Happy Leap Day!!!

I decided early this morning that since this was an "extra" day; a gift, if you will, that I was not going to waste it doing anything important!!! So other than taking a shower, I've been a lovely lazy girl all day ~ what fun!!

I have, however, compiled the following for you... in honor of this special day...

On this date in history ~

1288 - Scotland established this day as one when a woman could propose marriage to a man. In the event that he refused the proposal he was

1504 ~ Christopher Columbus, stranded in Jamaica during his fourth voyage to the West, used a correctly predicted lunar eclipse to frighten hostile natives into providing food for his crew.

1692: The Salem witch trials begin when Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba are accused of using witchcraft.

1792 ~ Composer Gioacchino Antonio Rossini was born in Pesaro, Italy.

1904 ~ President Theodore Roosevelt appointed a seven-member commission to facilitate completion of the Panama Canal.

1904 ~ Bandleader Jimmy Dorsey was born in Shenandoah, Pa.

1940 ~ "Gone with the Wind" won eight Oscars at the Academy Awards ceremony in Los Angeles, including best picture.

1940 - Hattie McDaniel became the first black person to win an Oscar. She won Best Supporting Actress award for her role as Mammy in "Gone with the Wind."

1944 - Dorothy McElroy Vredenburgh of Alabama became the first woman to be appointed secretary of a national political party. She was appointed to the Democratic National Committee.

1952 - In New York City, four signs were installed at 44th Street and Broadway in Times Square that told pedestrians when to walk.

1956 ~ President Eisenhower announced he would seek a second term.

1956 ~ An Islamic Republic was proclaimed in Pakistan.

1960 ~ The first Playboy Club, featuring waitresses clad in bunny outfits, opened in Chicago.

1968 ~ The discovery of the first pulsar, a star which emits regular radio waves, was announced by Dr. Jocelyn Bell Burnell at Cambridge, England.
1972: Hank Aaron signs for $200,000 a year, making him the highest paid professional baseball player to date.

1972 - Jack Anderson revealed a memo written by ITT's Washington lobbyist, Dita Beard, that connected ITT's funding of part of the Republican National Convention.

1984 ~ Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau announced he was stepping down after more than 15 years in power.

2004 ~ "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" won 11 Academy Awards, including best picture and best director for Peter Jackson, to tie the record held by 1959's "Ben-Hur" and 1997's "Titanic."


Historic Birthdays

John Philip Holland 1840 Irish-bn. American "father of the modern submarine"

Paul III 1468 Italian noble and last Renaissance Pope

Ann Lee 1736 English-bn. American religious leader

Karl Ernst Baer 1792 Prussian-Estonian embryologist

Gioacchino Rossini 1792 Italian operatic composer

Herman Hollerith 1860 American inventor of a tabulating machine; precursor of the modern computer

Jimmy Dorsey 1904 American musician and orchestra leader

Have a wonderful leap day!!!