Today, August 2, is the anniversary of the 1776 formal signing of the US Declaration of Independence. Fifty-six people signed the Declaration. It is also the anniversary of Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi’s 1834 birth in Colmar, France. Bartholdi grew up to become the sculptor… Continue Reading
Be not animal; refine thy rapture! If thou drink, drink by the eight and ninety rules of art: if thou love, exceed by delicacy; and if thou do aught joyous, let there be subtlety therein! –AL II:70 Today we celebrate… Continue Reading
On July 12, 1895, R. Buckminster “Bucky” Fuller was born in Milton, Massachusetts, the son of Richard Buckminster Fuller and Caroline Wolcott Andrews, and grand-nephew of the American Transcendentalist Margaret Fuller. Fuller was the second World President of Mensa from… Continue Reading
On July 11, 1533, Pope Clement VII excommunicated England’s King Henry VIII. If you are familiar with English history, you know that Henry asked to have his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled because she hadn’t given birth to a son. The… Continue Reading
Frater S.L.Q., the Treasurer General of Ordo Templi Orientis International Headquarters posted the following announcement to http://www.oto.org/. “Academia Ordo Templi Orientis, in cooperation with the OTO Grand Lodge of Italy, is pleased to announce a conference at Monte Verità in Ascona,… Continue Reading
Today is National Pink Day in the United States. The National Day Calendar website has been unable to determine the origins of this celebration. A search of the Congressional Record — Congress often designates national days — has yet to… Continue Reading
It is Pride Month, so today we look back a leader in the cause of freedom to love. In Weimar Berlin, gay culture flourished, as we can read in the works of such notables as writer Christopher Isherwood, on whose works… Continue Reading
Juneteenth, also known as Juneteenth Independence Day or Freedom Day, is a holiday that commemorates the June 19, 1865 announcement of the abolition of slavery in Texas, and more generally the emancipation of African-American slaves throughout the Confederate South. The… Continue Reading
Today is Bloomsday, the annual celebration in which James Joyce’s Ulysses breaks out of the classroom and hits the streets. To commemorate his first date with his future wife, Nora Barnacle, Joyce set his novel on June 16, 1904. That date… Continue Reading
On June 14, 1825, Pierre Charles L’Enfant, the French-born American architect who laid out Washington, DC, died at age 70. L’Enfant is said to have been a Freemason and a friend of George Washington. When Congress decided to build a… Continue Reading