Dawn is the name of a space probe launched by NASA in September 2007 with the mission of studying two of the three known protoplanets of the asteroid belt, Vesta and Ceres. It is currently in orbit about its second target, the dwarf planet Ceres. Dawn is the first spacecraft to orbit two extraterrestrial bodies, the first spacecraft to visit either Vesta or Ceres, and also the first to visit a dwarf planet, arriving at Ceres in March 2015, a few months before New Horizons flew by Pluto in July 2015.
“Dawn (Go Away)” written by Bob Gaudio and Sandy Linzer and recorded by The Four Seasons in January of 1964 while the group wasinvolved in a royalty dispute with Vee-Jay Records. As the lawsuit was making its way through the system, the group recorded “Dawn” and a handful of other songs and withheld the master tapes from Vee-Jay, which then claimed breach of contract. The dispute would not be settled until 1965, a year after the Four Seasons officially left Vee-Jay.
Tony Orlando recorded “Candida”, as a favor for a friend, under the name Dawn, since he was working for a different studio at the time in a non-performing capacity. The success of the single and the subsequent “Knock Three Times” led him to return to singing as a career, and recruit backing vocalists Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent Wilson to become Dawn, then Dawn featuring Tony Orlando, and later Tony Orlando and Dawn.
When Barry Manilow was attempting to break into the music business, he recorded four tracks as Featherbed, leading a group of session musicians produced and arranged by Tony Orlando. Three of the tracks—“Morning”, a ballad; “Amy”, a psychedelic-influenced pop song; and an early version of his own composition "Could It Be Magic, with an uptempo pop tune arrangement. Manilow had arranged the tune as a classical piece that slowly built. When he was persuaded to record his arrangement in his own voice, it began his career.
By 1970, Tony Orlando had retired from most singing. But then in July, Candida was released and became a hit, and then in November Tie a Yellow Ribbon was released and went to #1. Orlando’s birth name is Michael Anthony Orlando Cassavitis.
Michael S. Dukakis and Bill Clinton both served a single term as governor of their respective states (Massachusetts and Arkansas), were defeated, but then came back after a single term out of office to win reelection repeatedly. Dukakis was the unsuccessful Democratic nominee for President in 1988; Clinton, who gave a widely-panned nominating speech for Dukakis in 1988, was the successful nominee in 1992 and 1996.
Mike Dukakis tanked his 1988 campaign, literally and figuratively, when in September 1988 he went for a ride in a 68-ton M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank. The photo op was meant to bolster his credibility as a future commander-in-chief. The press gathering at a General Dynamics facility in Sterling Heights, MI went down as one of the worst Presidential campaign backfires in history.
About 90 reporters showed up for the event, and the small governor looked very dorky while wearing a kevlar helmet and riding the tank. Frankly, those kevlar helmets make just about anyone look dorky, but this showed Dukakis trying to be something he clearly wasn’t and the event left all 90 reporters laughing. Sam Donaldson was doubled over in stitches.
To this day, when campaigners are considering opportunities, if the opportunity seems dubious they will frequently call it a possible ‘Dukakis in the Tank’ moment.
The Abrams remained untested in combat until the Persian Gulf War in 1991, during Operation Desert Storm. A total of 1,848 M1A1s were deployed to Saudi Arabia to participate in the liberation of Kuwait. The M1A1 was superior to Iraq’s Soviet-era T-55 and T-62 tanks. A total of 23 M1A1s were damaged or destroyed during the war. Of the nine Abrams destroyed, seven were destroyed by friendly fire, and two were purposely destroyed to prevent capture after being damaged.[19] Some others took minor combat damage, with little effect on their operational readiness. Very few M1 tanks were hit by enemy fire, which resulted in no fatalities and only a handful of wounded.
The M1 motorway connects the metropolis of London to Leeds in North Yorkshire, through the Midlands. It was the first inter-urban motorway to be completed in the UK. The M1 is the only UK motorway to use transition curves (spirals) to connect straights to curves (circles) as is usual with railways. This was found to be unnecessary and curves connect directly to straights (or curves of a different radius) on later motorways.
The only BMW mid-engined car to be mass-produced was the BMW M1. It was built from 1978 to 1981.
(and I have ever only seen one on the road, once, in San Francisco about 15 years ago)
Nancy Pelosi, who as Speaker of the House was just two heartbeats away from the Presidency, has long represented San Francisco in the U.S. House of Representatives. Her father was a mayor of Baltimore long before Martin O’Malley, another Democrat and now a candidate for President.
One of Nancy Pelosi’s nicknames is Petunia.
Her brother, Franklin D. Roosevelt D’Alesandro, died at age 73 of cancer on February 21, 2007 in Baltimore MD.
On February 15, 1933, President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt had just sat down after giving a speech at the Bayfront Park in Miami, Florida when five shots rang out. Giuseppe Zangara, an Italian immigrant and unemployed bricklayer, had emptied his .32 caliber pistol while aiming the best he could at FDR while standing on a wobbly chair about 25 feet away.
Although none of the shots hit FDR, Chicago’s Mayor Anton Cermak was mortally hit in the stomach and four others received minor injuries.
In an interview with officials after the shooting, Zangara stated that he wanted to kill FDR because he blamed FDR and all rich people and capitalists for his chronic stomach pain.
After Cermak died of his wounds on March 6, 1933 (19 days after the shooting), Zangara was charged with first-degree murder. Zangara pleaded guilty to the charge and was then sentenced to death.
On March 20, 1933, Zangara died in the electric chair.
That electric chair was nicknamed Old Sparky. It was operational from 1924 to 2000 when lethal injection became the execution method in Florida.
Old Sparky was a popular nickname for electric chairs. The electric chairs in 14 states were nicknamed Old Sparky: Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Nebraska, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia.
Old Smokey was another popular nickname and was used for 3 states: New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee.
The US is the only G7 country to retain capital punishment. Only 36 of the 195 UN member nations retain it in both law and practice. Only China, Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia execute more people annually (based on 2007-2012 data) than the US.
The original Group of Six was formed informally in 1975 and included France, West Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. It became G7 when Canada was added the following year.
Russia joined the G7 in 1998, which was known thereafter as G8. They were expelled from the group in 2014 after the invasion of Ukraine.
The largest state situated entirely within Europe is Ukraine.
The largest US state east of the Mississippi River is Georgia. The smallest state west of it is Hawaii.
John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier in Newport, Rhode Island on September 12, 1953. On their way to the wedding they stopped in Kingsland and Cumberland Island, Georgia.