Calendar January 2010:

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Date	Description
This month we remember the life & work of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. 10 Ideas for Incorporating MLK in the classroom.doc Images of King.ppt
4 : M	Staff Development
11 : M	MoY Secondary Benchmark Testing Window Opens
14 : Th	HS LATE START
14 : Th	The Color Purple - Cast Dialogue 12 - 1 pm MLK Oratory Competition 5 pm Boyd Vance Theater George Washington Carver Museum
14 : Th	A.C.C.E.S.S. Traveling Exhibits Program Launch Orientation Professional Development Center 5:00 - 6:30 pm
16 : Sa	History Day Fair O. Henry M.S.
16 : Sa	City of Austin & Hands On Central Texas' MLK Day of Service View list of Volunteer Opportunities
18 : M	MLK Holiday
23 : Sa	Celebrate ME! Nigeria 11:00 a.m. George Washington Carver Museum
23 : Sa	IPGa Curriculum Writing Teams 8:30 - 3:30 Professional Development Center
27 : W	High School Department Chairs meeting at Gorzycki Middle School Library 1:00 - 4:00 pm
27 : W	"Flying High": Gary Hoover looks at creation of modern airline industry This talk is part of the U.T. series The Story of Enterprise: Lessons for Leaders from Business History. 5:30-7 p.m. AT&T Conf. Ctr. Room 204
28 : Th	Middle School Department Chairs Library Media Center @ Allan Elem. 1:00 - 4:00 pm
28 : Th	HS Late Start

This Month in History

JANUARY ANNIVERSARIES Momentous or Merely Memorable
50 Years Ago	BOTTOM'S UP Swiss engineer Jacques Piccard and U.S. Navy Lt. Don Walsh make the world's deepest manned dive, January 23, 1960, in the bathyscaph Trieste - a deep-sea research sub designed by Piccard's father. Their seven-mile descent to the floor of Challenger Deep in the Pacific's Mariana Trench - the deepest point in the oceans - takes nearly five hours. On the bottom they see fish - proof of life and oxygen at extreme depths. In June 2009 a robot sub retrieved samples from the trench that may reveal new information about tectonic plate collisions.
60 Years Ago	CHOCOLATE POCKET Raytheon engineer Percy Spencer patents the microwave oven, January 24, 1950. The idea came to him when working with magnetron tubes for use in radar; he discovered they melted the chocolate in his pocket, then popped some nearby corn. Initially sold for commercial use for $2,000 (left; a 1947 demo), today microwave ovens cook in over 90% of American kitchens.
120 Years Ago	AMAZING RACE Greeted at the train station by a horde of cheering readers, New York World journalist Nellie Bly, 25, arrives in New Jersey on January 25, 1890, a record 72 days 6 hours 11 minutes after leaving, to beat Cosmopolitan's Elizabeth Bisland in a race around the world. Bly's 21,740-mile journey includes a meeting with Jules Verne, creator of Phileas Fogg, whose 80-day record she believes can be bested - and by a woman, to boot! On her return Bly - born Elizabeth Cochran, she takes her name from a Stephen Foster song - publishes an account of her trip, Around the World in 72 Days, to robust sales.
150 Years Ago	A DRAMATIC LIFE Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is born, the son of a grocer, in Taganrog, Russia, January 29, 1860. A doctor by profession, Chekhov as a young man is known for his comedic stories. His writing takes a more serious turn with the publication of a novella, Steppe, in 1888. More than 50 short stories and plays - including The Seagull (1896), Uncle Vanya (1897), Three Sisters (1901), The Cherry Orchard (1904) - follow. The works masterfully chronicle the mundane lives and pent-up emotions of his three-dimensional characters. Chekhov dies of tuberculosis in 1904, age 44.
350 Years Ago	WORDS TO LIVE BY "Blessed be God, at the end of the last year I was in very good health." On January 1, 1660, English naval administrator Samuel Pepys begins one of literature's most famous diaries. For a decade he chronicles London affairs - of state and of the heart - the war with the Dutch, a plague outbreak and the Great Fire of 1666. His colorful details - a murderer, on being drawn and quartered, looks "as cheerfully as any man could in that condition" - make the diary good history and, after it publication in 1825, good reading. Pepys dies in 1703, age 70.
"This Month In History" is written each month for the Smithsonian magazine by Alison McLean.

JANUARY ANNIVERSARIES

Momentous or Merely Memorable

Years

Ago

BOTTOM'S UP

Swiss engineer Jacques Piccard and U.S. Navy Lt. Don Walsh make the world's deepest manned dive, January 23, 1960, in the bathyscaph Trieste - a deep-sea research sub designed by Piccard's father. Their seven-mile descent to the floor of Challenger Deep in the Pacific's Mariana Trench - the deepest point in the oceans - takes nearly five hours. On the bottom they see fish - proof of life and oxygen at extreme depths.

In June 2009 a robot sub retrieved samples from the trench that may reveal new information about tectonic plate collisions.

Years

Ago

CHOCOLATE POCKET

Raytheon engineer Percy Spencer patents the microwave oven, January 24, 1950. The idea came to him when working with magnetron tubes for use in radar; he discovered they melted the chocolate in his pocket, then popped some nearby corn.

Initially sold for commercial use for $2,000 (left; a 1947 demo), today microwave ovens cook in over 90% of American kitchens.

120

Years

Ago

AMAZING RACE

Greeted at the train station by a horde of cheering readers, New York World journalist Nellie Bly, 25, arrives in New Jersey on January 25, 1890, a record 72 days 6 hours 11 minutes after leaving, to beat Cosmopolitan's Elizabeth Bisland in a race around the world. Bly's 21,740-mile journey includes a meeting with Jules Verne, creator of Phileas Fogg, whose 80-day record she believes can be bested - and by a woman, to boot!

On her return Bly - born Elizabeth Cochran, she takes her name from a Stephen Foster song - publishes an account of her trip, Around the World in 72 Days, to robust sales.

150

Years

Ago

A DRAMATIC LIFE

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is born, the son of a grocer, in Taganrog, Russia, January 29, 1860. A doctor by profession, Chekhov as a young man is known for his comedic stories. His writing takes a more serious turn with the publication of a novella, Steppe, in 1888. More than 50 short stories and plays - including The Seagull (1896), Uncle Vanya (1897), Three Sisters (1901), The Cherry Orchard (1904) - follow. The works masterfully chronicle the mundane lives and pent-up emotions of his three-dimensional characters.

Chekhov dies of tuberculosis in 1904, age 44.

350

Years

Ago

WORDS TO LIVE BY

"Blessed be God, at the end of the last year I was in very good health." On January 1, 1660, English naval administrator Samuel Pepys begins one of literature's most famous diaries. For a decade he chronicles London affairs - of state and of the heart - the war with the Dutch, a plague outbreak and the Great Fire of 1666. His colorful details - a murderer, on being drawn and quartered, looks "as cheerfully as any man could in that condition" - make the diary good history and, after it publication in 1825, good reading.

Pepys dies in 1703, age 70.

"This Month In History" is written each month for
the Smithsonian magazine

by Alison McLean.

Austin Independent School District - Bureau of Curriculum

SOCIAL STUDIES

Calendar

STAFF

Calendar January 2010:

Go to: [Previous Month] [Next Month] [Full-Year] [Benchmark] [State Assessments]

Calendar Listing

This Month in History