Today's birthday bio is skimpy, I just couldn't find much. Normally I would spend a little while tracking down a subject, and if the information was this sparse I'd start over with another victim. But in this case that wasn't an option. Arthur C. Nielsen, the services he created, and the company he founded simply has too much influence on modern life. Perhaps the accounting personality prefers anonymity, and most statisticians certainly toil in obscurity, but though Nielsen's life isn't open his name is probably better known than any other individual who deals with tabulated data. The company claims that Nielsen invented the concept of "market share" in 1935. Although the meters that Nielsen uses to measure listening and viewing patterns can't tell if anyone is in the room, the company has established itself as the most accurate measure of audience size in radio, television, cable, and is working on the web. The original work of one man allows 1,000 families and 4,000 individuals to establish the successand failure of media programming, not only in the US but in most major markets around the world.
Sudden violence erupted at least twice on this day. A mentally unstable woman wanting to impress a homicidal maniac attempted to assassinate the president of the US, lack of basic knowledge of her weapon prevented injury to the target, three years after a stunning attack by Palestinian terrorists on the Israeli Olympic team at Munich. Many commentators feel that the disastrous hostage situation in Munich has permanently changed the Olympic Games.
The rallying cry of procrastinators everywhere is "I work best under pressure." I don't know about that, I've never had the chance to work any other way. The only things in my life that come up on time are the ones in the database, fortunately I happened to record this holiday earlier. Psychiatrists estimate that one in four persons has a tendency to procrastinate, which makes the attendance at the First Continental Congress look about right.
Oops, deadline is getting near, I'd better find some suitable quotes.
1774 - Representatives of 12 of the 13 colonies met in Philadelphia for the first time in what is now known as the First Continental Congress. Georgia chose not to send a delegation. On the first day 44 delegates were present, 12 more reported late.
1836 - Riding a wave of popularity after his victory at San Jacinto, Sam Houston is elected as first president of the Republic of Texas. Houston received 5,119 votes, Henry Smith 743, and Stephen F. Austin 587. Houston was sworn in on 22 October 1836, serving two years of the four year term, defeated his former vice president in 1840 and served a full term.
1882 - The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated with a parade in New York City, sponsored by the Central Labor Union, with an estimated ten to thirty thousand in attendance. It was held on the same date the following year, New York City officially made the first Monday of September Labor Day in 1884, other industrial cities did the same in 1885. The first state to declare the holiday was Oregon in 1887, and Congress enacted it for the District of Columbia and US territories in 1894.
1972 - Eight heavily-armed Black September terrorists stormed the apartments of the Israeli Olympic team at Munich, Germany, killing one athlete and one coach immediately, and demanding the release of 234 Arab prisoners by Israel and two more by Germany. After a 17-hour standoff, the Palestinian terrorists and their captives flew to a military airport where Bavarian police snipers attempted to shoot the terrorists. Police sharpshooters, terrorist automatic weapons, and a hand grenade led to the death of the eight terrorists and all nine remaining Israeli Olympians. In 1999 a ranking Palestinian official revealed that the PLO had been behind the attack.
1975 - Lynette Alice "Squeaky" Fromme, a disciple of mass-murderer Charles Manson, reached out to US President Gerald Ford on the grounds of the California Capitol at Sacramento, Ford reached to take her hand. Fromme's hand carried a Colt .45, but it failed to fire for want of a bullet in the chamber. She had wanted to impress Charles Manson.
Be Late for Something Day, Universal - Officially sponsored by the Procrastinators' Club of America, which protested the War of 1812 in 1967, the official news release for this year's observances hasn't been issued yet.
1897 - Arthur Charles Nielsen, US statistician - Born at Chicago, Illinois, parents were both accountants. Exhibited interest in math, graduated from University of Wisconsin 1918, found work as an engineer. Fraternity brothers backed 1923 creation of A. C. Nielsen Co. in market research, few takers in new field - company was near bankruptcy twice. Found business analyzing food and drug sales, still the company's most lucrative field. Invented the "Audimeter" in 1942, a device attached to radio sets to monitor hours of use and station selection, it was the first audience measurement that included rural areas. In 1950 bought C. E. Hooper, a company that did telephone surveys on radio habits, added "diaries" for supplemental information in 1955. Nielsen developed an Audimeter for television in 1950, and became the arbiter for programming in that medium as well. International operations started in England in 1939, Sweden in 1957 - Nielsen was knighted by the King of Denmark in 1961. Died 1 June1980.
An artist's career always begins tomorrow.
- James McNeill Whistler
I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
- Douglas Noel Adams
If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think
little of robbing. And from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking
and from that to incivility and procrastination.
- Thomas De Quincy
Never do tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.
- Mark Twain
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