PARACULTURAL CALENDAR FOR SEPTEMBER 13

[Mark Thibodeau]

<http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Phineas_Gage_Cased_Daguerreotype_WilgusPhoto2008-12-19_Unretouched_Color.jpg>

On this day in *1501*, *Michelangelo* begins work on his statue of David.

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On this day in *1743*, Great Britain, Austria and the Kingdom of Sardinia
sign the Treaty of Worms. Ewww…

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On this day in *1759*, England's General *James Wolfe* advances on French
General *Louis-Joseph de Montcalm-Gozon*'s defensive position on Quebec's
Plains of Abraham in a battle that would claim both officers' lives.
Gravely wounded during the battle, Montcalm asks his battlefield doctor how
long he can expect to live. "Scant hours, my lord," replied the physician.
"Good," Montcalm replies, "at least I won't live to see the English take
Quebec."

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On this day in *1848*, Vermont railroad worker *Phineas Gage* survives a
3-foot-plus iron rod being driven through his head; the reported effects on
his behavior and personality stimulate thinking about the nature of the
brain and its functions.

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On this day in *1899*, *Henry Bliss* is the first person in the United
States to be killed in an automobile accident.

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On this day in *1942*, German forces attack the Russian city of *Stalingrad*.
The operation turns out to be a little bit tougher than the Nazis had
anticipated. By the time the siege is over seventeen months later, more
than 147,000 Germans and over half a million Russians will have died.

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On this day in *1956*, The IBM 305 RAMAC is introduced, the first
commercial computer to use disk storage.

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On this day in *1971*, State police and National Guardsmen storm New York's
*Attica* Prison to end a prison revolt. It doesn't go so well.

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On this day in *1971*, Chairman *Mao Zedong*'s second in command and
successor *Marshal Lin Biao* flees China via plane after the failure of
alleged coup against Mao. The plane crashes in Mongolia, killing all aboard.

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On this day in *1977*, for the first time ever, a major television network
advises viewer discretion before airing a program. The program in question
was the broadly satirical and somewhat controversial sitcom *Soap*,
starring *Billy Crystal* as a homosexual. Hence, the warning.

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On this day in *1987*, a radioactive object is stolen from an abandoned
hospital in Goiânia, Brazil, contaminating many people in the following
weeks and causing some to die from radiation poisoning.

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On this day in *1993*, Israeli Prime Minister *Yitzhak Rabin* shakes hands
with PLO chairman *Yasser Arafat* at the White House after signing the Oslo
Accords granting limited Palestinian autonomy.

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On this day in *2001*, civilian aircraft traffic resumes in the United
States after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Unless you were a member of
the *Saudi* royal family or the *bin Laden* family, in which case civilian
aircraft traffic never came to any kind of stop at all.
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