History Schmistory: August 20. Who brought the cannon?
Tuesday, August 20, 2024
1882: Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky premiers the 1812 Overture in Moscow, with a section of real cannon blasting away during the finale. Six months later a cannonball falls out of the sky and kills Wagner. It was that awesome.
Don’t think you know it? Skip to 3:05….
History Schmistory: August 16. Can you hear me now?
Friday, August 16, 2024
1858: The United States exchanges overseas greetings with the United Kingdom for the first time through the transatlantic telegraph cable.
Which was destroyed 4 weeks later by this guy…
[Portrait of Wildman Whitehouse, 1856-1865, Maull and Polyblank, Science Museum, 1856-1865. Object No. 1980-2/50. © This image is available for use under the following license: CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0]
His complaint was it didn’t work fast enough, so he turned up the juice too high and fried the thing. Way to go, Wildman.
He tried to make it up to everybody with a communications device of his own…
No one was amused.
History Schmistory: August 9. No more Richard jokes!
Friday, August 9, 2024
History Schmistory: August 8. Riiiiiicolaaaa!
Thursday, August 8, 2024
History Schmistory: August 3. La Scala-kazam!
Saturday, August 3, 2024
Speaking of mediocre composers, here’s a Marco classic!
History Schmistory: August 1. Breathe, durn-it!
Thursday, August 1, 2024
History Schmistory: July 23. Speak now or forever hold your tongue.
Tuesday, July 23, 2024
History Schmistory: August 31. Zeppelin’s Zeppelin
Thursday, August 31, 2023
1895: German Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin patents his navigable balloon. He soon explores the heavens in search of the elusive stairway.
History Schmistory: August 30. “Vhaaaat?”
Wednesday, August 30, 2023
1940: Nazi Germany re-assigns Romania’s Northern Transylvania territory to Hungary. They hold daytime meetings to avoid Dracula.
Deadword of the Day: Errorist
Saturday, August 26, 2023
Errorist: One who errs. A proliferator of error.
As in: Major League Baseball has had its share of errorist attacks.