Motto for Today: ‘Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, a leader makes it happen.’

This is Your Day-TODAY: Take a Determined Step Forward and Make History! 

On this day, August 22….

1639 – Madras (now Chennai), founded by the British East India Company on sliver of land bought from local Nayak rulers.

1865 – The first U.S. patent for a liquid soap was issued to William Sheppard of New York City. It is a mixture of small quantities of common soap plus large quantity of spirits of ammonia or hartshorn.

1894 – Mahatma Gandhi forms the Natal Indian Congress in order to fight discrimination against Indian traders in Natal (South Africa).

1906 – The Victor Talking Machine Company of Camden, New Jersey, began to manufacture the Victrola record player. The hand-cranked unit, with a horn cabinet, sold for $200. Unlike previous phonographs, which were toy-like turntables with a large speaker horn to amplify the sound, this was housed in an elegant wood cabinet in several contemporary (for the time) furniture styles.

1939 – The first U.S. patent for dispensing liquids under pressure from a disposable container was issued to Julius Seth Kahn of New York City. The patent was titled “Apparatus for Mixing a Liquid with a Gas,” but was the predecessor of the aerosol spray can.

1962 – The Savannah, the world’s first nuclear-powered ship, completed her maiden voyage.

1864 – International Red Cross forms. (It has approximately 97 million volunteers, members and staff worldwide. Aims to respect for all human beings, and to prevent and alleviate human suffering).

1901 – Cadillac Co forms. (The Cadillac Motor Car Division, is a division of the U.S.-based General Motors (GM) that markets luxury vehicles worldwide. It was named after Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, who founded Detroit, Michigan. The Cadillac crest is based on his coat of arms).

1911 – Mona Lisa stolen from Louvre (Recovered in 1913). (Vincenzo Peruggia was an Italian thief, most famous for stealing the Mona Lisa on 21 August 1911. It has been described as the greatest art theft of the 20th century. It was a police theory that the former Louvre worker hid inside the museum on Sunday, August 20, knowing that

museum would be closed the following day. But according to Peruggia’s interrogation in Florence after his arrest, he entered the museum on Monday, August 21 around 7 am through the door where the other

Louvre workers were entering. He said he wore one of the white worker’s smocks that museum employees customarily wore and was indistinguishable from the other workers).

1933 – Inhabitants of Partabgarh face starvation as Opium was now outlawed. They had been living from the sale of opium for the past 800 years.

1962 – Failed assassination of president De Gaulle. (Though the assassination attempt came very close to claiming de Gaulle’s life, the President and his entire entourage escaped without injury. The event is chronicled in detail in the {otherwise fictional} 1971 work The Day of the Jackal and the 1973 film adaptation of the same name, the latter of which has character actor Jean Sorel playing the assassin Bastien-Thiry, a French Air Force lieutenant-colonel and military air weaponry engineer. He was the creator of the Nord SS.10/SS.11 missiles. Bastien-Thiry was the last person to be executed by firing squad in France. On 22 August 1962, de Gaulle’s car {a Citroën} and some nearby shops were raked with machine gun fire. De Gaulle, his wife and entourage escaped, uninjured. After the attempt, holes from fourteen bullets were found in the president’s vehicle, one of which barely missed the president’s head; another twenty were found to have struck the nearby Café Trianon; and an additional 187 spent shell casings were found on the pavement. De Gaulle credited the unusual abilities of the vehicle with saving his life —even though the shots had punctured two of the armored tires, the car escaped at full speed). There were over 30 assassination attempts on Charles De Gaulle.

1987 – Aircraft carrier ship of Indian Navy ‘Virat’ joined in fleet.

2014 – The Washington, D.C. Zoo is holding a Chinese first-birthday ceremony for celebrity giant panda baby Bao.

2017 – India’s highest court outlaws instant divorce for Muslim men (talaq, talaq, talaq).

Born….

1955 – Chiranjeevi, actor.

RIP….

1977 – Vimi, actor.

You may have known….

Bees have five eyes. There are 3 small eyes on the top of a bee’s head and 2 larger ones in front.

Good morning. Have a nice day.

{Compiled by Lt. Col. (R) Raj Kadyan}