Wiki

[stoutfellow]

So, well, I looked up my birthday on Wikipedia for Significant Events, as so many on my FL have been doing. I'm pleased (as a mathematician) to note that I share a birthday with Isaac Newton (New Style, mind you), and (as a dilettante linguist) also with Jakob Grimm. As a history buff, I suppose the best I can claim is Doris Kearns Goodwin.

On the "famous deaths" front, among the most prominent are Henri Bergson, Albert Camus, T. S. Eliot, and Erwin Schrödinger. Less famous, but of interest to me: Elizabeth Ann Seton, Gabriel Cramer, and Humphrey Carpenter.

Famous events? Not a lot: the landing of the Spirit rover in 2004, Nixon's refusal to hand over the Watergate tapes in 1974, Lyndon Johnson's "Great Society" speech in 1965, the first successful appendectomy (1885) and the founding of the Fabian Society (1884).

I think I'm best pleased by the birthday list.

Comments

[tygerr.livejournal.com]

Are we really SURE that Schrodinger is dead? Maybe we should have his cat check up on him. *g,d,r*

[carbonelle.livejournal.com]

As my own birthday is celebrated on July 4th with a national party in my honor, I'm skipping the wiki excercise :-)

[filkferengi]

Lots of filkers celebrate Newton's birthday; it's the perfect, non-controversial excuse to get together at that time of year.