#1783 The first American daily newspaper

[scotianostra]

On January 27th 1784 the newspaper the Glasgow Herald was published for the first time.

As the birth of America brought the decline of the city’s lucrative tobacco trade and an end to its first phase of imperial expansion, the first issue of a newspaper called The Glasgow Advertiser was published.

When John Mennons - writer, editor, printer and publisher of The Glasgow Advertiser - sold the few hundred copies of his first issue around the coffee houses of Glasgow in 1783, he was already dealing with international businessmen, the tobacco lords and the other members of the Merchants’ House who traded with the Americas and Caribbean, who owned plantations and mansions across the Atlantic and whose fortunes would provide the basis for Glasgow’s early and hugely successful participation in the Industrial Revolution. The American colonies were lost, but the city continued to trade across the Atlantic, and soon added businesses in Africa, Australia and the Far East.

That first issue of The Herald showed the international interests of the Glasgow business community. On the front page alone there was intelligence from London, Dresden, Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Jamaica, New York, Gibraltar and Madrid, and reports of ships belonging to the East India Company sailing for Africa and the South Sea (the South China Sea). In addition, a disapproving account of the princes and princesses of Europe changing their religion “as if it were part of their dress” when marrying for family or national advantage was enlivened by the news that the Sultan of the Ottomans (Turkey) and the Sophia of Persia (Iran) had sent ambassadors to south Germany to ask for the hands in marriage of two princesses of the House of Wurttemberg.

The Glasgow Herald is the longest running national newspaper in the world and is the eighth oldest daily paper in the world. The paper was originally named the Glasgow Advertiser, and after a short spell as The Herald and Advertiser and Commercial Chronicle, became The Glasgow Herald in 1804.

The paper’s first editor John Mennons worked from offices at Duncan’s Land on Gibson’s Wynd, with the company moving to ‘The Lighthouse’ in Mitchell Street in 1895,the building is creditted cto architect John Keppie, but he apprenticed the young Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

On the 19th of July, 1980, the paper moved to offices in Albion Street. It is currently printed at Carmyle just south east of Glasgow.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 11.3 (before 1960)

361 – Emperor Constantius II dies of a fever at Mopsuestia in Cilicia; on his deathbed he is baptised and declares his cousin Julian rightful successor. 1333 – The River Arno floods causing massive damage in Florence as recorded by the Florentine chronicler Giovanni Villani. 1468 – Liège is sacked by Charles I of Burgundy's troops. 1492 – Peace of Etaples between Henry VII of England and Charles VIII of France. 1493 – Christopher Columbus first sights the island of Dominica in the Caribbean Sea. 1534 – English Parliament passes the first Act of Supremacy, making King Henry VIII head of the Anglican Church, supplanting the pope and the Roman Catholic Church. 1783 – The American Continental Army is disbanded. 1793 – French playwright, journalist and feminist Olympe de Gouges is guillotined. 1812 – Napoleon's armies are defeated at the Battle of Vyazma. 1817 – The Bank of Montreal, Canada's oldest chartered bank, opens in Montreal. 1838 – The Times of India, the world's largest circulated English language daily broadsheet newspaper is founded as The Bombay Times and Journal of Commerce. 1848 – A greatly revised Dutch constitution, which transfers much authority from the king to his parliament and ministers, is proclaimed. 1867 – Giuseppe Garibaldi and his followers are defeated in the Battle of Mentana and fail to end the Pope's Temporal power in Rome (it would be achieved three years later). 1868 – John Willis Menard (R-LA) was the first African American elected to the United States Congress. Because of an electoral challenge, he was never seated. 1881 – The Mapuche uprising of 1881 begins in Chile. 1898 – France withdraws its troops from Fashoda (now in Sudan), ending the Fashoda Incident. 1903 – With the encouragement of the United States, Panama separates from Colombia. 1908 – William Howard Taft is elected the 27th President of the United States. 1911 – Chevrolet officially enters the automobile market in competition with the Ford Model T. 1918 – The German Revolution of 1918–19 begins when 40,000 sailors take over the port in Kiel. 1920 – Russian Civil War: The Russian Army retreats to Crimea, after a successful offensive by the Red Army and Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine. 1929 – The Gwangju Student Independence Movement occurred. 1930 – Getúlio Vargas becomes Head of the Provisional Government in Brazil after a bloodless coup on October 24. 1932 – Panagis Tsaldaris becomes the 142nd Prime Minister of Greece. 1935 – George II of Greece regains his throne through a popular, though possibly fixed, plebiscite. 1936 – Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected the 32nd President of the United States. 1942 – World War II: The Koli Point action begins during the Guadalcanal Campaign and ends on November 12. 1943 – World War II: Five hundred aircraft of the U.S. 8th Air Force devastate Wilhelmshaven harbor in Germany. 1944 – World War II: Two supreme commanders of the Slovak National Uprising, Generals Ján Golian and Rudolf Viest, are captured, tortured and later executed by German forces. 1946 – The Constitution of Japan is adopted through Emperor's assent. 1949 – Chinese Civil War: The Battle of Dengbu Island occurs. 1950 – Air India Flight 245 crashes into Mont Blanc, while on approach to Geneva Airport, killing all 48 people on board. 1956 – Suez Crisis: The Khan Yunis killings by the Israel Defense Forces in Egyptian-controlled Gaza result in the deaths of 275 Palestinians. 1956 – Hungarian Revolution: A new Hungarian government is formed, in which many members of banned non-Communist parties participate. János Kádár and Ferenc Münnich form a counter-government in Moscow as Soviet troops prepare for the final assault. 1957 – Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit, a dog named Laika.

[thedhananjayaparkhe]

DYK and TIQ

Did you know… … that today is American Daily Newspaper Day? In 1783, the Pennsylvania Evening Post was published by Benjamin Towner of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was the first daily newspaper published in America.~~~ Today’s Inspirational Quote: “Character is the ability to carry out a good resolution long after the excitement of the moment has passed.”— Cavett Robert

[bobmccullochny]

History

May 30, 1783 - The Pennsylvania Evening Post became the first daily newspaper published in America.

May 30, 1922 - The Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., was dedicated. The Memorial was designed by architect Henry Bacon and features a compelling statue of "Seated Lincoln" by sculptor Daniel Chester French.

May 30, 1943 - During World War II in the Pacific, the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska were retaken by the U.S. 7th Infantry Division. The battle began on May 12 when an American force of 11,000 landed on Attu. In three weeks of fighting U.S. casualties numbered 552 killed and 1,140 wounded. Japanese killed numbered 2,352, with only 28 taken prisoner, as 500 chose suicide rather than be captured.

Birthday - Founder of the Russian empire Peter the Great (1672-1725) was born near Moscow. He vastly increased the power of the Russian monarchy and turned his backward country into a major power in the Western world. Among his accomplishments, he completely overhauled the government and the Greek Orthodox Church as well as the military system and tax structure. He built St. Petersburg, established printing presses and published translations of foreign books, modernized the calendar, simplified the Russian alphabet and introduced Arabic numerals. He died at age 52 and was succeeded by his wife Catherine.

[esatyabca]

Today in History, 30 May

Today in History, 30 May

Today in History, May 30

  1416 Jerome of Prague is burned as a heretic by the Church. 1431 Joan of Arc is burned at the stake by the English. 1527 The University of Marburg is founded in Germany. 1539 Hernando de Soto lands in Florida with 600 soldiers in search of gold. 1783 The first American daily newspaper, The Pennsylvania Evening Post, begins publishing in Philadelphia.

[nordleuchten]

La Fayette in Prison - Part 2 - Magdeburg

After Wesel, off we go to Magdeburg. Here La Fayette and his fellow prisoners stayed from January 4, 1793 until January 4, 1794.  Just like Wesel, Magdeburg was and still is a prominent city in modern-day Germany (back then in Prussia). And just like Wesel, Magdeburg lies near a river, the Elbe to be precise. And again, the prison laid inside the city’s fortress. Large parts of the fortress are still intact and are the sites of numerous activities throughout the years, such as re-enactments, historic festivals, historic guided tour ... visitors are also free to request an individual guided tour, unrelated to any other activity. La Fayette is once more named as a noteworthy inmate by the Homepage of the organisation charged with taking care of the fortress. But he was far from the most prominent inmate – Germans at least will recognise the names of Fritz Reuter and Werner von Siemens (the guy who founded the company “Siemens”). Whoever created the Homepage either did not do their research or disliked La Fayette. It is stated that La Fayette attempted an coup d’état that failed and that he initiated the Champ the Mars massacre ... both statements are grossly oversimplified at best and utter nonsense at worst. During La Fayette’s stay Ludwig Karl von Kalkstein (then a Lieutenant-General) was the Governor of the prison and Otto Kasimir von Meerschneidt (then a Major-General) was its Commander.

La Fayette and is fellow Frenchmen were brought to Magdeburg by means of an open cart. What was in all likelihood intended to degrade them further, was actually a blessing for the prisoners. They now had fresh air and the open, blue sky in abundance, something that had been denied to them all those months prior. Something else happened as well. People recognized these august men and apparently also cheered for them. Where the Prussian and Austrian authorities had a keen dislike for La Fayette, the population was in large parts in favour of him (more on that in a bit). Though he may have been touched by the cheering, such outpours of affection did not help La Fayette endear himself to his jailers – not at all. Nevertheless, conditions at Magdeburg were better ... far from good, but better.

La Fayette was allowed to obtain some books. Among other things he read mostly about agriculture and this knowledge would later come in handy when he ventured into the farming business after his return to France in 1799. He was furthermore allowed to write and receive letter ... but there was a twist. You see, when a letter for La Fayette arrived, the authorities in Magdeburg would open it, read it and decide if La Fayette was allowed to receive this letter. If so, they would go into his cell and read the letter aloud to him exactly once. If he was allowed to reply, his letters were checked and if there was something in them that did not please his jailors, well, the letter then moved directly into the bin. Lovely!

Nevertheless, things were looking up for La Fayette and he started writing letters to the full extent of his possibilities. Although he ached to let his wife Adrienne know that he was more or less okay, he did nor dare to write her. She was still imprisoned in France and La Fayette feared that somebody there might recognise his handwriting and subsequently destroy the letter. Instead he tried to reach his English and American friends (both in America and as envoys in Europe).

La Fayette described his cell in a letter to an unknown friend in England:

“Imagine an opening made under the rampart of the citadel, and surrounded with a strong, high palisade; through this, after opening four doors, each armed with chains, bars, and padlocks, they come, not without some difficulty and noise, to my cell, three paces wide five and a half long. The wall is mouldy on the side towards the ditch, and the front one admits light, but not sunshine, through a little grated window. Add to this two sentinels, -- whose eyes penetrate into this lower region, but who are kept outside the palisade, lest they should speak other watchers not belonging to the guard, and all the walls ramparts, ditches, guards, within and without the citadel of Magdeburg, and you will think that the foreign powers neglect nothing to keep us within their dominions. The noisy opening of the four doors is repeated every morning to admit my servant; at dinner, that I may eat in presence of the commandant of the citadel and of the guard; and at night, to take my servant to his prison. After having shut upon me all the doors, the commandant carries off the keys to the room where, since our arrival, the king has ordered him to sleep. I have books, the white leaves of which are taken out, but no news, no newspapers no communications, -- neither pen, ink, paper, nor pencil. It is a wonder that I possess this sheet, and I am writing with a toothpick. My health fails daily (…).”

(I am a bit irked by the fact, that I can neither associated an recipient nor an exact date with the letter. The letter otherwise seems authentic and the content is similar to other letters by La Fayette that we have more information on – that being said, I gave the letter a pass although its provenance is not what I would like it to be.)

I have seen some people argue that La Fayette mostly managed to keep his spirits up, because he did not complained an awful lot in his letters – but when assessing such a statement, you have to keep in mind that La Fayette really could not complain a lot in his letters, otherwise they would never be posted. It is true though, that there were small betterments. I already mentioned the letters and books, but he and the other prisoners were also allowed to take regular walks in the yard of the prison. They walked separated from each other and were heavily guarded. But La Fayette fell ill again, this time with a fever. His illness was not as serious though as it had been at Wesel.

La Fayette also received some money from his friends in America. Some of his friends, such like Washington, privately send money for La Fayette to use. Thomas Jefferson, then Secretary of State, found a way for the Government to pay La Fayette some money. He argued that La Fayette had offered to serve in the Continental Army without pay but that there was no official document of the Continental Congress accepting this offer. It follows that the Treasury owned La Fayette six years of pay and furthermore ten years worth of interests since they had “forgotten” to pay him the money since the end of the war ten years prior. Jefferson wrote a letter to Washington on December 30, 1793:

“Soon after his captivity and imprisonment, and before the ministers had received our instructions to endeavor to obtain his liberation, they were apprised that his personal restraint, and the peculiar situation of his fortune disabled him from drawing resources from that, and would leave him liable to suffer for subsistence, and the common necessaries of life. After a consultation by letter, therefore, between our ministers at Paris, London, and the Hague, they concurred in opinion that they ought not in such a case to wait for instructions from hence, but that his necessities should be provided for until they could receive such instructions. Different sums have been therefore either placed at his disposal, or answered on his draughts, amounting, as far as we hitherto know to about twelve or thirteen hundred Guineas. This has been taken from a fund not applicable by law to this purpose nor able to spare it: and the question is whether, and how it is to be made good? To do this, nothing more is requisite than that the United States should not avail themselves of the Liberalities of M. de la Fayette, yielded at a moment when neither he nor we could foresee the time when they would become his only resource for subsistence. It appears by a statement from the war office, hereto annexed, that his pay and commutation as a major General in the service of the United States to the 3rd of nov. 1783 amounted to 24,100 dollrs thirteen Cents exclusive of ten years interest elapsed since that time, to the payment of which the following obstacle has occurred. at the foot of the original engagement by Mr Deane, a copy of which is hereto annexed, that a certain roll of officers there named, and of which M. de la Fayette was one, should be taken into the american service in the grades there specified, M. de la Fayette alone has subjoined for himself a declaration that he would serve without any particular allowance or pension. It may be doubted whether the words in the original French do strictly include the general allowance of pay and commutation. and if they do, there is no evidence of any act of acceptance by Congress. Yet, under all the circumstances of the case, it is thought that the legislature alone is competent to decide it. If they decline availing the United States of the declaration of M. de la Fayette, it leaves a fund which not only covers the advances which have been made, but will enable you take measures for his future relief. It does it too, in a way which can give offence to nobody, since none have a right to complain of the payment of a debt, that being a moral duty, from which we cannot be discharged by any relation in which the creditor may be placed as to them.”

Washington forwarded the letter to the Congress and on March 27, 1794 Congress passed a bill to pay La Fayette the money he had not accepted as a General during the Revolutionary War. To nobody’s surprise, neither Congress nor President Washington had any objections and the bill was approved swiftly.

Prisons in the 18th century (as well as today) often development into some sort of parallel society. Money and especially bribery could get you far in prison and La Fayette experienced that first hand. On November 18, 1809 La Fayette enclosed an account of his financial situation in a letter to Thomas Jefferson. It seems as if this lengthy report had been written by one of La Fayette’s secretaries. Here is a short excerpt of the English translation of the report:

“The expenses caused by his captivity were enormous; the prisoners had to pay their own way as long as their money lasted, and as General Lafayette was the only one with some money, he had to take responsibility for his fellow prisoners. But this was a small matter in comparison with all that his European friends did financially to save his life, to correspond with him, and to facilitate his escape. Some of them made great personal sacrifices, and the sums generously sent by the American government were swallowed up. General Lafayette’s family provided for its own expenses while living in Olmutz. So that on arriving at Hamburg after an imprisonment of five years he found nothing of what had been intended for him and only an increased debt to Mr. Gouverneur Morris up to the time when he was paid 68000.₶; to Mr. Parish former United States consul, forty three thousand Livres; to Mr. Bollman a contract reduced to 30000.₶”

(You see, a great deal of the financial troubles and transactions came after his stay in Magdeburg but since everything started in Magdeburg, I thought it convenient to discuss the monetary issue here in full.)

We see the United States taking actions to the best of their abilities and we see also more letters discussing La Fayette’s fate. News travelled slowly in the 18th century and it took the three months that La Fayette stayed in Wesel for the world to find out that he even had been arrested. But after the knowledge was out there, we see an increase in letters and also in newspaper coverage. So much so that Adrienne could read in the French newspapers that La Fayette was presently alive and in Magdeburg. We can further observe that people all other he world started petitioning the Prussian King for La Fayette’s relief. His friends, English Members of Parliament (although it would take a couple more years before the House of Commons would discuss the topic in full), Washington and his friends in America, Americas envoys in Europe, the list goes on. Some of La Fayette’s fellow prisoners, mostly unassuming secretaries and aids, had been released almost immediately and were now also trying to secure La Fayette’s freedom – some even returned to France to do so. We also see Prussians citizen petition their King. Most of these petitions were simple letters, but some petitioners had the money to spare and printed their petitions as pamphlets – many of them can today be found online.

Although the instructions for the guard were not less strict then they had been in Wesel, the guards in Magdeburg appeared to love to gossip. During his stay La Fayette was kept more or less up to date on the newest developments in France and the war. Eight months into his stay in Magdeburg he was also given some news about his wife Adrienne. La Fayette wrote Charles Pinckney in London on July 4, 1793:

My dear Sir,

Whilst on this anniversary my American fellow citizens are having their joy, I join in a solitary bumper with the happy remembrances, the patriotic wishes which are crowding upon us (...) Owning to your kind interference, my dear Sir, the crowned gaolers have consented after eight months to let me know that my wife and children were alive – be pleased to acquaint them that my health is tolerably good (...).

(Can we please acknowledge the fact that La Fayette took the time out of his day and remembered that it was the anniversary of American Independence?)

There is another letter that I want to give the spotlight. La Fayette wrote on March 15, 1793 to his friend, the Princess d’Hénin. In this letter he wrote that:

“I know not what disposition has been made of my plantation at Cayenne; but I hope Madame de Lafayette will take care that the negroes, who cultivated it, shall preserve their liberty.”

La Fayette had bought a plantation in the French colony of Cayenne and implemented a system of gradual emancipation. The plantation was later sold by French authorities and the people there re-enslaved. Although his endeavour ultimately failed I found it interesting to see that La Fayette, even during such a dark hour, thought about others as well.

Before we move on to the next prison, this time in Neisse, on last titbit. The Baron von Steuben, the absolutely legendary legend, was born in Magdeburg and as a man of military background probably spend some time in the fortress as well.

[rabbitcruiser]

Benjamin Franklin Day

Founding Father Benjamin Franklin was born on this day in 1706, in Boston, making today Ben Franklin Day. He was a polymath, or expert in many subjects. Some of the titles that could be given to him are inventor, scientist, politician, diplomat, civic activist, printer, author, postmaster, and mapmaker. He also founded or was a part of many organizations and groups.

Franklin was the tenth and youngest son of a soap and candle maker, Josiah Franklin, and Josiah's second wife, Abiah Folger. The elder Franklin wanted his son to follow the path of a preacher, but did not have the money to send him to school. Benjamin only attended school up until the age of ten, when he began working full-time in his father's shop. At the age of twelve he was sent to apprentice his older brother James, who was a printer. James started The New England Courant in Boston when Benjamin was fifteen. Benjamin wanted to be printed in the paper, but James would not allow it. So, he wrote letters under name of Silence Dogood, a fictional widow, and slid them under the print shop door at night. The fourteen letters he wrote were published; they gave advice and were filled with critical observations of the world. Benjamin eventually confessed to writing them, and James was not happy. Later, after harassment and beating at the hands of his brother, Benjamin ended up running away to New York, and then ended up in Philadelphia in 1723.

In Philadelphia, Franklin found work as an apprentice printer. He then went to England for several months of print work. He came back to Philadelphia and helped out a printer, but eventually borrowed money and set up his own printing business a few years later. Franklin bought the Pennsylvania Gazette in 1729, which became the most widely read newspaper in the colonies. He printed it and contributed pieces under aliases.

In 1728, Franklin had a son, William; it is not known who the mother was. In 1730, he married Deborah Read; it was a common-law marriage, as Read's first husband had deserted her. The Franklin's had two children: Francis, born in 1732, died at the age of four from smallpox. Sarah was born in 1743.

The Library Company, the nation's first subscription library, was founded by Franklin in 1731. He started publishing Poor Richard's Almanack in 1733, under the pseudonym of "Richard Saunders." Its lively writing and witty aphorisms separated it from other Almanacs of the day, and it was printed for twenty-five years. The first fire department of Philadelphia, the Union Fire Company, was organized by Franklin in 1736. Franklin also worked for environmental cleanup in the city, and launched projects and advocated for paved and lit streets. The first learned society in the country, the American Philosophical Society, was launched with the help of Franklin. In 1751, he brought together another group of people to form the Pennsylvania Hospital.

Franklin's bright mind came up with many inventions. His 1752 kite and key experiment demonstrated that lightning was electricity, and he also invented the lightning rod. He came up with other electricity related terms that we still use today, such as "battery." He invented a fireplace that became known as the "Franklin stove." Compared to the popular fireplaces of its time, it gave off more heat and used less fuel. Franklin refused to patent it, and wanted his invention to serve others freely. Franklin invented bifocals, which could be used for both distance and reading. He even invented a musical instrument, the armonica, which Beethoven and Mozart wrote music for. He charted the Gulf Stream and gave it its name, and suggested the idea for, and helped design the first penny in the United States.

In 1757, Franklin went to England to represent the Penn family over who should represent the colony. Until 1775 most of his time was spent in England. He served as a Colonial representative for Pennsylvania, Georgia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. His wife Deborah died in 1774, while he was still in London.

Franklin was originally a loyalist, but after the 1765 Stamp Act his views shifted. He testified before Parliament, helping persuade members of that body to repeal the law. He later became embroiled in what became known as the "Hutchinson Affair." Thomas Hutchinson, an English appointed governor, had written letters that had called for the lessening of liberties of colonists. Franklin got ahold of the letters and sent them to America. He was condemned publicly, and soon came back home.

He was elected to the Second Continental Congress, and was part of the committee of five that drafted the Declaration of Independence. He also was a signer of the Declaration. He was the first Postmaster General of the United States; long after his death he was honored by being put on the first US postage stamp.

He left America to become the first Ambassador to France. During this time he helped secure a treaty with them in 1778. He also helped to secure loans during the war. When the guns fell silent, he was present at signing of Treaty of Paris in 1783, which formally ended the war.

Franklin returned to his home country, and became a delegate at the Constitutional Convention; he signed the Constitution, being the oldest person to do so. Although Franklin owned slaves early in his life, his views changed over time, and in his last years he worked for the abolition of slavery. After suffering from gout and other ailments, he died on April 17, 1790, at his daughter Sarah's home. His funeral was attended by 20,000 people.

It is fitting a day would be dedicated to Benjamin Franklin, as he is so much more than just the man on the $100 bill. The breadth and scope of his achievements are almost unparalleled, not only in his political contributions to a fledgling country, but in his many other pursuits as well.

Here are just some of his accomplishments and activities: As writer/printer/publisher:

wrote as Silence Dogood in The New England Courant

published Poor Richard's Almanack for twenty-five years

owned the Pennsylvania Gazette

wrote an acclaimed autobiography

As an inventor:

"Franklin stove"

proved lightning is electricity and invented the lightning rod

bifocals

swim fins

carriage odometer

armonica

flexible catheter

As a founder:

The Library Company—the country's first subscription library

Union Fire Company of Philadelphia—the first fire department of Pennsylvania

American Philosophical Society

Pennsylvania Hospital

As a politician:

Colonial representative in England

member of Second Continental Congress

first Postmaster General of the United States

helped draft the Declaration of Independence and signed it

first ambassador to France

present at signing of Treaty of Paris

delegate to Constitutional Convention and signed Constitution

How to Observe

One way to celebrate the day is to follow the example he left of living a full life. Maybe you can start to do this by following his daily schedule. Learning more about the man may be a good way to celebrate his birthday and life as well. Why not read the man's own words in his Autobiography? You could also read his Silence Dogood letters, or some of Poor Richard's Almanack. Besides reading his own words, you could read books about him, or explore resources at the Library of Congress. Once you tire of reading you could find and watch the PBS mini-series on Franklin. Finally, you could plan a trip to visit his grave and the Benjamin Franklin Museum in Philadelphia.

Source

Benjamin Franklin, an American polymath and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, was born on January 17. 1706.

[blogloudqueenstudent-blog]

Media History Timeline

4000 B.C. – Sumerian stamp seals

3100 B.C. – Sumerian “writing” system on clay tablets

2000 B.C. – Phoenician alphabet

1900-1800 B.C. – Semitic alphabet in Egypt

600 B.C. – Egyptian papyrus scrolls

540 B.C. – Public library in Athens

105 A.D. – Chinese paper (didn’t arrive in West for centuries)

1450 – Gutenberg press (leads to Protestant Revolution, among other things)

1517 – Martin Luther nails “Ninety Five Theses” to church door in Wittenberg, Germany

1534 – first press in America (Spanish America)

1500s – Italian gazettes

1618 – Dutch Coranto (printed in English in 1620)

1638 – first press in what would become U.S. (Harvard College)

1644 – John Milton denounces licensing of the press in Areopagitica

1665 – Oxford Gazette (first English-language newspaper) in England

1690 – First American newspaper: Publick Occurrences (lasts one issue)

1704 – First successful American newspaper: The Boston News-Letter

1735 – John Peter Zenger trial

1741 – First American magazines

1783-1833 – Rise of Party Press

1791 – Bill of Rights (including First Amendment) ratified

1798 – Alien and Sedition Acts passed

1821 – Saturday Evening Post founded

1827 – First African-American newspaper in U.S.: Freedom’s Journal

1828 – First Native American newspaper in U.S.: Cherokee Phoenix

1828 – Noah Webster publishes first dictionary

1833s – New York Sun begins publication; rise of the Penny Press

1844 – Samuel Morse granted patent for telegraph. First message, May 24: “What hath God wrought?”  Second message: “Have you any news?”

1848 – Associated Press founded

1860-1865 – Civil War brings home “necessity” of news

1877 – Thomas Edison invents the “talking machine”

1888 – Edison lab develops movie camera

1888 – George Eastman introduces the Kodak camera

1888 – Heinrich Hertz transmits wireless sound waves

1890 – Linotype machine introduced at newspapers

1891 –Edison patents Kinetoscope – first parlor opens 1894 in New York

1890s – first “New Journalism” period; ���Yellow Journalism”

1890s – Edison develops mass market phonograph

1894 – Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World starts daily women’s page

1899 – “Stunt girl” Nellie Bly circles the world

1901 – Guglielmo Marconi sends and receives radio message across the Atlantic (Morse code, point to point)

1900s – Muckraking magazines

1905 – First “nickelodeon”

1906 – Reginald Fessenden broadcasts voice

1911 – Newsreels begin; continue into 1960s

1912 – Titanic sinks; leads to Federal Radio Act of 1912

1914-1918 – World War I propaganda, censorship, technology

1915 – D.W. Griffith releases Birth of a Nation, first full-length film to significantly impact culture

1917 – Charlie Chaplin becomes the first entertainer to earn $1 million

1919 – RCA founded

1920 – First radio stations in U.S. and Canada

1920s – “Jazz Journalism” tabloids

1922 – Reader’s Digest magazine founded

1923 – Lee de Forest shows first “talkie”

1923 – Time magazine debuts

1923 – A.C. Nielsen company begins

1923 – AT&T links two radio stations for first “network”

1927 – Federal Radio Act sets up commission to regulate airwaves

1927 – Philo Farnsworth applies for electronic TV patents

1927 – The Jazz Singer released

1928 – Academy Awards given for the first time (Wings wins Best Picture)

1930s & 40s – “Golden Age of Movies”

1933 – Eleanor Roosevelt insists on women-only press conferences (“the Roosevelt Rule”)

1934 – Federal Communications Commission  (FCC) established

1936 – England is first country with regular TV broadcasts

1936 – Life magazine debuts

1938 – Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds” broadcast

1939 – TV is a hit at the World’s Fair

1939 – First FM radio station started in New Jersey

1941 – First TV commercial advertises a Bulova clock

1941 – Welles’s Citizen Kane released; sometimes called the best movie of all time

1942 – John H. Johnson starts Negro Digest; would later found Ebony and Jet

1947 – Red Scare leads to congressional investigation of Hollywood

1948 – Supreme Court hands down Paramount Decision

1950 – Red Channels: The Communist Influence in Radio and Television ruins careers

1950s – “Golden Age of Television”

1951 – “I Love Lucy” debuts; uses film and three cameras

1952 – FCC lifts “the Freeze” imposed in 1948

1952 – Eisenhower runs 20-second campaign spot

1953 – TV Guide magazine debuts; Lucille Ball and her newborn son on first cover

1953 – Playboy magazine introduced; Marilyn Monroe is first centerfold

1954 – Edward R. Murrow’s “See It Now” focuses on Joseph McCarthy

1954 – Elvis Presley discovered by Sam Phillips of Sun Records

1958 – videotape introduced

1959 – Quiz show scandal rocks television industry

1960 – Kennedy-Nixon debate

1963 – Network news expands from 15 minutes to 30 minutes

1963 – Betty Friedan writes The Feminine Mystique

1964 – New York Times v. Sullivan gives press new right to criticize public officials

1964 – The Beatles first tour America

1965-1970s – Second “New Journalism” period; literary journalism; underground newspapers

1967 – Congress passes Public Broadcasting Act; PBS formed

Late 1960s – Internet formed for exchange of ideas, not available to general public

1969 – Neal Armstrong walks on moon; we see it on TV

1969 – ABC introduces made-for-TV movies

1970 – Feminists stage sit-in at Ladies Home Journal

1972 – Ms. magazine launched

1972 – Life magazine died; came back as monthly from 1978 to 2000

1972 – Boylan v. New York Times sex discrimination lawsuit filed

1972 – Cigarette advertising banned from TV

1974 – Richard Nixon resigns, a result of Watergate coverage

1974 – People magazine introduced

1975 – Home Box Office (formed by Time, Inc. in 1972) begins satellite distribution of TV; Ted Turner starts first “superstation”

1975 – Sony Betamax home videocassette recorder introduced

1976 – Matsushita introduces VHS

1978 – laser disc player introduced; largely a failure, but opened door for CDs

1979 – Sony Walkman appears in Japan

1979 – Iranian hostage crisis leads to “Nightline” and loss by Jimmy Carter to a former radio broadcaster and movie actor

1980 – “Who Shot J.R.?” on “Dallas” is first TV season-ending cliff-hanger

1981 – MTV (Music Television) first airs; first video is “Video Killed the Radio Star”

1982 – USA Today begins publication

1982 – Home shopping network debuts

1983 – Sony introduces CD player

1990s – Internet access opened to general public; changes everything

1996 – Telecommunications Act of 1996 brings V-chip, deregulation, and dramatic increase in mergers and takeovers

[ohhthatssosarella]

May 30

[1252] King of Castile and Leon, Ferdinand III died.

[1381] An unpopular poll tax helped spark the Peasants' Revolt, the first great popular rebellion in English history.

[1416] Czech philosopher, Jerome of Prague was burned as a heretic by the Church.

[1431] French heroine, Joan of Arc wss burned at the stake by an English-dominated tribunal in Rouen, France.

[1527] The University of Marburg was founded in Germany.

[1574] King of France, Charles IX died.

[1640] Flemish painter, Peter Paul Rubens died.

[1640] French historian, André Duchesne died.

[1695] French painter, Pierre Mignard died.

[1783] The first American daily newspaper, The Pennsylvania Evening Post, began publishing in Philadelphia.

[1814] The first of the Treaties of Paris was signed, ending the Napoleonic Wars.

[1814] Russian anarchist, Mikhail Bakunin was born.

[1840] English society hostess, Mary Monckton, Countess of Cork and Orrery died.

[1845] King of Spain, Amadeus was born.

[1846] Russian jeweler, Peter Carl Fabergé was born.

[1848] William Young patents the ice cream freezer.

[1854] The Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed.

[1868] "Decoration Day", later called Memorial Day is first observed in Northern U.S. states.

[1868] Ottoman Prince and Caliph, Abdülmecid II was born.

[1889] The brassiere was invented.

[1913] Treaty of London, signed by the Great Powers, the Ottoman Empire, and the victorious Balkan League brought an end to the First Balkan War.

[1916] Confederate military officer and statesman, John Singleton Mosby died.

[1922] The Lincoln Memorial, honouring Abraham Lincoln, was dedicated in Washington, D.C..

[1941] King of Siam, Prajadhipok died.

[1942] During World War II the British Royal Air Force dispatched more than 1000 bombers against Cologne, Germany.

[1950] French politician, Bertrand Delanoë was born.

[1961] Rafael Trujillo, an army officer who had become dictator of the Dominican Republican following a military revolt in 1930, was assassinated.

[1971] NASA launched Mariner 9, the first satellite to orbit Mars.

[2011] Germany abandoned nuclear energy.

[2012] Charles Taylor, the former President of Liberia, was sentenced to 50 years in prison after being convicted of crimes against humanity and war crimes that were committed during Sierra Leone's civil war.

[mastcomm]

In Coronavirus Fight, China Sidelines an Ally: Its Own People

Hospitals in Wuhan and surrounding Hubei Province have been making urgent pleas to the Chinese people for three weeks as the new coronavirus ripples through the country: Send more protective gear.

Supplies are close — and yet frustratingly out of reach. Medical supplies donated to the Red Cross Society of China’s Wuhan branch sit unused in warehouses. Officials in Xiantao, a city 70 miles from Wuhan and one of the world’s biggest manufacturing centers for protective supplies, ordered factories there to cease operations. Individuals who try to organize relief supplies face violating the country’s strict charity law.

Beijing has shown the world that it can shut down entire cities, build a hospital in 10 days and keep 1.4 billion people at home for weeks. But it has also shown a glaring weakness that imperils lives and threatens efforts to contain the outbreak: It is unable to work with its own people.

The coronavirus outbreak has exposed the jarring absence in China of a vibrant civil society — the civic associations like business groups, nonprofit organizations, charities and churches that bring people together without involving the government.

Think of it as the nervous system that helps a society move smoothly and briskly — something Benjamin Franklin recognized over 200 years ago when he organized Philadelphia’s first volunteer fire department, first public library and first charity hospital. “It is prodigious the quantity of good that may be done by one man, if he will make a business of it,” he wrote in 1783.

“The traditional management mechanism of ‘big government’ is no longer efficient, and is even failing,” Duan Zhanjiang, a management consultant, wrote in an article about managing the epidemic. “The government is very busy but not effective. The social forces aren’t being utilized because they can only stand on the sideline, watching anxiously.”

Mr. Duan suggested the government restrain its urge to be in charge of everything and focus more on supervision.

The Communist Party has never liked or trusted civil society. It is suspicious of any organization that could potentially pose challenge to its rule, including big private enterprises. It has cracked down on nongovernment organizations like rights groups and charities as well as churches and mosques. The party wants nothing to stand between its government and China’s 1.4 billion people.

Big Chinese corporations and wealthy individuals have been donating, many generously. But they also try to keep low profiles for fear of offending a government that is eager to take credit for any success and quick to suspect outside groups of challenging it.

Updated Feb. 10, 2020

What is a Coronavirus? It is a novel virus named for the crown-like spikes that protrude from its surface. The coronavirus can infect both animals and people, and can cause a range of respiratory illnesses from the common cold to more dangerous conditions like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS.

How contagious is the virus? According to preliminary research, it seems moderately infectious, similar to SARS, and is possibly transmitted through the air. Scientists have estimated that each infected person could spread it to somewhere between 1.5 and 3.5 people without effective containment measures.

How worried should I be? While the virus is a serious public health concern, the risk to most people outside China remains very low, and seasonal flu is a more immediate threat.

Who is working to contain the virus? World Health Organization officials have praised China’s aggressive response to the virus by closing transportation, schools and markets. This week, a team of experts from the W.H.O. arrived in Beijing to offer assistance.

What if I’m traveling? The United States and Australia are temporarily denying entry to noncitizens who recently traveled to China and several airlines have canceled flights.

How do I keep myself and others safe? Washing your hands frequently is the most important thing you can do, along with staying at home when you’re sick.

Those gaps are evident on the front lines of the outbreak, where workers have lacked the proper equipment to keep themselves safe. Doctors and nurses wear disposable raincoats instead of protective gowns. They wear ordinary, and inadequate, surgical masks while conducting dangerous throat swab tests. They wear adult diapers because, once they take off their one-piece protective suits, the suits will have to be thrown away. They only get one per day.

Authorities said on Monday that over 3,000 medical workers have been infected, though not all got it from work.

Ordinary Chinese people have set up social media groups to help patients find hospital beds, get volunteers to drive them to hospitals and scavenge the world for protective gear. In coordination with the government, they could do much more.

“We’re just a small boat with very limited capacity,” said Panda Yin, a Beijing-based designer who organized a WeChat volunteer group of about 200 people to help find protective supplies for front line medical workers. “People came to us because they know the highway that’s supposed to move fast has a big black hole on it.”

That “big black hole” is the Red Cross Society of China. Unaffiliated with the Red Cross elsewhere, the Red Cross Society is one of two government-controlled organizations through which Beijing monopolizes philanthropy. The Wuhan government has insisted that all donations go through the local chapter.

The Red Cross Society is notorious for corruption and inefficiency. The Chinese media have reported on many of its scandals, including one nine years ago when a person who reportedly held a senior position there shared pictures of her opulent lifestyle online.

The Red Cross Society has been slow in giving away masks and other supplies, according to analyses by people in China based on incomplete data. Buttressing those claims, the central government on Friday told it to speed up donations.

When the society did give out masks, it gave the best and the most directly to local government agencies instead of to front line hospitals, according to its own data.

On Feb. 11, the Wuhan government’s epidemic-fighting central command, which counts top city officials among its members, received nearly 19,000 N95 medical masks, considered among the most effective in filtering particles. Union Hospital, one of Wuhan’s biggest public hospitals, received only 450. It was one of only four hospitals that received masks. On Feb. 13, all N95 masks went to local heath commissions. None went to hospitals.

Three Red Cross officials in Hubei were disciplined earlier this month. The Red Cross in Wuhan said this week that it was only one part of the city’s resource supplying team and that city officials were in charge of allocating supplies.

If the Red Cross Society is a bottleneck in distributing medical supplies, the local and central governments can sometimes become obstacles in private efforts to make, purchase and distribute these supplies.

In Xiantao, the city government on Feb. 3 shut down all but 10 of its protective-gear factories.

A local official told the official People’s Daily newspaper last week that the city made the decision for quality control reasons. Out of 113 sizable companies in the city, the official said, only two have the certificates to sell medical protective gowns in China because the majority of Xiantao’s nonwoven fabric products are for exports only.

Nonsense, said a factory owner in Xiantao who asked to be identified only by his surname, Wang, for fear of retribution. The protective suits he makes for his British and American clients have to meet equal, if not higher, standards than those of China. Many get sold back to China anyway, he said. Xiantao officials did not respond to requests for comment.

The real reason is that Xiantao officials do not want to be held responsible if factory workers get infected or if quality problems emerge, said Mr. Wang and two other factory owners who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals, a contention backed by local media reports in China. They agreed that in this extraordinary time the government should set prices and scrutinize quality closely. But it can set rules and supervise them, said Mr. Wang and others, instead of shutting them down.

The city allowed 73 more companies back to work by Feb. 9, the local official told the People’s Daily, after getting approval from the provincial government, giving it political cover in case anything goes wrong. But the majority of the factories remain idle, said Mr. Wang and others.

Xiantao also cut off private efforts to secure supplies.

Earlier this month, Xiantao city officials blocked volunteers from Jingzhou, a city in Hubei 100 miles to the west, from getting the supplies it needs. The Xiantao authorities tried to confiscate their gear at a checkpoint as they were leaving, according to one volunteer, and they were kicked out of the city. The volunteer asked to be identified by the surname Zhang because he is a government employee and is not authorized to speak to the news media.

Mr. Zhang said he and other volunteers had to step in because the Jingzhou health commission was overwhelmed and too bureaucratic to move fast enough to provide supplies to local hospitals.

Photos and videos he shared on social media showed volunteers delivered protective clothing, goggles and medical alcohol to hospitals. He almost cried, he told a chat group, when he saw doctors and nurses at a local fever clinic had nothing for protection except ordinary surgical masks. The head of the clinic was so grateful, he said, that she gave him four watermelons.

Volunteers like Mr. Zhang raise money for supplies through social media. One of his chat groups is made up mostly of entrepreneurs like Mr. Liu, a tech entrepreneur in his 50s who only wants his surname used for fear of retribution.

One of the topics the group has debated is whether they can post their fund-raising statements on WeChat Moments, a social media feature similar to Facebook’s time line. China has strict rules regulating individuals raising money from the public.

The business owners in Mr. Liu’s group have experience dealing with the government. Some of them are wary of stepping on the toes of the public health authorities, who can come after them for any potential violation of public fund-raising rules.

If they have to stay clear of a very murky line, Mr. Liu argued, they probably won’t be able to do anything.

“Human lives should come above everything else,” he said.

from WordPress https://mastcomm.com/business/in-coronavirus-fight-china-sidelines-an-ally-its-own-people-2/

[robieheartanime-blog]

NEW MEDIA HISTORY TIMELINE

:  Early Innovations

105 A.D. – Chinese paper (didn’t arrive in West for centuries)

1450 – Gutenberg press (leads to Protestant Revolution, among other things)

1517 – Martin Luther nails “Ninety Five Theses” to church door in Wittenberg, Germany

1534 – first press in America (Spanish America)

1500s – Italian gazettes

1600 – 1800:  Colonial Era and Early Republic Years  

1618 – Dutch Coranto (printed in English in 1620)

1638 – first press in what would become U.S. (Harvard College)

1644 – John Milton denounces licensing of the press in Areopagitica

1665 – Oxford Gazette (first English-language newspaper) in England

1690 – First American newspaper: Publick Occurrences (lasts one issue)

1704 – First successful American newspaper: The Boston News-Letter

1735 – John Peter Zenger trial

1741 – First American magazines

1783-1833 – Rise of Party Press

1791 – Bill of Rights (including First Amendment) ratified

1798 – Alien and Sedition Acts passed

1800 – 1900:  Telegraph Era and the Start of the Industrial Revolution  

1821 – Saturday Evening Post founded

1827 – First African-American newspaper in U.S.: Freedom’s Journal

1828 – First Native American newspaper in U.S.: Cherokee Phoenix

1828 – Noah Webster publishes first dictionary

1833s – New York Sun begins publication; rise of the Penny Press

1844 – Samuel Morse granted patent for telegraph. First message, May 24: “What hath God wrought?”  Second message: “Have you any news?”

1848 – Associated Press founded

1860-1865 – Civil War brings home “necessity” of news

1877 – Thomas Edison invents the “talking machine”

1888 – Edison lab develops movie camera

1888 – George Eastman introduces the Kodak camera

1888 – Heinrich Hertz transmits wireless sound waves

1890 – Linotype machine introduced at newspapers

1891 –Edison patents Kinetoscope – first parlor opens 1894 in New York

1890s – first “New Journalism” period; “Yellow Journalism”

1890s – Edison develops mass market phonograph

1894 – Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World starts daily women’s page

1899 – “Stunt girl” Nellie Bly circles the world

Early 1900s:  Industrial Revolution Era and Golden Ages of Radio, TV, and Movies

1900s – Muckraking magazines

1901 – Guglielmo Marconi sends and receives radio message across the Atlantic (Morse code, point to point)

1905 – First “nickelodeon”

1906 – Reginald Fessenden broadcasts voice

1911 – Newsreels begin; continue into 1960s

1912 – Titanic sinks; leads to Federal Radio Act of 1912

1914-1918 – World War I propaganda, censorship, technology

1915 – D.W. Griffith releases Birth of a Nation, first full-length film to significantly impact culture

1917 – Charlie Chaplin becomes the first entertainer to earn $1 million

1919 – RCA founded

1920 – First radio stations in U.S. and Canada

1920s – “Jazz Journalism” tabloids

1922 – Reader’s Digest magazine founded

1923 – Lee de Forest shows first “talkie”

1923 – Time magazine debuts

1923 – A.C. Nielsen company begins

1923 – AT&T links two radio stations for first “network”

1927 – Federal Radio Act sets up commission to regulate airwaves

1927 – Philo Farnsworth applies for electronic TV patents

1927 – The Jazz Singer released

1928 – Academy Awards given for the first time (Wings wins Best Picture)

1930s & 40s – “Golden Age of Movies”

1933 – Eleanor Roosevelt insists on women-only press conferences (“the Roosevelt Rule”)

1934 – Federal Communications Commission  (FCC) established

1936 – England is first country with regular TV broadcasts

1936 – Life magazine debuts

1938 – Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds” broadcast

1939 – TV is a hit at the World’s Fair

1939 – First FM radio station started in New Jersey

1941 – First TV commercial advertises a Bulova clock

1941 – Welles’s Citizen Kane released; sometimes called the best movie of all time

1942 – John H. Johnson starts Negro Digest; would later found Ebony and Jet

1947 – Red Scare leads to congressional investigation of Hollywood

1948 – Supreme Court hands down Paramount Decision

1950 – Red Channels: The Communist Influence in Radio and Television ruins careers

1950s – “Golden Age of Television”

1951 – “I Love Lucy” debuts; uses film and three cameras

1952 – FCC lifts “the Freeze” imposed in 1948

1952 – Eisenhower runs 20-second campaign spot

1953 – TV Guide magazine debuts; Lucille Ball and her newborn son on first cover

1953 – Playboy magazine introduced; Marilyn Monroe is first centerfold

1954 – Edward R. Murrow’s “See It Now” focuses on Joseph McCarthy

1954 – Elvis Presley discovered by Sam Phillips of Sun Records

1958 – videotape introduced

1959 – Quiz show scandal rocks television industry

1960s:   Cold War Decade

1960 – Kennedy-Nixon debate

1963 – Network news expands from 15 minutes to 30 minutes

1963 – Betty Friedan writes The Feminine Mystique

1964 – New York Times v. Sullivan gives press new right to criticize public officials

1964 – The Beatles first tour America

1965-1970s – Second “New Journalism” period; literary journalism; underground newspapers

1967 – Congress passes Public Broadcasting Act; PBS formed

Late 1960s – Internet formed for exchange of ideas, not available to general public

1969 – Neal Armstrong walks on moon; we see it on TV

1969 – ABC introduces made-for-TV movies

1970s:   Social Issues Decade  

1970 – Feminists stage sit-in at Ladies Home Journal

1972 – Ms. magazine launched

1972 – Life magazine died; came back as monthly from 1978 to 2000

1972 – Boylan v. New York Times sex discrimination lawsuit filed

1972 – Cigarette advertising banned from TV

1974 – Richard Nixon resigns, a result of Watergate coverage

1974 – People magazine introduced

1975 – Home Box Office (formed by Time, Inc. in 1972) begins satellite distribution of TV; Ted Turner starts first “superstation”

1975 – Sony Betamax home videocassette recorder introduced

1976 – Matsushita introduces VHS

1978 – laser disc player introduced; largely a failure, but opened door for CDs

1979 – Sony Walkman appears in Japan

1979 – Iranian hostage crisis leads to “Nightline” and loss by Jimmy Carter to a former radio broadcaster and movie actor

1980s:   Cable Television Decade

1980 – “Who Shot J.R.?” on “Dallas” is first TV season-ending cliff-hanger

1981 – MTV (Music Television) first airs; first video is “Video Killed the Radio Star”

1982 – USA Today begins publication

1982 – Home shopping network debuts

1983 – Sony introduces CD player

1984  - The Cosby Show, African-American family sitcom, debuts  

1985 -  Microsoft Windows is launched  

1985 -  Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine become America’s leading Latin recording artists  

1986 -  MCI Mail, first commercial email service  

1986 -  Bethel v. Fraser, U.S. Supreme Court decision  

1988 -  Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, U. S. Supreme Court decision  

1989 -  Compaq laptop computer is launched  

1990s: Digital Decade  

1990s - Rise of talk radio   

1990s - Rise of independent film  

1990s – Internet access opened to general public; changes everything

1991 -  Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee invents the World Wide Web  

1991 -  Web expands online news and information  

1993 -  Marc Andreessen creates predecessor to Netscape browser    

1994 -  Direct Broadcast Satellite service is launched  

1995 -  Microsoft Internet Explorer is launched   

1995 -  Amazon.com launches online shopping  

1996 – Telecommunications Act of 1996 brings V-chip, deregulation, and dramatic increase in mergers and takeovers

1997 -  William Jefferson Clinton’s Inauguration is live on the Internet   

1997 -  DVDs replace VHS format  

1997 -  Titanic records global box office sales of $1.8 billion   

1997 -  First news blogs are introduced   

1997 -  Diana, Princess of Wales, uses the paparazzi to spotlight worthy causes around the world  

1998  - J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series is translated into many languages, sells to a world-wide mass market, and launches a continuous series of blockbuster movies  

1998 - Beussink v. Woodland R-IV School District, U.S. District Court decision 

1998 - Lewinsky  scandal puts news online and Napster is created

2000+ -  Age of Media Convergence  

2000′s - Rise of cell phone use and cellular technology  

2001 -  9/11 Attacks are reported immediately through multimedia   

2001 -  iPod and MP3 format compressed digital files debut   

2001 -  Dominance of newspaper chains and media conglomerates    

2001 -  Instant message services   

2002  - TV standard changes to digital   

2002 -  Satellite radio is launched  

2002 -  American Idol begins its first season   

2003 -  iTunes online music store   

2003  - TiVo, video on demand, debuts  

2003 - MySpace is the most popular social network

2004 -  24-hour coverage of the Olympic Games from Athens   

2004 -  Broadband is in half of American homes  

2004 - Facebook College Network created

2005 -  Bruce Springsteen releases album on DualDisc (CD/DVD)  

2005 -  U2, best-selling global superstar Irish band  

2005 -  Google Library Book Project, digitization of books  

2006 -  Google Video Pilot Project, digitization of National Archives films  

2006 - Citizen journalists record events on cellular cameras and technology  

2007 -  Morse v. Frederick, U. S. Supreme Court decision  

2007 -  Presidential debates on YouTube 

2007 - iPhone introduces mobile web

Submitted by: Robie Marie B. Leaño Grade 11 - St. Bro. Luciano Pablo

[scotianostra]

On January 27th 1784  the newspaper the Glasgow Herald was published for the first time.

As the birth of America brought the decline of the city’s lucrative tobacco trade and an end to its first phase of imperial expansion, the first issue of a newspaper called The Glasgow Advertiser was published.

When John Mennons - writer, editor, printer and publisher of The Glasgow Advertiser - sold the few hundred copies of his first issue around the coffee houses of Glasgow in 1783, he was already dealing with international businessmen, the tobacco lords and the other members of the Merchants’ House who traded with the Americas and Caribbean, who owned plantations and mansions across the Atlantic and whose fortunes would provide the basis for Glasgow’s early and hugely successful participation in the Industrial Revolution. The American colonies were lost, but the city continued to trade across the Atlantic, and soon added businesses in Africa, Australia and the Far East.

That first issue of The Herald  showed the international interests of the Glasgow business community. On the front page alone there was intelligence from London, Dresden, Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Jamaica, New York, Gibraltar and Madrid, and reports of ships belonging to the East India Company sailing for Africa and the South Sea (the South China Sea). In addition, a disapproving account of the princes and princesses of Europe changing their religion “as if it were part of their dress” when marrying for family or national advantage was enlivened by the news that the Sultan of the Ottomans (Turkey) and the Sophia of Persia (Iran) had sent ambassadors to south Germany to ask for the hands in marriage of two princesses of the House of Wurttemberg.

The Glasgow Herald is the longest running national newspaper in the world and is the eighth oldest daily paper in the world. The paper was originally named the Glasgow Advertiser, and after a short spell as The Herald and Advertiser and Commercial Chronicle, became The Glasgow Herald in 1804.

The paper’s first editor John Mennons worked from offices at Duncan’s Land on Gibson’s Wynd, with the company moving to ‘The Lighthouse’ in Mitchell Street in 1895,the building is creditted cto architect John Keppie, but he apprenticed the young Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

On the 19th of July, 1980, the paper moved to offices in Albion Street. It is currently printed at Carmyle just south east of Glasgow.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 11.3 (before 1960)

361 – Emperor Constantius II dies of a fever at Mopsuestia in Cilicia; on his deathbed he is baptised and declares his cousin Julian rightful successor. 1333 – The River Arno floods causing massive damage in Florence as recorded by the Florentine chronicler Giovanni Villani. 1468 – Liège is sacked by Charles I of Burgundy's troops. 1492 – Peace of Etaples between Henry VII of England and Charles VIII of France. 1493 – Christopher Columbus first sights the island of Dominica in the Caribbean Sea. 1534 – English Parliament passes the first Act of Supremacy, making King Henry VIII head of the Anglican Church, supplanting the pope and the Roman Catholic Church. 1783 – The American Continental Army is disbanded. 1793 – French playwright, journalist and feminist Olympe de Gouges is guillotined. 1812 – Napoleon's armies are defeated at the Battle of Vyazma. 1817 – The Bank of Montreal, Canada's oldest chartered bank, opens in Montreal. 1838 – The Times of India, the world's largest circulated English language daily broadsheet newspaper is founded as The Bombay Times and Journal of Commerce. 1848 – A greatly revised Dutch constitution, which transfers much authority from the king to his parliament and ministers, is proclaimed. 1867 – Giuseppe Garibaldi and his followers are defeated in the Battle of Mentana and fail to end the Pope's Temporal power in Rome (it would be achieved three years later). 1868 – John Willis Menard (R-LA) was the first African American elected to the United States Congress. Because of an electoral challenge, he was never seated. 1881 – The Mapuche uprising of 1881 begins in Chile. 1898 – France withdraws its troops from Fashoda (now in Sudan), ending the Fashoda Incident. 1903 – With the encouragement of the United States, Panama separates from Colombia. 1908 – William Howard Taft is elected the 27th President of the United States. 1911 – Chevrolet officially enters the automobile market in competition with the Ford Model T. 1918 – The German Revolution of 1918–19 begins when 40,000 sailors take over the port in Kiel. 1920 – Russian Civil War: The Russian Army retreats to Crimea, after a successful offensive by the Red Army and Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine. 1929 – The Gwangju Student Independence Movement occurred. 1930 – Getúlio Vargas becomes Head of the Provisional Government in Brazil after a bloodless coup on October 24. 1932 – Panagis Tsaldaris becomes the 142nd Prime Minister of Greece. 1935 – George II of Greece regains his throne through a popular, though possibly fixed, plebiscite. 1936 – Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected the 32nd President of the United States. 1942 – World War II: The Koli Point action begins during the Guadalcanal Campaign and ends on November 12. 1943 – World War II: Five hundred aircraft of the U.S. 8th Air Force devastate Wilhelmshaven harbor in Germany. 1944 – World War II: Two supreme commanders of the Slovak National Uprising, Generals Ján Golian and Rudolf Viest, are captured, tortured and later executed by German forces. 1946 – The Constitution of Japan is adopted through Emperor's assent. 1949 – Chinese Civil War: The Battle of Dengbu Island occurs. 1950 – Air India Flight 245 crashes into Mont Blanc, while on approach to Geneva Airport, killing all 48 people on board. 1956 – Suez Crisis: The Khan Yunis killings by the Israel Defense Forces in Egyptian-controlled Gaza result in the deaths of 275 Palestinians. 1956 – Hungarian Revolution: A new Hungarian government is formed, in which many members of banned non-Communist parties participate. János Kádár and Ferenc Münnich form a counter-government in Moscow as Soviet troops prepare for the final assault. 1957 – Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit, a dog named Laika.

[thedhananjayaparkhe]

DYK AND TIQ

Did you know… … that today is American Daily Newspaper Day? In 1783, the Pennsylvania Evening Post was published by Benjamin Towner of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was the first daily newspaper published in America.~~~ Today’s Inspirational Quote: “Character is the ability to carry out a good resolution long after the excitement of the moment has passed.”— Cavett Robert

[bobmccullochny]

May History

May 30, 1783 - The Pennsylvania Evening Post became the first daily newspaper published in America.

May 30, 1922 - The Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., was dedicated. The Memorial was designed by architect Henry Bacon and features a compelling statue of "Seated Lincoln" by sculptor Daniel Chester French.

May 30, 1943 - During World War II in the Pacific, the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska were retaken by the U.S. 7th Infantry Division. The battle began on May 12 when an American force of 11,000 landed on Attu. In three weeks of fighting U.S. casualties numbered 552 killed and 1,140 wounded. Japanese killed numbered 2,352, with only 28 taken prisoner, as 500 chose suicide rather than be captured.

Birthday - Founder of the Russian empire Peter the Great (1672-1725) was born near Moscow. He vastly increased the power of the Russian monarchy and turned his backward country into a major power in the Western world. Among his accomplishments, he completely overhauled the government and the Greek Orthodox Church as well as the military system and tax structure. He built St. Petersburg, established printing presses and published translations of foreign books, modernized the calendar, simplified the Russian alphabet and introduced Arabic numerals. He died at age 52 and was succeeded by his wife Catherine.

[scotianostra]

On January 27th 1784  the newspaper the Glasgow Herald was published for the first time.

As the birth of America brought the decline of the city's lucrative tobacco trade and an end to its first phase of imperial expansion, the first issue of a newspaper called The Glasgow Advertiser was published.

When John Mennons - writer, editor, printer and publisher of The Glasgow Advertiser - sold the few hundred copies of his first issue around the coffee houses of Glasgow in 1783, he was already dealing with international businessmen, the tobacco lords and the other members of the Merchants' House who traded with the Americas and Caribbean, who owned plantations and mansions across the Atlantic and whose fortunes would provide the basis for Glasgow's early and hugely successful participation in the Industrial Revolution. The American colonies were lost, but the city continued to trade across the Atlantic, and soon added businesses in Africa, Australia and the Far East.

That first issue of The Herald  showed the international interests of the Glasgow business community. On the front page alone there was intelligence from London, Dresden, Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Jamaica, New York, Gibraltar and Madrid, and reports of ships belonging to the East India Company sailing for Africa and the South Sea (the South China Sea). In addition, a disapproving account of the princes and princesses of Europe changing their religion "as if it were part of their dress" when marrying for family or national advantage was enlivened by the news that the Sultan of the Ottomans (Turkey) and the Sophia of Persia (Iran) had sent ambassadors to south Germany to ask for the hands in marriage of two princesses of the House of Wurttemberg.

The Glasgow Herald is the longest running national newspaper in the world and is the eighth oldest daily paper in the world. The paper was originally named the Glasgow Advertiser, and after a short spell as The Herald and Advertiser and Commercial Chronicle, became The Glasgow Herald in 1804.

The paper's first editor John Mennons worked from offices at Duncan's Land on Gibson's Wynd, with the company moving to 'The Lighthouse' in Mitchell Street in 1895,the building is creditted cto architect John Keppie, but he apprenticed the young Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

On the 19th of July, 1980, the paper moved to offices in Albion Street. It is currently printed at Carmyle just south east of Glasgow.