Today, The Grandma is waiting for the arrivals of all her closest friends: Claire, Joseph, Tonyi, Tina, Jordi, Montse, David and Mayte.
They are going to celebrate LaCastanyada, an ancient Catalan celebration. Today is a special festivity in many countries, and The Grandma and her friends want to talk about Dy'Halan Gwav, also an ancient Cornish celebration.
Allantide, in Cornish KalanGwav,meaning first day of winter, or Nos Kalan Gwav,meaning eve of the first day of winter and Dy' Halan Gwav,meaning day of the first day of winter, also known as Saint Allan's Day or the Feast of Saint Allan, is a Cornish festival that was traditionally celebrated on the night of 31 October, as well as the following daytime, and known elsewhere as Allhallowtide.
The festival in Cornwall is the liturgical feast day of St Allan, also spelled St Allen or St Arlan, who was the bishop of Quimper in the sixth century. As such, Allantide is also known as Allan Night and Allan Day. The origins of the name Allantide also probably stem from the same sources as Hollantide (Wales and the Isle of Man) and Hallowe'en itself.
As with the start of the celebration of Allhallowtide in the rest of Christendom, church bells were rung in order to comfort Christian souls in the intermediate state.
Another important part of this festival was the giving of Allan apples, large glossy red apples that were highly polished, to family and friends as tokens of good luck. Allan's apple markets used to be held throughout West Cornwall in the run-up to the feast.
There are a number of divination games recorded, including the throwing of walnuts in fires to predict the fidelity of partners, and the pouring of molten lead into cold water as a way of predicting the occupation of future husbands, the shape of the solidified lead somehow indicating this.
In some parts of CornwallTindle fires were lit, similar in nature to the Coel Coth (Coel Certh) of Wales.
Prior to the 20th Century, the parish feast of St Just in Penwith was known as Allantide.
The following is a description of the festival as it was celebrated in Penzance at the turn of the 19th century:
The shops in Penzance would display Allan apples, which were highly polished large apples. On the day itself, these apples were given as gifts to each member of the family as a token of good luck. Older girls would place these apples under their pillows and hope to dream of the person whom they would one day marry. A local game is also recorded where two pieces of wood were nailed together in the shape of a cross. It was then suspended with 4 candles on each outcrop of the cross shape. Allan's apples would then be suspended under the cross. The goal of the game was to catch the apples in your mouth, with hot wax being the penalty for slowness or inaccuracy.
In his book Popular Romances of the West of England, Robert Hunt describes Allantide in St Ives:
The ancient custom of providing children with a large apple on Allhallows-eve is still observed, to a great extent, at St Ives. 'Allan-day,' as it is called, is the day of days to hundreds of children, who would deem it a great misfortune were they to go to bed on 'Allan-night' without the time-honoured Allan apple to hide beneath their pillows. A quantity of large apples are thus disposed of, the sale of which is dignified by the term Allan Market.
On many accounts, Cornwall may be regarded as one of the most interesting counties of England, whether we regard it for its coast scenery, its products, or its antiquities.
Today, The Grandma has gone to the library to search more information aboutKostas Karyotakis, the Greek poet who was born on a day like today in 1896.
Kostas Karyotakis, in Greek: ΚώσταςΚαρυωτάκης,(30 October 1896-20 July 1928) is considered one of the most representative Greek poets of the 1920s and one of the first poets to use iconoclastic themes in Greece.
His poetry conveys a great deal of nature, imagery and traces of expressionism and surrealism. He also belongs to the Greek Lost Generation movement.
The majority of Karyotakis' contemporaries viewed him in a dim light throughout his lifetime without a pragmatic accountability for their contemptuous views; for after his suicide, the majority began to revert to the view that he was indeed a great poet. He had a significant, almost disproportionately, progressive influence on later Greek poets.
Karyotakis gave existential depth as well as a tragic dimension to the emotional nuances and melancholic tones of the neo-Symbolist and new-Romantic poetry of the time.
With a rare clarity of spirit and penetrating vision, he captures and conveys with poetic daring the climate of dissolution and the impasses of his generation, as well as the traumas of his own inner spiritual world.
Karyotakis was born in Tripoli, Greece, his father's occupation as a county engineer resulted in his early childhood and teenage years being spent in various places, following his family's successive moves around the Greek cities, including Argostoli, Lefkada, Larisa, Kalamata, Athens and Chania. He started publishing poetry in various magazines for children in 1912. It is solely rife speculation that he had felt deeply betrayed that a girl he had cared for in Hania in 1913 had married and sent him into melancholy.
After receiving his degree from the Athens School of Law and Political Sciences, in 1917, he did not pursue a career as a lawyer. Karyotakis became a clerk in the Prefecture of Thessaloniki. However, he greatly disliked his work and could not tolerate the bureaucracy of the state, which he wrote about often in his poems. His prose piece Catharsis is characteristic of this. For this reason he would often be removed from his posts and transferred to other locations in Greece. During these removals he became familiar with the boredom and misery of the country during World War I.
In February 1919, he published his first collection of poetry: The Pain of People and of Things, in Greek Ὁ πόνος τοῦ ἀνθρώπου καὶ τῶν πραμάτων, which was largely ignored or badly reviewed by the critics. In the same year he published, with his friend Agis Levendis, a satirical review, called The Leg, which, despite its success, was banned by the police after the sixth issue.
In 1921, he published his second collection called Nepenthe, in Greek Νηπενθῆ, and also wrote a musical revue, Pell-Mell, in Greek Πελ-Μελ.
In 1922, he began having an affair with the poet Maria Polydouri who was a colleague of his at the Prefecture of Attica.
In 1923, he wrote a poem called Treponema pallidum, in Greek Ὠχρὰ Σπειροχαίτη, which was published under the title Song of Madness and gave rise to speculation that he may have been suffering from syphilis, which before 1945 was considered a chronic illness with no proven cure for it.
George Skouras, a physician of the poet, wrote: He was sick, he was syphilitic and George Savidis (1929–1999), professor of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, who possessed the largest archive about Greek poets, revealed that Karyotakis was syphilitic, and that his brother, Thanasis Karyotakis, thought the disease to be a disgrace to the family.
In 1924, he travelled abroad, visiting Italy and Germany.
In December 1927 he published his last collection of poetry: Elegy and Satires, in Greek Ἐλεγεῖα καὶ Σάτιρες.
In February 1928, Karyotakis was transferred to Patras although soon afterwards he spent a month on leave in Paris and in June 1928 he was sent yet again to Preveza by ship.
Karyotakis lived in Preveza only for 33 days, until his suicide on 21 July 1928 at age 31. His work was in the Prefecture of Preveza, in the Palios mansion, 10 Speliadou street, as a lawyer for control of land donations from the State to refugees from Asia Minor War of 1922.
From Preveza he sent desperate letters to friends and relatives describing the misery he felt in the town. His family offered to support him for an indefinite stay in Paris, but he refused, knowing what a monetary sacrifice like this would entail for them. His angst is felt in the poem Preveza, in Greek Πρέβεζα, which he wrote shortly before his suicide. The poem displays an insistent, lilting anaphora on the word Death, which stands at the beginning of several lines and sentences.
On 19 July 1928, Karyotakis went to Monolithi beach and kept trying to drown in the sea for ten hours, but failed in his attempt, because he was an avid swimmer as he himself wrote in his suicide note. In the subsequent morning he returned home and left again to purchase a revolver and went to a little café in the place Vryssoula, near today Hotel Zikas. After smoking for a few hours, and drink cherry juice, he left 75 drachmas as a gratuity, while the cost of the drink was 5 drachmas, he went to Agios Spyridon, where, under a eucalyptus tree, he shot himself through the heart.
Today, The Grandma has been listening to some music. She has chosen OmaraPortuondo, the Cuban singer who was born on a day like today in 1930.
Omara Portuondo Peláez (born 29 October 1930) is a Cuban singer and dancer.
A founding member of the popular vocal group Cuarteto d'Aida, Portuondo has collaborated with many important Cuban musicians during her long career, including Julio Gutiérrez, Juanito Márquez and Chucho Valdés. Although primarily known for her rendition of boleros, she has recorded in a wide range of styles, from jazz to son cubano. Since 1996, she has been part of the Buena Vista Social Club project, touring extensively and recording several albums with the ensemble.
She won a Latin Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Tropical Album in 2009 and a Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019, and she received three Grammy Award nominations.
Born on 29 October 1930 in the Cayo Hueso neighbourhood of Havana, Portuondo had three sisters. Her mother, Esperanza Peláez, came from a wealthy family of Spanish ancestry, and had created a scandal by running off with and marrying a black professional baseball player, Bartolo Portuondo.
Omara joined the dance group of the Cabaret Tropicana in 1950, following her elder sister, Haydee. She also danced in the Mulatas de Fuego in the theatre Radiocentro, and in other dance groups. The two sisters also used to sing for family and friends, and they also performed in Havana clubs. Portuondo and Haydee then in 1947 joined the Loquibambia Swing, a group formed by the blind pianist Frank Emilio Flynn.
From 1952 to 1953, she sang for the Orquesta Anacaona, and later in 1953 both sisters joined (together with Elena Burke and Moraima Secada) the singing group Cuarteto d'Aida, formed and directed by pianist Aida Diestro.
The group had considerable success, touring the United States, performing with Nat King Cole at the Tropicana, and recording a 1957 album for RCA Victor.
In 1958, pianist and composer Julio Gutiérrez invited Portuondo to sing for his ensemble in a series of recordings bridging jazz and Cuban music for the record label Velvet. The result was Magia Negra, her debut solo album. Haydee left the Cuarteto d'Aida in 1961 in order to live in the US, and Omara continued singing with the quartet until 1967.
In 1967, Portuondo began to focus on her solo career, recording two albums for Areito, Omara Portuondo and Esta es Omara Portuondo. In the same year, she represented Cuba at the Sopot Festival in Poland, singing Juanito Márquez' Como un milagro. Alongside her solo work, in the 1970s she sang with the charanga Orquesta Aragón, and toured with them abroad.
In 1974, she recorded with guitarist Martín Rojas, an album in which she lauds Salvador Allende and the people of Chile a year after the military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet. Among other hits from the album, she sang Carlos Puebla's hit Hasta Siempre, Comandante, which refers to Ché Guevara. She also recorded Y que se sepa, with one of the most successful Cuban bands of the late 20th century, Los Van Van.
Later on she performed with Juan Formell, singing Formell's song Tal vez, a song she recorded later on with Maria Bethania. During the 1970s and 1980s, Portuondo enjoyed success at home and abroad, with tours, albums (including one of her most lauded recordings in 1984 with Adalberto Álvarez), film roles, and her own television series.
In 2004, the International Red Cross appointed her International Ambassador, the first Cuban musician to hold this title, in Montreal, Canada.
In 2007, she performed the title role to sold-out audiences in Lizt Alfonso's dance musical Vida, the story of modern Cuba through the eyes and with the memories of an old woman. She recorded in 2008 a duet album with Brazilian singer Maria Bethânia named Maria Bethânia e Omara Portuondo.
In 2008, she recorded the album Gracias as a tribute to the 60th anniversary of her singing career. Today, Omara lives in a high-rise flat just off the Malecón, Havana, overlooking the sea. She remains a popular fixture on the local music scene, singing regularly at the Tropicana Club, the Delirio Habanero and the Café Cantante.
Portuondo sang, duetting with Ibrahim Ferrer, on the album Buena Vista Social Club in 1996. This led not only to more touring, including playing at Carnegie Hall with the Buena Vista troupe, and her appearance in Wim Wenders' film BuenaVista Social Club, but to two further albums for the World Circuit label: BuenaVista Social Club Presents Omara Portuondo (2000) and Flor de Amor (2004). She remains a member of Buena Vista Social Club, being the only original vocalist to do so.
Today, The Grandma has received the wonderful visit of one of her closest friends, Joseph de Ca'th Lon. Joseph loves Science, and they have been talking about Ares I-X, the NASA's prototype that was launched on a day like today in 2009.
Ares I-X was the first-stage prototype and designconcept demonstrator of Ares I,alaunch systemfor human spaceflight developed by the NationalAeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Ares I-X was successfully launched on October 28, 2009. The project cost was $445 million.
The Ares I-X vehicle consisted of a functional four-segment solid rocket booster (SRB) stage, a fifth segment mass simulator, an upper-stage simulator (USS), which was similar in shape and heavier than the actual upper stage, as well as a simulated Orion crew module (CM) and launch abort system (LAS).
Since the actual upper-stage hardware could not be produced in time for the flight test, the upper-stage mass simulator allowed the booster to fly approximately the same trajectory through the first stage of flight. The USS and the CM/LAS mass simulators launched by the Ares I-X were not recovered and fell into the Atlantic Ocean. The first stage, including the fifth segment mass simulator, was recovered to retrieve flight data recorders and reusable equipment.
The Ares I-X vehicle used in the test flight was similar in shape, mass, and size to the planned configuration of later Ares I vehicles, but had largely dissimilar internal hardware, consisting of only one powered stage.
Ares I vehicles were intended to launch Orion crew exploration vehicles. Along with the Ares V launch system and the Altair lunar lander, Ares I and Orion were part of NASA's Constellation program, which was developing spacecraft for U.S. human spaceflight after the Space Shuttle retirement.
The Ares I-X flight profile closely approximated the flight conditions that the Ares I would expect to experience through Mach 4.5, at an altitude of about 39,600 m and through a maximum dynamic pressure, Max Q, of approximately 38 kPa.
The Ares I-X flight profile resembled the uncrewed Saturn I flights of the 1960s, which tested the Saturn propulsion concept.
By flying the vehicle through first-stage separation, the test flight also verified the performance and dynamics of the Ares I solid rocket booster in a single stick arrangement, which is different from the solid rocket booster's then-current double-booster configuration alongside the external tank on the space shuttle.
Ares I-X had been scheduled for launch on October 27, 2009, the 48th anniversary of the first Saturn I launch. The launch attempt was delayed due to weather plus other last-minute concerns.
The ground crew experienced difficulty removing a protective cover from an important nose-mounted five-port sensor package.
A private watercraft had blundered into the restricted downrange safety zone and had to be chased away. Launching through the day's high cirrus clouds could have caused triboelectrification, potentially interfering with range safety communication and hampering the RSO's ability to issue the self-destruction command. Launch Director Ed Mango repeatedly delayed resumption of the countdown from the planned hold point at T-00:04:00.
Ultimately, constraints of the 4-hour launch window, coupled with high clouds and other last-minute concerns, caused the mission to be scrubbed for the day at 15:20 UTC on October 27, 2009. Launch was rescheduled for a four-hour window opening at 12:00 UTC on October 28, 2009.
Ares I-X launched on October 28, 2009 at 11:30 EDT (15:30 UTC) from Kennedy Space Center LC-39B, successfully completing a brief test flight. The vehicle's first stage ignited at T-0 seconds and Ares I-X lifted off from Launch Complex 39B.
The first stage separated from the upper-stage simulator and parachuted into the Atlantic Ocean roughly 240 km downrange of the launch site. The maximum altitude of the rocket was not immediately known, but had been expected to be 45 km.
The launch accomplished all primary test objectives, and many lessons were learned in preparing and launching a new vehicle from Kennedy Space Center.
Today, The Grandma has received wonderful news of one of her closest friends, Tina Picotes, who is spending some days in Amsterdam, the capital of the Netherlands that was founded on a day like today in 1275.
Amsterdam is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands with a population of 872,680 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban area and 2,480,394 in the metropolitan area.
Found within the province of North Holland, Amsterdam is colloquially referred to as the Venice of the North, due to the large number of canals which form a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Amsterdam was founded at the Amstel, that was dammed to control flooding; the city's name derives from the Amstel dam.
Originating as a small fishing village in the late 12th century, Amsterdambecame one of the most important ports in the world during the Dutch Golden Age of the 17th century, and became the leading centre for finance and trade.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, the city expanded and many new neighbourhoods and suburbs were planned and built. The 17th-century canals of Amsterdam and the 19–20th century Defence Line of Amsterdam are on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Sloten, annexed in 1921 by the municipality of Amsterdam, is the oldest part of the city, dating to the 9th century.
Amsterdam's main attractions include its historic canals, the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum, the Stedelijk Museum, Hermitage Amsterdam, the Concertgebouw, the Anne Frank House, the Scheepvaartmuseum, the Amsterdam Museum, the Heineken Experience, the Royal Palace of Amsterdam, Natura Artis Magistra, Hortus Botanicus Amsterdam, NEMO, the red-light district and many cannabis coffee shops. It drew more than 5 million international visitors in 2014.
The city is also well known for its nightlife and festival activity; with several of its nightclubs (Melkweg, Paradiso) among the world's most famous. Primarily known for its artistic heritage, elaborate canal system and narrow houses with gabled façades; well-preserved legacies of the city's 17th-century Golden Age. These characteristics are arguably responsible for attracting millions of Amsterdam'svisitors annually. Cycling is key to the city's character, and there are numerous bike paths.
The Amsterdam Stock Exchange is considered the oldest modernsecurities market stock exchange in the world. As the commercial capital of the Netherlands and one of the top financial centres in Europe, Amsterdam is considered an alpha world city by the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) study group.
The city is also the cultural capital of the Netherlands. Many large Dutch institutions have their headquarters in the city, including: the Philips conglomerate, AkzoNobel, Booking.com, TomTom, and ING. Moreover, many of the world's largest companies are based in Amsterdam or have established their European headquarters in the city, such as leading technology companies Uber, Netflix and Tesla.
The Port of Amsterdam is the fifth largest in Europe. The KLM hub and Amsterdam's main airport, Schiphol, is the Netherlands' busiest airport as well as the third busiest in Europe and 11th busiest airport in the world.
The Dutch capital is considered one of the most multicultural cities in the world.
A few of Amsterdam's notable residents throughout history include: painters Rembrandt and Van Gogh, the diarist Anne Frank, and philosopher Baruch Spinoza.
Due to its geographical location in what used to be wet peatland, the founding of Amsterdam is of a younger age than the founding of other urban centers in the Low Countries. However, in and around the area of what later became Amsterdam, local farmers settled as early as three millennia ago. They lived along the prehistoric IJ river and upstream of its tributary Amstel.
The prehistoric IJ was a shallow and quiet stream in peatland behind beach ridges. This secluded area could grow there into an important local settlement center, especially in the late Bronze Age, the Iron Age and the Roman Age.
Neolithic and Roman artefacts have also been found downstream of this area, in the prehistoricAmstel bedding under Amsterdam's Damrak and Rokin, such as shards of Bell Beaker culture pottery (2200-2000 BC) and a granite grinding stone (2700-2750 BC). But the location of these artefacts around the river banks of the Amstel probably point to a presence of a modest semi-permanent or seasonal settlement of the previous mentioned local farmers. A permanent settlement would not have been possible, since the river mouth and the banks of the Amstel in this period in time were too wet for permanent habitation.
The origins of Amsterdam is linked to the development of the peatland called Amestelle, meaning watery area, from Aa(m) river + stelle site at a shoreline,river bank.
Amsterdam was granted city rights in either 1300 or 1306. From the 14th century on, Amsterdam flourished, largely from trade with the Hanseatic League. In 1345, an alleged Eucharistic miracle in Kalverstraat rendered the city an important place of pilgrimage until the adoption of the Protestant faith.
In the 16th century, the Dutch rebelled against Philip II of Spain and hissuccessors. The main reasons for the uprising were the imposition of new taxes, the tenth penny, and the religious persecution of Protestants by the newly introduced Inquisition. The revolt escalated into the Eighty Years' War, which ultimately led to Dutch independence.
Strongly pushed by Dutch Revolt leader William the Silent, the Dutch Republicbecame known for its relative religious tolerance. Jews from the Iberian Peninsula, Huguenots from France, prosperous merchants and printers from Flanders, and economic and religious refugees from the Spanish-controlled parts of the Low Countries found safety in Amsterdam. The influx of Flemish printers and the city's intellectual tolerance made Amsterdam a centre for the European free press.
The 17th century is considered Amsterdam's Golden Age, during which it became the wealthiest city in the western world. Ships sailed from Amsterdam to the Baltic Sea, North America, and Africa, as well as present-day Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, and Brazil, forming the basis of a worldwide trading network.
Amsterdam's merchants had the largest share in both the Dutch East India Company and the Dutch West India Company. These companies acquired overseas possessions that later became Dutch colonies.
Amsterdam was Europe's most important point for the shipment of goods and was the leading financial centre of the western world.
In 1602, the Amsterdam office of the international trading Dutch East India Company became the world's first stock exchange by trading in its own shares.
The Bank of Amsterdam started operations in 1609, acting as a full-service bank for Dutch merchant bankers and as a reserve bank.
Amsterdam's prosperity declined during the 18th and early 19th centuries. The wars of the Dutch Republic with England and France took their toll on Amsterdam. During the Napoleonic Wars, Amsterdam's significance reached its lowest point, with Holland being absorbed into the French Empire. However, the later establishment of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815 marked a turning point.
The end of the 19th century is sometimes called Amsterdam's second Golden Age. New museums, a railway station, and the Concertgebouw were built; in this same time, the Industrial Revolution reached the city. The Amsterdam-Rhine Canal was dug to give Amsterdam a direct connection to the Rhine, and the North Sea Canal was dug to give the port a shorter connection to the North Sea. Both projects dramatically improved commerce with the rest of Europe and the world. In 1906, Joseph Conrad gave a brief description of Amsterdam as seen from the seaside, in The Mirror of the Sea.
Shortly before the First World War, the city started to expand again, and new suburbs were built.
Nazi Germany invaded the Netherlands on 10 May 1940 and took control of the country. Some Amsterdam citizens sheltered Jews, thereby exposing themselves and their families to a high risk of being imprisoned or sent to concentration camps. More than 100,000 Dutch Jews were deported to Nazi concentration camps, of whom some 60,000 lived in Amsterdam.
Perhaps the most famous deportee was the young Jewish girl Anne Frank, who died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.
Many new suburbs, such as Osdorp, Slotervaart, Slotermeer and Geuzenveld, were built in the years after the Second World War.
The required large-scale demolitions began in Amsterdam's former Jewish neighborhood. Smaller streets, such as the Jodenbreestraat and Weesperstraat, were widened and almost all houses and buildings were demolished. At the peak of the demolition, the Nieuwmarktrellen broke out; the rioters expressed their fury about the demolition caused by the restructuring of the city.
As a result, the demolition was stopped and the highway into the city's centre was never fully built; only the metro was completed. Only a few streets remained widened. The new city hall was built on the almost completely demolished Waterlooplein. Meanwhile, large private organizations, such as StadsherstelAmsterdam, were founded to restore the entire city centre.
Although the success of this struggle is visible today, efforts for further restoration are still ongoing. The entire city centre has reattained its former splendour and, as a whole, is now a protected area. Many of its buildings have become monuments, and in July 2010 the Grachtengordel (the three concentric canals: Herengracht, Keizersgracht, and Prinsengracht) was added to the UNESCO WorldHeritage List.
In the 21st century, the Amsterdam city centre has attracted large numbers of tourists: between 2012 and 2015, the annual number of visitors rose from 10 to 17 million. Real estate prices have surged, and local shops are making way for tourist-oriented ones, making the centre unaffordable for the city's inhabitants. These developments have evoked comparisons with Venice, a city thought to be overwhelmed by the tourist influx.
Amsterdam experienced an influx of religions and cultures after the Second World War. With 180 different nationalities, Amsterdam is home toone of the widest varieties of nationalities of any city in the world. The proportion of the population of immigrant origin in the city proper is about 50% and 88% of the population are Dutch citizens.
Amsterdam has been one of the municipalities in the Netherlands which provided immigrants with extensive and free Dutch-language courses, which have benefited many immigrants.
Amsterdam lives and breathes creativity. One moment you walk into a building from the 17th century, and the next you find yourself in a hub of creative start-up companies.
Today, The Grandma is relaxing at home. She has decided to listen to some music, and she has chosen MahaliaJackson's songs, the American gospel singer who was born on a day like today in 1911.
Mahalia Jackson (born Mahala Jackson; October 26, 1911-January 27, 1972) was an American gospelsinger, widely considered one of the most influential vocalists of the 20th century.
With a career spanning 40 years, Jackson was integral to the development and spread of gospel blues in black churches throughout the U.S. during a time when racial segregation was pervasive in American society, she met considerable and unexpected success in a recording career, selling an estimated 22 million records and performing in front of integrated and secular audiences in concert halls around the world.
The granddaughter of enslaved people, Jackson was born and raised in poverty in New Orleans. She found a home in her church, leading to a lifelong dedication and singular purpose to deliver God's word through song.
She moved to Chicago as an adolescent and joined the Johnson Singers, one of the earliest gospel groups. Jackson was heavily influenced by blues' singer Bessie Smith, adapting her style to traditional Protestant hymns and contemporary songs. After making an impression in Chicago churches, she was hired to sing at funerals, political rallies, and revivals. For 15 years, she functioned as what she termed a fish and bread singer, working odd jobs between performances to make a living.
Nationwide recognition came for Jackson in 1947 with the release of Move On Up a Little Higher, selling two million copies and hitting the number two spot on Billboard charts, both firsts for gospel music.
Jackson's recordings captured the attention of jazz fans in the U.S. and France, and she became the first gospel recording artist to tour Europe. She regularly appeared on television and radio, and performed for many presidents and heads of state, including singing the national anthem at John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Ball in 1961.
Motivated by her experiences living and touring in the South and integrating a Chicago neighbourhood, she participated in the civil rights movement, singing for fundraisers and at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. She was a vocal and loyal supporter of Martin Luther King, Jr. and a personal friend of his family.
Mahalia Jackson was born to Charity Clark and Johnny Jackson, a stevedore and weekend barber. Clark and Jackson were unmarried, a common arrangement among black women in New Orleans at the time. He lived elsewhere, never joining Charity as a parent. Both sets of Mahalia's grandparents were born into slavery, her paternal grandparents on a rice plantation and her maternal grandparents on a cotton plantation in Pointe Coupee Parish about 160 km north of New Orleans.
Throughout her career, Jackson faced intense pressure to record secular music, but turned down high-paying opportunities to concentrate on gospel. Completely self-taught, Jackson had a keen sense of instinct for music, her delivery marked by extensive improvisation with melody and rhythm.
She
was renowned for her powerful contralto voice, range, an enormous stage
presence, and her ability to relate to her audiences, conveying and
evoking intense emotion during performances.
Passionate and at times frenetic, she wept and demonstrated physical expressions of joy while singing.
Her success brought about international interest in gospel music, initiating the Golden Age of Gospel making it possible for many soloists and vocal groups to tour and record.
Popular music as a whole felt her influence, and she is credited with inspiring rhythm and blues, soul, and rock and roll singing styles.
In a very cold December, Jackson arrived in Chicago. For a week she was miserably homesick, unable to move off the couch until Sunday when her aunts took her to Greater Salem Baptist Church, an environment she felt at home in immediately, later stating it was the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me.
Jackson's arrival in Chicago occurred during the Great Migration, a massive movement of black Southerners to Northern cities. Between 1910 and 1970, hundreds of thousands of rural Southern blacks moved to Chicago, transforming a neighbourhood in the South Side into Bronzeville, a black city within a city which was mostly self-sufficient, prosperous, and teeming in the 1920s. This movement caused white flight, with whites moving to suburbs, leaving established white churches and synagogues with dwindling members. Their mortgages were taken over by black congregations in good position to settle in Bronzeville. Members of these churches were, in Jackson's term, society Negroes who were well-educated and eager to prove their successful assimilation into white American society. Musical services tended to be formal, presenting solemnly delivered hymns written by Isaac Watts and other European composers. Shouting and clapping were generally not allowed as they were viewed as undignified. Special programs and musicals tended to feature sophisticated choral arrangements to prove the quality of the choir.
In 1937, Jackson met Mayo "Ink" Williams, a music producer who arranged a session with Decca Records. She recorded four singles: God's Gonna Separate theWheat From the Tares, You Sing On, My Singer, God Shall Wipe Away All Tears,and Keep Me Every Day.
A constant worker and a shrewd businesswoman, Jackson became the choir director at St. Luke Baptist Church. She bought a building as a landlord, then found the salon so successful she had to hire help to care for it when she travelled on weekends.
Each engagement Jackson took was farther from Chicago in a non-stop string of performances.
In 1946, she appeared at the Golden Gate Ballroom in Harlem. In attendance was Art Freeman, a music scout for Apollo Records, a company catering to black artists and audiences, concentrating mostly on jazz and blues.
Her first release on Apollo, Wait 'til My Change Comes backed with I'm Going to Tell God All About it One of These Days did not sell well. Neither did her second, IWant to Rest with He Knows My Heart. Berman asked Jackson to record blues and she refused. Berman told Freeman to release Jackson from any more recordings, but Freeman asked for one more session to record the song Jackson sang as a warm-up at the Golden Gate Ballroom concert. Move On Up a Little Higher was recorded in two parts, one for each side of the 78 rpm record.
As Jackson's singing was often considered jazz or blues with religious lyrics, she fielded questions about the nature of gospel blues and how she developed her singing style.
In 1954, Jackson learned that Berman had been withholding royalties and had allowed her contract with Apollo to expire. Mitch Miller offered her a $50,000-a-year (equivalent to $480,000 in 2021) four-year contract, and Jackson becamethe first gospel artist to sign with Columbia Records, a much larger company with the ability to promote her nationally.
Columbia worked with a local radio affiliate in Chicago to create a half hour radio program, The Mahalia Jackson Show. She appeared on a local television program, also titled The Mahalia Jackson Show, which again got a positive reception but was cancelled for lack of sponsors. Despite white people beginning to attend her shows and sending fan letters, executives at CBS were concerned they would lose advertisers from Southern states who objected to a program with a black person as the primary focus.
Jackson broke into films playing a missionary in St. Louis Blues (1958), and a funeral singer in Imitation of Life (1959).
While attending the National Baptist Convention in 1956, Jackson met MartinLuther King Jr. and Ralph Abernathy, both ministers emerging as organizers protesting segregation.
As gospel music became more popular -primarily due to her influencesingers began appearing at non-religious venues as a way to spread aChristianmessage to non-believers.
Jackson toured Europe again in 1964, mobbed in several cities and proclaiming, I thought I was the Beatles!, in Utrecht. She appeared in the film The Best Man(1964).
Jackson's recovery took a full year, during which she was unable to tour or record, ultimately losing 23 kg. From this point on she was plagued with near-constant fatigue, bouts of tachycardia, and high blood pressure as her condition advanced.
She was once more heartbroken upon learning of the assassination of MartinLuther King Jr. She attended the funeral in Atlanta where she gave one of her most memorable performances of Take My Hand, Precious Lord. With this, Jackson retired from political work and personal endorsements.
While touring Europe months later, Jackson became ill in Germany and flew home to Chicago where she was hospitalized. In January 1972, she received surgery to remove a bowel obstruction and died in recovery.
Today, The Grandma has been reading some poems written by Alfonsina Storni,the Argentine poetwho died on a day like today in 1938.
Alfonsina Storni (29 May 1892-25 October 1938) was an Argentine poet of the modernist period.
Storni was born on May 29, 1892 in SalaCapriasca, Switzerland. Her parents were Alfonso Storni and Paola Martignoni, who were of Italian-Swiss descent. Before her birth, her father had started a brewery in the city of San Juan, Argentina, producing beer and soda.
In 1891, following the advice of a doctor, he returned with his wife to Switzerland, where Alfonsina was born the following year; she lived there until she was four years old.
In 1896 the family returned to San Juan, and a few years later, in 1901, moved to Rosario because of economic issues. There her father opened a tavern, where Storni did a variety of chores. That family business soon failed, however.
Storni wrote her first verse at the age of twelve, and continued writing verses during her free time. She later entered into the Colegio de la Santa Union as a part-time student.
In 1906, her father died, and she began working in a hat factory to help support her family.
In 1907, her interest in dance led her to join a travelling theatre company, which took her around the country. She performed in Henrik Ibsen's Ghosts, Benito Pérez Galdós's La loca de la casa, and Florencio Sánchez's Los muertos.
In 1908, Storni returned to live with her mother, who had remarried and was living in Bustinza. After a year there, Storni went to Coronda, where she studied to become a rural primary schoolteacher. During this period, she also started working for the local magazines Mundo Rosarino and Monos y Monadas, as well as the prestigious Mundo Argentino.
In 1912, she moved to Buenos Aires, seeking the anonymity afforded by a big city. There she met and fell in love with a married man, whom she described as an interesting person of certain standing in the community. He was active in politics... That year, she published her first short story in Fray Mocho.
At age nineteen, she found out that she was pregnant with the child of a journalist and became a single mother. Supporting herself with teaching and newspaper journalism, she lived in Buenos Aires, where the social and economic difficulties faced by Argentina's growing middle classes were inspiring an emerging body of women's rights activists.
Storni was among the first women to find success in the male-dominated arenas of literature and theatre in Argentina, and as such, developed a unique and valuable voice that holds particular relevance in Latin American poetry.
Storni was an influential person, not only to her readers but also to other writers. Though she was known mainly for her poetic works, she also wrote prose, journalistic essays, and drama.
Storni often gave controversial opinions. She criticized a wide range of topics, from politics to gender roles and discrimination against women.
In Storni's time, her work did not align itself with a particular movement or genre. It was not until the modernist and avant-garde movements began to fade that her work seemed to fit in. She was criticized for her atypical style, and she has been labelled most often as a postmodern writer.
Storni published some of her first works in 1916 in Emin Arslan's literary magazine La Nota, where she was a permanent contributor from 28 March until 21 November 1919. Her poems Convalecer and Golondrinas were published in the magazine. In spite of economic difficulties, she published La inquietud del rosal in 1916, and later started writing for the magazine Caras y Caretas while working as a cashier in a shop.
Even though today Storni's early works of poetry are among her most well known and highly regarded, they received harsh criticism from some of her male contemporaries, including such well-known figures as Jorge Luis Borges and Eduardo Gonzalez Lanuza. The eroticism and feminist themes in her writing were a controversial subject for poetry during her time, but writing about womanhood in such a direct way was one of her principal innovations as a poet.
In the rapidly developing literary scene of Buenos Aires, Storni soon became acquainted with other writers, such as José Enrique Rodó and Amado Nervo. Her economic situation improved, which allowed her to travel to Montevideo, Uruguay. There she met the poet Juana de Ibarbourou, as well as Horacio Quiroga, with whom she would become great friends. Quiroga led the Anaconda group and Storni became a member together with Emilia Bertolé, Ana Weiss de Rossi, Amparo de Hieken, Ricardo Hicken and Berta Singerman.
During one of her most productive periods, from 1918 to 1920 Storni published three volumes of poetry: El dulce daño, 1918; Irremediablemente, 1919; and Languidez, 1920. The latter received the first Municipal Poetry Prize and the second National Literature Prize, which added to her prestige and reputation as a talented writer.
She also published many articles in prominent newspapers and journals of the time. Later, she continued her experimentation with form in 1925's Ocre, a volume composed almost entirely of sonnets that are among her most traditional in structure. These verses were written around the same time as the more loosely structured prose poems of her lesser-known volume, Poemas de Amor, from 1926.
After a nearly 8-year hiatus from publishing volumes of poetry, Storni published El mundo de siete pozos, 1934. That volume, together with the final volume she published before her death, Mascarilla y trébol (Mask and Clover), 1938, mark the height of her poetic experimentation. The final volume includes the use of what she termed antisonnets, or poems that used many of the versification structures of traditional sonnets but did not follow the traditional rhyme scheme.
In 1935, Storni may have discovered a lump on her left breast and decided to undergo an operation. On May 20, 1935, she underwent a radical mastectomy.
In 1938, she found out that the breast cancer had reappeared. Around 1:00 AM on Tuesday, 25 October 1938. Storni left her room and headed towards the sea at La Perla beach in Mar del Plata, and committed suicide. Later that morning, two workers found her body washed up on the beach.
Although her biographers hold that she jumped into the water from a breakwater, popular legend is that she slowly walked out to sea until she drowned. She is buried in La Chacarita Cemetery. Her death inspired Ariel Ramírez and Félix Luna to compose the song Alfonsina y el Mar.
Today, The Grandma has been following the latest news about La Palma, the Canarian Island, and Cumbre Vieja, the volcano that erupted last month, and it is still active destroying towns and changing landscapes.
The Grandma has remembered another volcano, Gagxanul, that erupted on a day like today in 1902 creating a situation very similar to La Palma's one.
Santa María Volcano is a large activevolcano in the western highlands of Guatemala, in the QuetzaltenangoDepartment near the city of Quetzaltenango.
The volcano was known as Gagxanul in the local K'iche' language, before the 16th century Spanish conquest of the region.
The VEI-6 eruption of Santa María Volcano in 1902 was one of the three largest eruptions of the 20th century, after the 1912 Novarupta and 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruptions. It is also one of the five biggest eruptions of the past 200, and most likely 300, years.
Santa María Volcano is part of the Sierra Madre range of volcanoes, which extends along the western edge of Guatemala, separated from the Pacific Ocean by a broad plain.
The volcanoes are formed by the subduction of the Cocos Plate under the Caribbean Plate, which led to the formation of the Central America Volcanic Arc.
Eruptions at Santa María are estimated to have begun about 103 ka.Construction of the volcanic edifice occurred in four phases, from 103-72, 72, 60-46, and 35-25 ka, building up the large cone that reaches about 1,400 metres above the plain on which the nearby city of Quetzaltenango sits. Following the cone-building eruptions, activity seems to have changed to a pattern of long periods of repose followed by the emission of small lava flows from vents on the mountain.
The first eruption of Santa María in recorded history occurred in October1902. Before 1902 the volcano had been dormant for at least 500 years and possibly several thousand years, but its awakening was clearly indicated by a seismic swarm in the region starting in January 1902, which included a major earthquake in April 1902.
The eruption began on 24 October, and the largest explosions occurred over the following two days, ejecting an estimated 8 cubic kilometres of magma. The eruption was one of the largest of the 20th century, only slightly less in magnitude to that of Mount Pinatubo in 1991. The eruption had a Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI) of 6, thus being Colossal.
The pumice formed in the climactic eruption fell over an area of about 273,000 square kilometres, and volcanic ash as far away as San Francisco, California, 4,000 kilometres away.
The eruption occurred out of a vent on the southwest side of the volcano, leaving a crater about 1 kilometre in diameter and about 300 metres deep, stretching from just below the summit to an elevation of about 2,300 metres. The first evidence of the eruption was a sprinkling of sand on Quezaltenango. The wind then changed from the south to the east and ashes began to fall at Helvetia, a coffee plantation 10 kilometres southwest.
Because of the lack of recorded
eruptive activity at Santa María, local people did not recognize the
preceding seismicity as warning signs of an eruption.
Estimates are that
6,000 people died as a result of the eruption.
In the middle of the disaster, Quetzaltenango regional authorities had to take charge, as the central government was focused on the celebration of the Fiestas Minervalias,the largest propaganda festival of president Manuel Estrada Cabrera' regime; furthermore, the central government was so focused on the festival that it tried to minimize the impact of the eruption and went as far as tell the citizens that it was not in Guatemalan soil, but in México.
Furthermore, the official government response was to tell Quetzaltenango authorities that there were no funds for the recovery, as those were already spent to help after the April 1902 earthquake.
Under such circumstances, Quetzaltenango regional authorities declared that all the West zone agricultural harvest was ruined, and forecasted famine due to food shortages; likewise, cattle were dying and there were meat shortages as well. They were allowed by the central government to import flour free of taxes for the next few months.
For the native people the eruption consequences were catastrophic: they not only lost relatives, friends, homes and harvest, but they were also forced to work free of charge in the recovery while criollo landlords were compensated for the loss with lands that were confiscated from native communities in San Miguel Uspantán Quiché Department, Panam in Suchitepéquez Department and in Sololá Department.
-24 October. 5:00 pm: At San Felipe a sound was heard, similar to the roar of a waterfall, for five minutes, coming from the volcano; but the mist surrounding the volcano did not allow any direct observation of what was happening.
-24 October. 6:00 pm: Cinders and ashes started falling over Quetzaltenango.
-24 October. 7:00 pm: Witnesses recall seeing lightning and a strong fiery red light coming from the volcano, and noise similar to that of an industrial furnace.
-24 October. 8:00 pm: From San Felipe one could see a giant plume of black ash with numerous whirlwinds crossed by thousands of lightning bolts and curved lines of red light. All the area surrounding the volcano kept shaking, and large explosions could be heard as far as 160 km away; strong winds carried ash and debris as far as 800 km way, or even more; a part of the cloud hovered on the north side of the cone for days, and a pitch-black darkness ensued.
-25 October. 1:00 am: The eruption became more violent and large rocks from the volcano started falling as far as 14 km away, destroying towns and farm houses.
-26 October. 12:00 am: The volcano calmed down.
-26 October. 3:00 pm: Another eruption, but this time it was a white plume that came out, which was likely composed of water vapour.
The 1902 eruption was followed by 20 years of dormancy. New eruptions began in 1922, with the extrusion of a lava dome complex in the crater left by the 1902 eruption.
The lava dome complex, which was named Santiaguito, is still active today, with over 1 km3 of lava erupted so far. The lava dome complex has four main domes: El Caliente, La Mitad, El Monje and El Brujo. The currently active vent is El Caliente.
The areas to the south of Santa María are considerably affected by volcanic activity at Santiaguito.
Currently, the most common volcanic hazards at Santa María are lahars, which frequently occur in the rainy season due to heavy rainfall on loose volcanic deposits. Lahars are particularly large and frequent during periods of high volcanism at Santiaguito.
The town of El Palmar, 10 kilometres from Santiaguito, has been destroyed twice by lahars from Santiaguito forcing the town to be moved to the present Nuevo El Palmar, and infrastructure such as roads and bridges have been repeatedly damaged. Lahar deposits from Santiaguito have affected rivers all the way downstream to the Pacific Ocean.
Near constant lava flows occur from Santiaguito, and can reach up to 4 km from the vent. Lava flow activity occurs in cycles, with the longest lava flows occurring during times of high volcanic activity. Much shorter lava flows occur during the longer periods of low volcanic activity. These lava flows flow only a short distance from the vent before collapsing.
The magma at Santiaguito is rich in silica and is thus highly viscous. The lava flows are slow moving and mostly cause property damage, although in the past catastrophic pyroclastic flows have been triggered from lava flows, which have extended several kilometres towards the west.
One hazard which could be devastating is the collapse of Santa María itself. The 1902 crater has left the southern flank of the mountain above Santiaguito highly over-steepened, and a large earthquake or eruption from Santiaguito could trigger a huge landslide, which might cover up to 100 square kilometres. However, this is thought to be unlikely in the short term.
In light of the threat it poses to nearby populations, Santa María has been designated a Decade Volcano, identifying it as a target for particular study by volcanologists to mitigate any future natural disasters at the volcano.
The paradox of volcanoes was that they were symbols of destruction but also life. Once the lava slows and cools, it solidifies and then breaks down over time to become soil -rich, fertile soil.
Today, The Grandma has been reading some tales written by one of her favourite authors, the Italian writer Gianni Rodari,who was born on a day like today in 1920.
Giovanni Francesco "Gianni" Rodari (23 October 1920-14 April 1980) was anItalianwriter and journalist, mostfamous for his works of children'sliterature, notably Il romanzo di Cipollino.
For his lasting contribution as a children's author, he received the biennial Hans Christian Andersen Medal in 1970. He is considered as Italy's most important 20th-century children's author and his books have been translated into many languages, though few have been published in English.
Rodari was born in Omegna, a small town on Lake Orta in the province of Novara in northern Italy. His father, a baker, died when Rodari was only eight. Rodari and his two brothers, Cesare and Mario, were raised by his mother in her native village, in the province of Varese.
After three years at the seminary in Seveso, Rodari received his teacher's diploma at the age of seventeen and began to teach elementary classes in rural schools of the Varese district.
He had interest in music (three years of violin lessons) and literature (discovered the works of Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Lenin and Trotsky which sharpened his critical sense).
In 1939, for a short time, Rodari attended the Catholic University of Milan.
During World War II, Rodari had a deferment from the army due to his ill health. Due to his precarious financial situation, he applied for work at the Casa del Fascio and was forced to join the National Fascist Party. Traumatized by the loss of his two best friends and his favourite brother, Cesare's incarceration in a German concentration camp, Rodari joined the Italian Communist Party in 1944 and participated in the Italian resistance movement.
In 1948, as a journalist for the Communist periodical L'Unità, he began writingbooks for children.
In 1950, the Party installed him as editor of the new weekly children's magazine Il Pioniere in Rome.
In 1951, Rodari published his first books, Il Libro delle Filastrocche and Il Romanzo di Cipollino.
In 1952, he travelled for the first time to the Soviet Union, which he frequented thereafter.
In 1953, he married Maria Teresa Feretti, who four years later gave birth to their daughter, Paola.
In 1957, Rodari passed the exam to become a professional journalist.
Rodari spent the years 1966-1969 working intensively on collaborative projects with children.
In 1970, he received the Hans Christian Andersen Medal for children's literature, which gained him a wide international reputation as the best modern children's writer in Italian. The biennial award by the International Board on Books for Young People is the highest recognition available to a writer or illustrator of children's books. His works have been translated into numerous languages.
In 1979, after another trip to the Soviet Union, his health, never very robust, declined and his productivity diminished. He died in Rome, following a surgical operation, in April 1980.
He is perhaps best known for developing the story of Cipollino.
The story of Cipollino was popular enough to have a ballet staged in the Soviet Union in 1973, composed by Karen Khachaturian and choreographed by Genrik Alexandrovich Maiorov.
Cipollino, or Little Onion, fights the unjust treatment of his fellow vegetable townfolk by the fruit royalty (Prince Lemon and the overly proud Tomato) in the garden kingdom. The main theme is the struggle of the underclass and the powerful, good versus evil and the importance of friendship in the face of difficulties.
Rodari's works have continued to be published and re-illustrated by other authors after his death, including Nicoletta Costa.
It’s difficult to do difficult things: To talk to a deaf, to show a rose to a blind. Children! Learn to do difficult things: take the blind by hand, sing for the deaf, set free slaves who believe themselves free.
