Good morning.

We’ll have a sunny Thursday with a high of eighty-five and calm winds.

Those wishing to hear the School Board meeting of Monday, August 26th (during which the Board hired a new principal for the middle school, among other items) can do so via Whitewater Community Television. The program airs again today at Noon on cable, and is also available anytime on the Web at Vimeo. Alan Luckett of Whitewater Community Television has made available the audio that Chris Welch of the Daily Union kindly supplied. Many thanks to both for their efforts.

Whitewater’s Police Commission meets today at 6 PM.

What’s it like to fly in close air formation? It’s like this:

Wolfe Air Reel from 3DF on Vimeo.

On this day in 2005, Hurricane Katrina hits the Gulf Coast:

Hurricane Katrina makes landfall near New Orleans, Louisiana, as a Category 4 hurricane on this day in 2005. Despite being only the third most powerful storm of the 2005 hurricane season, Katrina was the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States. After briefly coming ashore in southern Florida on August 25 as a Category 1 hurricane, Katrina gained strength before slamming into the Gulf Coast on August 29. In addition to bringing devastation to the New Orleans area, the hurricane caused damage along the coasts of Mississippi and Alabama, as well as other parts of Louisiana….

The storm also set off 36 tornadoes in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, resulting in one death.

For the week of August 26 to 30, Puzzability continues a back-to-school series entitled, Welcome, students:

Welcome, Students
For this week’s class act, we started each day with a word or phrase, added the seven letters in the word STUDENT, and rearranged all the letters to get a new phrase. Both pieces are described in each day’s clue, with the shorter one first.
Example:
Skating venues; Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man love interest
Answer:
Rinks; Kirsten Dunst
What to Submit:
Submit both pieces, with the shorter one first (as “Rinks; Kirsten Dunst” in the example), for your answer.

Here’s today’s puzzle:

Thursday, August 29
Steinbeck novel set in Monterey; music genre with singers like Reba McEntire and Randy Travis

Good morning.

We’ll have occasional morning drizzle in the Whippet City, with patchy fog. Thereafter, Wednesday will gradually become sunnier, with a high of 83.

Downtown Whitewater’s Board of Directors meets this morning at 8 AM.

Sixteen-year-old Noah Graham had an unexpected and violent encounter with a wolf, but now Noah’s fortunately recovering and the wolf’s dead:

On this day in 1937, Toyota Motors becomes an independent company.

On August 28, 1928, Babe Ruth has a good day:

1928 – Babe Ruth Cracks Homer in Milwaukee
On this date Babe Ruth hit a towering game-winning home run in the ninth inning to give his team a 5-4 victory in a baseball exhibition at Borchert Field in Milwaukee. Lou Gehrig also played at this event. [Source: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

For the week of August 26 to 30, Puzzability offers a back-to-school series entitled, Welcome, students:

Welcome, Students
For this week’s class act, we started each day with a word or phrase, added the seven letters in the word STUDENT, and rearranged all the letters to get a new phrase. Both pieces are described in each day’s clue, with the shorter one first.
Example:
Skating venues; Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man love interest
Answer:
Rinks; Kirsten Dunst
What to Submit:
Submit both pieces, with the shorter one first (as “Rinks; Kirsten Dunst” in the example), for your answer.

Here’s today’s puzzle:

Wednesday, August 28
Very close friends; agency responsible for making American coins

Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny and hot, with a high of ninety-two and a heat index near one-hundred.

On this day in 1883, the largest volcanic eruption recorded kills tens of thousands:

The most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded history occurs on Krakatau (also called Krakatoa), a small, uninhabited volcanic island located west of Sumatra in Indonesia, on this day in 1883. Heard 3,000 miles away, the explosions threw five cubic miles of earth 50 miles into the air, created 120-foot tsunamis and killed 36,000 people.

Krakatau exhibited its first stirrings in more than 200 years on May 20, 1883. A German warship passing by reported a seven-mile high cloud of ash and dust over Krakatau. For the next two months, similar explosions would be witnessed by commercial liners and natives on nearby Java and Sumatra. With little to no idea of the impending catastrophe, the local inhabitants greeted the volcanic activity with festive excitement.

On August 26 and August 27, excitement turned to horror as Krakatau literally blew itself apart, setting off a chain of natural disasters that would be felt around the world for years to come. An enormous blast on the afternoon of August 26 destroyed the northern two-thirds of the island; as it plunged into the Sunda Strait, between the Java Sea and Indian Ocean, the gushing mountain generated a series of pyroclastic flows (fast-moving fluid bodies of molten gas, ash and rock) and monstrous tsunamis that swept over nearby coastlines. Four more eruptions beginning at 5:30 a.m. the following day proved cataclysmic. The explosions could be heard as far as 3,000 miles away, and ash was propelled to a height of 50 miles. Fine dust from the explosion drifted around the earth, causing spectacular sunsets and forming an atmospheric veil that lowered temperatures worldwide by several degrees.

Of the estimated 36,000 deaths resulting from the eruption, at least 31,000 were caused by the tsunamis created when much of the island fell into the water. The greatest of these waves measured 120 feet high, and washed over nearby islands, stripping away vegetation and carrying people out to sea. Another 4,500 people were scorched to death from the pyroclastic flows that rolled over the sea, stretching as far as 40 miles, according to some sources.

On this day in 1878, The United States issues a patent for the typewriter:

On this date Christopher Latham Sholes patented the typewriter. The idea for this invention began at Kleinsteuber’s Machine Shop in Milwaukee in the late 1860s. A mechanical engineer by training, Sholes, along with associates Carlos Glidden and Samuel Soulé, spent hours tinkering with the idea. They mounted the key of an old telegraph instrument on a base and tapped down on it to hit carbon & paper against a glass plate. This idea was simple, but in 1868 the mere idea that type striking against paper might produce an image was a novelty. Sholes proceeded to construct a machine to reproduce the entire alphabet. The prototype was sent to Washington as the required Patent Model.

This original model still exists at the Smithsonian. Investor James Densmore provided the marketing impetus which eventually brought the machine to the Remington Arms Company. Although Remington mass-marketed his typewriter begining in 1874, it was not an instant success. A few years later, improvements made by Remington engineers gave the machine its market appeal and sales skyrocketed. [Source: Wisconsin Lore and Legends, p.41]

For the week of August 26 to 30, Puzzability offers a back-to-school series entitled, Welcome, students:

Welcome, Students
For this week’s class act, we started each day with a word or phrase, added the seven letters in the word STUDENT, and rearranged all the letters to get a new phrase. Both pieces are described in each day’s clue, with the shorter one first.
Example:
Skating venues; Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man love interest
Answer:
Rinks; Kirsten Dunst
What to Submit:
Submit both pieces, with the shorter one first (as “Rinks; Kirsten Dunst” in the example), for your answer.

Here’s today’s puzzle:

Tuesday, August 27
Learned person; star of TV’s Roc

Good morning.

Our week begins with sunny and hot skies, a high of ninety, and southwest winds around 10 mph.

On this day in 1920, the 19th Amendment went into effect, with no public, signing ceremony beforehand:

Washington, Aug. 26 — The half-century struggle for woman suffrage in the United States reached its climax at 8 o’clock this morning, when Bainbridge Colby, as Secretary of State, issued his proclamation announcing that the Nineteenth Amendment had become a part of the Constitution of the United States.

The signing of the proclamation took place at that hour at Secretary Colby’s residence, 1507 K Street Northwest, without ceremony of any kind, and the issuance of the proclamation was unaccompanied by the taking of movies or other pictures, despite the fact that the National Woman’s Party, or militant branch of the general suffrage movement, had been anxious to be represented by a delegation of women and to have the historic event filmed for public display and permanent record.

It’s more than funny that the New York Times account refers to the National Woman’s Party as a militant movement. Our definition of that term has changed.

We think of sharks as swimmers, but some of them look more like walkers:

For the week of August 26 to 30, Puzzability offers a back-to-school series entitled, Welcome, students:

Welcome, Students
For this week’s class act, we started each day with a word or phrase, added the seven letters in the word STUDENT, and rearranged all the letters to get a new phrase. Both pieces are described in each day’s clue, with the shorter one first.
Example:
Skating venues; Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man love interest
Answer:
Rinks; Kirsten Dunst
What to Submit:
Submit both pieces, with the shorter one first (as “Rinks; Kirsten Dunst” in the example), for your answer.

Here’s today’s puzzle:

Monday, August 26
Pickled Korean specialty dish; wet blanket