- 120th Day of 2013 / 245 Remaining
- 52 Days Until The First Day of Summer
- Sunrise:6:13
- Sunset:7:59
- 13 Hours 46 Minutes of Daylight
- Moon Rise:12:265am
- Moon Set:10:52am
- Moon’s Phase:69 %
- The Next Full Moon
- May 24 @ 9:27pm
- Full Flower Moon
- Full Corn Planting Moon
- Full Milk Moon
In most areas, flowers are abundant everywhere during this time. Thus, the name of this Moon. Other names include the Full Corn Planting Moon, or the Milk Moon.
- Tides
- High:2:24am/4:34pm
- Low:9:21am/9:45pm
- Rainfall (measured July 1 – June 30)
- This Year:16.32
- Last Year:15.62
- Normal To Date:22.95
- Annual Seasonal Average:23.80
- Holidays
- Hairstylist Appreciation Day
- National Oatmeal Cookie Day
- Louisiana Purchase Day
- National Go Birding Day
- National Honesty Day
- National Rebuilding Day
- Spank Out Day USA
- Admission Day-Louisiana
- World Healing Day
- World Tai Chi and Qigong Day
- Beltane(Northern Hemishpere)-Wiccan
- Samhain(Southern Hemisphere)-Wiccan
- Children’s Day-Mexico
- Liberation Day-Viet Nam
- May Day Eve-Finland
- Walpurgis Night-Sweden
- On This Day In …
- 1789 --- In New York City, George Washington, the great military leader of the American Revolution, is inaugurated as the first president of the United States.
- 1812 --- There aren’t many states that can boast an abundance of pelicans, but Louisiana, the 18th state to enter the United States of America, has plenty. That’s why it calls itself the Pelican State and the state bird is the eastern brown pelican. Named in honor of Louis XIV of France, Louisiana has several other nicknames: Sportsman’s Paradise, Sugar State, and Creole State. The capital of Louisiana is Baton Rouge and the beautiful magnolia is its adopted flower while the state tree is the bald cypress. All together now, let’s sing You are My Sunshine, Louisiana’s state song. Give Me Louisiana is also considered a state song, and the state motto is: Union, justice and confidence. We’re not too confident in choosing which song to sing, though.
- 1859 --- "A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens was first published in serial form in a literary magazine.
- 1900 --- Train engineer Casey Jones was killed when trying to save the Cannonball Express as it highballed its way through Vaughn, MS. The famous song about Jones is loosely relatable to the train accident which cost the railroad engineer his life.
- 1904 --- The Louisiana Purchase Exposition opened in St. Louis (St. Louis World's Fair). It was at the Fair that the ice cream cone was supposed to have been invented. The hot dog and iced tea were also popularized at the Fair.
- 1927 --- The Federal Industrial Institution for Women, the first women's federal prison, opens in Alderson, West Virginia. All women serving federal sentences of more than a year were to be brought here.
- 1939 --- The New York World's Fair opens in New York City. The opening ceremony, which featured speeches by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and New York Governor Herbert Lehman, ushered in the first day of television broadcasting in New York. Spanning 1,200 acres at Flushing Meadow Park in Queens, the fairground was marked by two imposing structures--the "Perisphere" and the "Trylon"--and exhibited such new technology as FM radio, robotics, fluorescent lighting, and a crude fax machine.
- 1947 --- Maps had to be changed as Boulder Dam was changed back to its original name, Hoover Dam. Some people, mostly those who live in the community of Boulder, Nevada, still refer to the dam as Boulder Dam. Many of them think that changing the name was a damn shame.
- 1948 --- The Land Rover, a British-made all-terrain vehicle that will earn a reputation for its use in exotic locales, debuts at an auto show in Amsterdam.
- 1948 --- The United States and 20 Latin American nations sign the charter establishing the Organization of American States (OAS). The new institution was designed to facilitate better political relations between the member states and, at least for the United States, to serve as a bulwark against communist penetration of the Western Hemisphere.
- 1952 --- Mr. Potato Head is introduced to the world. Mr. Potato Head is the also the first toy to be advertised on television.
- 1958 --- The American Association of Retired Persons was founded in Washington, D.C.
- 1960 --- Fats Domino recorded "Walking to New Orleans."
- 1964 --- TV sets would be drastically different after a ruling by the FCC stating that all TV receivers should be equipped to receive both VHF (channels 2-13) and the new UHF (channels 14-83). As a result, TV dealers scrambled to unload their VHF-only models as fast as possible. Antenna manufacturers were kept busy, as the new UHF receivers required new antennas too.
- 1970 --- U.S. troops invaded Cambodia to disrupt North Vietnamese Army base areas. The announcement by U.S. President Nixon led to widespread protests.
1975 --- Saigon -- and all of Vietnam -- fell into communist hands this day, the unofficial end of the Vietnam War. By dawn, communist forces move into Saigon, where they meet only sporadic resistance. The South Vietnamese forces had collapsed under the rapid advancement of the North Vietnamese. The most recent fighting had begun in December 1974, when the North Vietnamese had launched a major attack against the lightly defended province of Phuoc Long, located due north of Saigon along the Cambodian border, overrunning the provincial capital at Phuoc Binh on January 6, 1975. Despite previous presidential promises to provide aid in such a scenario, the United States did nothing. By this time, Nixon had resigned from office and his successor, Gerald Ford, was unable to convince a hostile Congress to make good on Nixon's earlier promises to rescue Saigon from communist takeover. This situation emboldened the North Vietnamese, who launched a new campaign in March 1975. The South Vietnamese forces fell back in total disarray, and once again, the United States did nothing. The South Vietnamese abandoned Pleiku and Kontum in the Highlands with very little fighting. Then Quang Tri, Hue, and Da Nang fell to the communist onslaught. The North Vietnamese continued to attack south along the coast toward Saigon, defeating the South Vietnamese forces at each encounter. The South Vietnamese 18th Division had fought a valiant battle at Xuan Loc, just to the east of Saigon, destroying three North Vietnamese divisions in the process. However, it proved to be the last battle in the defense of the Republic of South Vietnam. The South Vietnamese forces held out against the attackers until they ran out of tactical air support and weapons, finally abandoning Xuan Loc to the communists on April 21. Having crushed the last major organized opposition before Saigon, the North Vietnamese got into position for the final assault.In Saigon, South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu resigned and transferred authority to Vice President Tran Van Huong before fleeing the city on April 25.By April 27, the North Vietnamese had completely encircled Saigon and began to maneuver for a complete takeover. When they attacked at dawn on April 30, they met little resistance.North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace and the war came to an end.
- 1984 --- U.S. President Reagan signed cultural and scientific agreements with China. He also signed a tax accord that would make it easier for American companies to operate in China.
- 1993 --- Top women’s tennis player Monica Seles is stabbed by a deranged German man during a match in Hamburg. The assailant, a fan of German tennis star Steffi Graf, apparently hoped that by injuring Seles his idol Graf would be able to regain her No. 1 ranking. Seles, then 19, was sitting on a courtside seat during a changeover in her match against Magdalena Maleeva at the Hamburg Open when 38-year-old Gunter Parche leaned over a fence and stabbed her between the shoulder blades with a knife. Parche was quickly apprehended by security officials and Seles was taken to the hospital. She recovered from her physical injuries but was left with deep emotional scars and didn’t play again professionally for another two years.
- 1997 --- ABC aired the "coming out" episode of the sitcom "Ellen." The title character, played by Ellen DeGeneres, admitted she was a lesbian.
- 1998 --- NATO was expanded to include Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. The three nations were formally admitted the following April at NATO's 50th anniversary summit.
- Birthdays
- Willie Nelson
- Bobby Vee
- Jane Campion
- Kirsten Dunst
- Theodore Schultz
- Johnny Galecki
- Burt Young
- Eve Arden
- Robert Shaw
- Al Lewis
- Cloris Leachman
- Johnny Farina