Today’s Motto: ‘Our emotions are the slaves to our thoughts, and we are the slave to our emotions’.

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

On this day, July 21………

1928 – 1st woman to win an Olympic Gold medal – Halina Knonpacka of Poland (pic credit -The Vintage Inn).

1946 – An aviation first took place with the first U.S. test of the adaptability of jet aircraft to shipboard operations. An XFD-1 Phantom, piloted by Lieutenant Commander James Davidson made successful landing and take-offs (deck launched without catapults) from a ship-based launching platform – the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt. The ship had been launched the previous year, then the biggest ship in the World.

1947 – Indian Constitution Assembly accepted the tricolour flag as its National Flag. This flag is with three equal horizontal stripes of Saffron (Sacrifice), White (Truth) and Green (Prosperity) and a Chakra is superimposed on white (Dharma Chakra on the capitol of Ashoka’s Pillar at Sarnath) in blue colour having 24 spokes. The ratio of the width to length is two to three.

1955 – Ian Donald made his first investigation of the use of ultrasound in medical diagnosis. At the research department of the boiler makers Babock and Wilcox, Scotland, he used an industrial ultrasonic metal flaw detector to image tumours from human organs.

1959 – 1st nuclear powered merchant ship, NS Savannah, christened, Camden, New Jersey, US.

1960 – In Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) Sirimavo Bandaranaike is world’s 1st woman PM (pic credit- Daily FT)
1969 – Apollo XI astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin blasted off from the moon after 21 1/2 hours on the surface and returned to the command module piloted by Michael Collins. The lunar module’s lower section, left behind, has a plaque mounted upon it, reading, “Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the moon, July 1969 A.D. We came in peace for all mankind.”

1970 – The Aswan High Dam in Egypt was completed after 18 years of work. It captures the world’s longest river, the Nile, in the world’s third largest reservoir, Lake Nasser. It now produces hydroelectricity meeting 50% of Egypt’s power needs. It holds several years of irrigation reserves, assists multi-cropping, has increased productivity 20-50%, enormously increased Egypt’s arable land, and overall, increased Egypt’s agricultural income by 200%.

1984 – 1st documented case of a robot killing a human in US.
1994 – The Indian Supreme Court declares that SC/ST will lose status on migration to other states.

2018 – India scraps tax on sanitary products after campaign by activists.

2021 – Life expectancy in the US falls by 1.5 years (3 years for Hispanic Americans. 2.9 for Black Americans) in largest decline since WWII.

2021 – World’s fastest train debuts, a Chinese state-owned maglev bullet train, with speeds of 600 kilometers per hour (373 miles) in Qingdao, China.

Born….

1920 – Anand Bakshi, famous lyricist. (A migrant from Rawalpindi. Fond of writing poetry from early days. He joined the Indian Army, where due to paucity of time, he could only write occasionally. He continued to write poetry whenever time permitted, and used his songs and lyrics in local programmes related to his troops. He worked in the Army for many years and simultaneously tried to market his songs in the Mumbai film world. He really established himself as a versatile lyricist with the song “Dum Maro Dum” in the movie Hare Rama Hare Krishna in 1972).

1934 – Chandrakant Gulabrao Borde, cricket batsman (55 Tests for India 1959-67); pic credit-ESPNCricinfo}

RIP….

2001 – Shivaji Ganeshan, actor.

Titbits….

1978 – World’s strongest dog, 80-kg St. Bernard, pulls 2909-kg load 27 m.

You may have known….
A Narwhal tusk is actually an exaggerated left tooth, and unlike most teeth, it’s soft and sensitive on the outside with a tough interior.

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