Well, I still can't find my copy of 1066 and All That, but I do know that today is the 943rd anniversary of one of the two Genuine Dates. I just don't remember if Messrs. Sellar & Yeatman declared it to be a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. Other things that have happened on this day in history: Robert the Bruce defeated Edward II at Byland in 1322. In 1789, George Washington declared this to be the first National Day of Thanksgiving. It didn't become an annual holiday until the mid-19th Century. The 265 year-long Tokugawa Shogunate came to an end in 1868. The United Kingdom's worst mining disaster occurred in 1912, when an explosion at the Senghenydd Colliery killed 439 men. And in 1943, prisoners at the Sobibor death camp revolted. Nearly half of the camp's prisoners escaped and 50 survived the war.
Born today: William Penn (1644-1718), Eamon de Valera (1882-1975), e.e. cummings (1894-1962), Hannah Arendt (1906-1975), Roger Moore (1927), Cliff Richard (1940) and Steve Coogan (1965).
It is Teacher Day in Poland.
