February 3

15th Amendment to US Constitution ratified, granting voting rights regardless of race (1870); American novelist Gertrude Stein born (1874); Luna 9 becomes first spacecraft to make soft landing on the moon (1966); Eileen Collins becomes the first woman to pilot a space shuttle (1995).

February 2

City of Buenos Aires, Argentina, is founded (1536); Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is signed, ending the Mexican-American War (1848); First Groundhog Day celebrated (1887); First Groundhog Day celebrated (1887); First Groundhog Day celebrated (1887); NYC's Grand Central Terminal opens (1913); James Joyce's "Ulysses" published (1922); Actor Paul Mescal born (1996)

February 1

 "Oxford English Dictionary" debuts (1884); Poet Langston Hughesborn (1901); Film legend Clark Gable born (1901); Harriet Tubman becomes first Black woman on US postage stamp (1978); Harry Styles born (1994); Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates on reentry, all seven astronauts killed (2003).

January 31

Guy Fawkes is executed (1606); 13th Amendment, abolishing slavery, passes in Congress (1865); Jackie Robinson born (1919); Actress Kerry Washington born (1977); Justin Timberlake born (1981).

January 30

American flag maker Betsy Ross dies (1836); Franklin D. Roosevelt born (1882); Mahatma Gandhi assassinated (1948); The Beatles give their last public performance (1969); 14 killed on Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland (1972).

January 29

President William McKinley born (1843); Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" first published (1845); Baseball Hall of Fame announces first inductees (1936); Oprah Winfrey born (1954); Robert Frost dies (1963).

Julia Cameron

Julia Cameron is an American author best known for her book “The Artist Way”. She struggled with alcoholism and drug abuse for years before becoming sober and dedicating her life to helping people unblock their creativity.Weird side note in her story, she was married to famous film maker Martin Scoreses for a year before divorcing.

January 28

Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” published (1813); Painter Jackson Pollock born (1912); Modern US Coast Guard is founded (1915); Space Shuttle Challenger disintegrates after launch, killing all seven astronauts on board (1986); Actress Cicely Tyson dies (2021).

Denis Diderot

Diderot is pointing out a basic weakness in human nature: we are much more willing to accept ideas that make us feel good than ideas that challenge us.When a lie or untruth confirms our pride, beliefs, or self-image, we take it in eagerly and without much thought. But when a truth is uncomfortable or threatens our assumptions, we approach it slowly, skeptically, or avoid it altogether.This idea fits squarely within Diderot’s broader project as an Enlightenment thinker and editor of the Encyclopédie, where his goal was not to comfort readers but to unsettle them. He believed progress depended on questioning authority, tradition, and superstition, even when doing so felt painful or destabilizing. In this sense, the quote explains why enlightenment is so hard to achieve: the obstacle is not a lack of information, but our emotional resistance to truths that demand change.Denis Diderot was born in 1713 in the provincial town of Langres, the son of a skilled cutler who expected his boy to enter the Church. Diderot did not refuse outright. He drifted. He studied theology, then law, then nothing in particular. He lived hand to mouth in Paris, translating English books for a few coins, arguing in cafés, falling in love imprudently, and thinking constantly. What he absorbed in those years was not discipline but velocity. Ideas moved faster than institutions. Conversation mattered more than credentials. Truth was something you chased, not something you inherited.That restlessness made him dangerous. Diderot believed that knowledge should be practical, public, and unsettling. When he took over as editor of the Encyclopédie, it became less a reference work and more a quiet revolution. It smuggled skepticism into articles on mechanics, theology into metallurgy, politics into definitions. Church and Crown understood exactly what was happening. Diderot was arrested in 1749 and locked in Vincennes for his writing. The experience did not break him. It clarified him. Power feared ideas because ideas worked.What makes Diderot different from his contemporaries is that he never pretended to be clean or complete. He contradicted himself openly. He wrote philosophy as dialogue, fiction as argument, art criticism as moral inquiry. He cared about pleasure, about sex, about laughter, about the body. He believed morality without happiness was empty, and reason without humanity was tyranny. While others built systems, Diderot kept moving. His mind refused to sit still long enough to become dogma.By the time he died in 1784, Diderot had not seen the French Revolution he helped make inevitable. Much of his most daring work was unpublished or ignored. But the force was already loose. He had trained readers to question, to doubt, to notice where authority hid its weak points. That was his real achievement. He did not tell people what to think. He taught them how uncomfortable thinking was supposed to feel.Denis Diderot had a problem, that eventually became a parable. He was poor, accustomed to worn furniture and a cluttered desk that suited his life and his mind. Then he acquired a magnificent red robe as a gift, elegant and expensive, and the moment he put it on, everything changed. The robe made the rest of his possessions look shabby. The desk felt unworthy. The chairs looked wrong. One improvement demanded another, and soon the simple life he had lived comfortably no longer seemed acceptable.Diderot realized, with some alarm, that the robe had quietly taken control. It had set a new standard he felt compelled to meet. In trying to match his surroundings to the robe, he spent more money, felt more anxious, and became less free. The object he owned had begun to own him. He turned the experience into an essay, blunt and self-aware, arguing that luxury creates chains as surely as poverty does.The story of Diderot's Robe lasts because it shows the hidden momentum of pleasure and material things. It is human nature to appreciate life's comforts, even if you are trying to live simply.

January 27

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart born (1756); British author Lewis Carroll born (1832); Auschwitz concentration camp liberated (1945); Paris Peace Accords bring end to Vietnam War (1973); American author JD Salinger dies (2010).

January 26

Actor Paul Newman born (1925); Ellen DeGeneres born (1958); Football coaching great Paul "Bear" Bryant dies (1983); Condoleezza Rice becomes first Black woman appointed US secretary of state (2005); Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna among nine deaths in California helicopter crash (2020).

January 24

First Boy Scout troop is organized (1908); Actress Sharon Tate born (1943); Winston Churchill dies (1965); Thurgood Marshall dies (1993); Department of Homeland Security begins operations (2003).

Casey Kasem

"Kemal Amin “Casey” Kasem was born April 1932 and passed away June 2014. Although primarily known as a radio personality with his popular American Top 40 franchise, he had an active career doing voice work."https://cartoonresearch.com/index.php/in-his-own-words-casey-kasem-on-shaggy/?utm_source=join1440&utm_medium=email&utm_placement=newsletter&user_id=66c4c92f5d78644b3ac5d5b4

January 26

Actor Paul Newman born (1925); Ellen DeGeneres born (1958); Football coaching great Paul "Bear" Bryant dies (1983); Condoleezza Rice becomes first Black woman appointed US secretary of state (2005); Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna among nine deaths in California helicopter crash (2020).

January 22

First Winter Olympics take place in Chamonix, France (1924); Battle of the Bulge comes to an end (1945); Al Capone dies (1947); Alicia Keys born (1981); Mary Tyler Moore dies (2017).

January 23

American statesman John Hancock born (1737); The US and Vietnam reach peace settlement (1973); Athlete, artist, and activist Paul Robeson dies (1976); Salvador Dalí dies (1989); Madeleine Albright becomes first US female secretary of state (1997).

January 22

English polymath Francis Bacon born (1561); President Lyndon B. Johnson dies (1973); Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision (1973); Caitlin Clark born (2002); Hank Aaron dies (2021). 

Rumi

RumiJalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rumi, popularly known as Rumi, was a Persian poet and Sufi master who belonged to the 13th century. Born in the year 1207 in modern-day Afghanistan, Rumi was the greatest Sufi mystic and poet in the Persian language, famous for his lyrics and for his didactic epic Mas̄navī-yi Maʿnavī, who enjoys a massive fan following in US and across the globe. Rumi’s influence transcends national borders and his poems have widely translated into many of the world’s language. Rumi moved to Konya, modern-day Turkey where his life was filled with hardships and turmoil. Despite challenging times, Rumi wrote extensively about topics like self-transformation, love for God, and the truth that lies beyond life. The experience of love, longing, and loss turned Rūmī into a poet.The poems of Rumi contain deep, transcendent wisdom that, if understood and applied, have the power to utterly transform our lives for the better. Deeply steeped in Sufism- his works, especially the Masnavi and Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi, trace the souls of human beings in their longing to unite, be free, and live in peace. From existential angst to love, sex and loneliness, from belonging at physical and spiritual levels to morality and religion, contradictory human emotions and impulses – no stone is left unturned in Rumi’s poetry

Bob Ross

It’s hard to picture Bob Ross as anything but the zen painter with his soothing voice and giant perm, but he actually was first a military man. Get this: Bob was a drill sergeant in the Air Force and was nicknamed “Bust-em-up-Bobby”.

Yes. The soft-spoken PBS painter was actually quite the hot head for two decades. During his time in the military, Bob was stationed in Alaska where he saw snow for the first time. This served as his lifelong muse with many of his paintings featuring snow-topped mountains.

After retiring from the military, Bob pursued his career in painting. Along with this newfound pursuit, Bob vowed to never yell again.

January 21

Louis XVI of France is executed by guillotine (1793); Fashion designer Christian Dior born (1905); Golf great Jack Nicklaus born (1940); Founding father of American cinema Cecil B. DeMille dies (1959); Women’s March sees large-scale protests in more than 160 countries (2017).

John Dryden

John Dryden is a famous English poet from the 17th century known for his satire and literary prowess. He died of gangrene on May 1st, 1700 and was promptly buried with a small service to commemorate his life.That didn’t sit well with his friends. They felt he deserved a more elaborate celebration and to be buried in the prestigious “Poet’s Corner” in Westminster Abbey. So they dug him up, threw a huge party and reburied him 12 days after he was initially laid to rest.

January 20

Astronaut Buzz Aldrin born (1930); Iran hostage crisis ends as 52 Americans are released after 444 days (1981); Martin Luther King Jr. Day is observed for first time (1986); Actress Audrey Hepburn dies (1993); Barack Obama becomes first Black president of the US (2009).

January 19

Robert E. Lee born (1807); Edgar Allan Poe born (1809); Janis Joplin is born (1943); Dolly Parton born (1946); Pixar begins production of "Toy Story" (1993); First BlackBerry device hits the market (1999)

January 17

Benjamin Franklin born (1706); Actress Betty White born (1922); Muhammad Ali born (1942); UN Security Council holds its first meeting (1946); Former first lady Michelle Obama born (1964).

January 18

President John Tyler dies (1862); Actor Cary Grant born (1904); WWI Paris Peace Conference begins (1919); Author Rudyard Kipling dies (1936); Willie O’Ree becomes the first Black player in the National Hockey League (1958).

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR DAY

"On the third Monday in January, Martin Luther King Jr Day honors the American clergyman, activist, Civil Rights Movement leader."https://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/national-day/martin-luther-king-jr-day-third-monday-in-january?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=16490249&hashed_email=6c23328441e0f46865e8039a24ce7ccf8880f2d7&email=yeremiah%40aol.com

January 16

Hiram Revels, first African American to serve in Congress, dies (1901); 18th Amendment ratified, banning alcohol in the US (1919); R&B and pop singer Aaliyah born (1979); "Hamilton" creator Lin-Manuel Miranda born (1980); Operation Desert Storm of the Persian Gulf War begins (1991).

January 15

Queen Elizabeth I is coronated (1559); Martin Luther King Jr. is born (1929); Harry Truman becomes the first US president to use radio and TV for his farewell address (1953); First Super Bowl is played (1967); Cranberries lead singer Dolores O’Riordan dies (2018).

January 13

Author James Joyce dies (1941); Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus born (1961); Douglas Wilder becomes first elected Black US governor (1990); 32 die as cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off coast of Italy (2012).

January 14

Astronomer Edmond Halley dies (1742); “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” author Lewis Carroll dies (1898); Actress Faye Dunaway born (1941); Franklin D. Roosevelt arrives in Casablanca, Morocco, as the first US president to travel on official business by airplane while in office (1943); NBC’s “Today” debuts (1952).

Casper Van Dien

"Casper Robert Van Dien Jr. (born December 18, 1968) is an American actor, best known for his lead role as Johnny Rico in the science-fiction action film Starship Troopers (1997). "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casper_Van_Dien

Aldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley is a famous 20th-century writer. Born in England, he spent his early career writing satires and contributing to Vanity Fair and Vogue magazine. The First World War had a profound effect on Huxley’s thinking and made him a staunch pacifist. In 1937, Aldous left England for America to be a writer in Hollywood.The subsequent year Aldous made close to $3,000 a week writing for major studios. About $50,000 in today’s money. The money was never idle. Huxley spent the majority of it helping Jewish and left-wing refugees flee Hitler’s Germany.Aldous Huxley contributed to screenplays like Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre, and even wrote a script for Alice in Wonderland though the script was never used.

Amor Towles

When Amor was 10 years old, he threw a bottle with a message into the Atlantic Ocean. Several weeks later, he received a letter from the managing director of the New York Times who happened to have found the bottle. The two of them became pen pals after that and wrote to each other on and off for years. And thus began Amor’s lifelong career of writing. Amor’s stories have topped New York Times best selling lists including his book, The Lincoln Highway, being selected as Amazon’s book of the year in 2021.

January 12

Author Jack London born (1876); Hattie Caraway becomes first woman elected to US Senate (1932); Howard Stern born (1954); Mystery novelist Agatha Christie dies (1976); Earthquake in Haiti kills more than 100,000 (2010).

January 11

Alexander Hamilton born (1755 or 1757); Grand Canyon becomes a national monument (1908); First use of insulin to treat diabetes in humans (1922); Mary J. Blige born (1971); Sir Edmund Hillary, one of the first two people to reach the summit of Mount Everest, dies (2008).

Karen Wookey

"Karen Wookey is a television producer and supervising producer."https://tvdatabase.fandom.com/wiki/Karen_Wookey

Avi Arad

"Avi Arad (/ˈɑːvi ˈɑːrɑːd/; Hebrew: אבי ארד; born August 1, 1948) is an Israeli-American studio executive and producer of film, television and animation. He became the CEO of Toy Biz in the 1990s, was the Chief Creative Officer of Marvel Entertainment and is the founder, former chairman and former CEO of the latter's successor, Marvel Studios."https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avi_Arad

January 10

UN General Assembly gathers for first time (1946); Boxer George Foreman born (1949); The US and Holy See establish diplomatic relations (1984); David Bowie dies (2016).

January 9

Jean-Pierre Blanchard makes the first manned balloon flight in the US (1793); President Richard Nixon born (1913); Activist and singer-songwriter Joan Baez born (1941); Catherine, Princess of Wales, born (1982); iPhone makes its debut (2007).

January 8

George Washington delivers first State of the Union address (1790); Elvis Presley born (1935); Fashion designer Carolina Herrera born (1939); Stephen Hawking born (1942); David Bowie born (1947).

Don Zimmer

Don Zimmer was an American baseball player, manager, and coach. He was a part of major league baseball for 65 years spanning eight decades. Don was no lover of spinach but was lovingly nicknamed “Popeye” by his peers. The resemblance is a little shocking.Back in 2004 during the American League Championship a 72 year old Don Zimmer was coaching the New York Yankees. The Yankees were squaring off with their rivals the Boston Red Sox. At the bottom of the fourth benches cleared after an altercation between the Yankees Pitcher and a Red Sox batter.Well, 72 year old Don Zimmer had a bit of beef to squash with Red Sox Pitcher Pedro Martinez. During the scuffle Don charged straight up to Pedro and was promptly tossed to the ground by the Red Sox Pitcher. After the game the press questioned Don on whether Pedro should be punished. Don responded with this:“What does he have to apologize for? I was the guy who charged him and threw the punch. To the people who said Pedro beat up an old man I said, 'No, an old man was dumb enough to try and beat up on Pedro.'"

January 7

Galileo Galilei discovers first three Jupiter moons (1610); First US presidential electors chosen (1789); Author Zora Neale Hurston born (1891); Inventor Nikola Tesla dies (1943); NFL star Lamar Jackson born (1997).

January 6

Joan of Arc born (1412); Telegraph publicly demonstrated for first time (1838); President Teddy Roosevelt dies (1919); US Capitol stormed in attempt to disrupt certification of 2020 electoral results (2021); Actor Sidney Poitier dies (2022).

January 5

Actress Jane Wyman born (1917); Dancer and choreographer Alvin Ailey born (1931); Construction of Golden Gate Bridge begins (1933); Scientist and inventor George Washington Carver dies (1943); Singer and congressman Sonny Bono dies in skiing accident (1998).

January 4

Boxer Floyd Patterson born (1935); Biographer and journalist Doris Kearns Goodwin born (1943); Luna 1 is first spacecraft to reach vicinity of the moon (1959); Poet TS Eliot dies (1965); Burj Khalifa, tallest building in the world, opens in Dubai (2010). 

January 3

"The Lord of the Rings" author JRR Tolkien born (1892); Alaska becomes the 49th US state (1959); The US cuts diplomatic ties with Cuba (1961); Apple is incorporated (1977); Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega surrenders to the US (1990).

January 2

Spanish Reconquista completed (1492); Viet Cong achieve first major victory of Vietnam War (1963); President Ronald Reagan sworn in as California governor (1967); President Jimmy Carter ends US-Russia détente (1980).

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Rousseau warned that society has a way of drowning out our own voice if we are not careful. A new year is an opportunity to listen again and to separate borrowed ambitions from genuine conviction. Strip away external applause, comparison, and the pressure to perform for others.Rousseau's advice for us on this New Year's Day? That simplicity, honesty, and alignment with our inner compass are often the truest forms of renewal.A common theme among all of these great thinkers seems to be to focus on oneself. Sound advice, and all within your control.

Voltaire

Voltaire’s famous advice is both practical and intentionally unsentimental. Stop arguing with the universe and tend to your own garden. Focus your effort on the work in front of you, your craft, your habits, your responsibilities, and the small domains where your effort actually matters.Voltaire may tell us that our improvement in 2026 will come not from grand plans or perfect conditions, but from daily attention to what is within our control and worth doing well.

Cicero

The statesman Cicero believed progress comes from strengthening judgment and moral clarity, not from chasing novelty or external success. A new year does not ask you to become someone else; it asks you to recommit to what you already know is honorable and right. Each decision is a small vote for the kind of person you are becoming, whether anyone notices or not.Cicero might advise you to let 2026 be governed more by reason than impulse, and more by principle than convenience.

Marcus Aurelius

 

Aurelius reminds us that each morning should start with clear eyed realism about what the day will bring. You will meet frustration, distraction, and difficult people, not as rare events but as the normal texture of life. The task is not to wish these away, but to decide in advance how you will respond when they arrive.

Aurelius would tell us that a good year is not one without obstacles, but one in which we meet them with steadiness, restraint, patience, and self command.