The Anglo-Portuguese Alliance, between England (succeeded by the United Kingdom) and Portugal, was ratified by the Treaty of Windsor in 1386. It is the oldest alliance in the world that is still in force.
As recently as 1982 it was called into effect when Portugal offered the use of its facilities on the Azores to the Royal Navy during the Falklands War.
Not the tricorder, but the laser scalpel:
In play:
Although it was not revealed until many years later, the Reagan Administration offered the Royal Navy the use of the USS Iowa Jima, an amphibious assault carrier, if anything happened to the two British carriers involved in the 1982 Falklands campaign.
The weekly newspaper in the Falkland Islands, published on Fridays, is called the Penguin News.
The Falklands War of 1982 not only fought over the Falkland Islands which are about 500 miles from the Argentina coast, but also over South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands which are about 1,600 miles east of the Falklands.
The South Sandwich Islands were named in honour of John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, who was the First Lord of the Admiralty. The word “South” was later added to distinguish them from the “Sandwich Islands”, now known as the Hawaiian Islands.
The 4th Earl of Sandwich is probably best known for the claim that he was the eponymous inventor of the sliced bread snack.
The Earldom of Sandwich is currently held by John Edward Hollister Montagu, the 11th Earl, 5 x great grandson of the 4th Earl.
Damned spellcheck …
During 1943, U.S. officials imposed a short-lived ban on sliced bread as a wartime conservation measure. Officials explained that “the ready-sliced loaf must have a heavier wrapping than an unsliced one if it is not to dry out.” It was also intended to counteract a rise in the price of bread, caused by the Office of Price Administration’s authorization of a ten percent increase in flour prices.
Sliced bread (the greatest thing since, well, something else but that’s a GQ thread) was first sold nationwide in the US by Wonder Bread in 1930.
1943 was the most recent year in which Easter Sunday fell on its latest possible date of 25 April. The next year when this will occur is 2038.
In the year 2016, Easter Sunday will fall on March 27th, a full 26 days before the beginning of Passover on April 21st. In other words, Christians will celebrate Jesus’s supposed resurrection 26 days before his supposed crucifixion.
(Note: This information was obtained from this whackadoddle website.)
Christ died on the cross on Good Friday. On the third day, Easter Sunday, he rose from the dead. Good Friday and Easter Sunday are set by one calendar, while a different calendar sets the Jewish holidays. The different religions’ calendars are not synchronized.
President Abraham Lincoln was shot in Ford’s Theatre on Good Friday, April 14, 1865, and died early the next morning in the Petersen House across the street. He did not then rise from the dead, although contemporary accounts suggest that many American preachers that Easter Sunday likened his sacrifice to that of Christ.
In 325CE the Council of Nicaea established that Easter would be held on the first Sunday after the first full moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox, while the Jewish calendar year begins in late September or early October with the celebration of Rosh Hashana, and uses twelve lunar months of 29 to 30 days in length. The new moon marks the beginning of each month with the full moon occurring halfway through the month. The seventh month in a normal Jewish calendar year is the month of Nisan (also called Abib in the Old Testament). Passover is celebrated on the 14th day of Nisan at the time of the full moon.
The first woman put to death by the federal government was Mary Surratt. She was hanged on 07 July 1865. Surratt, a Booth conspirator, owned the boarding house that had served as a council meeting place for Booth and his other conspirators.
Mary Surratt’s boarding house still stands, not far from Ford’s Theatre in Washington D.C.'s Chinatown, but is now a Chinese restaurant.
nm, duplicate material
Dishes commonly found in Chinese restaurants in the US, but not China, include General Tso’s chicken, chop suey, chow mein, crab Rangoon, beef and broccoli, and fortune cookies.
Major General George H. Thomas, born and raised in Virginia, remained loyal to the United States during the Civil War. Upon his death after the war, virtually disowned by his family, he was buried with full military honors in Troy, N.Y., his wife’s hometown. Among the dignitaries attending his funeral was President U.S. Grant, a former commander of his.
Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson’s roommate at West Point was future Union General George Stoneman, whose cavalry came and tore up the tracks again. In the winter of '65, we were hungry, just barely alive. By May the Tenth, Richmond had fell …
Oh. Sorry. Stoneman was later Governor of California.
Stonewall Jackson died as a result of friendly fire.
The first four Canadian military casualties in combat since the Korean War were killed by friendly fire from the USAF in Afghanistan.
Steve Austin, title character in the Seventies TV show The Six Million Dollar Man, was a test pilot who held the rank of colonel in the U.S. Air Force.