Motto for Today: ‘Mind replays what the heart can’t delete.’

This is Your Day-TODAY: Take a Determined Step Forward and Make History! 

On this day, Nov.15…….

1492 – Christopher Columbus notes 1st recorded reference to tobacco.

1744 – Gowan Knight presented his research on magnetising metals to the Royal Society. The method he discovered was for permanently magnetising hard steels. The use of steel instead of soft iron greatly improved the otherwise crude compass needles used by England’s Royal Navy, which then had a much longer magnetised life.

1837 – Isaac Pitman introduces his steno system. (Sir Isaac Pitman was an English teacher who developed the most widely used system of shorthand, known now as Pitman shorthand. He was also the vice president of the Vegetarian Society).

1883 – Thomas Edison received a patent for his two-element vacuum tube, the forerunner of the vacuum tube rectifier.

1887 – German scientist, Dr. Carl Gassner, was issued a U.S. patent, the first in the U.S. for a “dry” cell. (Gassner had already patented his invention in Germany on 8 Apr 1886, and also in Austria, Belgium, England, France and Hungary in the same year).

1896 – The first long-distance transmission of hydroelectricity from the Niagara Falls Power Company flowed to Buffalo, N.Y., 26 miles away.

1899 – Morning Post reporter Winston Churchill captured by Boers in Natal.

1904 – King Camp Gillette was issued a U.S. patent for his invention of a safety razor using disposable blades. He began working on an idea to invent something that everyone would use, and in 1895 produced a crude version of a disposable razor blade. It took another six years to refine his invention. (The blade was made from very thin sheet-steel which is placed in a holder to provide a rigid backing and support. By being very thin – 0.006 inch – the blades required little material and could be ground both very quickly and easily. Further, their low cost enabled the user to buy them in quantity and simply throw them away when dull. Two sides were finished with cutting edges thus doubling their life).

1948 – The first gas-turbine electric locomotive in the U.S. was track-tested in Erie, Pensylvania. Preliminary road tests of the 4800 hp Alco-GE locomotive included hauling of 85 loaded freight cars at speeds as high as 65 mph. (The gas-turbine engine was originally designed for aircraft, in which it gives forward thrust from the reaction of its exhaust stream).

1989 – Test debut of Sachin Tendulkar and Waqar Yunus at Karachi.

1991 – Import curbs on capital goods relaxed in India.

2000 – Jharkhand, was formed as a new State.

2011 – In Tibet, several acts of self-immolation prompt exiled Tibetans in India to urge the Chinese government to end its repressive policies restricting the Tibetan’s religious freedom.

2019 – Pakistan becomes the 1st country to introduce a vaccine against typhoid, targeting 10 million children.

2020 – World-record price for a Belgian racing pigeon called New Kim sold for €1.6m at auction.
Born….

1932 – Air Chief Marshal Surinder Kumar Mehra former Chief of Indian Air Force.

1947 – Vidya Sinha, actor.

1986 – Sania Mirza, tennis player.

RIP….

1937 – Jayshankar Prasad, famous Hindi writer. His works include the epic (mahakavya) “Kamayanee” and play “Chandra Gupt”.

1949 – Nathuram Godse. He was a right-wing advocate of Hindu nationalism who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi. After a trial that lasted over a year, Godse was sentenced to death on 8 November 1949. Although pleas for commutation were made by Gandhi’s two sons, Manilal Gandhi and Ramdas Gandhi, Godse was hanged in the Ambala jail on 15 November 1949).

1967 – Elmer McCollum, American biochemist who originated the letter system of naming vitamins. He discovered vitamins A, B and worked with others on vitamin D.

1982 – Acharya Vinoba Bhave, great freedom fighter and social reformer.

1984 – Baby Fae, an infant born a month before, who had lived for 20 days with a transplanted walnut-sized young-baboon heart.

You may have known….

An adult lion’s roar can be heard up to five miles away, and warns off intruders or reunites scattered members of the pride.

{Compiled by Lt. Gen. (R) Raj Kadyan}