The most ancient Indo-European cultures divide society into three castes. Their rituals involved the sacrifice of three animals: typically a ram for the priestly caste (Brahmin, Druids, etc.), a stallion or bull (or rarely a human) for the warrior caste, and a he-goat (or boar) for the third caste.
It is supposed that the Christian emphasis on a Trinity derives from the tripartite nature of the pagan Greek and Roman religions. After all, the only mention of a Trinity in the Bible is the very final sentence in Matthew’s Gospel, probably a late addition.
Thomas Jefferson, polymath Secretary of State, Vice President and President of the United States, declined to serve as a godfather for any of his friends’ children. Anglican doctrine at the time required that godparents avow their belief in the Christian Trinity, and Jefferson said that since he couldn’t even understand the concept, he could not in good conscience make such an avowal.
The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, commonly referred to as the Jefferson Bible, was completed in 1820 by cutting and pasting with a razor and glue numerous sections from the New Testament as extractions of the doctrine of Jesus. Jefferson’s condensed composition is especially notable for its exclusion of all miracles by Jesus and most mentions of the supernatural, including sections of the four gospels that contain the Resurrection and most other miracles, and passages that portray Jesus as divine.
Harris Glenn Milstead, better known by his stage name Divine was an American actor, singer and drag queen. He was best noted for his work with independent filmmaker John Waters, Divine was a character actor, usually performing female roles in cinematic and theatrical appearances, and adopted a female drag persona for his music career. He was best known for his appearances in Hairspray and Pink Flamingos.
The plastic pink flamingo was designed in 1957 by Don Featherstone while working for Union Products of Leominster, Massachusetts (pronounced LEM-sta ), and has become an icon of pop culture, that won him the Ig Nobel Prize for Art in 1996. It has even spawned a lawn greeting industry where flocks of pink flamingos are installed on a victim’s lawn in the dark of night. After the release of John Waters’s 1972 movie Pink Flamingos, plastic flamingos came to be the stereotypical example of lawn kitsch. In 2009, the city of Madison, Wisconsin Common Council designated the plastic flamingo as the city’s official bird.
The founder of Madison, Wisconsin named the city Madison for James Madison, the fourth President of the U.S. who had died on June 28, 1836, and he named the streets for the other 39 signers of the U.S. Constitution.
Among many other roles, Ed Harris has played a gee-whiz astronaut (The Right Stuff), a grumpy engineer (The Abyss), a Wild West lawman (Appaloosa), a Nazi sniper (Enemy at the Gates) and an iconoclastic painter (Pollock).
The well-known pink flamingo lawn ornament was created by designer Don Featherstone in 1957, during his second year on the job at Union Products in Massachusetts. Featherstone, who designed over 600 plastic ornaments, eventually became president and part-owner of the company. In 1987, the governor of Massachusetts declared the pink flamingo ornament to be ‘an essential contribution to folk art.’
In 1987, Prime Minister Mulroney and the 10 provincial premiers agreed to a package of constitutional reforms, designed to get Quebec to agree to the 1982 constitutional amendments.
The 1987 package was put together in a series of locked room meetings at the Prime Minister’s summer retreat, known as Meech Lake.
The Meech Lake Accord proved to be unpopular and is widely credited with bringing down Mulroney’s popularity, leading to his retirement before the disastrous 1993 federal election.
I think Elendil’s post (#37203) was skipped, so to return balance to the Universe:
Wapakoneta, Ohio is the birthplace of astronaut Neil Armstong, who was the first man to walk on the moon. It is also a sister city to Lengerich, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.
Interesting. It almost looks like algae. Possibly.
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Texas leads all states for being the state most men who walked on the moon were born in — with 3.
In order of who walked on the moon, listed with their birth state and birth city:
OH, Wapakoneta — Neil Armstrong
NJ, Glen Ridge — Buzz Aldrin
PA, Philadelphia — Pete Conrad
TX, Wheeler — Alan Bean
NH, Derry — Alan Shepard
TX, Hereford — Ed Mitchell
TX, San Antonio — David Scott
PA, Pittsburgh — James Irwin
CA, San Francisco — John Young
NC, Charlotte — Charlie Duke
IL, Chicago — Gene Cernan
NM, Santa Rita — Harrison Schmitt
The late John Young, after whom a parkway in his native Orlando is named, was the first astronaut to make seven liftoffs - two each from Earth in the Gemini, Apollo, and Space Shuttle programs, and one from the Moon as commander of Apollo 16. He, the late Gene Cernan, and Jim Lovell were the only astronauts to fly to the Moon twice.
Colma is a small incorporated town in San Mateo County, California, near the northern end of the San Francisco Peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area. Colma became the site for numerous cemeteries after the city of San Francisco in 1900 outlawed new interments within city limits, then in 1912 evicted all existing cemeteries. The population of the dead — about 1.5 million, as of 2006 — outnumbers that of the living by nearly a thousand to one.
There have been seven warships named USS *California *to serve in the United States Navy, the first a steam frigate commissioned in 1870. The latest, a Virginia-class nuclear fast attack submarine, was commissioned in 2011 and remains on active service.
India’s first nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine has been out of commission for the past 10 months. The vessel propulsion compartments were flooded with seawater after somebody left a hatch open when the vessel was in port. When it set sail, water entered the vessel and caused the accident.
In 1965, Fred DeLuca borrowed $1,000 from friend Peter Buck to start “Pete’s Super Submarines” in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and in the following year, they formed Doctor’s Associates Inc. to oversee operations of the restaurants as the franchise expanded.The holding company derives its name from DeLuca’s goal to earn enough from the business to pay tuition for medical school, as well as Buck’s having a doctorate in physics. Doctor’s Associates is not affiliated with, nor endorsed by, any medical organization. In 1968, the sandwich shop was renamed “Subway”.
), and has become an icon of pop culture, that won him the Ig Nobel Prize for Art in 1996. It has even spawned a lawn greeting industry where flocks of pink flamingos are installed on a victim’s lawn in the dark of night. After the release of John Waters’s 1972 movie Pink Flamingos, plastic flamingos came to be the stereotypical example of lawn kitsch. In 2009, the city of Madison, Wisconsin Common Council designated the plastic flamingo as the city’s official bird.