I've learned many things during the months that I've written and assembled Twisted History, unfortunately one of them is that you can't spend 40 hours a week on a project with no profit and still earn a living. I've thought long and hard about this, trying to think of a way to cut the time down. I discarded the idea of cutting it back to three or four days a week, and I never seriously considered stopping it altogether - it's too much fun.
The largest part of the time in creating each issue goes into the biography. The extended biography grew out of frustration with the terse capsules that serve in most birthday lists; prising out additional detail, even additional dimensions, of the famous lives has been rewarding to me. Fan mail tells me that many of you agreed. Even though the great patriot and brewer Samuel Adams was born on this day in 1722, I'm going to go without a biography for a while. If the subscription list continues to grow and we find some advertisers I'll put them back as revenue enables.
The introduction may be a little shorter on some days, but probably not. Once I get started ...
1540 - Through the encyclical "Regimini militantis ecclesiae," Pope Paul III officially approved the Society of Jesus, a body of priests organized by Ignatius of Loyola in 1534 for missionary work. Today, the Jesuits constitute the largest Catholic teaching order in the United States.
1825 - The first passengers to be carried by a railroad pulled by a locomotive on the Stockton & Darlington Railroad. George Stephenson's "Locomotion" pulled 36 wagons - 12 of coal and flour, six of guests, and 14 carrying workmen. The nine-mile journey from Darlington took two hours, although speeds of 15 mph were reached in the final downhill stretch into Stockton.
1876 - The United States Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania was scandalized when it was learned that the painter of "Under the Oaks," a huge oil showing cows and sheep taking shelter from a storm under the oak trees that had been awarded a bronze medal, was painted by Edward Mitchell Bannister, a free black man from Providence, Rhode Island.
1892 - A patent for book matches was issued to John Pusey, whose design had the striking surface on the inside of the book of 50 matches, often igniting the whole book and burning the user. The Diamond Match Company of Barberton, Ohio bought his patent rights and put the striking surface on the outside where they could print "Close cover before striking."
1938 - The Cunard White Star liner Queen Elizabeth was launched at John Brown's shipyard at Clydebank, Scotland. At 83,673 she was the largest passenger ship built to date. The interior was not completed when war broke out, she was fitted as a troop carrier for use during WW II, refitted as a luxury liner in 1945, sailed as the sister ship to the Queen Mary until the 1960s. After becoming a floating school the ship was destroyed by fire at Hong Kong in 1972.
1989 - Jeffrey Petkovich, 25, of Ottawa and Peter DeBernardi, 42, of Niagara Falls climbed into a single barrel and rode over Horseshoe Falls. It was the first time a pair attempted the trip. They were fined $500 for performing a stunt in Niagara Park without permission, DeBernardi was also fined $1,000 for trespassing.
Maskal, the Finding of the True Cross, Ethiopia - According to pious tradition the Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, located the original cross in Jerusalem in 326, and a festival has been kept by Christians ever since. In Ethiopia a fresh green tree is planted the evening of the 26th in town squares and village market places, and everyone prepares a wooden pole topped with the bright yellow Maskal daisies that bloom at this time, making a pyramid around the tree, which will be burned at the end of the day's festivities - dancing, feasting, bonfires, merrymaking, and gun salutes. The festival was observed on 3 May on the Roman calendar until it was omitted under Pope John XXIII in 1960.
In communities where men build ships for their own sons to fish or fight
from, quality is never a problem.
- J. Deville
It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon
the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle
and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to standing
upon the vantage ground of truth....and to see the errors, and wanderings,
and mists, and tempests, in the vale below.
- Francis Bacon
Men of sense often learn from their enemies. It is from their foes, not
their friends, that cities learn the lesson of building high walls and
ships of war.
- Aristophanes
People who soar are those who refuse to sit back, sigh and wish things
would change. They neither complain of their lot nor passively dream of
some distant ship coming in.
- Charles R. Swindoll
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Copyright 2000 G. Armour Van Horn, all rights reserved. This document may be distributed freely. Please forward the complete message including this copyright notice.