On this day in 1870, the First Vatican Council decrees the dogma of papal infallibility. That means the Pope can never be wrong. Imagine that.
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On this day in 1872, Britain introduces voting by secret ballot. Up until then, Brits had been using a complicated system that involved shaving candidates' names into stray dogs, then hurling the mutts into the Thames, where they were scooped up by raft-going hooligans who would call out the results while Freemasons in full apron'd regalia wandered the docksides recorded the tally. The hooligans would then kill, gut, cook and then eat the dogs, saving the penis for the Queen, of course.
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After being denied a permit to fly solo across the Atlantic, aviator Douglas Corrigan changed his official flight plans, declaring his intent to fly across America from New York to California instead. But mere minutes after taking off, Corrigan - who claimed, with a wink and a smile, that his compass was "busted" - doubled back and flew his plane to Ireland, earning himself the nickname "Wrong Way." That's BALLS! He completed his solo trans-Atlantic flight on this day in 1938.
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Happy Chappaquiddick Day! It was on this day in 1969 that Senator Ted Kennedy gave the conservative movement a gift that keeps on giving when he flipped an Oldsmobile off a wooden bridge, then swam ashore and spent the night in a hotel, leaving his passenger - campaign volunteer and Kennedy family friend Mary Jo Kopechne - to drown.
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On this day in 1984, sad sack loser-boy James Oliver Huberty walks into a San Ysidro McDonalds and starts shooting at the walls of heart-ache, bang, bang. By the time a police sniper's bullet ends his rampage, Huberty had snuffed out 21 lives.
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On this day in 2003, NBA star Kobe Bryant is charged with anally raping a 19-year old hotel employee, thus putting into motion a series of events that would ultimately lead to the revitalization of several small Central African nations' diamond industries.
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