Lead Story
1888 National Geographic Society founded
On January 27, 1888, the National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C., for “the increase and diffusion of geographical knowledge.”
The 33 men who originally met and formed the National Geographic Society were a diverse group of geographers, explorers, teachers, lawyers, cartographers, military officers and financiers. All shared an interest in scientific and geographical knowledge, as well as an opinion that in a time of discovery, invention, change and mass communication, Americans were becoming more curious about the world around them. With this in mind, the men drafted a constitution and elected as the Society’s president a lawyer and philanthropist named Gardiner Greene Hubbard. Neither a scientist nor a geographer, Hubbard represented the Society’s desire to reach out to the layman.
Nine months after its inception, the Society published its first issue of National Geographic magazine. Readership did not grow, however, until Gilbert H. Grosvenor took over as editor in 1899. In only a few years, Grosvenor boosted circulation from 1,000 to 2 million by discarding the magazine’s format of short, overly technical articles for articles of general interest accompanied by photographs. National Geographic quickly became known for its stunning and pioneering photography, being the first to print natural-color photos of sky, sea and the North and South Poles.
The Society used its revenues from the magazine to sponsor expeditions and research projects that furthered humanity’s understanding of natural phenomena. In this role, the National Geographic Society has been instrumental in making possible some of the great achievements in exploration and science. To date, it has given out more than 1,400 grants, funding that helped Robert Peary journey to the North Pole, Richard Byrd fly over the South Pole, Jacques Cousteau delve into the sea and Jane Goodall observe wild chimpanzees, among many other projects.
Today, the National Geographic Society is one of the world’s largest non-profit scientific and educational institutions. National Geographic continues to sell as a glossy monthly, with a circulation of around 9 million. The Society also sees itself as a guardian of the planet’s natural resources, and in this capacity, focuses on ways to broaden its reach and educate its readers about the unique relationship that humans have with the earth.
Vietnam War
1967Donald Evans earns Medal of Honor
Specialist Four Donald W. Evans, a 23-year-old medic from Covina, California, was awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor for action on this day in the Kontum Province.
Evans’ platoon had not yet been committed to the battle near the hamlet of Tri Tam when firing broke out in an adjacent unit. Without hesitation, Evans charged forward through 100 yards of open ground to reach six wounded soldiers. With total disregard for his own safety, he moved among the soldiers, treating the men and carrying two of the more seriously wounded back to his platoon. Grenade fragments hit Evans, but he ignored his wounds to rejoin his unit as it entered the battle. Twice more he carried the wounded out of the line of fire. He was running toward another man when he was killed by enemy fire. His devotion to duty and uncommon valor won him the nation’s highest award for bravery.
Sports
1996Monica Seles wins first Grand Slam title since being attacked
On January 27, 1996, Serbian-born tennis player Monica Seles, the former No. 1 women’s player in the world, defeats Anke Huber of Germany to win the Australian Open.
The win in Melbourne was Seles’ first Grand Slam title since she was stabbed by Gunther Parche, a self-professed fan of the German tennis champion Steffi Graf during the quarterfinals of the Citizen Cup tournament in Hamburg on April 30, 1993. At that time, the 19-year-old Seles had won more titles as a teenager than any player besides Graf and Chris Evert, including eight Grand Slams (the French Open in 1990, 1991 and 1992; the Australian Open in 1991, 1992 and 1993; and the U.S. Open in 1991 and 1992). Only Wimbledon continued to elude her, though she made it to the finals in 1992.
Obsessed with seeing Graf retain the world No. 1 ranking, Parche stalked Seles at the Citizen Cup until her quarterfinal match against Magdalena Maleeva. During a changeover, Parche lunged across the courtside barrier and stabbed Seles between the shoulder blades with a 10-inch knife, in front of some 6,000 spectators. He was later found psychologically unstable and sentenced to a two-year suspended sentence and psychological treatment.
In the aftermath of the stabbing, a shaken Seles did not return to professional tennis for more than two years. In August 1995, she won her first tournament back, the Canadian Open, beating Amanda Coetzer in the final 6-0, 6-1. She made it to the final of the U.S. Open the following month, reaching the final and holding set point against Graf in the first set before eventually losing 7-6, 0-6, 6-3. Seles’ trajectory seemed to be steadily back on the rise by January 1996, culminating in her 6-4, 6-0 dispatch of Huber in the final on January 27. She would never regain her former glory, however, as she was plagued by injuries and failed to win another Grand Slam title. Her last appearance in a Grand Slam final came at the French Open in 1998, when she defeated the world No. 3, Jana Novotna, and No. 1, Martina Hingis, before losing to Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a three-set final.
Music
1970John Lennon writes and records “Instant Karma” in a single day
“I wrote it for breakfast, recorded it for lunch and we’re putting it out for dinner.” That’s the way John Lennon told the story of “Instant Karma,” one of his most memorable songs as a solo artist and the third Lennon single to appear before the official breakup of the Beatles. The only exaggeration in John’s description was the part about dinner: “Instant Karma” wasn’t actually released to the public until 13 days after it was written and recorded over the course of a single Tuesday, on January 27, 1970. By any measure, it was one of the fastest pop songs ever to come to market.
“Instant Karma” came during a tumultuous time for John Lennon personally and for the band he was in the midst of leaving behind. The Beatles had spent the better part of 1969 trying to decide whether or not they were still a band, abandoning recording sessions that had just begun and canceling plans for their first live performances in more than three years. The material for both of the band’s last two albums—Abbey Road and Let it Be—was recorded that year, but Let it Be sat unreleased and without an agreed-upon producer. Lennon, meanwhile, was moving in a new direction. “Give Peace a Chance,” recorded during the famous June 1969 “bed-in,” had already come out under the name “The Plastic Ono Band,” as had “Cold Turkey,” his wrenching account of kicking heroin that same year. By January 1970, John had walked away from the Beatles, and the Plastic Ono Band was the only musical entity he considered himself part of.
The January 27 session came about spontaneously. Lennon wrote the song that morning and, as he said, “I knew I had a hit record.” What got the record finished that same day and gave it its incredible sound, however, was the unexpected appearance of Phil Spector that evening in the EMI studios. After several run-throughs under Spector’s direction, John said, “Suddenly we went in the room and heard what he’d done to it…it was fantastic. It sounded like there was [sic] fifty people playing.” John’s happiness with the results would lead directly to Spector’s taking over the dormant Let it Be project—a development that ended up driving a further wedge between Lennon and McCartney prior to the official breakup of the Beatles.
Hollywood
2004Thirteen-year-old Keisha Castle-Hughes nominated for Best Actress Oscar
On this day in 2004, the actress Sigourney Weaver joins Frank Pierson, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, to announce the 76th annual Academy Award nominations.
Weaver was a three-time Oscar nominee herself (twice for Best Actress, for 1986’s Aliens and 1988’s Gorillas in the Mist and for Best Supporting Actress in 1988’s Working Girl). She and Pierson announced the nominations, which were chosen by the Academy’s 5,803 members by mail-in ballot, before 400 members of the international media at a 5:30 a.m. news conference in Los Angeles.
In addition to the 11 nominations racked up by Peter Jackson’s trilogy-ending The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, undoubtedly one of the leading stories to come out of that year’s nominations was the Best Actress nod given to Keisha Castle-Hughes, the 13-year-old star of the independent film Whale Rider and the youngest actress ever to be nominated in the category. (The youngest winner of a contended Academy Award was 10-year-old Tatum O’Neal, who collected a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for 1973’s Paper Moon.) Born in Western Australia to a Maori mother and an Australian father, Castle-Hughes moved with her family to New Zealand when she was an infant. While attending primary school in Wellington, the 11-year-old was spotted by the Whale Rider casting director. She was later chosen from among several hundred young girls to play Paikea, the heroine of the film.
Directed by Niki Caro, Whale Rider told the story of Pai, the only grandchild of a tribal leader who resents her for not being the first-born son who can traditionally inherit the leadership role. Named for the tribe’s ancient ancestor, who as legend has it rode into town on the back of a whale, Pai must overcome the tribe’s chauvinism and her grandfather’s animosity and prove herself as the tribe’s rightful leader. The film became one of the year’s biggest independent hits at the U.S. box office, and Castle-Hughes won raves for her precociously nuanced performance, culminating in the historic Oscar nomination. Though she eventually lost the Best Actress statuette to Charlize Theron (Monster), the nomination marked her arrival on the Hollywood scene. She soon appeared in the controversial video for Prince’s song Cinnamon Girl, in which she played an Arab-American girl who dreams of carrying out a suicide bomb attack on an airport after she is victimized in the aftermath of 9/11.
In 2005, Castle-Hughes played the Queen of Naboo in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith and the following year she starred as Mary in The Nativity Story. She gave birth to a baby girl, Felicity-Amore, in the spring of 2007; the father is Bradley Hull, her boyfriend of several years. Castle-Hughes promptly returned to film work, starring opposite Toni Collette in Hey, Hey, It’s Esther Blueburger (2007) and reteaming with Caro for a second collaboration,Vintner’s Luck (2009).
General Interest
1926Baird demonstrates TV
On January 27, 1926, John Logie Baird, a Scottish inventor, gives the first public demonstration of a true television system in London, launching a revolution in communication and entertainment. Baird’s invention, a pictorial-transmission machine he called a “televisor,” used mechanical rotating disks to scan moving images into electronic impulses. This information was then transmitted by cable to a screen where it showed up as a low-resolution pattern of light and dark. Baird’s first television program showed the heads of two ventriloquist dummies, which he operated in front of the camera apparatus out of view of the audience.
Baird based his television on the work of Paul Nipkow, a German scientist who patented his ideas for a complete television system in 1884. Nipkow likewise used a rotating disk with holes in it to scan images, but he never achieved more than the crudest of shadowy pictures. Various inventors worked to develop this idea, and Baird was the first to achieve easily discernible images. In 1928, Baird made the first overseas broadcast from London to New York over phone lines and in the same year demonstrated the first color television.
The first home television receiver was demonstrated in Schenectady, New York, in January 1928, and by May a station began occasional broadcasts to the handful of homes in the area that were given the General Electric-built machines. In 1932, the Radio Corporation of America demonstrated an all-electronic television using a cathode-ray tube in the receiver and the “iconoscope” camera tube developed by Russian-born physicist Vladimir Zworykin. These two inventions greatly improved picture quality.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) inaugurated regular high-definition public broadcasts in London in 1936. In delivering the broadcasts, Baird’s television system was in competition with one promoted by Marconi Electric and Musical Industries. Marconi’s television, which produced a 405-line picture–compared with Baird’s 240 lines–was clearly better, and in early 1937 the BBC adopted the Marconi system exclusively. Regular television broadcasts began in the United States in 1939, and permanent color broadcasts began in 1954.
Disaster
2002Explosions trigger deadly panic in Nigeria
On this day in 2002, explosions at a military depot in Lagos, Nigeria, trigger a stampede of fleeing people, during which more than 1,000 people are killed.
The Ikeja armory was located just north of the city center of Lagos and housed a large barracks and munitions depot. On January 27, a Sunday afternoon, a street market was set up at Ikeja when fire broke out. It spread to a munitions area and, at about 6 p.m., caused a huge explosion.
The blast immediately leveled an area of several square blocks and killed approximately 300 people, mostly soldiers and their families. The explosion was heard and felt 30 miles away and the tremors collapsed homes and broke windows as many as 10 miles away. Making matters worse, the explosion sent munitions debris raining down over a wide swath of the north side of Lagos. This caused fires to break out all over the city.
The explosions and fires caused a general panic in part of the city. Lagos has a large canal, the Oke-Afa, running north to south through the city. On the other side of the canal is a banana plantation. Apparently, much of the panicking crowd thought they could seek refuge in the banana fields, but failed to remember the location of the canal in the dark. As thousands of people pushed toward the fields, at least 600 people drowned in the canal.
Stampedes in other parts of the city killed hundreds more, most of them children separated from their parents. Approximately 5,000 people were injured in total, overwhelming the city’s hospitals. Explosions continued throughout the night and into the following afternoon. Due to a lack of firefighters in Lagos, the blazes were not contained until more than 24 hours later. At least 12,000 people were left homeless by the disaster.
Afterward, the commander of Ikeja issued a statement, “On behalf of the military, we are sorry… efforts were being made in the recent past to try to improve the storage facility, but this accident happened before the high authorities could do what was needed.
Automotive
1965Shelby GT 350 debuts
On this day in 1965, the Shelby GT 350, a version of a Ford Mustang sports car developed by the American auto racer and car designer Carroll Shelby, is launched. The Shelby GT 350, which featured a 306 horsepower V-8 engine, remained in production through the end of the 1960s and today is a valuable collector’s item.
Carroll Shelby was born in Texas in 1923 and gained fame in the racing world in the 1950s. Among his accomplishments was a victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1959, making him just the second American ever to win the iconic endurance race. By the early 1960s, Shelby had retired from racing for health reasons and was designing high-performance cars. He became known for his race cars, including the Cobra and the Ford GT40, as well as such muscle cars as the Shelby GT 350. According to The New York Times: “In the 60’s, at the apex of the Southern California car efflorescence, his name was synonymous with muscle cars, relatively small vehicles with big, beefy engines. It was an era that many car buffs consider Detroit’s golden age, and Mr. Shelby was arguably its prime mover.”
The Shelby GT 350 was an iteration of the first Ford Mustang, which was officially unveiled by Henry Ford II at the World’s Fair in Flushing Meadows, New York, on April 17, 1964. That same day, the new car also debuted in Ford showrooms across America and almost 22,000 Mustangs were immediately snapped up by buyers. Named for a World War II fighter plane, the Ford Mustang had a long hood and short rear deck. More than 400,000 Mustangs sold within its first year of production, far exceeding sales expectations. Over the ensuing decades, the Mustang has undergone numerous evolutions and remains in production today, with more than 9 million sold.
In addition to collaborating with Ford, Shelby partnered with other automakers, including Chrysler, for whom he designed the Dodge Viper sports car, which launched in 1992.
The Times in 2003 quoted comedian Jay Leno, an avid car collector who has owned several Shelby cars, as saying: “Carroll is sort of like the car world’s Mickey Mantle or Willie Mays… Unlike so many racers, he didn’t come from a rich family, so he signifies that everyman, common-sense ideal. When I was kid, American cars were big, clunky things, until Carroll used his ingenuity to make them compete with European cars. He was a populist, the kind of guy that other car buffs could emulate.”
American Revolution
1785Georgia incorporates the first state university
On this day in 1785, the Georgia General Assembly incorporates the University of Georgia, the first state-funded institution of higher learning in the new republic.
The previous year, the assembly had set aside 40,000 acres from which they planned to earn the money they would need to endow such an institution. In 1786, the future university’s board of trustees met for the first time in Augusta, Georgia, choosing Yale University alumnus Abraham Baldwin as president and drafting the school’s charter. In 1801, John Milledge, future governor of Georgia, donated 633 acres along the Oconee River in what is now Athens to serve as the site of the new university. Three years later, the school graduated its first class.
In its first incarnation, the new institution was named Franklin College, in honor of the ubiquitous Benjamin, and modeled in architecture and pedagogy after Baldwin’s alma mater, Yale. An important distinction existed, however, in the founding of the two institutions. Yale was founded by Congregationalist ministers on explicitly theological grounds, while the University of Georgia–a religiously tolerant institution founded in a more religiously tolerant age–remained purposely independent of any theological affiliation.
Reflecting the trajectory of the nation as a whole, it took an additional century and a half for the university to complete a shift from religious tolerance to gender equity and racial integration. The university began admitting women in 1918, the same year President Woodrow Wilson gave his support to a constitutional amendment guaranteeing women the right to vote. In 1961, after a three-year legal battle, Charlayne Hunter and Hamilton Holmes became the first African-American students to enroll at the University of Georgia.
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