150 years ago today, the first competitive game of rugby in New Zealand was played in the City of Nelson between Nelson College and the new Nelson Rugby Football Club. It was a Nelson College old boy, Charles Monro, who…
Happy Birthday to the brilliant Stevie Wonder who turns 70 today. As a young child, he became blind, but he was a musical prodigy and went on to become one of the most beloved performers of his time. After signing…
200 years ago today, Florence Nightingale was born. The Englishwoman came to prominence for her pioneering work in nursing, tending injured soldiers in the Crimean War, and laying the foundation for professional nursing. She studied mathematics and became a trailblazer…
60 years ago today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved of birth control as an additional use for the G. D. Searle drug Enovid, making it the first approved oral contraceptive pill following the largest drug trials ever run.…
75 years ago today, a jubilant world celebrated V-E Day (Victory in Europe Day). It was proclaimed by England’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill when the Allies in World War II finally defeated Nazi Germany. The end of six years of…
180 years ago today, Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, the iconic Russian composer was born. Famous for his ballets like The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, Romeo and Juliet, and The Sleeping Beauty—he also wrote popular classical works including the famous 1812 Overture (the…
60 years ago today, President Eisenhower signed the Civil Rights Act of 1960, a US federal law that established federal inspection of local voter registration polls. It introduced penalties for anyone who obstructed someone’s attempt to register to vote. It…
Today is Liberation Day (Bevrijdingsdag) for the Dutch people—a national holiday celebrated in the Netherlands to mark the end of the German occupation by Nazi forces during World War II. It was 75 years ago today that Canadian and British…
70 years ago today, writer Gwendolyn Brooks became the first black person (her preferred term) to win a Pulitzer prize.The quintessential Chicago poet published her first poem at the age of 13—by age 16 she’d published 75. Her second book…
Today is the 50th anniversary of Earth Day: On this day in 1970—when water and air pollution were out of control—20 million Americans in colleges, schools and communities observed the first Earth Day. The movement’s leader, Sen. Gaylord Nelson, directly…
