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Archives for February 2019

Facts About Astronaut Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova

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Valentina Tereshkova, pilot-cosmonaut, first female cosmonaut, Hero of the USSR. Pictured as a Major of the Soviet Air Forces. (1969)
RIA Novosti archive, image #612748 / Alexander Mokletsov / CC-BY-SA 3.0

Valentina Tereshkova is a Soviet astronaut known for being the first woman to go into space. Valentina was born on 6th March 1937 in the village of Maslennikovo.

Facts about the first woman in space:

  • She joined the Russian Air Force because she wanted to become a cosmonaut.
  • Out of 400 applicants Valentina became the first woman to go into space.
  • On 16th June 1963, after extensive training she was put on the Vostok 6 capsule which was sent into space. Valentina was only 26 at the time.
  • Her capsule orbited the earth 48 times and stayed in space for 3 days.
  • Her capsule landed on June 19, 1963 in Southern Siberia. She bruised her nose while landing her parachute.
  • Valentina also has a PhD in engineering.
  • Apart from being a cosmonaut and engineer, she is also a politician. Valentina held many political positions during her career.
  • She retired as a Major General from the Russian Air Force in 1997.
  • Valentina married a fellow astronaut in 1963 and became a mother in 1967.
  • In 1982, she divorced her first husband and remarried someone else later.
Valentina at the opening of the Lenin Museum in Gorki, Pereslavl region

Valentina Tereshkova in 2017
Kremlin.ru / (CC BY 3.0)

Facts on Wernher Von Braun: Inventor of the V-2 Rocket

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Wernher von Braun

Wernher Von Braun was born on March 23rd 1912 in Wrsitz(Back then, part of the German Empire, but now in Poland). Von Braun is mostly known for developing the V-2 Rocket for Germany in World War II and later on, the Saturn V Rocket System for the Americans, after being secretly shifted to the United States.

Facts about Dr. Werner Von Braun:

  • He studied engineering at Universities of Berlin and Zurich.
  • He also got a PhD in physics in 1934.
  • In 1936 he was appointed Technical Director of a Rocket Research Facility.
  • In just 2 years after his appointment, Von Braun developed a prototype rocket, capable of carrying a warhead for 11 miles. After getting support from Hitler he perfected the design. This improved version was called the V-2(vergeltungswaffe), meaning reprisal or retribution weapon.
  • Each V-2 rocket was capable of carrying warheads weighing 1000kg for 200 miles.
  • Germans launched over 3000 V-2 rockets on Allied Forces during World War II.
  • These V-2 attacks resulted in the deaths of over 9000 civilians and soldiers.
  • The V-2 rocket was the world’s first ballistic missile system.
  • In May 1945 Von Braun and his brother who was also a rocket scientist, surrendered to the American Forces.
  • He was brought to the United States and made an American citizen.
  • Braun was made Director of the U.S. Ballistic Missile Agency in Alabama.
  • In addition to developing the V-2 rockets Von Braun is also known for developing the Red Stone rocket, America’s first ballistic missile.
  • Braun also developed the first Untied States satellite which was launched from Cape Canaveral on 31st January 1958.
  • Besides this, he is also responsible for the Saturn V Rocket System. The Saturn V rocket was used in the Apollo missions.
  • The successful flight which resulted in the Moon Landing of July 1969, also used Saturn V rockets.
  • Dr. Von Braun was known as a ladies man. While studying in Berlin, he was often seen in the company of two girlfriends at once.
  • Braun also wrote a science fiction novel about humans going to Mars but his manuscript was rejected by at least 18 publishers.
  • Von Braun also worked with Walt Disney on the production of three educational films about space exploration.
  • Some people accused him of enforcing slave labor in V-2 rocket factories. However, Braun denied these allegations.
  • He said that he was aware of slave labor being used in the factories but he was helpless and couldn’t do anything about it.
  • Dr. Braun died of pancreatic cancer on June 16th 1977.
Dr. Von Braun holding a model of the V-2 rocket

Von Braun was a brilliant scientist who made some great accomplishments in science. He encouraged space exploration and himself had a passion to go on the Moon. Some people believe, Americans couldn’t have made it to the Moon if it wasn’t for Von Braun.

Some Facts About General Omar Nelson Bradley

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Omar Nelson Bradley was a United States Army General. He is most known for commanding the Normandy landings on D-Day, June 6th 1944.

General Omar Nelson Bradley (1949)

A few facts about General Bradley:

  • Omar Bradley was born on February 12th 1893 in Clark, Missouri.
  • He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1915.
  • Most of his early military assignments were in the United States.
  • As a second lieutenant he served in the 14th Infantry Regiment. He was posted at the U.S border with Mexico.
  • By 1917, during World War II, Bradley was promoted to Captain. Bradley was given the task to guard the Butte, Montana copper mines.
  • From 1920 to 1924 Bradley was a mathematics instructor at the U.S Military Academy.
  • By 1924 he was promoted to the rank of Major.
  • In 1936 he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and was posted in the war department.
  • In 1941 he was given the command of an infantry school. By this time Bradley had become a Brigadier General after bypassing the rank of Colonel.
  • After the start of World War II, Bradley was promoted to the rank of Major General.
  • In 1943 Bradley became a Lieutenant General and was given the command of American 2nd Corps stationed in Tunisia. He was incharge of the invasion of Sicily during which the Allied troops retook the Island of Sicily from the Axis powers.
  • Bradley was made Commander-in-Chief of the American ground forces and was then moved to London in 1944 to command the Normandy invasion.
  • General Bradley had under his command 11 million men. This was the largest army ever entrusted to any General in United States history.
  • His men invaded Normandy, advanced to Cherbourg, and drove through Avranches, right into the heart of France.
  • His troops crossed the Rhine at Remagen, Germany and met up with Russian troops on 25th April 1945.
  • By 1950 he was promoted to the highest U.S. army rank and was made General of the Army.
  • From 1948 to 1953 Bradley served as the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chief of Staff.
  • Bradley is famously nicknamed as the GI General.
  • He was responsible for building up NATO and assessing American strategy in the Korean War.
  • He served on active duty for more than 69 years. Thus making his active duty career the longest ever in U.S. history.
  • General Bradley died on April 8th 1981 of a cardiac arrhythmia.
Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Omar Bradley talk with a young member of the French resistance in the American sector during the liberation of Lower Normandy in the summer of 1944

Balmoral Castle Facts

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Balmoral Castle is a large estate house in Royal Deeside, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Originally, the only building on the property was a hunting lodge, built in 1319. In 1390, Sir William Drummond constructed a house to replace the lodge. Since then, the house and property exchanged hands several times. Then in 1847, while on a trip to the area, the cold, rainy weather prompted Queen Victoria’s physician to recommend a stay in Deeside. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert arrived for their first visit to the house in 1848. Victoria found the house “small but pretty” and recorded in her diary that “All seemed to breathe freedom and peace, and to make one forget the world and its sad turmoils.”

Balmoral Castle in 2006
Author: JThomas / CC BY-SA 2.0

The couple purchased the property privately in November 1851 for £32,000. In 1853, feeling the original castle was too small, the couple began construction on the current Balmoral Castle. The new castle was completed in 1856 and the old castle was then destroyed. The architect of the current castle was William Smith of Aberdeen. His designs were reviewed and amended by Prince Albert himself. The castle has remained the private property of the royal family since that time.

Here are a few facts about Balmoral Castle:

A painting of the castle in a newspaper from 1897
  • The castle is an example of Scots Baronial architecture. It is made up of two main blocks with a courtyard between. The south-western block contains the main rooms, while the north-eastern block houses the service wings.
  • There is an 80-foot (24m) tall clock tower topped with turrets on the south-east corner.
  • The castle was built from granite quarried on the estate.
  • Additional land and buildings have been adding by the Royal Family since it was first purchased. It now covers an area of about 49,000 acres.
  • The Balmoral Estate is a working estate. It includes grouse moors, forestry and farmland as well as managed herds of deer, cattle and ponies.
  • The Royal Family employs about 50 full-time and 50–100 part-time staff to maintain the working estate.
  • The purchase of a Scottish estate by Victoria and Albert and the adoption of the Scottish architectural style played a key role in influencing the revival of Scottish Highland culture.
  • After Albert’s death, Victoria spent more and more time at Balmoral. During this time, she began to depend on her servant John Brown, a local ghillie or gamekeeper, who became one of her closes companions during her long mourning after Albert’s death.
  • After Victoria’s death the royal family continued to use Balmoral and have periodically made improvements to buildings and the landscape.
  • Since 1987 the castle is shown on the back side of £100 notes issued by the Royal Bank of Scotland.

The current Queen was in residence at Balmoral at the time of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. Although another castle was used for the film, her private discussions with Prime Minister Tony Blair during that time are dramatized in Stephen Frears’ film “The Queen” (2006).

Facts About Baltic Languages

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Distribution of the Baltic languages

The Baltic language category is a subset of the Indo-European group of languages. These languages are associated with people that live in proximity to the Baltic Sea, which is where they get their name from. There are two types of Baltic languages: the Eastern Baltic languages and the Western Baltic languages. These language groups include dead languages as well as living languages. There is some controversy about whether certain Baltic languages should be categorized as Western or Eastern Baltic languages.

People that are not native speakers of Baltic languages will have many opportunities to learn them. Online language resources for the Latvian and Lithuanian languages are widely available today. Since Latvian and Lithuanian are not as widely spoken as other European languages, translators that specialize in these languages may be comparatively successful within their language niches, particularly if they also know other European languages.

People that are familiar with Slavic languages will have an easier time learning Latvian and Lithuanian than people that are primarily familiar with the Romance languages. While there are fewer opportunities for Latvian or Lithuanian translation than for French or Spanish translation, there are also fewer people involved in the sub-field. They will not face as much competition as translators that specialize in French or Spanish. Most opportunities for language translation call for native speakers, so native Latvian and Lithuanian speakers will be able to capitalize on most opportunities.

An old Prussian manuscript from 1440
PD-old-100

Baltic Language Facts:

  • The most influential Baltic languages in the modern world are Lithuanian and Latvian.
  • The Latvian and Lithuanian languages are both East Baltic languages.
  • Western Baltic languages include Skalvian, Galindian, Sudovian, and Old Prussian.
  • The languages that are categorized as West Baltic languages have very few living speakers.
  • There are about 3.9 million Lithuanian speakers in the modern world.
  • There are as many as 2.5 million speakers of Latvian in the world today.
  • As many as one million ethnic Russian people also speak the Latvian language.
  • The Samogitian language is one of the living Lithuanian dialects.
  • Old Prussian could be regarded as the oldest of all Baltic languages. It currently has no living speakers.
  • People that speak the Latvian language will usually have a hard time understanding the Lithuanian language, even though the two languages have similar origins.
  • There are many similarities between the Slavic and Baltic languages, and some linguists group them together.
  • The Baltic languages began with the Proto-Baltic language, which dates back to before the year 1000 B.C.
  • The exact dawn of Baltic languages is very difficult to pinpoint. Particularly since the point at which one language becomes another is always debatable. However, the oldest written work in a Baltic language that is still available today is from around 1400.

Regardless of its exact history, the Baltic language group is very old and it still continues to have a lot of influence today. Millions of people throughout Europe and beyond speak Baltic languages. With modern globalization trends, it remains to be seen how the Baltic language group will continue to grow and change over time.

Facts About the Flag of the United States

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The United States flag

Americans have been proud of their flag in all of its different designs since the United States of America gained independence from Great Britain in 1783. The flag has changed a few times, mainly as the number of states within the Union increased. Here a few facts about the stars and stripes.

Some facts about the American Flag:

  • The present flag with 50 stars on it was officially adopted on 14 June 1960, soon after Hawaii had become the 50th state. The original American flag had 13 stars as at that point in time there were 13 states.
  • Whenever another state was admitted into the Union another star was added to the federal flag (so in theory if any state left a star would be taken off).
  • Every state is represented by one of the fifty stars.
  • The thirteen red and white stripes are there to remind American citizens of the thirteen British colonies that broke away from the British Empire to form the United States.
  • Old Glory, Stars and Stripes and the Star Spangled Banner are the most frequently used nicknames for the American flag.
  • The current version of the Stars and Stripes was designed by a 18 year old student.He was not paid to redesign it, and his only reward was a B – for his assignment grade.
  • The United States armed forces fold the flag thirteen times .
  • 14th June was the day selected for Americans to have their national flag day.This is the anniversary of the day when the Second Continental Congress approved the design of an American flag.
  • The colors of the flag were carefully selected to have symbolic meaning. Red represents hardiness as well as valor. White symbolizes purity plus innocence. Blue stands for justice, vigilance besides persistence.
  • Belief it or not it is not illegal to burn the flag, as according to the Supreme Court making it so would would become an attack on the right to freedom of speech.

Thus the American flag has a proud history, that is as old as the nation that it represents. It is also one of the most recognized flags across the globe.