Today's Reading: "Woolworth's" by Mark Irwin from QUICK, NOW, ALWAYS, published by Boa Editions (1996).
Today is the start of the three-day BON FESTIVAL in Japan. During the time also known as the Feast of Lanterns, religious rites are performed in memory of the dead who according to Buddhist belief, revisit Earth. Lanterns are lighted for their souls and on the last day huge bonfires in the shape of the character dai are burned on hillsides to bid farewell to the spirits of the dead.
Frank Sinatra recorded his first album, "From the Bottom of My Heart" with the Harry James Band on this day in 1939. Shortly after its release bandleader Tommy Dorsey wooed him away from the James band for $250 a week.
It's the birthday of Nigerian playwright, poet and novelist WOLE SOYINKA, born in Abeokuta, Nigeria in 1934. Since his imprisonment (for political reasons) during the Nigerian civil war of the late 1960's, he has often written about the conflicts of the new and old in modern Africa. The Interpreters, which came out in 1965 was called the first really modern African novel. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986.
It’s the birthday of English novelist DAVID STOREY, born in Wakefield, England, in 1933. He set aside his first seven novels before his eighth novel, This Sporting Life, was published in 1960. His other books include the novel Flight into Camden (1960), the play Home (1969), and Saville (1976) the autobiographical account of a coal miner's son which won the Booker Prize.
Poet WILLIAM WORDSWORTH visited the ruins of TINTERN ABBEY in Wales in 1798 and wrote his famous poem about them, "Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of the Wye on a Tour, July 13, 1798" Five years have passed; five summers, with the length/Of five long winters! And again I hear/These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs/With a soft inland murmur.
It's the birthday of English poet JOHN CLARE, born in the small village of Helpston, England in 1793. He was 27 years old when his first book of poems made him famous overnight, Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery (1820). He continued to write but his later collections were never as popular as his first and his financial problems began to affect his health. He spent the final 23 years of his life in an asylum, writing some of his best poems including Selected Poems and Prose which was published in 1966.
Today's Reading: "Sonnet 18" by William Shakespeare.
It's BASTILLE DAY in France, commemorating the day in 1789 when citizens stormed and burned the prison that symbolized the monarchy's autocratic rule. King Louis XVI was forced to withdraw from Paris and face the consequences of the French Revolution.
Today is the birthday in 1918 of Swedish writer-director INGMAR BERGMAN in Uppsala, Sweden. The son of a stern Lutheran pastor he was raised with authoritarian discipline, and the traumatic experiences of childhood later played a huge role in his work as a film director. He became famous in the 1950s with such films as The Seventh Seal and Smiles of a Summer Night. In 1983 he came out with the film Fanny and Alexander – a story of childhood with an adult's perception of pleasure and pain.
It's also the birthday in 1918 of electrical engineer and management expert, JAY WRIGHT FORRESTER, born in Anselmo, Nebraska. He invented the random-access magnetic core memory, or RAM, the information storage device used in most digital computers.
It's the birthday of one of Italy's most important writers, NATALIA GINZBURG, born in Palermo in 1916. She wrote her first book, The Road to the City, during the 1940s when she and her husband were confined to a small village near Rome because they were Jews.
It's the birthday of singer, songwriter WOODROW WILSON "WOODY" GUTHRIE, born in Okemah, Oklahoma, 1912. He was 15 years old when he left home to travel the country by freight train, often visiting the hobo and migrant camps of the Great Depression where he played his harmonica and guitar. He went on to write over 1,000 songs during his career including, "So Long (It's Been Good to Know Ya)," "Blowing Down This Old Dusty Road," "Union Maid" and "Tom Joad" (inspired by Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath") and the famous "This Land Is Your Land."
Yiddish writer, ISAAC BASHEVIS (bah-SHEV-vuhs) SINGER, was born in Poland, on this day in 1904, the author of novels, short stories, memoirs, and children's books, often about Jewish life and his native Poland. In 1935 he sailed for the United States after becoming alarmed at the growing Nazism in Europe. He settled in New York where he went to work for the Yiddish newspaper, Daily Forward, where most of his fiction was first serialized. He lived a modest life and was eating in a neighborhood drugstore when he learned he had won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1978. Among his over 30 books are the novels "The Family Moskat," (1950), "The Manor" (1967) and "A Crown of Feathers" for which he received The National Book Award in 1973.
It's the birthday of author IRVING STONE, born Irving Tennenbaum in San Francisco in 1903. Whose novels include Lust for Life – about Vincent Van Gogh, Love Is Eternal (1954) about Mary Todd Lincoln, and The Agony and the Ecstasy (1961) about the life of the Renaissance artist, Michelangelo.
It's the birthday of novelist OWEN WISTER, born in North Kingstown, Rhode Island in 1860. The author of The Virginian, the 1902 novel that helped establish the cowboy as an American folk hero.
Today's Reading: "At Greers Grocery with Mrs. Thibodeau" by James Kimbrell from THE GATE HOUSE HEAVEN, published by Sarabande Books (1998).
Today is ST. SWITHIN'S DAY, with the superstition that if it rains on July 15th, it will continue to rain for 40 days as told in the old rhyme: St. Swithin's Day, if thou dost rain/For forty days it will remain/St. Swithin's Day, if thou be fair/For forty days it will rain nae mair.
In Crisfield, Maryland the annual CRAB AND CLAMBAKE takes place today at Somers Cove Marina.
THE amateur HOG CALLING CONTEST will be held today at the Broadway Market Square in Baltimore (Maryland).
And SINCLAIR LEWIS DAYS get underway today in Lewis's hometown of Sauk Centre, Minnesota.
It's the birthday of British novelist, playwright and philosopher DAME IRIS MURDOCH, born in Dublin in 1919, and raised in suburban London. Her first novel Under the Net came out in 1954 and was a big success, followed by many others including The Bell (1958), A Severed Head (1961), and her Booker Prize winning The Sea, The Sea (1978).
It's the birthday of English novelist, RALPH HAMMOND INNES, born in Sussex in 1913, and best known for his adventure stories such as The White South (1949), Campbell's Kingdom (1952), and The Mary Deare (1956).
Lyricist DOROTHY FIELDS was born in Allenhurst, New Jersey, on this day in 1905, the daughter of a vaudeville comedian. For more than 50 years, she turned out the words to over 400 songs including "On the Sunny Side of the Street," and "I'm in the Mood for Love."
The first American saint, FRANCES XAVIER (ZAY-vyer) CABRINI, MOTHER CABRINI, was born on this day in Lombardy, Italy, in 1850, the 13th child of Agostino and the 52 year-old Stella Cabrini. As a young woman, she established the religious order known as Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart in 1880. Nine years later, (1889) she and a small group of sisters sailed to America where they worked with the poor Italian immigrants in New York City.
It's the birthday today of CLEMENT CLARKE MOORE in New York City in 1779. He was a teacher and Hebrew scholar, but is best remembered for a little ballad that begins with these lines, familiar to children everywhere: "Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house…"
Today is the birthday in 1606 of the great Dutch painter, REMBRANDT VON RIJN (fon RHINE) in Leiden (LYE-den), the Netherlands, known for his use of rich color and the use of light and shadow. In his famous painting The Night Watch, the models paid Rembrandt to be included in the painting – the people in front paying more than the ones in the back.
Today's Reading: "Evening Game" by Richard Foerster from TRILLIUM, published by BOA Editions (1998).
J.D. Salinger's classic rite-of-passage novel, THE CATCHER IN THE RYE, WAS PUBLISHED on this day in 1951. The adventures of Holden Caulfield that begins: "If you really want to know about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."
Today is the anniversary of the TESTING OF THE FIRST ATOMIC BOMB in 1945. It took place at 5:30 a.m. in the desert at Alamogordo Air Base in New Mexico. When it was detonated, a fireball rose 8,000 feet, followed by a mushroom cloud that rose to 41,000 feet. The heat generated at ground zero was three times the temperature of the Sun’s interior.
It’s the birthday of Norwegian novelist, short-story writer and playwright DAG SOLSTAD, in Sandefjord, Norway, in 1941. Author of Spiraler (Spirals, 1965), 25 September Plassen (September 25th Square, 1974), and a World War II trilogy, which includes Svik. Forkrigsår (Betrayal: Prewar Years, 1977), Krig. 1940 (War: 1940, 1978) and Brod og vapen (Bread and Weapons, 1980).
English novelist and art historian ANITA BROOKNER was born in London on this day in 1928. After writing her first novel, A Start in Life (1981), she produced books at a rapid pace, including the Booker Prize-winning Hotel du Lac (1984), Brief Lives, Incidents in the Rue Laugier and Altered States (1996).
The last Russian czar, NICHOLAS II, along with his family, servants, doctor and even his pet dog, WERE SHOT on this day in 1918 by Bolsheviks in the cellar of the house where they were being held in Ekaterinberg, Russia. It’s thought a local Bolshevik commander ordered the executions when White Russian forces were approaching the area and he didn’t think his troops could prevent the royal family’s rescue.
It’s the birthday of actress and dancer GINGER ROGERS (VIRGINIA KATHERINE McMATH), in Independence, Missouri, in 1911. She was just 22 years old when she and Fred Astaire were cast in supporting roles in Flying Down to Rio (1933), but they stole the show and starred together in eight more films, including The Gay Divorcée and Follow The Fleet.
Polar explorer ROALD AMUNDSEN was born in Borge, Norway, on this day in 1872. After being beaten to the North Pole by Robert Peary, he set out for the South Pole, and with four companions became the first to reach it in 1911, beating the British expedition of Robert Scott by a little over a month.
It's the birthday of the founder of the Christian Science movement and the Christian Science Monitor newspaper, MARY BAKER EDDY, born on a farm in Bow, New Hampshire, in 1821. She was sickly and, believing that disease was a mental misstep, became a disciple of the mental healer of the day, Phineas P. Quimby, who defined his method as Christian Science. She eventually broke with Quimby and established her own version of Christian Science.
SAINT CLARE OF ASSISI was born in Assisi, Italy, on this day in 1194. She refused marriage in accordance with her family’s wishes, and instead fled to a chapel where St. Francis accepted her vows as a nun. A few years later she became abbess of the ascetic order known as the Poor Clares, and eventually established monasteries in Italy, Germany and France.
Today's Reading: "American Summer" by Edward Hirsch from ON LOVE, published by Alfred A. Knopf (1998).
In Yarmouth, Maine the 33rd YARMOUTH CLAM FESTIVAL gets underway today.
The ten-day MINNEAPOLIS AQUATENNIAL begins today with over 30 events including a milk-carton boat race, sand- sculpture competitions, fireworks, and a torch light parade.
THE KANSAS CITY BLUES AND JAZZ FESTIVAL takes place this weekend at Penn Valley Park (Kansas City, Mo.).
It’s the birthday of composer and humorist PETER SCHICKELE, in Ames, Iowa, in 1935, the creator of P.D.Q. Bach.
Hungarian poet LASZLO NAGY (nahj) was born in Felsöiszkáz, Hungary, on this day in 1925. The son of peasant farmers he grew up in the countryside and intended to become a painter but settled on a career in poetry, publishing his first collection, Tünj el, fájás (Vanish, Pain) in 1949.
It’s the birthday of novelist and short-story writer JAMES (AMOS) PURDY, in Ohio, in 1923, author of Don’t Call Me By My Right Name and Other Stories and the novels Cabot Wright Begins (1964), I Am Elijah Thrush (1972) and Candles of Your Eyes (1986).
English poet and literary critic DONALD (ALFRED) DAVIE was born in Barnsley, Yorkshire, on this day in 1922. During the 1950s he became a leader of an influential conservative literary group called The Movement, which stressed purity of language and steered away from romanticism.
It’s the birthday of photographer BERENICE ABBOTT, in Springfield, Ohio, in 1898, who went to Europe at the age of 23 to study sculpture and drawing and wound up working as a darkroom assistant to the surrealist Man Ray. She set up a portrait photography studio in Paris, where her models included many artists and writers, including James Joyce and Jean Cocteau. Abbott returned to New York in the 1930s and documented the architectural character of the city in striking black-and-white photographs, many of which were published in the book Changing New York (1939).
Belgian astronomer GEORGES LEMAÎTRE was born in Charleroi, Belgium, on this day in 1894. He proposed the big-bang theory, maintaining that the universe originated with a gigantic explosion of what he called a small super-atom, and that the universe is constantly expanding.
It’s the birthday of novelist and attorney ERLE STANLEY GARDNER, in Malden, Massachusetts, in 1889, the creator of the famous lawyer and detective character, Perry Mason. He started writing stories about the courtroom for pulp magazines, then in 1933 he wrote his first book, The Case of the Velvet Claws, introducing the Perry Mason character.
Israeli novelist and short-story writer S.Y. AGNON (SAMUEL JOSEF CZACZKES) was born in what is now Buchach, Ukraine, on this day in 1888. He became an active Zionist in his teens and moved to Palestine when he was 19, and soon published his first novel, Agunot (Forsaken Wives, 1909), and from the title derived his pen name. Agnon means "cut off" in Hebrew, the language he always wrote in. His other novels include A Guest for the Night (1938), The Day Before Yesterday (1945) and A Dwelling Place of My People (1983).
It’s the birthday of English nonconformist minister and hymn writer ISAAC WATTS, in Southampton, in 1674. He wrote a number of famous Protestant hymns, most while serving as pastor of Mark Lane Independent Chapel in London during the early 1700s including "Behold the Glories of the Lamb," "Jesus Shall Reign," and "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross."
Today's Reading: "Butter" by Stefanie Marlis from RIFE, published by Sarabande Books (1998).
It's the birthday of poet YEVGENY YEVTUSHENKO [yevtu SHENG koh], born in Zima, Russia, in 1933. He grew up in Siberia, where four generations of his relatives had been exiled, and in Moscow where he became a crusader for greater creative freedom for artists in the post-Stalin era.
It's the 80th birthday today of South African leader NELSON MANDELLA born in Umtata, South Africa, in 1918. Son of a Tembu chief, he became a lawyer and got involved in the anti-apartheid struggle as a leader of the African National Congress. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964 for conspiracy to overthrow the South African government and was finally released in 1990 after spending 28 years in jail. Three years later (1993) Mandela became the first black president of South Africa.
It’s the birthday of comedian RED (RICHARD BERNARD) SKELTON, in Vincennes, Indiana, in 1913, the son of a circus clown who died two months before Skelton was born. He was just ten years old when he left home to join a medicine show. He went on to work in radio, made over 30 films, and starred in his own television show for 20 years (1951-71), creating such characters as Freddie the Freeloader, Sheriff Deadeye, and Clem Kadiddlehopper.
Playwright CLIFFORD ODETS was born in Philadelphia on this day in 1906. A member of the Group Theatre during the 1930's, he wrote a series of socially and politically oriented plays, including Waiting For Lefty and the popular 1937 play Golden Boy.
It’s the birthday of short-story writer and novelist JESSAMYN WEST, born near North Vernon, Indiana, 1902. She was diagnosed with tuberculosis when she was 28 years old and spent the next two years in a sanitarium. She was sent home to die, but her mother nursed her back to health while telling her stories of the family’s origins in Indiana. They became the basis for her first book, The Friendly Persuasion (1945), which was an instant success.
On this day in 1877, inventor Thomas Edison RECORDED THE HUMAN VOICE FOR THE FIRST time at his laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. He used a stylus-tipped carbon transmitter to make impressions on a strip of paraffin paper to make a reproduction of the original sound when he pulled the paper back along the stylus. It was the first phonograph.
It’s the birthday of English novelist and satirist WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY, born in Calcutta (India) in 1811, best known for the historical novel Vanity Fair (1847).
And it was on this day in 64 B.C. that ROME BURNED, destroying two-thirds of the city.
Today's Reading: "Sunday Dinner" by ALL THINGS, SEEN AND UNSEEN, published by University of Arkansas Press (1997).
English painter and writer JOHN BRATBY was born in Wimbledon on this day in 1928. He came to fame in the early 1950s as a founder of the Kitchen-Sink School, and his paintings sometimes incorporated beer bottles, trash cans and other everyday objects. He was associated with the Angry Young Men movement.
Journalist and author EDGAR SNOW, was born on this day in Kansas City (Missouri), 1905. Famous for reporting on the Communist movement before it achieved power in China.
Scottish physician and author A.J. CRONIN, was born in Cardoss, Dumbarton in 1896. He used his background as a medical doctor and inspector of coal mines and occupational diseases in his novels The Citadel (1937) and The Keys of the Kingdom (1944).
Russian poet VLADIMIR MAYAKOVSKY was born today in Bagdadi, Russia in 1893. His romantic poems include "A Cloud in Trousers" and "The Backbone Flute," while in later poems including "Ode to Revolution," he became the leading poet of the Russian Revolution and the early Soviet period.
It's the birthday in Rochester, Minnesota of CHARLES HORACE MAYO,1865, the surgeon who, with his brother Will, founded the Mayo Clinic. He was called a surgical wonder, pioneering modern procedures in goiter surgery, orthopedics, and neurosurgery, as well as the notion of the modern group medical practice, at the Mayo Clinic.
It's the 150th anniversary of the first WOMEN’S RIGHTS CONVENTION in Seneca Falls, New York, 1848. Elizabeth Cady Stanton had just moved to the village of Seneca Falls and that summer she and four friends, including Lucretia Mott, decided to hold the first women's rights convention. They got together and wrote the Declaration of Sentiments, a list of grievances and remedies modeled on the Declaration of Independence, and on July 19 they held their convention. 300 people turned out, including Frederick Douglass and many other men. But most people considered the convention very radical; it was severely criticized by newspapers and many women later felt pressured to remove their names from the Declaration that they had signed.
And today is the birthday of French Impressionist painter EDGAR DEGAS born in Paris in 1834. Known for his mastery of motion and famous for his portrayals of ballet dancers.
