Good morning.
It’s a breezy day for the Whippet City, with west winds of 15 to 20 mph, and gusts as high as 30 mph. The mercury will hit a high of about forty-five, then fall to around thirty-one by the late afternoon. We’ll have a strong likelihood of snow overnight, of about two inches.
It’s Sherlock Holmes’s 159th birthday this week, and CNN has published an article entitled, Become a Mastermind with Sherlock Holmes’ Help. The story features an interview with Maria Konnikova, author of Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes:
Much of Holmes’ appeal has always been his amazing mind — how he is able to solve a seemingly insurmountable mystery through simple observation and deep thought. Wouldn’t we all like to borrow from his bag of mental tricks?
Just imagine the possibilities if you put Holmes’ brain power to use in the workplace, the classroom or social situations. That’s the premise of Maria Konnikova’s fascinating new book, “Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes.” Konnikova, a columnist for Scientific American and a doctoral student in psychology, explores the latest science to dissect the inner workings of the iconic detective’s mind.
More about the book is available at her CNN interview and Konnikova’s website. Other work of hers is available at her blog and Scientific American.
Interesting, insightful, and simply fun.
On this day in 1932, the first woman won election to the U.S. Senate:
Ophelia Wyatt Caraway, a Democrat from Arkansas, becomes the first woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate. Caraway, born near Bakerville, Tennessee, had been appointed to the Senate two months earlier to fill the vacancy left by her late husband, Thaddeus Horatio Caraway. With the support of Huey Long, a powerful senator from Louisiana, Caraway was elected to the seat. In 1938, she was reelected. After failing to win renomination in 1944, she was appointed to the Federal Employees Compensation Commission by President Franklin Roosevelt.
Although she was the first freely elected female senator, Caraway was preceded in the Senate by Rebecca Latimer Felton, who was appointed in 1922 to fill a vacancy but never ran for election. Jeannette Rankin, elected to the House of Representatives as a pacifist from Montana in 1917, was the first woman to ever sit in Congress.
On this day in 1864, the American Civil War took a Wisconsin regiment to Mexico:
1864 – (Civil War) Engagement at Matamoras, Mexico
The 20th Wisconsin Infantry took part in a battle in Matamoras, Mexico. They crossed from Brownsville, Texas, to rescue the American consul in Matamoras when he was caught in a local uprising between two opposing Mexican forces.
Google-a-Day asks about a British naval tradition: “What is the term for the traditional ritual by which officers in the UK’s Royal Navy are retired?”