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Chocolate Covered Cashews Day-KALW Almanac-4/21/2016

  • 112th Day of 2016 254 Remaining
  • Summer Begins in 60 Days
  • Sunrise: 6:24
  • Sunset: 7:51
  • 13 Hours 27 Minutes
  • Moon Rise: 7:36pm
  • Moon Set: 6:23am
  • Full Moon @ 10:25pm
  • Full Pink Moon, this name came from the herb moss pink, or wild ground phlox, which is one of the earliest widespread flowers of the spring. Other names for this month’s celestial body include the Full Sprouting Grass Moon, the Egg Moon, and among coastal tribes the Full Fish Moon, because this was the time that the shad swam upstream to spawn.
  • Tides
  • High: 11:41am/11:22pm
  • Low: 5:22am/5:16pm
  • Holidays
  • Chocolate Covered Cashews Day
  • Bulldogs Are Beautiful Day
  • John Muir Day
  • Big Word Day
  • Keep Off The Grass Day
  • National Ask An Atheist Day
  • National High Five Day
  • Poem In Your Pocket Day
  • Thank You For Libraries Day
  • Tuna Rights Day
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  • International Pizza Cake Day
  • International Creativity and Innovation Day
  • Kartini Day-Indonesia
  • Kindergarten Day-Germany
  • National Tree Planting Day-Kenya
  • First Day of Rivdan-Baha’i
  • On This Day
  • 753B.C. --- According to tradition, Romulus and his twin brother, Remus, found Rome on the site where they were suckled by a she-wolf as orphaned infants. Actually, the Romulus and Remus myth originated sometime in the fourth century B.C., and the exact date of Rome’s founding was set by the Roman scholar Marcus Terentius Varro in the first century B.C.
  • 1777 --- British troops under the command of General William Tryon attack the town of Danbury, Connecticut, and begin destroying everything in sight. Facing little, if any, opposition from Patriot forces, the British went on a rampage, setting fire to homes, farmhouse, storehouses and more than 1,500 tents. The British destruction continued for nearly a week before word of it reached Continental Army leaders, including General Benedict Arnold, who was stationed in nearby New Haven. Along with General David Wooster and General Gold Silliman, Arnold led a contingent of more than 500 American troops in a surprise attack on the British forces as they began withdrawing from Danbury.
  • 1836 --- During the Texan War for Independence, the Texas militia under Sam Houston launches a surprise attack against the forces of Mexican General Santa Anna along the San Jacinto River. The Mexicans were thoroughly routed, and hundreds were taken prisoner, including General Santa Anna himself. After gaining independence from Spain in the 1820s, Mexico welcomed foreign settlers to sparsely populated Texas, and a large group of Americans led by Stephen F. Austin settled along the Brazos River. The Americans soon outnumbered the resident Mexicans, and by the 1830s attempts by the Mexican government to regulate these semi-autonomous American communities led to rebellion. In March 1836, in the midst of armed conflict with the Mexican government, Texas declared its independence from Mexico. The Texas volunteers initially suffered defeat against the forces of Santa Anna–Sam Houston’s troops were forced into an eastward retreat, and the Alamo fell. However, in late April, Houston’s army surprised a Mexican force at San Jacinto, and Santa Anna was captured, bringing an end to Mexico’s effort to subdue Texas. In exchange for his freedom, Santa Anna recognized Texas’s independence.
  • 1865 --- A train carrying the coffin of assassinated President Abraham Lincoln leaves Washington, D.C. on its way to Springfield, Illinois, where he would be buried on May 4. The train carrying Lincoln’s body traveled through 180 cities and seven states on its way to Lincoln’s home state of Illinois. Scheduled stops for the special funeral train were published in newspapers. At each stop, Lincoln’s coffin was taken off the train, placed on an elaborately decorated horse-drawn hearse and led by solemn processions to a public building for viewing. In cities as large as Columbus, Ohio, and as small as Herkimer, New York, thousands of mourners flocked to pay tribute to the slain president. In Philadelphia, Lincoln’s body lay in state on in the east wing of Independence Hall, the same site where the Declaration of Independence was signed. Newspapers reported that people had to wait more than five hours to pass by the president’s coffin in some cities.
  • 1892 --- The first Buffalo was born in Golden Gate Park.
  • 1918 --- In the skies over Vauz sur Somme, France, Manfred von Richthofen, the notorious German flying ace known as “The Red Baron,” is killed by Allied fire. Richthofen, the son of a Prussian nobleman, switched from the German army to the Imperial Air Service in 1915. By 1916, he was terrorizing the skies over the western front in an Albatross biplane, downing 15 enemy planes by the end of the year, including one piloted by British flying ace Major Lanoe Hawker. In 1917, Richthofen surpassed all flying ace records on both sides of the western front and began using a Fokker triplane, painted entirely red in tribute to his old cavalry regiment. Although only used during the last eight months of his career, it is this aircraft that Richthofen was most commonly associated with and it led to an enduring English nickname for the German pilot–the Red Baron.
  • 1930 --- A fire at an Ohio prison kills 320 inmates, some of whom burn to death when they are not unlocked from their cells. It is one of the worst prison disasters in American history. The prison, built to hold 1,500 people, was almost always overcrowded and notorious for its poor conditions. At the time of the 1930 fire, there were 4,300 prisoners living in the jail. Construction crews were working on an expansion and scaffolding was set up along one side of the building. On the night of April 21, a fire broke out on the scaffolding. The cell block adjacent to the scaffolding housed 800 prisoners, most of whom were already locked in for the night. The inmates begged to be let out of their cells as smoke filled the cell block. However, most reports claim that the guards not only refused to unlock the cells, they continued to lock up other prisoners. Meanwhile, the fire spread to the roof, endangering the inmates on the prison’s upper level as well. Finally, two prisoners forcibly took the keys from a guard and began their own rescue efforts. Approximately 50 inmates made it out of their cells before the heavy smoke stopped the impromptu evacuation. The roof then caved in on the upper cells. About 160 prisoners burned to death.
  • 1945 --- Soviet forces fighting south of Berlin, at Zossen, assault the headquarters of the German High Command. The only remaining opposing “force” to the Russian invasion of Berlin are the “battle groups” of Hitler Youth, teenagers with anti-tank guns, strategically placed in parks and suburban streets. In a battle at Eggersdorf, 70 of these Hitler teens strove to fight off a Russian assault with a mere three anti-tank guns. They were bulldozed by Russian tanks and infantry.
  • 1960 --- Dick Clark testified before a congressional committee investigating payola. He admitted that he had a financial interest in 27 percent of the records he played on his show in a period of 28 months. 
  • 1962 --- As part of the celebration of World’s Fair, the The Top Of The Needle restaurant in the Seattle, Washington Space Needle, was officially opened. It was the second revolving restaurant in the U.S. It seats 260 and rotates completely once every hour. The world's first revolving restaurant was the La Ronde Restaurant built in 1961 atop the Ala Moana building fronting the Ala Moana shopping center in Honolulu, Hawaii. The restaurant has since closed down.
  • 1967 --- Svetlana Alliluyeva Stalina defected in New York City. She was the daughter of Joseph Stalin. 
  • 1972 --- Apollo 16 astronauts John Young and Charles Duke explored the surface of the moon.
  • 1973 --- The yellow ribbon— has long been a symbol of support for absent or missing loved ones. There are some who believe that the tradition of the yellow ribbon dates back as far as the Civil War era, when a yellow ribbon in a woman’s hair indicated that she was “taken” by a man who was absent due to service in the United States Army Cavalry. But research by professional folklorists has found no evidence to support that story. The Library of Congress itself traces the cultural ubiquity of this powerful symbol to the well-known song by Tony Orlando and Dawn: “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree,” which topped the U.S. pop charts on this day. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWn1Oj2V7Xw
  • 1977 --- The musical "Annie," based on the comic strip "Little Orphan Annie," opened on Broadway.
  • 1980 --- Rosie Ruiz, age 26, finishes first in the women’s division of the Boston Marathon with a time of 2:31:56 on April 21, 1980. She was rewarded with a medal, a laurel wreath and a silver bowl; however, eight days later Ruiz is stripped of her victory after race officials learned she jumped into the race about a mile before the finish line.
  • 1989 --- Six days after the death of Hu Yaobang, the deposed reform-minded leader of the Chinese Communist Party, some 100,000 students gather at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square to commemorate Hu and voice their discontent with China’s authoritative communist government. The next day, an official memorial service for Hu Yaobang was held in Tiananmen’s Great Hall of the People, and student representatives carried a petition to the steps of the Great Hall, demanding to meet with Premier Li Peng. The Chinese government refused such a meeting, leading to a general boycott of Chinese universities across the country and widespread calls for democratic reforms.
  • 1992 --- Robert Alton Harris is executed in California’s gas chamber after 13 years on death row. This was California’s first execution since former Chief Justice Rose Bird and two other state Supreme Court justices, Joseph Grodin and Cruz Reynoso, had been rejected by California voters. From 1979 to 1986, the Bird court had reversed 64 out of the 68 death penalty cases on appeal. Supporters of capital punishment initiated a campaign against Bird, Grodin, and Reynoso, successfully ousting them from the court in 1986. Republican Governor George Deukmejian then appointed three justices in favor of the death penalty to take their places.
  • Birthdays
  • Charlotte Bronte
  • John Muir
  • Friederich Froebel
  • Marcel Camus
  • Anthony Quinn
  • Queen Elizabeth II
  • Elaine May
  • Charles Grodin
  • Iggy Pop (James Osterburg)
  • Patti LuPone
  • Tony Danza
  • Michael Franti
  • Nicole Sullivan