This post has been updated. For years, Kendra Jackson battled an incessantly runny nose — sniffling and sneezing, blowing and losing sleep each night. Jackson said she initially thought she was getting a cold, then, as her symptoms persisted, doctors … Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Parker was a young girl when Comanches raided Fort Parker—located in what is now Texas—and massacred its inhabitants, capturing her in the process. Raised by her captors, she was adopted into the tribe and went on to bear the last great Comanche chief, Quanah Parker. At first, Quanah led raids on frontier settlements, but after his defeat and surrender, he learned to live alongside his white neighbors and eventually became the richest Native American in the US. What became of his mother? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Ho Chi Minh was born on May 19, 1890. Referred to as the “father of modern Vietnam,” he spearheaded the Vietnamese revolt against French and Japanese occupation. In 1954, after the French and Japanese left, the United States entered the scene; it was during this struggle that Ho Chi Minh died in 1969. In 1975, North and South Vietnam united into the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. On Ho Chi Minh’s birthday each year, people hold parades in cities, carrying posters depicting him. Many women wear the áo dài, a traditional Vietnamese garment. Speeches about Ho Chi Minh often follow the parades. Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
At just 29 years of age, African-American playwright Lorraine Hansberry secured her place in theatrical history when she became the first black woman to have a play produced on Broadway. Her acclaimed A Raisin in the Sun, a penetrating psychological study of a working-class African-American family in Chicago, was inspired in part by the discrimination and legal battle Hansberry’s own family faced upon buying a home in a white Chicago neighborhood. Why was her literary career cut short? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
In July 2001, red-colored rain began falling in the Indian state of Kerala. For the next two months, it returned intermittently. A number of theories explaining the origins of the coloration were proposed, including that it was contamination from a dust cloud, debris from a volcanic eruption, and even extraterrestrial cells. The Indian government initially speculated that the red rain was caused by an exploding meteor but later issued an official report asserting that it had been caused by what? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Definition: (noun) The attribute of being brief or fleeting.
Synonyms: brevity, briefness.
Usage: The superficiality and transience of the club scene is part of its appeal for young people.
Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Ken Shen was racing against the sun. It was 3 A.M. on April 25 and Shen—an astronomer at the University of California, Berkeley—was sitting at his kitchen table in his pajamas. At that precise moment the scientists behind the European Space Agency’s Gaia … Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
Over the course of several months leading up to May 18, 1927, disgruntled school board member Andrew Kehoe hid hundreds of pounds of explosives inside the Bath Consolidated School in Bath Township, Michigan. That day, after destroying his farm—which was slated for foreclosure—he detonated the explosives inside the school and set off a bomb in his vehicle. The massacre is considered the deadliest act of mass murder in a school in US history. How many people were killed? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
One of the preeminent Hollywood directors of the 1930s and 40s, Capra produced idealistic populist movies that celebrate the virtues of the common American. At age six, the Sicilian-born future director immigrated with his family to the US. After holding various jobs in the film industry, he emerged as a major director in 1928. Within years, he had won his first Oscar. Which of his films is now considered one of the best American films ever made—despite having initially been a box office flop? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis, an oil painting by Dutch master painter Rembrandt, depicts a Roman historian’s account of an episode from the Batavian rebellion, led by the one-eyed chieftain Claudius Civilis. At around 16 x 16 ft (5 x 5 m), it was Rembrandt’s largest completed work before it was reduced in size for sale. Commissioned in the mid-17th century by Amsterdam’s city council for the city hall, it was returned to Rembrandt after being displayed for only a short time. Why? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary