348th Day of 2011 / 16 Remaining
7 Days Until Winter Begins
Sunrise:7:18
Sunset:4:52
9 Hr 34 Min
Moon Rise:10:19pm
Moon Set:10:42am
Moon’s Phase: 73 %
The Next Full Moon
January 8 @ 11:32pm
Full Wolf Moon
Full Old Moon
January Amid the cold and deep snows of midwinter, the wolf packs howled hungrily outside Indian villages. Thus, the name for January’s full Moon. Sometimes it was also referred to as the Old Moon, or the Moon After Yule. Some called it the Full Snow Moon, but most tribes applied that name to the next Moon.
Tides
High:2:33am/1:15pm
Low:7:47am/8:02pm
Rainfall
This Year:3.27
Last Year:6.80
YTD Avg:6.39
Annual Avg: 22.28
Holidays
Bill of Rights Day
Cat Herders Day
National Lemon Cupcake Day
Halcyon Day (12/15-29)
Trivial Pursuit Day
Coon Skin Cap Day
Navidades-Puerto Rico
Constitution Day-Nepal
Fast Of Tebet-Israel
Kingdom Day/St Martin
Kingdom Day-Nederlands
This Day In History
1654 --- A meteorological office established in Tuscany began recording daily temperature readings.
1791 --- In the U.S., the first ten amendments to the Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights, went into effect following ratification by the state of Virginia. In September 1789, the first Congress of the United States approved 12 amendments to the U.S. Constitution and sent them to the states for ratification. The amendments were designed to protect the basic rights of U.S. citizens, guaranteeing the freedom of speech, press, assembly, and exercise of religion; the right to fair legal procedure and to bear arms; and that powers not delegated to the federal government would be reserved for the states and the people.
1890 --- American Sioux Indian Chief Sitting Bull and 11 other tribe members were killed in Grand River, SD, during an incident with Indian police working for the U.S. government.
1903 --- Italo Marchiony received a patent for an ice cream cup mold. Initially, he would fold warm waffles into a cup shape. He then developed the 2-piece mold that would make 10 cups at a time.
1939 --- The cinema spectacular, “Gone With the Wind”, premiered at Loew’s Grand Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia. It was the first movie premiere ceremony to be televised. The governor of Georgia proclaimed the day a state holiday in commemoration of the event and the holiday celebrations continued for three days. Earlier the same year on June 27th, a ‘wrap’ party was held to celebrate the completion of the major cinematography of GWTW. David O. Selznick had paid author Margaret Mitchell $50,000 for the movie, and ultimately, the TV rights to her novel. MGM then paid out $1.25 million to help finance the film, to convince Clark Gable to play the role of Rhett Butler, and to receive a fifty percent share of the movie’s profits. Two versions of the film were produced. One contains Rhett Butler’s famous farewell to Scarlett, “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.” For including the word ‘damn’, Selznick was fined $5,000. The other version had Gable’s Butler saying, “Frankly my dear, I just don’t care.”
1941 --- A musical standard was recorded this day on Victor Records. Lena Horne sang the torch classic that became her signature: “Stormy Weather”. “Don’t know why there’s no sun up in the sky. Stormy weather...”
1944 --- A small plane carrying band leader Glenn Miller disappeared on a flight from England to Paris. Forty years later a British bomber crew admitted they had accidentally dropped bombs onto Miller's plane over the English Channel.
1954 --- "Davy Crockett" debuted on TV's "Disneyland". Within weeks, millions of kids were wearing coonskin caps (though the real Davy, himself, never wore one).
1961 --- Former Nazi official Adolf Eichmann was sentenced to death in Jerusalem by an Israeli court. He had been tried on charges for organizing the deportation of Jews to concentration camps.
1964 --- Canada adopted the maple leaf as the official symbol for its national flag.
1973 --- The American Psychiatric Association reversed a longstanding position and declared for the first time that homosexuality was not a mental illness.
1979 --- Canadians Chris Haney and Scott Abbott, who created the “Trivial Pursuit” game
1970 --- The Soviet probe Venera 7 became the first spacecraft to land softly on the surface of Venus. The probe only survived the extreme heat and pressure for about 23 minutes and transmitted the first data received on Earth from the surface of another planet.
1993 --- The prime ministers of Britain and the Republic of Ireland (John Major and Albert Reynolds respectively) made the "Downing Street Declaration," stating the basis for trying to achieve peace in Northern Ireland.
1998 --- Andrew Lloyd Webber was acquitted on charges that he plagiarized a 20-year-old song to write the theme from "The Phantom Of The Opera."
2000 --- New York Senator-elect Hillary Rodham Clinton agreed to accept an $8 million book deal with Simon & Schuster. The book was to be about her eight years in the White House. The advance was the highest ever to be paid to a member of the U.S. Congress.
2001 --- It was announced that Siena Heights University would begin offering a class called "Animated Philosophy and Religion." The two-credit class would cover how religion and philosophy are part of popular culture and is based on the television series "The Simpsons."
Birthdays
Don Johnson
Helen Slater
Adam Brody
Tim Conway
Dave Clark
Mo Vaughn
Cindy Birdsong
J Paul Getty
Emperor Nero
Gustave Eiffel
Charles Duryea
Buddy Cole
Alan Freed
Clyde McPhatter
Paul Simonon