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Friday February 27, 2015

  • 58th Day of 2015 307 Remaining
  • Spring Begins in 21 Days
  • Sunrise:6:42
  • Sunset:6:01
  • 11 Hours 19 Minutes
  •  
  • Moon Rise:12:59pm
  • Moon Set:2:36am
  • Phase:71%
  • Full Moon March 5 @ 10:06am

As the temperature begins to warm and the ground begins to thaw, earthworm casts appear, heralding the return of the robins. The more northern tribes knew this Moon as the Full Crow Moon, when the cawing of crows signaled the end of winter; or the Full Crust Moon, because the snow cover becomes crusted from thawing by day and freezing at night. The Full Sap Moon, marking the time of tapping maple trees, is another variation. To the settlers, it was also known as the Lenten Moon, and was considered to be the last full Moon of winter.

  • Tides
  • High:5:39am/7:50pm
  • Low:12:58pm
  • Rainfall:
  • This Year to Date:17.01
  • Last Year:6.85
  • Avg YTD:17.94
  • Annual Avg:23.80
  • Holidays
  • National Kahlua Day
  • National Strawberry Day
  •  
  • International Polar Bear Day
  • Independence Day-Dominican Republic
  • On This Day
  • 1801 --- The District of Columbia was placed under the jurisdiction of Congress.
  • 1827 --- A group of masked and costumed students dance through the streets of New Orleans, Louisiana, marking the beginning of the city's famous Mardi Gras celebrations. The celebration of Carnival--or the weeks between Twelfth Night on January 6 and Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Christian period of Lent--spread from Rome across Europe and later to the Americas. Nowhere in the United States is Carnival celebrated as grandly as in New Orleans, famous for its over-the-top parades and parties for Mardi Gras (or Fat Tuesday), the last day of the Carnival season. Though early French settlers brought the tradition of Mardi Gras to Louisiana at the end of the 17th century, Spanish governors of the province later banned the celebrations. After Louisiana became part of the United States in 1803, New Orleanians managed to convince the city council to lift the ban on wearing masks and partying in the streets. The city's new Mardi Gras tradition began in 1827 when the group of students, inspired by their experiences studying in Paris, donned masks and jester costumes and staged their own Fat Tuesday festivities.
  • 1860 --- President Abraham Lincoln poses for the first of several portraits by noted Civil War-era photographer Mathew Brady. Days later, the photograph is published on the cover of Harper's Bazaar with the caption, Hon. Abram [sic] Lincoln, of Illinois, Republican Candidate for President.
  • 1861 --- In Warsaw, Russian troops fired on a crowd protesting Russian rule over Poland. Five protesting marchers were killed in the incident. 
  • 1864 --- The first Union inmates begin arriving at Andersonville prison, which was still under construction in southern Georgia. Andersonville became synonymous with death as nearly a quarter of its inmates died in captivity. Henry Wirz, who ran Andersonville, was executed after the war for the brutality and mistreatment committed under his command.
  • 1922 --- The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, providing for female suffrage, is unanimously declared constitutional by the eight members of the U.S. Supreme Court. The 19th Amendment, which stated that "the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State on account of sex," was the product of over seven decades of meetings, petitions, and protests by women suffragists and their supporters.
  • 1943 --- An explosion at the Montana Coal and Iron Company mine kills 74 workers. It was the worst mining disaster in Montana's history. The small communities of Washoe and Bearcreek, Montana, consisted almost entirely of mine workers and their families. Many of them worked Smith Mine #3 for the Montana Coal and Iron Company. On a cold Saturday morning, February 27, 77 men were working in the mine when, at 9:30 a.m., a huge explosion rang out. The people of Washoe and Bearcreek heard the roar and then the long, wailing siren that followed. The exact cause of the explosion is not known, though some of the company's miners claimed methane gas had built up in some abandoned shafts and was ignited after a cave-in. Of the 77 workers in the mine at the time of the explosion, only three made it out alive. 
  • 1951 --- The 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, limiting a president to two terms of office, was ratified.
  • 1960 --- The underdog U.S. Olympic hockey team defeats the Soviet Union in the semifinals at the Winter Games in Squaw Valley, California. The next day, the U.S. beats Czechoslovakia to win its first-ever Olympic gold medal in hockey.
  • 1964 --- The Italian government announces that it is accepting suggestions on how to save the renowned Leaning Tower of Pisa from collapse. The top of the 180-foot tower was hanging 17 feet south of the base, and studies showed that the tilt was increasing by a fraction every year. Experts warned that the medieval building--one of Italy's top tourist attractions--was in serious danger of toppling in an earthquake or storm. Proposals to save the Leaning Tower arrived in Pisa from all over the world, but it was not until 1999 that successful restorative work began.
  • 1972 --- As the concluding act of President Richard Nixon's historic visit to communist China, the president and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai issue a joint statement summarizing their agreements (and disagreements) of the past week. The "Shanghai Communique" set into motion the slow process of the normalization of relations between the two former Cold War enemies.
  • 1973 --- On the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, some 200 Sioux Native Americans, led by members of the American Indian Movement (AIM), occupy Wounded Knee, the site of the infamous 1890 massacre of 300 Sioux by the U.S. Seventh Cavalry. The AIM members, some of them armed, took 11 residents of the historic Oglala Sioux settlement hostage as local authorities and federal agents descended on the reservation.
  • 1977 --- Keith Richards' (Rolling Stones) Toronto hotel suite was raided by Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Richards was arrested and charged possession of heroin with the intent to traffic and possession of cocaine. He was release on $25,000 bail.
  • 1990 --- The Exxon Corporation and Exxon Shipping were indicted on five criminal counts in reference to the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. 
  • 1991 --- James Brown was paroled from prison after serving two years. He had been sentenced to six years in prison after leading police on an interstate car chase. 
  • 1997 --- Divorce became legal in Ireland.
  • 1997 --- Don Cornelius received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
  • 1998 --- Britain's House of Lords agreed to give a monarch's first-born daughter the same claim to the throne as any first-born son. This was the end to 1,000 years of male preference. 
  • 2002 --- Alicia Keys won five Grammy Awards for her debut album, "Songs in A Minor."
  • 2002 --- A terrorist mob set fire to a train carrying hundreds of Hindu nationalists in Godhra, India; some 60 people died.
  • Birthdays
  • Marian Anderson
  • Ralph Nader
  • John Steinbeck
  • Justice Hugo Black
  • Joanne Woodward
  • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
  • Lotte Lehmann
  • Irwin Shaw
  • Enrico Caruso
  • Joan Bennett
  • Howard Hessman
  • Neal Schon (Journey / Santana)
  • Chelsea Clinton