On January 20th, I didn’t blog about Martin Luther King, Jr., on the observance of his birthday, which actually occurs on January 15th but is not observed until the Federally-sanctioned holiday (usually a Monday to give Federal workers a three-day weekend) that occurred this year on January 20th.
As Pat (an Arkansas stamper) might say, January 21st is also a day.
On this date in 763, the Battle of Bakhamra between Alids and Abbasids near Kufa ended in a decisive Abbasid victory.
On this date in 1525, the Swiss Anabaptist Movement was founded when Conrad Grebel, Felix Manz, George Blaurock, and about a dozen others baptized each other in the home of Manz’s mother in Zürich, breaking a thousand-year tradition of church-state union.
On this date in 1535, following the Affair of the Placards, French Protestants were burned at the stake in front of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris.
On this date in 1720, Sweden and Prussia signed the Treaty of Stockholm.
On this date in 1793, after being found guilty of treason by the French Convention, Louis XVI of France was executed by guillotine.
On this date in 1840, Jules Dumont d’Urville discovered Adélie Land, Antarctica.
On this date in 1861, Jefferson Davis, who would become the President of the Confederate States of America, resigned from the United States Senate.
On this date in 1887, 465 millimetres (18.3 in) of rain fell in Brisbane, a record for any Australian capital city.
On this date in 1908, New York City passed the Sullivan Ordinance, making it illegal for women to smoke in public, only to have the measure vetoed by the mayor.
On this date in 1925, Albania declared itself a republic.
On this date in 1941, sparked by the murder of a German officer in Bucharest, Romania, the day before, members of the Iron Guard killed 125 Jews.
On this date in 1948, the Flag of Quebec was adopted and flown for the first time over the National Assembly of Quebec. The day is marked annually as Quebec Flag Day.
The Wikipedia article that contains all of the preceding information also lists hundreds of famous and not-so-famous persons whose births or deaths occurred on January 21st. Perhaps you will recognize some of them.
Just thank your lucky stars I did not publish a post yesterday. If I had, you might have been subjected to a poem called The Eve of St. Agness by a Mr. John Keats (1795-1821) which is almost as long as the list of births and deaths for January 21st.
I dare you to read it.
Who is this man? (Helpful hint: It is not Jefferson Davis):
