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Almanac - Monday 12/14/20

Chestnuts Roasted, by flickr user LexnGer

It's Roasted Chestnuts day...

Today is Monday December 14, 2020

It is the 349th day of the year

17 days remain until the end of the year.

7 days until winter begins

The sun rises at 7:18 am

and sunset will be at 4:52 pm.

Today we will have 9 hours and 34 minutes of daylight.

The solar transit will be at 12:05 pm

The first low tide was at 4:13 am

The only high tide of the day will be at 10:32 am.

and the final low tide at Aquatic Park will be at 5:15 pm.

New Moon this morning at 8:17 am

There will be Total Solar Eclipse this morning

Best visible in central Chile and Argentina from 5:33 am SF time to 10:53 am PST

You can watch it on space.com

Today is…

Free Shipping Day

Green Monday

Monkey Day

National Bouillabaisse Day

Roast Chestnuts Day

Today is also…

Alabama Day (Alabama)

1819 – Alabama becomes the 22nd U.S. state.

Forty-seven Ronin Remembrance Day in Sengaku-ji, Tokyo

Martyred Intellectuals Day in Bangladesh

On this day in history…

1896 – The Glasgow Underground Railway is opened by the Glasgow District Subway Company.

1900 – Quantum mechanics: Max Planck presents a theoretical derivation of his black-body radiation law.

1902 – The Commercial Pacific Cable Company lays the first Pacific telegraph cable, from San Francisco to Honolulu.

1903 – The Wright brothers make their first attempt to fly with the Wright Flyer at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

1911 – Roald Amundsen's team, comprising himself, Olav Bjaaland, Helmer Hanssen, Sverre Hassel, and Oscar Wisting, becomes the first to reach the South Pole.

1940 – Plutonium (specifically Pu-238) is first isolated at Berkeley, California.

1972 – Apollo program: Eugene Cernan is the last person to walk on the moon, after he and Harrison Schmitt complete the third and final extravehicular activity (EVA) of the Apollo 17 mission.

1985 – Wilma Mankiller takes office as the first woman elected to serve as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation.

2008 – Muntadhar al-Zaidi throws his shoes at then-U.S. President George W. Bush during a press conference in Baghdad, Iraq.

2012 – Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting: Twenty-eight people, including the gunman, are killed in Newtown, Connecticut.

2017 – The Walt Disney Company announces that it would acquire 21st Century Fox, including the 20th Century Fox movie studio, for $52.4 billion.

…and if today is your birthday, Happy Birthday To You!  You get to share birthday cake with…

1852 – Daniel De Leon, Curaçaoan-American journalist and politician (d. 1914)

1895 – George VI of the United Kingdom (d. 1952)

1896 – Jimmy Doolittle, American general and pilot, Medal of Honor recipient (d. 1993)

1897 – Margaret Chase Smith, American educator and politician (d. 1995)

1904 – Virginia Coffey, American civil rights activist (d. 2003)

1908 – Morey Amsterdam, American actor, singer, and screenwriter (d. 1996)

1911 – Spike Jones, American singer and bandleader (d. 1965)

1916 – Shirley Jackson, American novelist and short story writer (d. 1965)

1917 – June Taylor, American dancer and choreographer (d. 2004)

1918 – James T. Aubrey, American broadcaster (d. 1994)

1918 – B. K. S. Iyengar, Indian yoga instructor and author, founded Iyengar Yoga (d. 2014)

1920 – Clark Terry, American trumpet player, composer, and educator (d. 2015)

1922 – Don Hewitt, American journalist and producer, created 60 Minutes (d. 2009)

1932 – Charlie Rich, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 1995)

1935 – Lee Remick, American actress (d. 1991)

1946 – Patty Duke, American actress (d. 2016)

1947 – Christopher Parkening, American guitarist and educator

1947 – Dilma Rousseff, Brazilian economist and politician, 36th President of Brazil

1948 – Lester Bangs, American journalist and author (d. 1982)

1960 – James Comey, 7th Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

1965 – Ted Raimi, American actor, director, and screenwriter

1970 – Beth Orton, English singer-songwriter and guitarist