Almanac for April 21st

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 21st: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-21-Charlotte-Bronte-P5P41E8UA7

Artist Birthday: Charlotte Brontë

Oh, Toby Stephens as Mr. Rochester, you rascal.

Bummer April 21st

April 21, 1910: Mark Twain dies in Redding, Connecticut, as Jill Badonsky writes in The Awe-manac, “just one day after Halley’s Comet’s perihelion.” The author born Samuel Langhorne Clemens is quoted as having said, “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year and I expect to go out with it.”

April 21, 1978: English folk-rock singer Sandy (Alexandria) Denny dies at age 31 from head injuries sustained from a fall down some stairs at her home. Denny, who had bipolar disorder, was known to use falls as a form of self-harm and had sustained a previous head injury from another fall down the stairs. Denny was being treated for headaches with a medication known to mix poorly with alcohol, so it’s unclear if Denny’s ultimate fall was an act of self-harm or an accident precipitated by mixing her medication with alcohol. 

April 21, 2016: The musician who performs as Prince (Prince Rogers Nelson) is found dead in an elevator inside his home. He has apparently passed away from taking pills of the opioid medication hydrocodone, to which he was addicted, which were counterfeit and laced with fentanyl. He is 57 years old.

On the same day, true crime writer Michelle McNamara dies in her sleep of an accidental overdose of street drugs and prescription medication. McNamara’s husband, actor Patton Oswalt, has acknowledged that McNamara was addicted to opioids. Her health condition was caused, in part, by her harrowing research on her book I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer. The book tells the story of a serial rapist and murderer who was not caught until 2018, two years after McNamara’s death.

Almanac for April 20th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 20th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-20-2002-A0A71E8OZ6

Bummer April 20th

April 20, 2010: Eleven workers are killed and a large-scale environmental disaster unfolds when the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling platform explodes. On September 4, 2014, the BP corporation who contracted the work on the rig was found to be legally negligent in the incident.

April 20, 2013: Virginia State University students Marvell Edmondson and Jauwan Holmes drown in the Appomattox River while taking part in a fraternity hazing event held by the Men of Honor, a local, unsanctioned fraternity. Five others are rescued from the river. Fraternity members plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter and hazing.

April 20, 2016: The first of an eventual 33 deaths resulting from the intentional poisoning of laddu, a baked sweet, occurs in the Layyah District of Punjab, Pakistan. The laddu was purchased at a shop belonging to a pair of brothers. The brothers had an argument, and one added the pesticide chlorfenapyr to the sweets mixture to spite his brother. Celebrants at a party for a baby born on April 17th ate the laddu and 33 of them died, including the baby’s father and five children.

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Almanac for April 19th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 19th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-19-The-Story-of-an-Hour-W7W21E0SSE

Beatles Trivia
April 19, 1998, South Bend: Mom, Stephanie, and I saw City of Angels at University Park Mall. I liked it because it was a celebration of why it’s good to be human. Afterward we went to Denny’s and had pie and coffee. Later, sitting in my room reading a People magazine with Tammy Wynette on the cover, I heard on the radio that Linda McCartney had died. She and Paul had been together for the past 30 years. 

Bummer April 19th

April 19, 1824: George Gordon, Sixth Lord Byron, dies of malaria while fighting in Greece for Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire. He is 36 years old.

April 19, 1995: The federal government building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma is destroyed by a terrorist truck bomb. White supremacist domestic terrorists destroy the building in retaliation for incidents in which civilians were wrongly killed by the federal government. An estimated 168 people are killed and almost 700 more are injured. Among the dead are six children who were in day care inside the building.

April 19, 2000: Ten-year-old Candace Newmaker dies of suffocation after taking part in a “rebirthing session” initiated by her adoptive mother Jeane. Candace reportedly had behavior problems while adjusting to being removed from the home of her biological parents, entering foster care, and being adopted. A psychologist in her home state of North Carolina referred Jeane Newmaker to unlicensed Colorado therapist Connell Watkins, who worked with co-therapist Julie Ponder.

Watkins and Ponder wrapped Candace in a flannel sheet and covered her with pillows, then told her to free herself to simulate the experience of being born. They hoped Candace would then start to bond with Jeane as a newborn baby would naturally born with its biological birthing parent, based on the theory of reactive attachment disorder. Candace complained that she couldn’t breathe and vomited inside the wrappings, but the therapists did not offer any help in releasing her. After Jeane left the room, Ponder releases Candace, who is not breathing and unresponsive. Candace is taken to a hospital in Denver, where she dies on the 19th without ever regaining consciousness. 

Watkins and Ponder are sentenced to 16 years in prison for child abuse; Jeane pleads guilty to a lesser charge and receives a 4-year suspended sentence, which is later expunged.

Almanac for April 18th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 18th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-18-F1F71E0SHV

French Republican Calendar Day Name (29 Germinal): Blueberry

Bummer April 18th

April 18, 1906: The Great San Francisco Earthquake strikes Northern California. About 80% of the city is destroyed. The collapse of so many buildings and subsequent fires are responsible for around 3,000 deaths. Fire chief Dennis T. Sullivan was among the victims of the earthquake, so the interim fire chief requested help from the U.S. military. 

Both psychologist Henry James and writer H.G. Wells (on his first visit to the United States) remarked on the positive attitude and general helpfulness of the survivors in the rebuilding effort.

April 18, 1966: A fire at the Jewish Theological Seminary library in Manhattan destroys 70,000 books. Fortunately, most of these were additional copies of books housed on the ground floor of the library, which was not damaged in the fire. The library’s collection of rare manuscripts is also unharmed.

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Almanac for April 17th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 17th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-17-Hardcover-Bound-2-V7V21E04ML

Bummer April 17th

April 17, 1960: Early rock ‘n roll musician Eddie Cochran dies at the age of 21 from injuries he sustained the previous day in a car accident while touring in England.

April 17, 1987: Comedian Dick Shawn performs a comedy routine at Mandeville Hall on the campus of U.C. San Diego. In the middle of a bit about the end of the world, he collapses face-down on the stage. Audience members assume this is part of the show, even when a stage hand checks on Shawn and asks if a doctor is present. Only when the paramedics arrive does the audience finally realize that Shawn has died on stage.

April 17, 1998: Linda McCartney dies of breast cancer that has spread to her liver. She’s 56 years old.

April 17, 2016: Joan Laurer, the professional wrestler who wrestled under the name Chyna, dies at age 46 of an overdose of prescription medications mixed with alcohol.

April 17, 2018: Engine failure aboard Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 from New York City to Dallas causes explosive depressurization of the cabin. Part of the engine cowl breaks off, damaging the fuselage and causing the loss of a cabin window. A passenger seated near the window, Jennifer Riordan, is partially sucked out the window opening before the other passengers are able to pull her back in. The flight makes an emergency landing in Philadelphia. Despite attempts to perform CPR on Riordan, she is pronounced dead at the hospital.

Almanac for April 16th

Erin O'Riordan's almanac for April 16th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-16-Shrimp-Cocktail-H2H11DYOX7

Artist Birthday: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Beatles Trivia

April 16, 1971: Ringo Starr releases his single “It Don’t Come Easy.”

April 16, 1973: ABC broadcasts the tv special James Paul McCartney, on which McCartney debuts “Live and Let Die.”

Bummer April 16th

April 16, 1689: Playwright Aphra Behn dies. She is 48 years old.

April 16, 1947: The French-owned ship SS Grandcamp is docked in the port of Texas City, Texas, in Galveston Bay when a fire breaks out onboard. The fire ignites the ship’s cargo of ammonium nitrate. The resulting explosion destroys everything in a 2,000-foot radius, including a Monsanto Chemical Company building, killing 145 of the 450 workers on duty at the time. 27 of Texas City’s 28 volunteer firefighters are killed.

That first explosion loosed the ship High Flyer free from its moorings; it drifts across the bay until it comes to rest beside the SS Wilson B. Keene. But the cargo of the High Flyer is slowly burning, and it explodes. It destroys the Wilson B. Keene. Super-heated steel from the High Flyer rains down on Texas City, igniting fires. At least 581 people are killed in the chain reaction started by the Grandcamp.

April 16, 1958: 37-year-old x-ray crystallographer and chemist Rosalind Franklin, who helped discover the structures of DNA and RNA molecules, dies of ovarian cancer.

April 16, 2021: English actress Helen McCrory, age 52, dies peaceful in her home of breast cancer.

Almanac for April 15th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for April 15th: https://ko-fi.com/post/April-15-Ready-Player-One-U7U11DHWDX

Artist Birthday: Bessie Smith

The San Antonio Light, Nov. 22, 1925

Bummer April 15th

April 15, 1865: After being in a coma for eight hours, Abraham Lincoln dies from the bullet wound inflicted on him by John Wilkes Booth.

April 15, 1888: English poet Matthew Arnold dies. He has suffered a heart attack while chasing after a streetcar.

April 15, 1912: The HMS Titanic sinks into the Atlantic Ocean, having struck an iceberg shortly before midnight. Of the approximately 2,200 people on board, 1,500 die. 

April 15, 1989: Nearly 100 spectators die in a crowd crush at a football match at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England.

April 15, 2013: In a terrorist attack by two brothers from Chechnya at the Boston Marathon, two pressure cooker bombs detonate, killing three people and injuring hundreds of others. The older brother of the two terrorists is also killed while trying to evade police. The other is tried, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison.