apparently shot himself to death in a scuffle with state troopers to avoid capture.
• 1990, Soviets admitted to Katyn Massacre.  The Soviet government officially accepts blame for the Katyn Massacre of World War II, when nearly 5,000 Polis h military officers were murdered and buried in mass graves in the Katyn Forest. The admission was part of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's promise to be more forthcoming and candid concerning Soviet history.



Tiger Woods in 2007
pic by Wiki user Staxringold

• 1990, Twin ferry accidents on opposite ends of the world.  In a tragic coincidence, two separate ferry accidents in different areas of the world take the lives of a reported 325 people. The first took place in Myanmar (formerly Burma) on the Gyaing River. Later in the day, Scandinavia was also rocked by tragedy.  A double-decker ferry traveling from Moulmein to Kyondo along the Gyaing River in Myanmar was carrying approximately 240 passengers and crew through a violent storm with very strong winds.  On the night of that same day, the Scandinavian Star, a Danish-owned vessel, was making its first trip after being bought by VR-DANO from SeaEscape, Ltd. It was carrying 493 passengers and their cars and trucks from Oslo, Norway, to Frederikshaven, Denmark.
• 1997, Tiger Woods won first major.  On April 13, 1997, in Augusta, Georgia, 21-year-old Tiger Woods wins the prestigious Masters Tournament by a record 12 strokes. It was Woods' first victory in one of golf's four major championships--the U.S. Open, the British Open, the PGA Championship, and the Masters--and the greatest performance by a professional golfer in more than a century.
• 2009, Baseball All-Star killed in truck accident.  Former Major League Baseball all-star pitcher Mark “The Bird” Fidrych is found dead at the age of 54 following an accident at his Massachusetts farm involving a Mack truck he was working on. Fidrych, the 1976 American League Rookie of the Year, suffocated when his clothes got tangled in the truck’s power takeoff shaft.

Resources: history.com, various magazines

⅏Did You Know - These Random Facts? #14 - March

Did You Know?  For the month of

back in.....

• 1900, Congress made gold the monetary standard for U.S. currency.  They set its value at $20.67 an ounce.  This same month back in 2008, gold futures hit an all-time high, topping $1,000 an ounce!
• 1906, A powerful earthquake and a full day of aftershocks rock Taiwan killing over 1,200 people. This terrifying day of tremors destroyed several towns and caused millions of dollars in damages.
• 1937, Nearly 300 students at The Consolidated School of New London, Texas were killed by an explosion of natural gas at their school.
• 1944, Britain announces that all travel between Ireland and the United Kingdom is suspended, the result of the Irish government's refusal to expel Axis-power diplomats within its borders.
• 1959, Barbie dolls arrived in stores.  Today, there are more Barbie dolls than people in the United States!
• 1964, Elizabeth Taylor married her fourth husband, Richard Burton.  Filmdom's most famous co-stars had met on the set of Cleopatra a year earlier.  They divorced in 1974 and remarried in 1975, but the second marriage only lasted one year.  Taylor split from her eighth husband, Larry Frotensky, in 1996, and has not remarried - yet!
• 1971, An earthquake set off by a series of calamities—a landslide, flood and avalanche-- resulted in the destruction of the town of Chungar, Peru, and the death of 600 of its inhabitants.
• 1972, Francis Ford Coppola directed The Godfather.  It was the first of a trilogy based on Mario Puzo's novel about a crime family.  It won three Oscars.  A few years ago, a hat Al Pacino wore in the movie sold at an auction for $16,100!

• 1989, Exxon Valdez runs aground.  The worst oil spill in U.S. territory begins when the supertanker Exxon Valdez, owned and operated by the Exxon Corporation, runs aground on a reef in Prince William Sound in southern Alaska. An estimated 11 million gallons of oil eventually spilled into the water. Attempts to contain the massive spill were unsuccessful, and wind and currents spread the oil more than 100 miles from its source, eventually polluting more than 700 miles of coastline. Hundreds of thousands of birds and animals were adversely affected by the environmental disaster.
• 1992, A 6.8-magnitude earthquake near Erzincan, Turkey, and an unusually powerful aftershock two days later kill at least 500 people and leave 50,000 people homeless. Erzincan was a provincial capital city of 90,000 people 600 miles east of Istanbul in Central Turkey. The people of the area were no strangers to earthquakes--deadly quakes had struck the area in 1047, 1547, 1583, 1666, 1784 and 1939. It was a Friday evening during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan when the 1992 earthquake struck; most people in Erzincan and the surrounding area were sitting down for their evening meal. Seventeen seconds of powerful jolts and rocking began at 7:19 p.m., bringing down buildings and all electricity in the region.
  One casualty of the quake was the minaret on top of the Demirkent Mosque—it toppled and fell, killing 27 people.
• 2003, The United States, along with coalition forces primarily from the United Kingdom, initiated war on Iraq.
 

Resources: history.com, various magazines

⅏Did You Know - These Random Facts? #10 - February

Did You Know?  For the month of

back in.....

• 1933, Giuseppe Zangara shoots Anton Cermak, the mayor of Chicago, in Miami, Florida. Zangara's shots missed President-elect Franklin Roosevelt, who was with Cermak at the time. Cermak was seriously wounded and died on March 6.
• 1953, Cambridge University scientists James D. Watson and Frances H.C. Crick announce that they have determined the double-helix structure of DNA, the molecule containing human genes.
• 1965, In New York City, Malcolm X, an African American nationalist and religious leader, is assassinated by rival Black Muslims while addressing his Organization of Afro-American Unity at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights.
• 1980, In one of the most dramatic upsets in Olympic history, the underdog U.S. hockey team, made up of college players, defeats the four-time defending gold-medal winning Soviet team at the XIII Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, New York. The Soviet squad, previously regarded as the finest in the world, fell to the youthful American team 4-3 before a frenzied crowd of 10,000 spectators. Two days later, the Americans defeated Finland 4-2 to clinch the hockey gold.
• 1985, In a highly controversial vote on February 20, 1985, the Irish government defies the powerful Catholic Church and approves the sale of contraceptives.
• 1993, Agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms raid the Branch Davidian cult compound in Waco, Texas, prompting a gun battle in which four agents and six cult members are killed. The federal agents were attempting to arrest the leader of the Branch Davidians, David Koresh, on information that the religious sect was stockpiling weapons. A nearly two-month standoff ensued after the unsuccessful raid.
• 1993, A bomb explodes in the parking garage beneath the World Trade Center in New York City on this day in 1993. Six people died and 1,000 were injured by the powerful blast, which also caused the evacuation of thousands of people from the Twin Towers.
• 2003, A man ignites a gasoline-filled container inside a subway train in Daegu, South Korea. The blaze engulfed the six-car train, before spreading to another train that pulled into station a few minutes later. In all, 198 people were killed and nearly 150 others were injured.
  The arsonist was later found to be a 56-year-old unemployed former taxi driver named Kim Dae-han. Kim had been left partially paralyzed after suffering a stroke in November 2001, and is believed to have been mentally unbalanced at the time of the arson. He later told police that he had wanted to commit suicide, and chose a crowded place to do so because he did not want to die alone.
• 2006, In the early morning hours of February 22, a gang of at least six men, some of them armed, steal £53 million from the Securitas bank depot in Kent, Great Britain. It was the largest such theft in British history.

Resources: history.com, datesinhistory.com

⅏Did You Know - These Random Facts? #8 - February

Did You Know?  For the month of

back in.....

• 1924, The first execution by lethal gas in American history is carried out in Carson City, Nevada. The executed man was Tong Lee, a member of a Chinese gang who was convicted of murdering a rival gang member. Lethal gas was adopted by Nevada in 1921 as a more humane method of carrying out its death sentences, as opposed to the traditional techniques of execution by hanging, firing squad, or electrocution.
• 1949, The NBC station in Chicago aired the first-ever TV daytime soap opera, These Are My Children.  It was not a success and prompted the critic from Television World to declare "there is no place on television for this type of program - a blank screen is preferable."

  

  Paul Newman with
  Joanne Woodward, 1958
  Los Angeles Time 
  file photograph

  
• 1952, After a long illness, King George VI of Great Britain and Northern Ireland dies in his sleep at the royal estate at Sandringham. Princess Elizabeth, the oldest of the king's two daughters and next in line to succeed him, was in Kenya at the time of her father's death; she was crowned Queen Elizabeth II on June 2, 1953, at age 27.
• 1958, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward married, after falling in love on the set of The Long, Hot Summer.  The marriage was unique for Hollywood:  It lasted 50 years, until his death in 2008.
• 1973, An agreement to end the Vietnam War was signed in Paris, ending America's role in the war in that country, which had begun in 1954.
• 1983, Gunmen steal the champion Irish race horse Shergar from a stud farm owned by the Aga Khan in County Kildare, Ireland. The five-year-old thoroughbred stallion, named European horse of the year in 1981, was worth $13.5 million and commanded stud fees of approximately $100,000.
• 1991, Whitney Houston performed "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Superbowl XXV.  The crowd loved her version so much, it was released as a single and quickly hit #20 on the charts!
• 1999, King Hussein bin Talal, the 20th century's longest-serving executive head of state dies, and his son Prince Abdallah bin Hussein ascends to the Jordanian throne.

Resources: history.com, datesinhistory.com

✈Worldwide Wednesdays: The Longest Names of Places!

A List of some of the longest names of places around the world!

Full name: Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateahaumaitawhitiurehaeaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokacockiwhenuakitanatahu (105 letters)
Short-forms: Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateapokaiwhenuakitanatahu (57 letters)
Location: A hill on North Island, New Zealand
Language: Māori
Translation: "The summit where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, the climber of mountains, the land-swallower who travelled about, played his nose flute to his loved one"
Notes: Listed in the Guinness World Records as the longest official placename in the world.


The station sign at "Llanfairpwllgwyngyll"

Full name: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (58 letters)
Short-forms: Llanfairpwllgwyngyll (20 letters)
Location: a town in Anglesey, Wales
Language: Welsh
Translation: "Saint Mary's Church in a hollow of white hazel near the swirling whirlpool of the church of Saint Tysilio with a red cave"
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in Wales.

 
Full name: Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg (45 letters)
Short-forms: Lake Chaubunagungamaug (17 letters)
Location: a lake in Massachusetts, United States
Language: Nimpuc
Translation: "Fishing Place at the Boundaries -- Neutral Meeting Grounds"
Notes: Believed to be the longest official one-word placename in the United States.

 
Full name: Tweebuffelsmeteenskootmorsdoodgeskietfontein (44 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: South Africa
Language: Afrikaans
Translation: "The spring (lit. Fountain) where two buffaloes were cleanly killed with a single shot"
Notes: Disputed whether or not the name belongs to a farm or town, and whether or not that farm or town actually exists.


Full name: Äteritsiputeritsipuolilautatsijänkä (35 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: Lapland, Finland
Language:
Translation:
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in Finland.


Full name: Pekwachnamaykoskwaskwaypinwanik (31 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a lake in Manitoba and Nunavut, Canada
Language: Inuktitut
Translation:
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in Canada.

 

Full name: Venkatanarasimharajuvaripeta (28 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a village in Andhra Pradesh, India
Language: Telugu
Translation:
Notes: The longest one-word placename in India.




Full name: Mamungkukumpurangkuntjunya (26 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a hill in South Australia, Australia
Language: Pitjantjatjara
Translation: "Where the devil urinates"
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in Australia.




Full name: Bullaunancheathrairaluinn (25 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a bullaun in County Galway, Ireland
Language: Anglicisation of Irish Ballán an Cheathrair Álainn
Translation:
Notes: Believed to be the longest official one-word Irish-derived placename in Ireland.




Full name: Gasselterboerveenschemond (25 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a hamlet in Drenthe, Netherlands
Language: Dutch
Translation:
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in the Netherlands.

Full name: Kuchistiniwamiskahikan (22 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: an island in Quebec, Canada
Language:
Translation:
Notes: The longest official one-word placename in Quebec.



Full name: Parangaricutirimicuaro (22 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a city in Michoacán, Mexico
Language: Spanish
Translation:
Notes:

Full name: Drehideenglashanatooha (22 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a bridge in County Tipperary, Ireland
Language: Anglicisation of Irish Droichidín Glaise na Tuaithe
Translation: Little bridge of stream of the túath
Notes:

Full name: Newtownmountkennedy (19 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a village in County Wicklow, Ireland
Language: English
Translation:
Notes: the longest official one-word English-derived placename in Ireland.



Full name: Thiruvananthapuram (18 letters)
Short-forms:
Location: a city in Kerala, India
Language: Malayalam
Translation: "Abode of Lord Ananta"

Other note-worthies: Novoperdelkinskotěrkenskaněvskoje-Nevyslovitelnoje in Russia or the Ojoojojojjjoooojjjoodddoookkkkeeeellllluuuuuusososoooov Ukraine.

Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Yuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit is the longest place name (with spaces in between words) in the world meaning “The city of angels, the great city, the eternal jewel city, the impregnable city of God Indra, the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukam”. Or, you should better use the name known to everyone as Bangkok.




Source: Wikipedia, necyklopedie.wikia.com, widbox.com