history

Today in History: August 13

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

The first episode of South Park aired on Comedy Central on this date in 1997. It remains the only episode created entirely with paper cut-outs.

Despite its high ratings (a 1.3 at 10:00 p.m. on a basic cable channel that was less than 10 years old in 1997 was quite a solid performance and amounted to almost one million television sets tuned in), the episode did not win its creators a long-term contract for the show. Within a month, however, the program had doubled its viewership, by the end of the season it had quintupled its viewer numbers, and a hit was born.
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Edison Obsessed

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

Sixteen months of embarrassingly public false starts and failed attempts led to the rarest of things from Thomas Edison: silence. He was going to allow his results to speak for themselves for once. When he and his invention were ready on December 31, 1879, Thomas Edison invited the public to his lab in Menlo Park, New Jersey, to witness electric lights being turned on and off for the first time.

In September 1878, Edison had convinced himself that he was so close to an electric light that he announced it to the press. “I have it now! When the brilliancy and cheapness of the lights are made known to the public, illumination by carburated hydrogen gas will be discarded,” he told the New York Sun. Gas lamps inside and outside the house, with their many inherent dangers, were about to be a thing of the past.
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A Man Rich in Friends

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

He was going to corner the rice market. There was a shortage of rice in San Francisco and he, well, he knew people.

Unfortunately, the day “his” ship arrived in port with a delivery of rice, every other ship that arrived that day also had a full load of rice. The shortage was suddenly over, but Joshua Norton was the only man waiting for his ship to come in who had invested his entire fortune—possibly as much as a quarter-million dollars—on that one shipment. He declared bankruptcy.

He began to file legal proceedings and lawsuits against every institution that he could think was to be blamed for his misfortune, from banks to the United States of America itself. Finally, he declared himself Emperor of the entire continent, America and Mexico. He had probably gone insane in his frustration and endless effort, but no man found greater riches.
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