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Daily Calendar for Tuesday, December 24, 2024

Question of the Day

What exactly is the “Icelandic low” that weathercasters talk about?
An Icelandic low is a low-pressure center that originates over Iceland and southern Greenland and dominates the wind circulation over the North Atlantic Ocean. In summer, the low weakens and often divides into two separate cells.

Advice of the Day

It is a good practice to leave a few things unsaid.

Home Hint of the Day

Use one-gallon metal paint-thinner cans for storing hardware and other small objects in your workshop. Cut the top off each can with a can opener and pour out any remaining thinner. There’s no need to wash the cans; the last traces of the thinner will evaporate.

Word of the Day

Ancraophobia
Fear of wind

Puzzle of the Day

When does a caterpillar improve in morals?
When it turns over a new leaf.

Born

  • Kit Carson (frontiersman) –
  • Eliza Cook (poet) –
  • Charles Wakefield Cadman (composer) –
  • Juan Ramon Jimenez (poet) –
  • Ava Gardner (actress) –
  • Mary Higgins Clark (author) –
  • Robert Joffrey (dancer) –
  • Ricky Martin (singer) –
  • Ryan Seacrest (television host) –
  • Pepper (Bolivian gray titi monkey) –

Died

  • Peter Lawford (actor) –
  • Michael Vale (actor) –
  • Cheetah (chimpanzee sidekick in the Tarzan movies of the early 1930s) –
  • Charles Durning (actor) –
  • Jack Klugman (actor) –

Events

  • Treaty of Ghent signed between the U.S. and Great Britain, ending the War of 1812–
  • Stille Nacht (Silent Night) first performed, Oberndorf, Austria–
  • Clement Moore’s “A Visit From St. Nicholas” likely written–
  • The Eggnog Riot began at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York–
  • First great fire of San Francisco–
  • Two-thirds of the collection of the Library of Congress (35,000 volumes) and a portion of the Capitol were destroyed by fire–
  • Canadian-born Reginald A. Fessenden sent the first extended radio broadcast from Brant Rock, Massachusetts–
  • O Holy Night was played on the world’s first radio program broadcast, from Brant Rock, Massachusetts–
  • Unofficial Christmas truce began in areas of the Western Front during World War I–
  • CONAD (later, NORAD) began to track Santa Claus–
  • Catcher Jason Varitek was named captain of the Boston Red Sox–

Weather

  • Chicago set a record low temperature of -23 degrees F–
  • In Fairfield, Montana, the temperature dropped from 63 degrees F at noontime to a chilly 21 degrees below zero F at midnight–