Almanac for November 15th

Erin O'Riordan's Almanac for November 15th: https://ko-fi.com/post/November-15-Mothman-H2H015W1LZ

Author Julie S. Howlin post of the day: Marianne Moore
Artist Birthday: Georgia O'Keeffe

Bummer November 15th

November 15, 1914: Harry Turner, age 27, plays in an American football game for the Canton Professionals in the Ohio League, a forerunner of the National Football League. During a tackle, Turner fractures his back. His spinal cord is severed, and Turner dies at the hospital shortly afterward. His last words are allegedly, “I know I must go, but I am satisfied, for we beat Peggy Parratt.” Parratt is the captain of the opposing team, the Akron Indians. Turner’s is the first fatal sports injury recorded in Ohio.

November 15, 1958: Actor Tyrone Power, age 44, suffers a massive heart attack while filming a dueling scene. He dies on the way to the hospital.

November 15, 1959: Herb and Bonnie Clutter and two of their four children, Nancy and Kenyon, are murdered by Dick Hickock and Perry Smith in Holcomb, Kansas. The murders form the basis of Truman Capote’s “nonfiction novel” In Cold Blood. All four were shot, and Herb is also stabbed.

November 15, 2010: 68-year-old Steven Cowan of Black Earth, Wisconsin, shoots his tv set with a shotgun after becoming upset by seeing Bristol Palin, the daughter of former U.S. Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, perform on the program Dancing With the Stars. Cowan reportedly also pointed the shotgun at his wife, who called the police, leading to a standoff with the SWAT team that ends peacefully. Cowan pleads no contest to charges of negligently handling a weapon and disorderly conduct, both misdemeanors, and is given probation.

November 15, 2018: American missionary John Allen Chau, age 26, bribes two local fisherman to take him to North Sentinel Island. The Sentinelese live in voluntary isolation, choosing to have no contact with outsiders, and it is illegal for non-Sentinelese to travel there without explicit permission of the government of India. This is, in part, because the Sentinelese have no immunity to microbes from outside their own community. Chau wants to convert the Sentinelese to Christianity and is aware that what he wanted to do was both illegal and dangerous. 

The exact manner of Chau’s death is unknown, but the fisherman who bring him to North Sentinel Island see the Sentinelese handling Chau’s body. His body is not recovered.