Browsing: Lifestyle

A Brief History On August 5, 1620, 2 small English sailing ships left Southampton Water in England on a trip to the New World, carrying a group of Puritans seeking a land where they could practice their brand of religion without interference. The larger of the 2 ships, the Mayflower, has gone down in history as one of the most famous ships in the English speaking world, while the other, the Speedwell, became an historical afterthought. On July 22, 1620, the pinnace Speedwell left Delfshaven, now part of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, with a cargo of English Pilgrims bound for…

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A Brief History On August 3, 2018, just as on every first Friday in August, we celebrate International Beer Day. In fact, here in History and Headlines Land, we celebrate International Beer Day everyday! For those readers that are underage, teetotalers, or lightweight non-hackers, forget this important holiday and go right to National Watermelon Day, which is celebrated on August 3 each year. For that matter, so is Grab Some Nuts Day, a holiday favored by squirrels everywhere. Today is also Airplane Crop Duster Day and Pie Day. We think Pie Day is the more important of those last 2…

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A Brief History On July 30, 2012, the Tamil Nadu Express train caught fire as passengers lay sleeping at 4:22 am, roasting 32 of them and injuring another 27. Only quick action by a railroad emergency crew prevented further carnage when the flaming sleeping car was detached from the other cars. Some died leaping from the moving train, some died trying to leave through the forward exit, and some died asleep in their beds. Digging Deeper The S-11 sleeping car carried 78 passengers that morning, bound from New Delhi to Chennai. Of those passengers, 72 had reservations to be on…

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A Brief History On July 29, 1973, British race car driver Roger Williamson met his death when his Formula 1 race car crashed at the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort Circuit in the Netherlands. The 25 year old 2 time British Formula 3 champion was trapped under his flipped car, not seriously hurt from the crash, but was burned to death as the car was engulfed in flames. We wrote about that crash in our July 29 article, “10 Famous Car Wrecks” and followed that article with “5 More Famous Car Wrecks.” Today we look at another 5 famous/infamous car…

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A Brief History On July 25, 1609, the excellently named British ship, Sea Venture, encountered serious storms while crossing the Atlantic Ocean en route to Virginia, and was purposely run ashore to prevent loss of the ship and passengers. These would be colonists of the Virginia Colony instead found themselves on the uninhabited Island of Bermuda, establishing a European presence that continues to this day. Digging Deeper About 665 miles East-Southeast of North Carolina, Bermuda is in the Atlantic Ocean, unlike the other European settled islands in the New World, most of which are either adjacent to North or South…

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