Good morning, Whitewater.
Sunday in town will be partly cloudy with a high of forty-five. Sunrise is 6:55 AM and sunset 7:08 PM, for 12h 13m 01s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 91.8% of its visible disk illuminated.
It’s the first day of spring, and Google has a doodle to mark the day:
On this day in 1778, France receives a delegation from America:
Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane and Arthur Lee present themselves to France’s King Louis XVI as official representatives of the United States on this day in 1778. Louis XVI was skeptical of the fledgling republic, but his dislike of the British eventually overcame these concerns and France officially recognized the United States in February 1778.
On this day in 1854, the Republican Party is founded:
1854 – Republican Party Founded
On this date Free Soilers and Whigs outraged by the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, met in Ripon to consider forming a new political party. The meeting’s organizer, Alvan E. Bovay, proposed the name “Republican” which had been suggested by New York editor Horace Greeley. You can see eyewitness accounts of the meeting, early Republican campaign documents, and other original sources on our page devoted to Wisconsin and the Republican Party. Though other places have claimed themselves as the birthplace of the Republican Party, this was the earliest meeting held for the purpose and the first to use the term Republican. [Source: History of Wisconsin, II: 218-219]