June 7, 2011 - Happy Birthday, Beau Brummell

Although he was born in 1778, his influence stretches all the way to today—in the sphere of men's fashion.

Men's fashions in the 1700s included powdered wigs and, often, elaborately decorated and stitched waistcoats and colorful jackets. Lots of satin, lots and lots of lace. Some men were even “painted” and “patched” (think make up and temporary facial tattoos). Shoes with heels and buckles. Jewels (oh, yes, they wore bling). Men who dressed like this often took hours to get dressed.

Well, Beau Brummell was part of a trend to vastly simplify men's fashion—but he still took hours to get properly dressed!

Brummell cared a lot about image but strove to have a look that implied that he didn't care! He took a long time to get ready but tried to look as if he had carelessly hurried into his clothes. He liked clothes that were simple and subtle—clothes that didn't attract stares and attention—but his clothes were simply perfect, well made, of good material, with beautiful cut and perfect fit and tailoring.

He wore no wig, nor hair powder, and his jackets were of non-shiny cloth and solid dark colors. His only decorative element was his white linen cravat—which was usually large and elaborately tied. He felt that he needed no make up, wig, or scent because he took huge pains to be immaculately clean, scrubbed, shaved, and shampooed.

I guess all that scrubbing is what took him so long each day, in getting dressed. Oh, and having his valet tie his large cravat into elaborate-yet-careless-looking displays!

The thing is, Brummell was copied. His style of dress was called dandyism, and it became very popular. (Check out Jane Austen movies to see it for yourself.) Fashion historians credit Brummell with beginning the ideas behind today's power suit: often dark colored, deceptively simple yet elegant, impeccably fitted and tailored, with the one decorative element the necktie. And of course the modern power suit usually goes along with really careful grooming.

Old-time celebrity...

Another trend Beau Brummell began is that of celebrity. Some authors claim he is the first modern celebrity—that is, he was famous, not for creating a work of art, achieving an unparalleled athletic feat, or inventing a new technology—he was famous for being famous!

He wasn't a born aristocrat, but he wasn't exactly a self-made man, either. Instead, he adopted an aristocratic lifestyle that he couldn't actually afford; he lived on credit; and eventually his debts (especially his gambling debts) ruined him. 

June 6, 2011 - Eruption of the Century!

– 1912

The largest volcanic eruption in the 1900s happened very early in the century--

but (thankfully) far from large cities and population centers.

Novarupta (which means “new eruption”) is located at the base of the Alaska Peninsula. It is almost 300 miles from Anchorage (Alaska's largest city) and about 750 miles to Juneau (Alaska's capital city). When it began to erupt on this day in 1912, nobody knew it for a while. Alaska was not yet a U.S. state, population density was even lower then than now, few scientists were studying volcanoes, and there was not yet a worldwide seismic network in place. People as far away as Juneau did hear the sound of later blasts.

For the next sixty hours, Novarupta continued to erupt, shooting gas, rocks, and ash high into the air. Compared to other famous volcanoes, Novarupta emitted 30 times more “ejecta” than did the 1980 eruption of Mount St Helens. Yet the latter volcano, even with modern monitoring and plenty of warning, killed 57 people. There were NO human deaths attributed to Novarupta! (Unfortunately, many, many plants and animals died.)

(Sadly, the largest volcanoes in the 1800s were super-deadly. In 1815 Tambora killed many thousands of Indonesians directly and was the cause of even more deaths because so many crops and so much forest was destroyed, and in 1883 Krakatoa killed from 36 to 120 thousand Indonesians. Obviously these volcanic eruptions were in more densely populated areas, although they were more powerful, as well.)

To learn more about volcanoes, check out this earlier post. 

June 5, 2011 - Happy Birthday, Dennis Gabor

Holy Holograms! The inventor of holography—which is a 3-D imaging technique—was born on this day in 1900 in Hungary. He served in Hungary's military during World War I and studied electrical engineering in universities in his homeland and also in Germany. But as Gabor entered his thirties in the 1930s, it began to be clear that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. A Jew, he fled from the Nazis in 1933—all the way to Britain.

There Gabor researched oscilloscopes, communication theory, physical optics, and television. He developed holography in 1947 using mercury-vapor lamps—but now that he was in the right place, he was still at the wrong time! His holograms were difficult to see, and holography didn't become practical until lasers were invented, thirteen years later, in 1960. Suddenly, a bunch of uses for holography developed—security devices, art and graphics, medical and engineering uses, training and testing uses, and even information storage—and Gabor finally achieved recognition for his invention, including the 1971 Nobel Prize in Physics!

Some companies and governmental

agencies use holograms so that ID and

bank cards are more difficult to copy.

Learn about holography!

Holoworld has a section for kids. 

In addition to books about holograms, some books have holographic images in their illustrations. Here are a few... 

June 4, 2011 - Great Auk Goes Extinct

– 1844

Called “the penguin of the north,” although not closely related to penguins, the great auk was, in the 1800s, very much endangered by human hunting. People hunted this bird for its meat, feathers, and oil. It had disappeared from Norway by the 1300s, and its population had dramatically dipped elsewhere by the end of the 1600s. By the 1800s, one of the bird's last breeding spots was a small volcanic island off the coast of Iceland.

In 1830, an underwater volcanic eruption and earthquake destroyed that island.

With only a few survivors left in the entire world, the great auk settled on a few nearby islands. Someone beat the last bird on St. Kilda to death because he thought it might be a witch. The last pair, who lived on Eldey Island, were beaten to death by collectors—and their egg was broken, as well—on this day in 1844.

Was everyone blind to the problem that extinction is forever? Did nobody think ahead and realize that, if ALL the birds were killed for meat, oil, feathers, and trophies, then our supply of those things would be gone forever?

Actually, some people did realize that human exploitation was driving the bird to extinction, and they did plead with governments to protect the birds—to “stop the massacre.”  And some laws were passed and even enforced. But not enough.

Not enough laws and not enough enforcement, not soon enough, and not widespread enough, to save the great auk.

Defenders of Wildlife have a website for kids here.  Don't miss the section that tells how you can help preserve wildlife. 

June 3, 2011 - Tonsillitis for Musicians Day

On this date in 1959, Elvis Presley was stricken with tonsillitis. He was serving in the U.S. army at the time, and he was taken to the base hospital, where he remained for about six days while Army personnel searched for a doctor to take his tonsils out.

But...um...operate on ELVIS Presley's THROAT? No doctor wanted risk operating on such a famous throat, so the infection just ran its course, and Elvis kept his tonsils. Probably for the best, I feel.

On this date in 1964, tonsillitis-for-musicians disaster struck again. This time, it was Ringo Starr, the drummer for the Beatles. The day before a big tour, Starr collapsed at an early-morning photo shoot. He had a high fever, and when he got to the hospital, the doctors ordered complete rest.

Now, did you know that touring with a rock-and-roll band isn't particularly restful? It certainly doesn't qualify as “complete rest.” So a session drummer named Jimmie Nicol stepped in and was part of the Beatles for 12 days, touring Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, and Australia. Finally, on June 11, Ringo was discharged from the hospital and rejoined the group in Australia on June 15.

(By the way, Ringo had his tonsils removed in December of that year, on a break from touring.)

What are tonsils?

Tonsils are part of the lymphatic system and presumably help fight off infections. However, when tonsils are inflamed, they can be enlarged so much that they make it hard to breathe or swallow. This is why tonsils are sometimes removed. Also, when people have frequent recurring tonsillitis (inflammation of the tonsils), their tonsils are often removed.

While recovering from a tonsillectomy, it's really painful to swallow, and patients often eat a whole lot of popsicles and ice cream to make their throats feel better.

June 2, 2011 - Happy Birthday, Clair Patterson

He reached into the past and computed the age of the Earth.

His reach for the future got the lead out...

Born in Iowa on this day in 1922, Patterson developed the uranium-lead radiometric dating method into lead-lead dating using lead isotopes, and he was able to calculate that the age of the Earth is approximately 4.55 billion years. This is really close to today's estimate of 4.54 billion years!

Another of Patterson's most important contributions was his work on lead contamination. He first encountered lead contamination while still a graduate student, and he began to study lead concentrations in the air and in the food chain, evaluating the health problems caused by the then-current levels. Due to Patterson's research and his campaign to change industrial practices and lower the lead contamination levels, laws were passed that banned lead additives to gasoline and lead solder in food cans.

Since lead poisoning can cause learning and behavior disorders, abdominal pain, confusion, headache, anemia, irritability, even seizures, comas, and death. So moving a nation from leaded to unleaded gas was no small contribution!

June 1, 2011 - Madaraka Day – Kenya

This national day commemorates the day that Kenya attained self-rule in 1963. (The nation was fully independent from the United Kingdom by December of the same year.) Kenyans will celebrate the day with speeches and shows. You can get idea of the sorts of shows are being put on today by watching this short video (even though the visuals are a bit blurry). 

Kenya, the cradle of humanity...

Many archeologists, such as Richard Leakey, believe that humanity began in what we now call Kenya, because they have found ancient human skeletons and also skeletons from pre-human ancestors. One example is Turkana boy, who was Homo erectus. (Other pre-human skeletons such as Lucy, the famous Australopithecus afarensis, have been found in nearby Ethiopia.)

Read about early pre-humans and prehistoric humans at Kids Past. 

Learn more about Kenya...

• Here's a quick quiz about Kenya.

• Here's a map game about all of Africa.

• Here is a jigsaw puzzle of a Kenyan scene. (Note: you can choose to have way fewer pieces by clicking the words "Change Cut" on the left side of the screen.)