Al Nofi's CIC
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Issue #70, March 16, 2002 |
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This Issue...
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Infinite Wisdom
"The capacity of any conqueror is more likely than not to be an illusion produced by the incapacity of his adversary."
--George Bernard Shaw
La Triviata
- Among the gunners serving in Nelson's fleet at the Battle of the Nile (August 1, 1799), were 50 Austrian grenadiers, who had been captured by the French at Genoa, only to be liberated when Nelson's squadron intercepted the ship carrying them to France.
- In 1918-1919, the steersman of the transport U.S.S. Leviathan � the former German liner Vaterland � was a young seaman named Humphrey Bogart.
- While the name "Samurai" suggests heroic bushi running around wielding katana, it has recently been adopted by several computer consulting firms, not to mention a graphic arts company and one selling wood working tools; Sic transit gloria mundi.
- In April of 1986 the Council of the Isles of Scilly, an archipelago 30 miles west of Land's End, England, concluded a treaty of peace with the Netherlands, thus ending a technical state of war that had existed since 1651, when the Dutch got tired of having their ships victimized by Scillian "false-lighters," who would erect decoy beacons to lure ships onto rocks to be plundered.
- African-Americans numbered approximately 12.5-percent of American troops killed in Vietnam, a figure roughly in conformity with the proportion of black men of military age in the overall U.S. population.
- In the three days before the British declaration of war against Germany on September 3, 1939, c. 600,000 children were evacuated from London to safer areas in the countryside.
- Union Brig. Gen. Adalbert Ames was the oldest surviving Civil War general of either side, crossing the river in 1933 at 97 years, five months, and 14 days.
- The Byzantine Emperor Nicphorus I was defeated at the Battle of Verbita Pass (July 25, 811) by the Bulgar Khan Krouma, who had his skull encased in silver, so that he could use it as a drinking cup.
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