You know, if Ricimer hadn’t defeated Avitus back on this day in 456 — which, incidentally, was the Year of the Consulship of Avitus Without Colleague — then he wouldn’t have gone on to be the magister militum of the western Roman Empire for the next sixteen years. There were various emperors, of course, but… Continue reading

Today we’re halfway through October, at the measured center of a month the ends with the thinning of the trusty veil holding back the dark from us. Or to take the other side of it, holding the chaos and discord of us back from the slower, comforting dark.  People have always been afraid of that… Continue reading

This is the day that George Eastman received his first patent on photographic film delivered in a roll. It was 1884, and photography at that point was very much a matter of an individual craftsman putting together a camera, an amateur chemist preparing “photographic plates,” usually on glass or metal, and a self-taught photographer putting… Continue reading

If you’re not reading this on your mobile phone, stop right now and switch. Today is the anniversary of the first cellular service in the US being switched on. It was available only in Chicago, and the first service provider was Ameritech Mobile Communications.  There were only a couple of kinds of phones available, and… Continue reading

October 12 is Freethought Day, at least in California. Freethought Day commemorates October 12, 1692, the day the Salem Witch Trials were ended by the governor of Massachusetts Colony (the US didn’t exist yet). The trials had gotten completely out of hand, particularly in the kinds of evidence that were being allowed. The tipping point,… Continue reading

An odd thing happened on October 11, 1976. A promotion was awarded to an officer in the US Army. On the face of it, that seems like something that happens all the time, but this time the promotion was posthumous. Which is not something that happens all the time, but it’s certainly not unprecedented or… Continue reading

In one of those odd coincidences that we manufacture all the time (because it’s not a coincidence until somebody says “gee, that’s an odd coincidence”), October 10 in 1914, 1915, and 1917 is the birthday of three famous jazz/R&B musicians: Ivory Joe Hunter, Harry Edison, and Thelonious Monk, in that order.  Ivory Joe Hunter —… Continue reading

October 9, 1701, the Collegiate School was chartered in the colony of Connecticut. The thinking was that Harvard College, which had been around for over 60 years by that time, was getting much too liberal and a new school was needed that would “maintain the Puritan religious orthodoxy.” The school didn’t have a permanent location,… Continue reading

Ken Warby was born in 1939 — not on October 8; he’s not appearing here because of his birthday. It’s because Warby’s boyhood hero was Donald Campbell. To Donald Campbell, the most important thing was speed records — he set speed records (eight of them) for top speeds in cars and boats. He was following… Continue reading

Railroads are older than you think. That’s because when we think of railroads, we naturally envision a locomotive (diesel, electric, or steam powered) and railcars, all rolling on steel tracks. But what are the really essential parts of the system? Tracks, certainly, along with some kind of containers being conveyed along them in some way. … Continue reading