Today in History November 8 :Wilhelm Röntgen discovers the X-ray and wins the very first Nobel Prize in Physics.

Wilhelm Röntgen

November 8 is the 312th day of the year. There are 53 days remaining until the end of the year.

Today's Highlight in History:
1895 – While experimenting with electricity, Wilhelm Röntgen discovers the X-ray.

Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen ( 27 March 1845 – 10 February 1923) was a German credited as the discoverer of X-rays on 8 November 1895, because he was the first to systematically study them, though he is not the first to have observed their effects. He is also the one who gave them the name "X-rays" (signifying an unknown quantity though many others referred to these as "Röntgen rays" (and the associated X-ray radiograms as, "Röntgenograms") for several decades after their discovery and even to this day in some languages, including Röntgen's native German.

Birthplace of Roentgen in Remscheid-Lennep

His Early Life and Education


Born on March 27, 1845 in the small town of Lennep (Rhine Province) in Germany; Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen was the only child of a cloth merchant. He was raised in the Netherlands because his family moved to Apeldoorn when he was still three. For his early education he went to a boarding school in Apeldoorn named, Institute of Martinus Herman van Doorn. He was not a sparkling student rather he was keenly interested in nature during his young years. In

1862, he joined Ambachts school; a technical school in Utrecht. There he got involved in a contrivance against one of his teachers and was expelled subsequently.

In 1865, he studied mechanical engineering at the Federal Polytechnic Institute in Zurich having failed to get admission in University of Utrecht lacking required credentials. There he flourished greatly under the influence of the teachers like Kundt and Clausius. He graduated from the University of Zurich and received his Ph.D. in 1869. In the same year, he assisted Kundt and followed him to Wurzburg and then to the University of Strasburg in 1873.

His Professional Career

In 1874 Röntgen became a lecturer at the University of Strassburg. In 1875 he became a professor at the Academy of Agriculture at Hohenheim, Württemberg. He returned to Strassburg as a professor of physics in 1876, and in 1879, he was appointed to the chair of physics at the University of Giessen. In 1888, he obtained the physics chair at the University of Würzburg, and in 1900 at theUniversity of Munich, by special request of the Bavarian government. Röntgen had family in Iowa in the United States and at one time planned to emigrate. Although he accepted an appointment at Columbia University in New York City and had actually purchased transatlantic tickets, the outbreak of World War I changed his plans and he remained in Munich for the rest of his career.

Discovery of X-ray Beams

On November 8, 1895, Wilhelm Röntgen stumbled on X-rays while experimenting with Lenard and Crookes tubes and began studying them. He found that if vacuum tube, used for experiments with cathode rays, was covered tightly with thin, black cardboard and placed in a darkened room, bright glow was observed during each discharge on a screen covered with fluorescent barium platinum cyanide (placed near the device). He realised that the fluorescence was caused by an agent which could infiltrate from within the vacuum tube through dark cardboard (impermeable to visible or ultraviolet radiation) to the outside of the set. He termed this agent as x-rays.

Wilhelm Roentgen working in his laboratory

Nearly two weeks after his discovery, he took the very first picture using X-rays of his wife Anna Bertha's hand. When she saw her skeleton she exclaimed "I have seen my death!".

Hand mit Ringen (Hand with Rings):
 print of Wilhelm Röntgen's first 
medical" X-ray, of his wife's hand,
 taken on 22 December 1895

By developing the image of his wife's hand and analyzing the variable transparency as showed by her bones, flesh and her wedding ring. and also based on his subsequent research and experiments, he declared that X-ray beams are produced by the impact of cathode rays on material objects

He wrote an initial report "On a new kind of ray: A preliminary communication" and on December 28, 1895 submitted it to the Würzburg's Physical-Medical Society journal. It was the first written paper on X-rays. Röntgen referred to the radiation as "X", to indicate that it was an unknown type of radiation. The name stuck, although (over Röntgen's great objections) many of his colleagues suggested calling them Röntgen rays. They are still referred to as such in many languages, including German, Danish, Polish, Swedish, Finnish, Estonian, Russian, Japanese, Dutch,

In 1901 Röntgen was awarded the very first Nobel Prize in Physics. The award was officially "in recognition of the extraordinary services he has rendered by the discovery of the remarkable rays subsequently named after him".

Nobel Prize

Röntgen donated the monetary reward from his Nobel Prize to his university. Like Pierre Curie, Röntgen refused to take out patents related to his discovery, as he wanted mankind as a whole to benefit from practical applications of the same

Röntgen was married to Anna Bertha Ludwig (m. 1872, d. 1919) and had one child, Josephine Bertha Ludwig. With the inflation following World War I, Röntgen fell into bankruptcy later in life, spending his final years at his country home at Weilheim, near Munich.

 In keeping with his will, all his personal and scientific correspondence was destroyed upon his death Röntgen died on 10 February 1923 from carcinoma of the intestine.It is not believed his carcinoma was a result of his work with ionizing radiation because of the brief time he spent on those investigations, and because he was one of the few pioneers in the field who used protective lead shields routinely.



World Events

1889 – Montana is admitted as the 41st U.S. state.
1892 – The New Orleans general strike begins, uniting black and white American trade unionists in a successful four-day general strike action for the first time.
1895 – While experimenting with electricity, Wilhelm Röntgen discovers the X-ray.
1898 – The Wilmington Insurrection of 1898, the only instance of an attempted coup d'état in American history.
1901 – Bloody clashes take place in Athens following the translation of the Gospels into demotic Greek.
1917 – The People's Commissars give authority to Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Joseph Stalin.
1933 – Great Depression: New Deal – US President Franklin D. Roosevelt unveils the Civil Works Administration, an organization designed to create jobs for more than 4 million unemployed.
1936 – Spanish Civil War: Francoist troops fail in their effort to capture Madrid, but begin the 3-year Siege of Madrid afterwards.
1957 – Operation Grapple X, Round C1: the United Kingdom conducts its first successful hydrogen bomb test over Kiritimati in the Pacific.
1960 – John F. Kennedy defeats Richard Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections of the twentieth century to become the 35th president of the United States.
1965 – The British Indian Ocean Territory is created, consisting of Chagos Archipelago, Aldabra, Farquhar and Des Roches islands.
1965 – The Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act 1965 is given Royal Assent, formally abolishing the death penalty in the United Kingdom.
1966 – Former Massachusetts Attorney General Edward Brooke becomes the first African American elected to the United States Senate since Reconstruction.
1966 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs into law an antitrust exemption allowing the National Football League to merge with the upstart American Football League.
1968 – The Vienna Convention on Road Traffic is signed to facilitate international road traffic and to increase road safety by standardising the uniform traffic rules among the signatories.
1972 – HBO launches its programming, with the broadcast of the 1971 movie Sometimes a Great Notion, starring Paul Newman and Henry Fonda.
1973 – The right ear of John Paul Getty III is delivered to a newspaper together with a ransom note, convincing his father to pay US$2.9 million.
2002 – Iraq disarmament crisis: UN Security Council Resolution 1441 – The United Nations Security Council unanimously approves a resolution on Iraq, forcing Saddam Hussein to disarm or face "serious consequences".
2004 – War in Iraq: More than 10,000 U.S. troops and a small number of Iraqi army units participate in a siege on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.
2011 – The potentially hazardous asteroid 2005 YU55 passes 0.85 lunar distances from Earth (about 324,600 kilometres or 201,700 miles), the closest known approach by an asteroid of its brightness since 2010 XC15 in 1976.
2013 – Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest storms in history hits the Visayas region in the Philippines. The typhoon killed 6,201 people as of 29 January 2014 and was considered the deadliest typhoon to hit the country. It caused around $1 billion in damages unofficially.

Imelda Marcos: she is often remembered for her collection of more than a thousand pairs of shoes.

Imelda Marcos is the widow of former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos. she spent more than 20 years as the first lady of the Philippines. She became infamous for her spending habits and enormous shoe collection.

Imelda Marcos
First Lady of the Philippines
In office
December 30, 1965 – February 25, 1986

Born Imelda Remedios Visitación Trinidad Romuáldez on July 2, 1929 in Manila to Remedios Trinidad and Vicente Romuáldez, brother of Philippine Supreme Court Associate Justice Norberto Romuáldez. Her paternal ancestors were from a land-owning family inTolosa, Leyte, descended from Granada, Andalusia, Spain.




She has five other siblings: Alfredo, Alita, Armando, Benjamin (1930-2012), and Concepcion, they spent their childhood in San Miguel. However, after their mother death in 1938, the family moved to Tacloban, where she was known as the "Rose of Tacloban", and was raised by her servant Estrella Cumpas.


Imelda returned to Manila in 1950, and took up employment in a music store on Escolta street as a singer to attract customers. She took voice lessons at the music conservatory of the University of Santo Tomas. She late a beauty pageant known as "Miss Manila" where she placed second but was named the "Muse of Manila" after she contested the results.This led her to become a local model with her pictures appearing in local magazines and newspapers.

Muse of Manila

Before she met her husband, she briefly dated Benigno Aquino, Jr., who later became a political rival.On May 1, 1954, Imelda married Ferdinand Marcos, a Nacionalista Party congressman from Ilocos Norte, to whom she was introduced by her uncle. The marriage resulted in three children: Imee, Ferdinand, Jr., and Irene. She also adopted a girl named Aimee.

Imelda and  Ferdinand

On December 1965, her husband, Ferdinand, was elected as the 10th President of the Philippines and she became the First Lady. She secured the Miss Universe 1974 pageant for Manila, which necessitated the construction and completion of the 10,000-seat Folk Arts Theater in less than three months. She also organized the Kasaysayan ng Lahi, an extravagant festival parade showcasing the history of the Philippines. Imelda initiated social programs such as the Green Revolution that intended to address hunger and a lack of farming by encouraging the planting of vegetables and fruits in people's gardens. Other programs included a national family-planning program and an African safari on Calauit Island. During the early 1970s, she took control of the distribution of the bread called the "nutribun", which came from the USAID.


In 1978, Imelda was appointed as a member of the Interim Batasang Pambansa representing Region IV-A. later appointed Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary and toured numerous countries, most notably the United States, China, the Soviet Union, Libya, Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Cuba. Throughout her travels, she became friends with a variety of political figures including Richard Nixon, Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, and Joseph Tito.


To justify the multi-million U.S. dollar expenditure of traveling with a large diplomatic entourage using private jets, she claimed that her tours include securing a cheap supply of oil from China, Iraq, and Libya, which she also said was instrumental in the signing of the Tripoli Agreement of the Moro National Liberation Front. She continued her extravagant lifestyle with US$5-million shopping tours in New York, Rome, and Copenhagen in 1983.




One of her excesses included sending a plane to pick up Australian white sand for a beach resort. During her trip to the dedication of the Sydney Opera House, she tried to upstage Queen Elizabeth. Besides being an ambassador, Imelda also held the position of Minister of Human Settlements, allowing her to build institutions including Cultural Center of the Philippines, Philippine Heart Center, Lung Center of the Philippines, Philippine International Convention Center,Coconut Palace, and the Manila Film Center, most of which are still used in the 21st century.

Imelda and her husband and her
son visit The Pentagon

Imelda purchased a number of properties in Manhattan in the 1980s, including the US$51-million Crown Building, the Woolworth Building in 40 Wall Street, and the US$60-million Herald Centre. It was stated that she declined to purchase the Empire State Building for $750m as she considered it "too ostentatious." Her property also included jewels and a 175-piece art collection, which included works

by Michelangelo, Botticelli, Canaletto, Raphael, as well as Monet’s “L’Église et La Seine à Vétheuil” (1881), Alfred Sisley’s among others”When criticized, Imelda responded that it was her "duty" to be "some kind of light, a star to give the poor guidelines."


Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in 1972, basically making himself the country's dictator. This move allowed him to crush growing resentment among the people and prevent his adversaries from unseating him from power. The Marcos government could be brutal to those who opposed it. Some were tortured and others were executed without trial. Martial Law was later lifted in 1981 and her husband, Ferdinand, was again elected president in what was considered a sham election. As her husband began to suffer from lupus erythematosus, Imelda started to effectively rule in his place. Aquino returned in 1983 but was assassinated at the Manila International Airport. With accusations against her beginning to rise, her husband ordered the Agrava Commission, a fact-finding committee, to investigate her, ultimately finding her not guilty.


In 1986, snap elections were held between Ferdinand Marcos and Corazon Aquino, the widow of former Senator and opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr. In spite of Ferdinand winning the elections, allegations of vote rigging led to mass protests that would be later known as the People Power Revolution. On February 25, Imelda and her family fled to Hawaii via Guam. After they left Malacañan Palace, Imelda was found to have left behind 15 mink coats, 508 gowns, 1,000 handbags, and 1,060 pairs of shoes. The exact number of shoes varies with estimates of up to 7500 pairs of shoes. However, Time reported that the final tally was only 1,060 The location where her shoes and jewelry were being kept was later destroyed and the contents stolen. Even a painting of Imelda was destroyed outside the Palace.

MailOnline                                     Her impressive shoe collections                 

some of the 3,000 plus shoes in the former First Lady's collection               MailOnline 

In October 1988, Imelda, her husband Ferdinand, and Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi Arabian former billionaire and arms dealer, were tried by a Federal grand jury in Manhattan in a racketeering case. Charges included embezzlement of more than US$100 million from the Philippines used to buy three buildings in New York City and fraudulently borrowing US$165 million from American banks to refinance the buildings and buy additional property. The couple pleaded not guilty and were represented by trial lawyer Gerry Spence. Imelda's US$5-million-dollar bail was posted by tobacco heiress, Doris Duke, who befriended her while she lived in Hawaii. Actor George Hamilton was a witness for her defense. The case ended in acquittal in 1990. Ferdinand died in exile in Hawaii on September 28, 1989. Aquino refused to permit the repatriation of his remains because of national security reasons. The Supreme Court upheld the decision of the government in Marcos vs. Manglapus

Her love of shoes extended to other objects as well,
 as this 1999 picture, of her shoe-shaped telephone show

After her fall from grace, Imelda was allowed to return to the Philippines by Corazon Aquino on November 4, 1991 and was arrested the next day for tax fraud and corruption. She was then released on $6,400 bail. The following year, she ran for president in the hotly-contested 1992 presidential elections, finishing 5th out of 7 candidates with 2,338,294 votes. In trials held that year, Imelda claimed that her fortune came from Yamashita's Gold.

In September 1993, Imelda was found guilty of corruption by a Manila court and sentenced to 18 to 24 years in prison. She was set free on bail and filed an appeal. This was just one of approximately 100 cases involving US$350-million allegedly held by the Marcos family in Swiss banks. The Swiss federal tribunal ruled in December 1990 that the money would only be returned to the national government in Manila if a Philippine court convicted Imelda in a fair trial.


In 1995, she was elected as a congresswoman of Leyte, representing the first district. Imelda defeated Cirilo Montejo with a victory of 70,471 votes to Montejo's 36,833. Initially, a disqualification case was filed against her, but the Supreme Court ruled in her favor. In 1998, Imelda again seek the presidency. She ran but later withdrew to support the eventual winner Joseph Estrada, whose administration was instrumental in the dismissal of the cases filed by the Aquino government.

Imelda and her husband with Ronald Reagan

In contrast to Imelda's very public life in the 1990s, her life in the first decade of the 21st century was a bit more private as she had retreated from politics and focused on her trials. In December 2000, she suffered a blood clot in her brain but recovered. In 2004, the Global Transparency Report published a study that showed she and her husband amassed $5–10 billion. By September 21, 2007, Imelda still had 10 pending graft cases. She was acquitted on March 10, 2008 by the Manila Regional Trial Court Branch of 26 of 32 counts of dollar salting involving Swiss bank accounts due to reasonable doubt. Imelda, in reaction to her acquittal, said: "First of all, I am so happy and I thank the Lord that the 32 cases have been dismissed by the regional court here in Manila. This will subtract from the 901 cases that were filed against the Marcoses." Imelda still had 10 pending criminal cases remaining before the Sandiganbayan Courts.


Imelda ran for the second district of Ilocos Norte in the 2010 elections to replace her son, Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., who was running for Senate under the Nacionalista Party. She defeated her nearest rival Mariano Nalupta, Jr. with 80% of the vote. She held the position of Millennium Development Goals chairperson in the Lower House.


In 2011, the Sandiganbayan's Fifth Division ordered Imelda to return US$280,000 in government funds taken by her and her late husband from the National Food Authority. In 2012, Imelda declared her net worth to be US$22-million. She was listed as the second-richest Filipino behind boxer Manny Pacquiao. On September 27, 2012, Imelda attended the book launch of Juan Ponce Enrile's autobiography, Juan Ponce Enrile: A Memoir, in the Rigodon Ballroom of The Peninsula Manila near her home in Makati. There, Imelda met with Benigno S. Aquino III.Imelda filed her certificate of candidacy on October 3, 2012 in a bid to renew her term as Ilocos Norte's second district representative, saying she wants to continue serving the province despite her age. In 2013, she won the election with 94,484 votes against her opponent Ignacio with 11,221 and Madamba with 1,647.


. Imelda caused a stir in January 2014 when she called the hospital arrest of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo by Benigno Aquino III as "cruel, unjust."

Marikina Shoe Museum, where her shoes rest.

Imelda's lavish collection of 3,000 pairs of shoes including white Pierre Cardin heels now lie partly in the National Museum of the Philippines and partly in a shoe museum in Marikina. Typhoon Haiyan damaged her ancestral home in Tacloban, which also serves as a museum, although she still retains homes in Ilocos Norte and Makati, where she resides. Her net worth is assumed to be US$5 billion making her the third richest Filipino after Henry Sy and Lucio Tan and the richest woman in the country. Towns in Biliran, Bohol, and Zamboanga Sibugay are named after her. She is known by her nicknames "Iron Butterfly" or "Steel Butterfly", which she has earned through surviving challenges in her life such as the deaths of her parents and her husband. Her beauty has led her to be known in the Philippines as a fashion icon.

Topic Quotes by Imelda Source Popularity and Politics "When you reach a certain level of leadership, people cannot be neutral with you. They either love, love, love you, or hate, hate, hate you." BBC News(2000) Human Rights “We never had such a violation of human rights. In fact, we have had no human rights case here in the Philippines, even to this day. “ Imelda(2003) Beauty “It is not expensive to be beautiful. It takes only a little effort to be presentable and beautiful. But it takes some effort. And unfortunately people think of beauty as luxury, beauty as frivolity, ... or extravagance. Beauty is a discipline, beauty is art, is harmony, in the ideological sense and in the theological sense,beauty is God and love made real. And the ultimate reach in this world is beauty.” Imelda Ugliness “I seem to be able to only see the positive things in life and the beautiful things in life and when I see, for instance, garbage or ugliness, then I turn my back or I seem to be able to skip it.” Imelda Setting an example "I am my little people's star and slave. When I go out into the barrios, I get dressed because I know my little people want to see a star. Other presidents' wives have gone to the barrios wearing house dresses and slippers. That's not what people want to see. People want someone they can love, someone to set an example." Los Angeles Times(1980) Her Legacy "I was born ostentatious. They will list my name in the dictionary someday. They will use Imeldific to mean ostentatious extravagance." Associated Press(1998) Making it “’Who is Imelda?’ I come from a third world country, third class province. And I was orphaned—and look, Imelda made it. If Imelda made it everyone can make it. At this age and stage I feel so good I’m still ready to fly.”

Today in History: November 7 - Mary Robinson 7th President of Ireland and first female President.

November 7 is the 311th day of the year. There are 54 days remaining until the end of the year.

Mary Robinson 7th President of Ireland

Today's Highlight in History.
1990 – Mary Robinson becomes the first woman to be elected President of the Republic of Ireland.

Born Mary Therese Winifred Bourke in Ballina, County Google, in 1944, she is the daughter of two medical doctors. Her father was Dr. Aubrey Bourke of Ballina, County Mayo, while her mother was Dr. Tessa Bourke (née O'Donnell) of Carndonagh, Inishowen.

Mary Bourke attended Mount Anville Secondary School in Dublin and studied law at Trinity College, Dublin, King's Inns and Harvard Law School. In her twenties, she was called to the Inner Bar as Senior Counsel and was appointed Reid Professor of Law in the college, considered to be a prestigious appointment made to accomplished lawyers.A subsequent holder of the title was her successor as Irish president, Mary McAleese. In 1965 she was elected as a Scholar of Trinity College Dublin.

In 1970, Bourke married Nicholas Robinson, with whom she had had a relationship since they were fellow law students and who was then practising as a solicitor. Despite the fact that her family had close links to the Church of Ireland, her marriage to a Protestant caused a rift with her parents, who did not attend her wedding. The rift was eventually overcome in subsequent months. Together they have three children.

Robinson was inaugurated as the seventh President of Ireland on 3 December 1990. She proved a remarkably popular president, earning the praise of Brian Lenihan himself who, before his death five years later, said she was a better president than he ever could have been. She took an office that had a reputation as being little more than a retirement position for prominent politicians and breathed new life into the role. Robinson brought to the presidency legal knowledge, deep intellect, and political experience. She reached out to the Irish diaspora (the large number of Irish emigrants and people of Irish descent). She also changed the face of Anglo-Irish relations, when she was the first serving Irish president to visit the United Kingdom and meet Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace. She welcomed visits by senior members of the British royal family, most notably the Prince of Wales, to her official residence, Áras an Uachtaráin.
She served as the seventh, and first female, President of Ireland from 1990 to 1997, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, from 1997 to 2002. She first rose to prominence as an academic, barrister, campaigner and member of the Irish Senate (1969–1989). She defeated Fianna Fáil's Brian Lenihan and Fine Gael's Austin Currie in the 1990 presidential election becoming, as an Independent candidate nominated by the Labour Party, the Workers' Party and independent senators, the first elected president in the office's history not to have had the support of Fianna Fáil.

Robinson in Somalia, 2011.

She is widely regarded as a transformative figure for Ireland, and for the Irish presidency, revitalising and liberalising a previously conservative, low-profile political office. She resigned the presidency two months ahead of the end of her term of office to take up her post in the United Nations. During her UN tenure, she visited Tibet (1998), the first High Commissioner to do so; she criticised Ireland's immigrant policy; and criticised the use of capital punishment in the United States. She extended her intended single four-year term by a year to preside over the World Conference against Racism 2001 in Durban, South Africa; the conference proved controversial, and under continuing pressure from the US, Robinson resigned her post in September 2002.

After leaving the UN in 2002, Robinson formed Realizing Rights: the Ethical Globalization Initiative which came to a planned end at the end of 2010. Its core activities were 1) fostering equitable trade and decent work, 2) promoting the right to health and morehumane migration policies, and 3) working to strengthen women's leadership and encourage corporate responsibility. The organisation also supported capacity building and good governance in developing countries. Robinson returned to live in Ireland at the end of 2010, and has set up The Mary Robinson Foundation -

Climate Justice, which aims to be 'a centre for thought leadership, education and advocacy on the struggle to secure global justice for those many victims of climate change who are usually forgotten - the poor, the disempowered and the marginalised across the world.'

Robinson is Chair of the Institute for Human Rights and Business and Chancellor of the University of Dublin. Since 2004, she has also been Professor of Practice in International Affairs at Columbia University, where she teaches international human rights. Robinson also visits other colleges and universities where she lectures on human rights. Robinson sits on the Board of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, an organisation which supports good governance and great leadership in Africa, and is a member of the Foundation’s Ibrahim Prize Committee. Robinson is an Extraordinary Professor in the Centre for Human Rights and the Centre for the Study of AIDS at the University of Pretoria. Robinson served as Oxfam's honorary president from 2002 until she stepped down in 2012 and is honorary president of the European Inter-University Centre for Human Rights and Democratisation EIUC since 2005. She is Chair of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and is also a founding member and Chair of the Council of Women World Leaders. Robinson was a member of the European members of the Trilateral Commission.



In 2004, she received Amnesty International's Ambassador of Conscience Award for her work in promoting human rights

.In July 2009, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour awarded by the United States.In presenting the award to Robinson, U.S. President Barack Obama said
"Mary Robinson learned early on what it takes to make sure all voices are heard. As a crusader for women and those without a voice in Ireland, Mary Robinson was the first woman elected President of Ireland, before being appointed U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. When she traveled abroad as President, she would place a light in her window that would draw people of Irish descent to pass by below. Today, as an advocate for the hungry and the hunted, the forgotten and the ignored, Mary Robinson has not only shone a light on human suffering, but illuminated a better future for our world."

Robinson receiving the Presidential
Medal of Freedom from Barack Obama.

Amnesty International congratulated Mary Robinson on being named as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. "Mary Robinson has long defended the rights of the underdog and has never shirked from speaking truth to power,” said Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International. "As an outspoken, passionate and forceful advocate for human rights and human dignity in all regions of the world, Mary Robinson has helped countless individuals from Sierra Leone to Rwanda to the Balkans to Somalia and to the Middle East," she continued. Nelson Mandela and Graca Machel also congratulated Robinson on her acceptance of the award.

United States Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, United States Senate Assistant Majoriy Leader Dick Durbin, and some other legislators welcomed the presenting of the award to Robinson." Forty-five Republican Congressmen sent a letter to President Obama raised issue with the presentation citing "her failed, biased record as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights".

In a letter to President Obama, Nancy Rubin, a former American ambassador to the UN Human Rights Commission, welcomed the award and praised Robinson as a "dedicated crusader for human rights for all people". Oxfam confederation also expressed its strong support for Robinson. The Council of Women World Leaders, the Champalimaud Foundation, and the Imagine Nations Group welcomed the presentation of the Medal of Freedom to Robinson.

The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission congratulated Robinson, saying she "helped advance recognition of the human rights of LGBT people in her capacity as President of Ireland and as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. She has been unwavering in her passionate call to end torture, persecution, and discrimination against LGBT people globally."

Wikipedia

World Events

1914 – The first issue of The New Republic magazine is published.
1920 – Patriarch Tikhon issues a decree that leads to the formation of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.
1929 – In New York City, the Museum of Modern Art opens to the public.
1931 – The Chinese Soviet Republic is proclaimed on the anniversary of the October Revolution.
1933 – Fiorello H. La Guardia is elected the 99th mayor of New York City.
1940 – In Tacoma, Washington, the original Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapses in a windstorm, a mere four months after the bridge's completion.
1941 – World War II: Soviet hospital ship Armenia is sunk by German planes while evacuating refugees and wounded military and staff of several Crimean hospitals. It is estimated that over 5,000 people died in the sinking.
1944 – A passenger train derails in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico from excessive speed when descending a hill. Sixteen people are killed and 50 are injured.
1944 – Soviet spy Richard Sorge, a half-Russian, half-German World War I veteran, is hanged by his Japanese captors along with 34 of his ring.
1944 – Franklin D. Roosevelt elected for a record fourth term as President of the United States of America.
1949 – The first oil was taken in Oil Rocks (Neft Daşları), oldest offshore oil platform.
1956 – Suez Crisis: The United Nations General Assembly adopts a resolution calling for the United Kingdom, France and Israel to immediately withdraw their troops from Egypt.
1963 – Wunder von Lengede: In Germany, eleven miners are rescued from a collapsed mine after 14 days.
1967 – Carl B. Stokes is elected as Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, becoming the first African American mayor of a major American city.
1967 – US President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, establishing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
1973 – The U.S. Congress overrides President Richard M. Nixon's veto of the War Powers Resolution, which limits presidential power to wage war without congressional approval.
1983 – 1983 United States Senate bombing: a bomb explodes inside the United States Capitol. No one is injured, but an estimated $250,000 in damage is caused.
1987 – In Tunisia, president Habib Bourguiba is overthrown and replaced by Prime Minister Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
1987 – Singapore's first Mass Rapid Transit line was opened, starting with train services between Yio Chu Kang and Toa Payoh stations.
1989 – Douglas Wilder wins the governor's seat in Virginia, becoming the first elected African American governor in the United States.
1989 – David Dinkins becomes the first African American to be elected mayor of New York City.
1989 – East German Prime Minister Willi Stoph, along with his entire cabinet, is forced to resign after huge anti-government protests.
1990 – Mary Robinson becomes the first woman to be elected President of the Republic of Ireland.
1991 – Magic Johnson announces that he is infected with HIV and retires from the NBA.
1994 – WXYC, the student radio station of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, provides the world's first internet radio broadcast.
2000 – Hillary Rodham Clinton is elected to the United States Senate, becoming the first former First Lady to win public office in the United States, although she was actually still the First Lady.
2000 – Controversial US presidential election that is later resolved in the Bush v. Gore Supreme Court Case.
2000 – The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration discovers one of the country's largest LSD labs inside a converted military missile silo in Wamego, Kansas.
2002 – Iran bans advertising of United States products.
2004 – Iraq War: The interim government of Iraq calls for a 60-day "state of emergency" as U.S. forces storm the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.
2007 – Jokela school shooting in Tuusula, Finland, resulting in the death of nine people.
2012 – An earthquake off the Pacific coast of Guatemala kills at least 52 people.

Today in History November 6 : Tammy Baldwin, the first openly gay politician to be elected to the United States Senate.

November 6 is the 310th day of the year. There are 55 days remaining until the end of the year.

Tammy Baldwin

Today's Highlight in History:
2012 – Tammy Baldwin becomes the first openly gay politician to be elected to the United States Senate.

Tammy Suzanne Green Baldwin (born February 11, 1962) is the junior United States Senator from Wisconsin and a member of the Democratic Party. She previously served as the U.S. Representative from Wisconsin's 2nd congressional district from 1999 to 2013, as well as serving three terms in the Wisconsin Assembly representing the 78th district.

Baldwin defeated her Republican opponent, former Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson, in the 2012 U.S. Senate election. She is the first woman elected to represent Wisconsin in the Senate and the first openly gay U.S. Senator in history. As of 2012, Baldwin's voting record makes her one of the most liberal members of Congress.

Baldwin was born and grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, the daughter of Pamela (née Green) and Joseph Edward Baldwin. She was raised by her mother and her maternal grandparents. Her maternal grandfather was Jewish (the son of immigrants from Russia and Germany), and her maternal grandmother, who was Anglican, was English-born. Baldwin graduated from Madison West High School in 1980 as the class valedictorian. She earned a B.A. degree from Smith College in 1984 and a J.D. degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1989. She practiced law from 1989 to 1992.

Baldwin was first elected to political office in 1986 when she was elected to the Dane County Board of Supervisors, a position she held until 1994. She also served one year on the Madison City Council to fill a vacancy in the coterminous district

Baldwin presiding over the House
while serving as Speaker Pro Tempore

Baldwin was the first openly lesbian member of the Wisconsin Assembly and one of just six openly gay political candidates nationwide to win a general election in 1992.

In 1993, Baldwin said she was disappointed by Democratic President Bill Clinton's compromise on LGBT rights in supporting the military's don't ask, don't tell policy. In early 1994, she proposed legalizing same-sex marriage in Wisconsin. In 1995, she proposed domestic partnerships in Wisconsin Baldwin opposes capital punishment in Wisconsin

US Senator Tammy Baldwin from
Wisconsin speaking at a US Department of Justice event.

An outspoken advocate of single-payer, government-run health insurance since her days as a state legislator, Baldwin introduced the Health Security for All Americans Act, aimed at creating such a system, multiple times, beginning in 2000.

On July 26, 2004, Baldwin spoke at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in prime time on the issue of health care. During the 110th Congress, Baldwin wrote several pieces of legislation that were passed by the House. The Reeve Paralysis Act authorizes additional funding for the treatment of ailments that result in immobility, while the National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program Act increases funding for low-income women to receive preventative screenings. Another bill she authored, the Veteran Vision Equity Act, guarantees benefits for military veterans.

Baldwin speaks during the second day of the
2008 Democratic National Convention
in Denver,Colorado.

Baldwin introduced provisions to the healthcare reform bill that specifically addressed disparities in health care for queer and trans* communities. Most significant among them were the “Early Treatment for HIV Act,” which sought to allow states to provide Medicaid coverage to low-income individuals living with HIV or AIDS.

The Tax Equity for Health Plan Beneficiaries Act, which sought to end the tax for gay employees whose partners are covered under their employment health insurance coverage.

In November 2009, Baldwin voted for the version of healthcare reform that included a public option, a government-run healthcare plan that would have competed with private insurers, but only the House passed that version. She ultimately voted for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, that become law in 2010.

Baldwin and Thompson debating during the 2012 election

Baldwin ran as the Democratic nominee against Republican nominee Tommy Thompson, who had formerly been governor and Secretary of Health and Human Services. She announced her candidacy on September 6, 2011, in a video emailed to supporters. She ran uncontested in the primary election, and spoke at the 2012 Democratic National Convention about tax policy, campaign finance reform, and equality in the United States.
She was endorsed by Democracy for America, and she received campaign funding from EMILY's List, the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, and LPAC. Baldwin was endorsed by the editorial board of The Capital Times, who wrote that "Baldwin's fresh ideas on issues ranging from job creation to health care reform, along with her proven record of working across lines of partisanship and ideology, and her grace under pressure mark her as precisely the right choice to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl." Former Gov. Tommy Thompson claimed that her “far left approach leaves this country in jeopardy.”

On November 6, 2012, Baldwin became the first openly gay candidate to be elected to the U.S. Senate. Because of her 14 years in the House of Representatives, under Senate rules she had the highest seniority in her entering class of senators.

The senator was featured in Time's November 19 edition in the Verbatim section, where she was quoted as saying "I didn't run to make history" on her historic election. In a separate section, she was also mentioned as a new face to watch in the Senate.

Wikipedia

World Events

1789 – Pope Pius VI appoints Father John Carroll as the first Catholic bishop in the United States.
1844 – The first constitution of the Dominican Republic is adopted.
1856 – Scenes of Clerical Life, the first work of fiction by the author later known as George Eliot, is submitted for publication.
1861 – American Civil War: Jefferson Davis is elected president of the Confederate States of America.
1913 – Mohandas Gandhi is arrested while leading a march of Indian miners in South Africa.
1917 – World War I: Third Battle of Ypres ends: After three months of fierce fighting, Canadian forces take Passchendaele in Belgium.
1918 – The Second Polish Republic is proclaimed.
1935 – Edwin Armstrong presents his paper "A Method of Reducing Disturbances in Radio Signaling by a System of Frequency Modulation" to the New York section of the Institute of Radio Engineers.
1935 – First flight of the Hawker Hurricane, with its K5083 first prototype.
1935 – Parker Brothers acquires the forerunner patents for Monopoly from Elizabeth Magie.
1944 – Plutonium is first produced at the Hanford Atomic Facility and subsequently used in the Fat Man atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan.
1947 – Meet the Press makes its television debut (the show went to a weekly schedule on September 12, 1948).
1962 – Apartheid: The United Nations General Assembly passes a resolution condemning South Africa's racist apartheid policies and calls for all UN member states to cease military and economic relations with the nation.
1991 – The last Kuwaiti oil field fire is extinguished.
1995 – The Rova of Antananarivo, home of the sovereigns of Madagascar from the 16th to 19th centuries, is destroyed by fire.
1999 – Australians vote to keep the Head of the Commonwealth as their head of state in the Australian republic referendum.
2004 – An express train collides with a stationary car near the village of Ufton Nervet, England, killing seven and injuring 150.
2012 – Tammy Baldwin becomes the first openly gay politician to be elected to the United States Senate.

Today in History November 5 : Susan B. Anthony the first non-fictitious woman to be depicted on U.S. currency

November 5 is the 309th day of the year. There are 56 days remaining until the end of the year

Portrait of Susan B. Anthony
that was used in the History of Woman Suffrage

Today's Highlight in History:
1872 – Women's suffrage in the United States: In defiance of the law, suffragist Susan B. Anthony votes for the first time, and is later fined $100.

Susan Brownell Anthony (February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906) was an American social reformer who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement.

 Born into a Quaker family, to Daniel Anthony and Lucy Read in Adams, Massachusetts, the second oldest of seven children. Anthony's father was an abolitionist and a temperance advocate. A Quaker, he had a difficult relationship with his traditionalist congregation, which rebuked him for marrying a non-Quaker.Their father encouraged them all, girls as well as boys, to be self-supporting, teaching them business principles and giving them responsibilities at an early age

Her family shared a passion for social reform. Her brothers Daniel and Merritt moved to Kansas to support the anti-slavery movement there. Merritt fought with John Brown against pro-slavery forces during the Bleeding Kansas crisis. Daniel eventually owned a newspaper and became mayor of Leavenworth. Anthony's sister Mary, with whom she shared a home in later years, became a public school principal in Rochester, and a woman's rights activist committed to social equality,

In 1851, she played a key role in organizing an anti-slavery convention in Rochester. She was also part of the Underground Railroad. An entry in her diary in 1861 read, "Fitted out a fugitive slave for Canada with the help of Harriet Tubman." In 1837, at age 16, Anthony collected petitions against slavery as part of organized resistance to the newly established gag rule that prohibited anti-slavery petitions in the U.S. House of Representatives.In 1856, she became the New York state agent for the American Anti-Slavery Society.

Anthony embarked on her career of social reform with energy and determination. Schooling herself in reform issues, she found herself drawn to the more radical ideas of people like William Lloyd Garrison, George Thompson and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Soon she was wearing the controversial Bloomer dress, consisting of pantaloons worn under a knee-length dress. Although it was more sensible than the traditional heavy dresses that dragged the ground, she reluctantly quit wearing it after a year because it gave her opponents the opportunity to focus on her apparel rather than her ideas

Headmistress Susan B. Anthony
in 1848 at age 28

When Anthony tried to speak at the New York State Teachers' Association meeting in 1853, her attempt sparked a half-hour debate among the men about whether it was proper for women to speak in public. Finally allowed to continue, Anthony said, 

"Do you not see that so long as society says a woman is incompetent to be a lawyer, minister, or doctor, but has ample ability to be a teacher, that every man of you who chooses this profession tacitly acknowledges that he has no more brains than a woman." 

At the 1857 teacher's convention, she introduced a resolution calling for the admission of black people to public schools and colleges, but it was rejected as "not a proper subject for discussion." When she introduced another resolution calling for males and females to be educated together at all levels, including colleges, it was fiercely opposed and decisively rejected. One opponent called the idea "a vast social evil... the first step in the school which seeks to abolish marriage, and behind this picture I see a monster of social deformity.

"In 1851, Anthony was introduced to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who had been one of the organizers of the Seneca Falls Convention and had introduced the controversial resolution in support of women's suffrage. Anthony and Stanton soon became close friends and lifelong co-worker in social reform activities, primarily in the field of women's rights.The two women had complementary skills. Anthony excelled at organizing, while Stanton had an aptitude for intellectual matters and writing. Because Stanton was homebound with seven children while Anthony was unmarried and free to travel, Anthony assisted Stanton by supervising her children while Stanton wrote.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton (sitting) with Anthony

In 1852, they founded the New York Women's State Temperance Society after Anthony was prevented from speaking at a temperance conference because she was a woman. Temperance was very much a women's rights issue at that time because of laws that gave husbands complete control of the family and its finances. A woman with a drunken husband had little legal recourse even if his alcoholism left the family destitute and he was abusive to her and their children. Anthony and her co-workers collected 28,000 signatures on a petition for a law to prohibit the sale of alcohol in New York State. She organized a hearing on that law before the New York legislature, the first that had been initiated in that state by a group of women.

Susan B. Anthony

In 1872, Anthony was arrested for voting in her hometown of Rochester, New York, and Anthony and nearly fifty other women in Rochester attempted to vote in the presidential election of 1872. Fifteen of them convinced the election inspectors to allow them to cast ballots, but the others were turned back. When Anthony voted, however, the reaction was different, and her case became a national controversy.Anthony was arrested on November 18, 1872, by a U.S. Deputy Marshal and charged with illegally voting. The other fourteen women were also arrested but released pending the outcome of Anthony's trial In 1878, Anthony's trial was a major step in the transition of the women's rights movement into the women's suffrage movement. The trial began on July 17, 1873, and was closely followed by the national press. she was convicted and asked to pay a fine of $100, Although she refused to pay the fine, the authorities declined to take further action.

They founded the Women's Loyal National League, which conducted the largest petition drive in the nation's history up to that time, collecting nearly 400,000 signatures in support of the abolition of slavery. In 1866, they initiated the American Equal Rights Association, which campaigned for equal rights for both women and African Americans. Anthony and Stanton arranged for Congress to be presented with an amendment giving women the right to vote. Popularly known as the Anthony Amendment, it became the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920.

Anthony and Stanton began publishing a weekly newspaper called The Revolution in New York City in 1868. It focused primarily on women's rights, especially suffrage for women, but it also covered other topics, including politics, the labor movement and finance. One of its goals was to provide a forum in which women could exchange opinions on key issues from a variety of viewpoints. Anthony managed the business aspects of the paper while Stanton was co-editor along with Parker Pillsbury, an abolitionist and a supporter of women's rights. Initial funding was provided by George Francis Train, the controversial businessman who supported women's rights but who alienated many activists with his political and racial views.

Printing House Square in Manhattan in 1868,
showing the sign for The Revolution's office
at the far right below
The World and aboveScientific American.

In 1869, they founded the National Woman Suffrage Association as part of a split in the women's movement. In 1890 the split was formally healed when their organization merged with the rival American Woman Suffrage Association to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association, with Anthony as its key force. In 1876, Anthony and Stanton began working with Matilda Joslyn Gage on what eventually grew into the six-volume History of Woman Suffrage. The interests of Anthony and Stanton diverged somewhat in later years, but the two remained close friends.

Their interests began to diverge somewhat as they grew older. As the drive for women's suffrage gained momentum, Anthony began to form alliances with more conservative groups, such as the Women's Christian Temperance Union, the nation's largest women's organization and a supporter of women's suffrage. Such moves irritated Stanton, who said, "I get more radical as I get older, while she seems to grow more conservative." In 1895 Stanton published The Woman's Bible, which attacked the use of the bible to relegate women to an inferior status. It became a highly controversial best-seller. The NAWSA voted to disavow any connection with it despite Anthony's strong objection that such a move was unnecessary and hurtful. Even so, Anthony refused to assist with the book's preparation, telling Stanton: "You say 'women must be emancipated from their superstitions before enfranchisement will have any benefit,' and I say just the reverse, that women must be enfranchised before they can be emancipated from their superstitions."Despite such friction, their relationship continued to be close until Stanton death in 1902,

Anthony traveled extensively in support of women's suffrage, giving as many as 75 to 100 speeches per year and working on many state campaigns. She worked internationally for women's rights, playing a key role in creating the International Council of Women, which is still active. She also helped to bring about the World's Congress of Representative Women at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.

When she first began campaigning for women's rights, Anthony was harshly ridiculed and accused of trying to destroy the institution of marriage. Public perception of her changed radically during her lifetime. During the six remaining years of her life, Anthony spoke at six more NAWSA conventions and four congressional hearings, completed the fourth volume of the History of Woman Suffrage, and traveled to eighteen states and to Europe. As Anthony's fame grew, some politicians (certainly not all of them) were happy to be publicly associated with her. Her seventieth birthday was celebrated at a national event in Washington with prominent members of the House and Senate in attendance.Her eightieth birthday was celebrated at the White House at the invitation of President William McKinley

U.S. dollar coin with image of
Susan. B. Anthony

She became the first non-fictitious woman to be depicted on U.S. currency when her portrait appeared on the 1979 dollar coin.

Susan B. Anthony
commemorative stamp, 1936 issueIssued  on the 16th anniversary of ratification of  the 19th Amendment,
allowing women to vote.

Susan B. Anthony died at the age of 86 of heart failure and pneumonia in her home in Rochester, New York, on March 13, 1906. She was buried at Mount Hope Cemetery, Rochester.

Anthony did not live to see the achievement of women's suffrage at the national level, but she was proud of the progress the women's movement had made. At the time of her death, women had achieved suffrage in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado and Idaho, and several larger states followed soon after. Legal rights for married women had been established in most states, and most professions had at least a few women members. 36,000 women were attending colleges and universities, up from zero a few decades earlier." Two years before she died, Anthony said, "The world has never witnessed a greater revolution than in the sphere of woman during this fifty years".

Legacy

Anthony's home in Rochester is now a National Historic Landmark called the National Susan B. Anthony Museum and House. The house of her birth in Adams, Massachusetts, and her childhood home in Battenville, New York, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The rotunda of the U.S. Capitol contains a statue that honors three leading women's rights leaders: Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Lucretia Mott. The Cathedral of St. John the Divine in Manhattan, one of the world's largest, has a sculpture honoring four spiritual heroes of the twentieth century: Anthony, Martin Luther King, Albert Einstein, and Mohandas Gandhi.

In 1936, the U.S. Post Office issued its first postage stamp honoring Susan B. Anthony. A second stamp honoring Anthony was issued in April 1958.

In 1979, the United States Mint began issuing the Susan B. Anthony dollar coin, the first U.S. coin to honor a real woman rather than an allegorical female figure.The Nineteenth Amendment, which guaranteed the right of women to vote, was popularly known as the Susan B. Anthony Amendment. After it was ratified in 1920, the National American Woman Suffrage Association, whose character and policies were strongly influenced by Anthony, was transformed into the League of Women Voters, which is still an active force in U.S. politics.

wikipedia

World Events

1831 – Nat Turner, American slave leader, is tried, convicted, and sentenced to death in Virginia.
1872 – Women's suffrage in the United States: In defiance of the law, suffragist Susan B. Anthony votes for the first time, and is later fined $100.
1895 – George B. Selden is granted the first U.S. patent for an automobile.
1912 – Woodrow Wilson is elected to the presidency of the United States.
1916 – The Kingdom of Poland is proclaimed by the Act of November 5th of the emperors of Germany and Austria-Hungary.
1917 – St. Tikhon of Moscow is elected the Patriarch of Moscow and of the Russian Orthodox Church.
1925 – Secret agent Sidney Reilly, the first "super-spy" of the 20th century, is executed by the OGPU, the secret police of the Soviet Union.
1937 – Adolf Hitler holds a secret meeting and states his plans for acquiring "living space" for the German people.
2006 – Saddam Hussein, former president of Iraq, and his co-defendants Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti and Awad Hamed al-Bandar are sentenced to death in the al-Dujail trial for the role in the massacre of the 148 Shi'a Muslims in 1982
2007 – China's first lunar satellite, Chang'e 1 goes into orbit around the Moon.
2007 – Android mobile operating system is unveiled by Google.
2009 – U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan murders 13 and wounds 32 at Fort Hood, Texas in the deadliest mass shooting at a U.S. military installation.
2013 – India launches the Mars Orbiter Mission, its first interplanetary probe.