In 1994 when the Mariners needed an alternate field due to The Kingdome tile issue, they considered Cheney Stadium of the Pacific Coast League Tacoma Tigers (now Rainiers). The reason they didn’t were the Angels were the only team that refused to play in a minor league stadium. Because of this, the Mariners were forced to play on the road until they could return to the Kingdome.
Note: The Angels were not even competitive that year but had to be whiney-ass punks about it. Cheney Stadium is a great ballpark (I used to watch the Tigers there) and absolutely no reason you could not have MLB games there. I don’t know the rules on temporary stadium locations, but considering every other team agree to play at Cheney, I would have moved there anyways and if the Angels didn’t want to play there, then fine - forfeit you chumps.
In the 1990s, 16 active volcanoes were identified as “Decade Volcanoes” by the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth’s Interior (IAVCEI) as being worthy of particular study, due to the danger they pose to population centers and their risk of eruption.
Many of them, including Mount Rainier, Colima in Mexico, Unzen in Japan, Taal in the Philippines, and Merapi in Java, are located around the Pacific Ring of Fire.
Others, in the Mediterranean, include Etna, Vesuvius and Santorini.
Father Bernard Hubbard, S.J. was a famous explorer who was dubbed The Glacier Priest because of his alpine adventures. He was also known for his exploration of Alaska volcanos, including going to Katmai in 1929 not long after it’s eruption, and being the first person to land in the Aniakchak caldera (and barely making it out). He also climbed Mt. Shishaldin in a blizzard in 1932. He wrote three books about his adventures, which I highly recommend.
The Good Friday Earthquake was a major earthquake that occurred on Good Friday, March 27, 1964, near Anchorage, Alaska. It remains the strongest earthquake to hit North America (at 9.2 on the Richter Scale), and the second most powerful earthquake in the world (since modern seismography began in 1900). The quaking lasted 4.5 minutes and estimated death toll was 139, due to structure collapse, ground fissures and tsunamis. (My parents recently moved from Anchorage a year before.)
Here are two before and after photos of 4th Avenue in Anchorage, a prominent thoroughfare at the time of the quake:
The San Jose Earthquakes are a Major League Soccer team, based in San Jose, California.
San Jose’s first MLS team, the Clash, began play in 1996; in 1999, the team changed its name to the Earthquakes, in homage to the city’s NASL team from the 1970s and 1980s.
In 2006, the team’s owner, Anschutz Entertainment Group, moved the Earthquakes’ players and coaches to a new expansion team in Houston; MLS then awarded a new franchise to the San Jose area, which began play – again named the Earthquakes – in 2008.
NASL, the North American Soccer League, operated from 1968 to 1984 and is considered to be the first soccer league to be successful on a national scale in the US.
The National Security Agency, which handles signals intelligence for the U.S. Government, is based at Ft. Meade, Maryland. It is part of the Department of Defense. The fort is named after George G. Meade, the U.S. Army general who won the Battle of Gettysburg against Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. For many years, it was joked that the initials of the secretive agency stood for “No Such Agency.”
A vast National Security Agency workspace filled with staff at computer terminals is featured in the The Simpsons Movie, directed by David Silverman and released in 2007 by Gracie Films and 20th Century Fox Animation.
Gracie Mansion is the official residence of the Mayor of New York City; it is located in the Yorkville neighborhood of Manhattan, overlooking the East River.
Originally built by wealthy merchant Archibald Gracie in 1799, it served as a private residence until 1896, when it was obtained by the City of New York; the mansion was used as an ice cream stand, a storage facility, a museum, and a public restroom, before becoming the mayor’s residence in 1942.
The East River is technically not a river; rather it is a saltwater tidal estuary or strait. The waterway connects Upper New York Bay to Long Island Sound. It separates Long Island from the mainland. Two of the five New York boroughs are located on Long Island, Brooklyn and Queens.
Long Island has 4 counties: Kings, Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk. Kings County began as the Dutch settlement of “Breuckelen” and was named for King Charles II of England before being consolidated with New York City in 1898. Queens County was named after Queen Catherine of Braganza who was Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland during her marriage to King Charles II. Nassau County is named after the House of Nassau. Suffolk County is named after Suffolk, England.
The Planters Peanuts Company was established in Suffolk, Virginia in 1912 by Italian immigrant Amedeo Obici. The hospital that bears his wife’s name is Louise Obici Memorial Hospital, on Godwin Boulevard, a few miles from downtown. It was acquired by the Sentara system of hospitals in 2005.
Constitutionally speaking, a person must be at least 35 years old, a natural-born citizen, and have been a resident of the United States for at least 14 years to be eligible to be President of the United States.
They may also be disqualified under Article 1, Section 3, Clause 7 (having been impeached and disqualified from holding further office), Section 3 of the 14th Amendment (for having sworn an oath to the Constitution and later rebelled against it), and under the 22nd Amendment, which provides for term limits.
More than 11,000 amendments have been proposed to the U.S. Constitution in Congress, but only 33 have been sent to the states for ratification, and six of those did not receive the necessary support to be added to the Constitution.
The most recent amendment added was the 27th, which was originally proposed in 1789 and finally ratified in 1992.
When George W. Bush was President, the Flag Desecration Amendment came within one vote of passing the Senate in 2006, after the House approved the measure in 2005. Known as the Flag-Burning Amendment, it would have provided punishment for the physical “desecration” of the flag of the United States.
