For King John, the last two years of his reign (and life) must have felt like a long losing streak: he failed in his attempt to retake Normandy by force, in part because his own barons refused to serve in his military; later, he was made to sign the Magna Carta with many of those same barons, and even though the pope took John’s side and declared the Magna Carta null and void, the barons and he still fell into war against each other.

And then came October 12, 1216. John spent much of his reign traveling; even when he was home in England he traveled from friendly manor house to the next friendly house, allowing his allies to play host to the king, and he did not travel light: his entourage carried everything that he owned personally and in the name of the crown everywhere it went. John collected jewels and gold and silver, and he inherited the Crown Jewels of Germany from his grandmother. His traveling court included several horse-drawn carts full of jewels and precious metals.
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30 Rock, a television series created by Tina Fey and starring Fey, Alec Baldwin, Tracy Morgan, Jane Krakowski, and my friend and fellow “Pelican” Sean Marrinan, debuted on NBC ten years ago tonight.
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John Wesley Hyatt of Albany, New York, was granted a patent for his method of manufacturing billiard balls on this date in 1865. In the search for billiard ball materials other than ivory, Hyatt had invented celluloid, which was found to have many other uses in subsequent decades.
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