On This Day: Friday October 27, 2006

This is the 300th day of the year, with 65 days remaining in 2006.

Fact of the Day: vitamins

Vitamins are organic substances necessary in small quantities for health and growth in higher forms of animal life. If a vitamin is absent from the diet or is not properly absorbed by an organism, a deficiency disease may develop. The term "vitamin" originated from vitamine, a word first used in 1911 to designate a group of compounds considered vital for life; each was thought to have a nitrogen-containing component known as an amine. The final "e" of vitamine was dropped when it was discovered that not all of the vitamins contain nitrogen and, therefore, not all are amines. Vitamins are usually divided into two groups: fat-soluble (A, D, E) and water-soluble (folic acid or folate, niacin, riboflavin, thiamin, B12, B6, and C).

Holidays

Feast day of St. Otteran or Odhran of Iona, and St. Frumentius of Ethiopia.
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: Independence Day.
Turkmenistan: Independence Day.
United States: Navy Day.

Events

1659 - Two Quakers who came from England in 1656 to escape religious persecution, were executed in the Massachusetts Bay Colony for their religious beliefs.
1662 - England's Charles II sold Dunkirk to Louis XIV of France.
1787 - The first of the "Federalist Papers," a series of essays calling for ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America, was published in the New York "Independent Journal."
1878 - The Manhattan Savings Bank in New York City was robbed of $3 million by George "Western" Leslie and his gang.
1904 - The first rapid transit subway, the IRT, opened in New York City. Today, the New York subway system is the largest in the world.
1927 - The first newsreel with sound was released in New York by Fox Movietone News.
1936 - Mrs. Wallis Simpson was granted a divorce from her husband, leaving her free to marry Britain's King Edward VIII.
1938 - DuPont announced its new synthetic yarn, called "nylon."
1947 - "You Bet Your Life," starring Groucho Marx, premiered on radio; it later became a television show.
1962 - In the Cuban Missile Crisis, Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev offered to remove Soviet missile bases in Cuba if the United States removed its missile bases in Turkey.
1971 - Republic of Congo changed its name to the Republic of Zaire.
1978 - Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.
1979 - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines gained independence.
1994 - U.S. Justice Department announced that the U.S. prison population has topped one million.
1998 - Hurricane Mitch in Central America killed more than 7000 in Honduras, Nicaragua, and other countries.
2004 - The Boston Red Sox won their first World Series since 1918, beating the St. Louis Cardinals 3-0 in Game 4.

Births

1728 - James Cook, British sea captain and explorer.
1782 - Niccoló Paganini, Italian violinist and composer.
1811 - Isaac Singer, American inventor of the sewing machine.
1858 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States of America (1901-1909).
1914 - Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet.
1923 - Roy Lichtenstein, American sculptor, artist.
1924 - Ruby Dee (Ruth Wallace), American actress.
1932 - Sylvia Plath, American poet.
1939 - John Cleese, English actor and comedian.
1984 - Kelly Michelle Lee Osbourne, daughter of rock legend Ozzy Osbourne.
anowyn was born today! Whooo! Happy Birthday! They're taking the Hobbits to Isengard!....what?....O.o;

Deaths

1553 - Michael Servetus, Spanish physician and theologian and discoverer of pulmonary blood circulation, burned for heresy in Switzerland.
1975 - Rex Stout, American writer best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe.
1977 - James Mallahan Cain, American novelist.

Happy Birthday, anowyn!