Good morning, Whitewater.

The work week ends with mostly cloudy skies, only a slight chance of rain, and a high of fifty-six.

On this day in 1777, British Gen. Burgoyne surrenders at Saratoga:

Burgoyne’s strategy to divide New England from the southern colonies had started well, but slowed due to logistical problems. He won a small tactical victory over General Horatio Gates and the Continental Army in the September 19 Battle of Freeman’s Farm at the cost of significant casualties. His gains were erased when he again attacked the Americans in the October 7 Battle of Bemis Heights and the Americans captured a portion of the British defenses. Burgoyne was therefore compelled to retreat, and his army was surrounded by the much larger American force at Saratoga, forcing him to surrender on October 17. News of Burgoyne’s surrender was instrumental in formally bringing France into the war as an American ally, although it had previously given supplies, ammunition and guns, notably the de Valliere cannon, which played an important role in Saratoga.[9] This battle also resulted in Spain joining France in the war against Britain.

Google-a-Day asks a zoology question:

What does the name given to the Aldabra giant tortoise, considered one of the longest-living animals on record at the time of his death, mean in English?

Good morning, Whitewater.

Thursday brings a cloudy morning but a sunny afternoon to the Whippet City. We can expect a high of about fifty-five, and no more than a ten-percent chance of rain.

The Fire & Rescue Task Force meets again tonight at 6:30 PM.

Perhaps you’ve watched a letter or bank statement travel through a pneumatic tube and wondered, ‘what’s that look like from the inside?’ More likely, you’ve not wondered, but someone has. Here’s their video depicting the journey:

On this day in 1976, the song Disco Duck hits number one on U.S. pop charts, confirming (if one needed confirmation) that the 70s were a troubled time:

Google-a-Day has question about a different kind of music for today:

The Curatorial Director of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum authored a book describing 50 years of what rock band?

Good morning, Whitewater.

Wednesday in Whitewater will be an occasionally rainy day with a high of fifty-five.

On this day in 1989, Wayne Gretzky breaks a longstanding record:

During a game against his old team, the Edmonton Oilers, Canadian ice hockey great Wayne Gretzky breaks Gordie Howe’s National Hockey League career scoring record of 1,850 points.

Gretzky dominated professional hockey during the 1980s, setting numerous records and leading the Oilers to four Stanley Cup victories. In 1988, the “Great One” was traded to the Los Angeles Kings, where he continued to excel as one of the National Hockey League’s foremost players. He retired in 1999 as a New York Ranger, holding records for most career goals, 894; most career assists, 1,963; and most career points, 2,857.

Here are some of his top moments on ice:

Google-a-Day asks a question about baseball:

In what year did the manager and team depicted in the blockbuster film “Moneyball” finally win their first playoff series?

Good morning, Whitewater.

Tuesday in town brings a probability of thunderstorms and a high of sixty-two. Sunrise today in 7:07 AM and sunset 6:14 PM. The moon is a waning gibbous with sixty-one percent of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Parks & Rec Board meets at 5:30 PM, and Cable Television committee meets at 6:30 PM.

On this day in 1947, Captain (later Brigadier General) Chuck Yeager becomes the first person to break the sound barrier:

Yeager remained in the Air Force after the war, becoming a test pilot at Muroc Army Air Field (now Edwards Air Force Base). After Bell Aircraft test pilot “Slick” Goodlin demanded $150,000 to break the sound “barrier,” the USAAF selected Yeager to fly the rocket-powered Bell XS-1 in a NACA program to research high-speed flight.[13][14]

Yeager in front of the Bell X-1, which, as with all of the aircraft assigned to him, he named Glamorous Glennis (or some variation thereof), after his wife.

Yeager in the Bell X-1 cockpit.
Such was the difficulty in this task that the answer to many of the inherent challenges were along the lines of “Yeager better have paid-up insurance.”[15] Two nights before the scheduled date for the flight, Yeager broke two ribs falling from a horse. He was so afraid of being removed from the mission that he went to a veterinarian in a nearby town for treatment and told only his wife, as well as friend and fellow project pilot Jack Ridley about the accident. On the day of the flight, Yeager was in such pain that he could not seal the X-1’s hatch by himself. Ridley rigged up a device, using the end of a broom handle as an extra lever, to allow Yeager to seal the hatch of the X-1.

Yeager broke the sound barrier on October 14, 1947, flying the X-1 at Mach 1.07 at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13,700 m).[16][N 2] Yeager was awarded the MacKay and Collier Trophies in 1948 for his mach-transcending flight, and the Harmon International Trophy in 1954. The X-1 he flew that day was later put on permanent display at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum.

Yeager went on to break many other speed and altitude records. He was also one of the first American pilots to fly a MiG-15, after its pilot defected to South Korea.[18][19] Returning to Muroc, during the latter half of 1953, Yeager was involved with the USAF team that was working on the X-1A, an aircraft designed to surpass Mach 2 in level flight. That year, he flew a chase aircraft for the civilian pilot Jackie Cochran, a close friend, as she became the first woman to fly faster than sound.[1]

Also on this day, in 1912, Theodore Roosevelt is shot in Milwaukee during his third-party run for the presidency:

On the night of October 14, 1912, Theodore Roosevelt was shot in Milwaukee. Roosevelt was in Wisconsin stumping as the presidential candidate of the new, independent Progressive Party, which had split from the Republican Party earlier that year. Roosevelt already had served two terms as chief executive (1901-1909), but was seeking the office again as the champion of progressive reform. Unbeknownst to Roosevelt, a New York bartender named John Schrank had been stalking him for three weeks through eight states. As Roosevelt left Milwaukee’s Hotel Gilpatrick for a speaking engagement at the Milwaukee Auditorium and stood waving to the gathered crowd, Schrank fired a .38-caliber revolver that he had hidden in his coat.

Roosevelt was hit in the right side of the chest and the bullet lodged in his chest wall. Seeing the blood on his shirt, vest, and coat, his aides pleaded with him to seek medical help, but Roosevelt trivialized the wound and insisted on keeping his commitment. His life was probably saved by the speech, since the contents of his coat pocket — his metal spectacle case and the thick, folded manuscript of his talk — had absorbed much of the force of the bullet. Throughout the evening he made light of the wound, declaring at one point, “It takes more than one bullet to kill a Bull Moose,” but the candidate spend the next week in the hospital and carried the bullet inside him the rest of his life.

Schrank, the would-be assassin, was examined by psychiatrists, who recommended that he be committed to an asylum. A judge concurred and Schrank spent the remainder of his life incarcerated, first at the Northern Hospital for the Insane in Oshkosh, then at Central State Hospital for the criminally insane at the state prison at Waupun. The glass Roosevelt drank from on stage that night was acquired by the Wisconsin Historical Museum. You can read more about the assassination attempt on their Museum Object of Week pages.

Google-a-Day asks a science question:

What type of arthropod limb branches into two, with each branch then comprised of a single series of segments attached end-to-end?