This is what we're celebrating or observing This Week
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March 4, 2012
The First US Congress meets in NYC to put the Constitution of the United States into effect (1789) - Mar. 04
Antonio Vivaldi (Baroque composer and Venetian priest) is born in Venice (1678) - 3/4
Hug a GI Day - 3/4
Jeannette Rankin becomes the 1st woman to be elected to the US House of Representatives (1917) - Mar. 04
St. Adrian (Herculian Guard of the Roman Emperor Galerius Masimian) is martyred at Nicomedia (306) - Mar. 04
Vermont joins the union as the 14th state (1791) - Mar. 04
Pennsylvania Colony is established as a Royal Colony in a charter granted by King Charles II of England (1681) - 3/4
Forth Bridge (a cantilever railway bridge over the Firth of Forth in Scotland) is opened as the longest bridge in Great Britain (1890) - Mar. 04
National Tavern Day celebrates the first tavern opened in America (Boston 1634) - Mar. 04
March 5, 2012
Boston Massacre is an incident involving the deaths of five civilians at the hands of British troops (1770) - Mar. 05
Bridge Players Day - 3/5
Fun Facts About Names Day - Mar. 5
Henry II of England (great-grandson of William the congueror and the first Plantagenet to rule England) is born in Le Mans France (1133) - Mar. 5
BOAC Flight 911 crashes due to severe turbulence when the pilot attempted to show passengers a view of Mt. Fuji, all 124 aboard were killed (1966) - Mar. 5
Josef Stalin (General Secretary of the Soviet Union Communist Part) died from a cerebral hemorrhage (1953) - 3/5
Patsy Cline (American country music singer) died at age 30 (in the height of her career) in a plane crash (1963) - Mar. 5
Personality Day - Mar. 5
Richard Kiley (American stage, TV and film actor best known for his role in Man of La Mancha) died of bone marrow disease in Warwick, NY (1999) - Mar. 5
Sergei Prokofiev (Russian composer of numerous musical genres) died at age 61 in Moscow (1953) - 3/5
Stop the Clocks Day - Mar. 5
St. Piran's Day (Cornwall England) - Mar. 5
March 6, 2012
Ayn Rand (Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright and screenwriter) died from heart failure at age 77 in NYC (1982) - Mar. 6
Battle of the Alamo occurs when after a 13 day siege by 3,000 Mexican troops overcome the 187 Texas volunteers and take over the fort (1836) - Mar. 6
Car Ferry capsizes just outside the Belgian port of Zeebruge resulting in 49 dead (1987) - Mar. 6
Constanze Mozart (wife of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) dies in Salzburg Austria at age 80 (1842) - Mar. 6
Dana Reeve (American Actress, singer and activist and widow of actor Christopher Reeve) dies of lung cancer at age 44 in NYC (2006) - Mar. 6
Davy Crockett (American folk hero, frontiersman soldier and politician) died during the battle of the Alamo (1836) - Mar. 6
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (English Victorian poet) is born in Durham England (1806) - Mar. 6
Georgia O'Keefe (American artist) died in Santa Fe New Mexico at age 98 (1986) - 3/6
Ghana (Independence Day from Britain - 1957) - Mar. 6
Jim Bowie (American pioneer and soldier) dies during the battle of the Alamo (1836) - Mar. 6
John Philip Sousa (American composer and conductor aka "The March King") dies of heart failure at age 77 in his hotel room (1932) - Mar. 6
Louisa May Alcott (American novelist best known for her novel Little Women) died at age 55 from mercury poisoning in Boston, MA (1888) - Mar. 6
Michelangelo (Italian Renaissance painter, sculptor, architect, poet and engineer) is born in Caprese near Arezzo, Tuscany (1475) - 3/6
Pearl S. Buck (Pulitzer-Prize winning American writer) died of lung cancer in Danby Vermont at age 80 (1973) - Mar. 6
Walter Cronkite signs off for the last time as the anchor of CBS Evening News (1981) - Mar. 6
March 7, 2012
Cereal Day - Mar. 7
Golda Meir is nominated as Prime Minister of Israel by the Labor Party she took office on Mar. 17 (1969) - Mar. 7
Goldie the Eagle escapes London Zoo and flies wild in Regent's Park for 13 days (1965) - Mar. 7
National Be Heard Day - 3/7
Shabbat Zachor (Sabbath of Remembrance) falls immediately prior to Purim (2012) - Mar. 7
National Crown Roast of Pork Day - Mar. 7
March 8, 2012
Anne Stuart (sister of Mary II of England) becomes Queen upon the death of her brother-in-law William II (1702) - Mar. 8
Beirut car bomb kills 45 and injures at least 175 in a failed attempt to assassinate Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah (1985) - Mar. 8
New York Stock Exchange is created and set up at 40 Wall Street (1817) - Mar. 8
Castle Gate Mine disaster occurs when a coal mine in Utah experiences 3 violent explosions that killed 172 men in total (1924) - Mar. 8
Eduard Dato e Iradier (Prime Minister of Spain) is assassinated by Catalan anarchists as he left parliament in Madrid (1921) - Mar. 8
Fight of the Century is a boxing match between Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali at Madison Square Garden - Joe Frazier wins the championship (1971) - Mar. 8
International Women's Day is launched in Copenhagen Denmark by Clara Zetkin (1911) - Mar. 8
Io is discovered to have volcanos when images of the first extraterrestrial volcano reaches Earth (1979) - Mar. 8
Spanish Flu pandemic takes its first victim in a 2 year long pandemic during which 20 to 100 million people were killed worldwide (1918) - Mar. 8
Holi (Hindu Spring festival aka the Festival of Colours) date is based on the full moon (Pooranmshi) in late Feb or early March (2012) - Mar. 8
Full Moon (Worm/Lenten Moon) - Mar. 8
Purim (Jewish holiday that commemorates the deliverance of Jewish people from Haman's plot to annihilate them) celebrated 14th day of Adar (2012) - Mar. 8
TWA Boeing 707 explodes at the McCarran Las Vegas Airport seven hours after it flew from JFK in NYC with no one injured since the plane stood alone on the tarmac (1972) - Mar. 8
March 9, 2012
Antonio Novello is appointed Surgeon General by President George H.W. Bush (as the first female and Hispanic American to hold the position - 1990) - 3/9
Barbie Doll debuts (1959) - Mar. 9
Svetlana Stalin (Joseph Stalin's daughter) defects to the US in India (1967) - Mar. 9
Cable Car tragedy in Cavalese near Trento Italy results in the death of 42 people including 15 children when the suspension line gave way (1976) - Mar. 9
David Rizzio (secretary to Mary Queen of Scots) is stabbed 56 times in Holyroodhouse while in the Queen's presence despite her protests (1566) - 3/9
Eastern Airlines is forced into bankruptcy when Eastern's mechanics and ramp service employees go on strike (1989) - Mar. 9
George Burns (American comedian married to Gracie Allen) dies at age 100 from cardiac arrest (1996) - Mar. 9
Jean Calas (French Protestant) is tortured and executed on the wheel for the murder of his son (1762) and exonerated 3 years later (1765) - 3/9
Napoleon and Josephine marry (1796) - Mar. 9
Cabin Fever Day - 3/9
No Smoking Day (UK) occurs on the second Wednesday in March (2011) - Mar. 9
March 10, 2012
Princess Beatrix of the Netherlands weds Claus von Amsberg in Amsterdam (1966) - Mar. 10
Courrieres mine disaster (France) occurs when an explosion of dust kills 1,099 miners (including many children) 600 survived (1906) - Mar. 10
First successful telephone call is made by Alexander Graham Bell to his assistant Thomas Watson (1876) - Mar. 10
The French Foreign Legion is founded by Louis Philippe, King of the French (1831) - Mar. 10
Harriet Tubman (African-American abolitionist, humanitarian and Union spy during the US Civil War) dies from pneumonia at age 93 (1913) - Mar. 10
Lloyd Bridges (Emmy Award-nominated American actor) died from natural causes at age 85 (1998) - Mar. 10
Long Beach, CA Earthquake (6.4 Richter scale) kills 115 people (1933) - Mar. 10
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter arrives at Mars (2006) - 3/10
Money Day (Break open your Piggy Bank) - 3/10
Organize Your Home Office Day (2nd Tuesday in March) - March 10
Prince Edward (youngest child of Queen Elizabeth II) is born (1964) - Mar. 10
Workplace Napping Day - Mar. 10
Rings of Uranus are discovered (1977) - Mar. 10
Telephone Day marks the world's first successful telephone call - Mar. 10
Tokyo is fire bombed by the US Army Air Force with the incendiaries destroying 267,000 buildings and killing over 100,000 civilians (1945) - Mar. 10
March 11, 2012
Sir Alexander Fleming (Scottish pharmacist credited with first discovering penicillin) dies of a heart attack at age 73 (1955) - 3/11
Bureau of Indian Affairs is established by Secretary of War John C. Calhoun (1824) - Mar. 11
Frankenstein (science fiction novel by Mary Shelley) is first published (1818) - 3/11
Michelle Bachelet becomes the first woman President of Chile (2006) - Mar. 11
Great Sheffield Flood (aka the Great Inundation) is a flood that was created when the Dale Dyke Dam in England broke killing 270 people (1864) - Mar. 11
Winnenden school shooting occurs in Baden-Wurtemmberg Germany resulting in 16 deaths including the suicide of the perpetrator, 17-year-old Tim Kretschmer (2009) - Mar. 11
International Criminal Court holds its inaugural session in The Hague in Netherlands (2003) - Mar. 11
Lithunia declares independence from the Soviet Union (1990) - Mar. 11
Madrid Train Bombings is a series of coordinated bombings against the communter train system of Madrid that kills 191 and wounds 1,800 (2004) - Mar. 11
The Roxy Theatre in NYC (a 5,920 seat movie theater) opens with the silent film The Love of Sunya with Gloria Swanson (1927) - Mar. 11
The Daily Courant (1st daily newspaper published in the UK) is 1st published by Edward Mallet from above the White Hart pub on Fleet Street (1702) - 3/11
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) established 15 June 1775 is authorized by congress (1779) - 3/11
Japan experiences an 8.9 earthquake from a break 80 miles off the coast of Sendai followed 1 hour later by a tsunami that caused more damage than the earthquake (2011) - Mar. 11
Daylight Saving Time begins when certain countries move their clocks forward one hour at 2AM to increase afternoon daylight hours - USA second Sunday in March (2012) - Mar. 11
Kuan Yin (aka Guan Yin the bodhisattva associated with compassion as venerated by East Asian Buddhists) celebrates her birthday (2012) - Mar. 11
