Elvis Presley, Boss Tweed, Forbidden Suttee Share What? All three share an important newsworthy anniversary on December 4th.
Curious to know more about Elvis Presley, Boss Tweed, and Forbidden Suttee? Read on to find out about these and other interesting tales that happened in history on Dec. 4th.
- 1674 – Father Jacques Marquette founds a mission on the shores of Lake Michigan to minister to the Illiniwek natives. (The mission would later grow into the city of Chicago.)
- 1786 – Mission Santa Barbara in California is dedicated (on the feast day of Saint Barbara).
- 1829 – In the face of fierce local opposition, British Governor-General Lord William Bentinck issues a regulation declaring that anyone who abets suttee (or sati) in Bengal is guilty of culpable homicide. Suttee is a funeral ritual within certain Asian communities whereby a recently widowed woman immolates herself, typically on her husband’s funeral pyre. Not all widows willingly participated. The practice remains an issue, as seen by the need for the Sati Prevention Act initiated in 1987 after the highly public sati of Roop Kanwar.
- 1867 – Former Minnesota farmer Oliver Hudson Kelley founds the Order of the Patrons of Husbandry (better known today as the Grange).
- 1875 – Notorious New York City politician Boss Tweed escapes from prison. He will later be recaptured in Spain.
- 1881 – The first edition of the Los Angeles Times is published.
- 1943 –U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt closes down the Works Progress Administration (WPA) due to the high levels of wartime employment in the United States.
- 1954 – The first Burger King fast food restaurant is opened in Miami.
- 1956 – The Million Dollar Quartet (Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash) get together at Sun Studio for the first and last time.
- 1971 – The Montreux Casino in Switzerland is set ablaze by someone wielding a flare gun during a Frank Zappa concert; the incident would be memorialized in the Deep Purple song "Smoke on the Water".
- 1978 – Following the murder of Mayor George Moscone in office, Dianne Feinstein becomes San Francisco's first female mayor. (She will serve until January 8, 1988.)
While these interesting facts about Chicago, Santa Barbara and Forbidden Suttee on December 4th have nothing to do with my real estate business selling Silicon Valley homes to families in San Jose, Cupertino and Saratoga in Santa Clara County, Calif., they add fun and entertainment to life.
For more fun facts and information on Silicon Valley real estate, homes and careers, subscribe for free to Michelle Cherie Carr Crowe’s blog at http://www.activerain.com/results.
Images courtesy of Michelle Cherie Carr Crowe’s private collection, the public domain, the U.S. government or www.freedigitalphotos.net.Facts compiled from Wikipedia, Smithsonian, HistoryOrb and MentalFloss among others.
Thanks for reading “Chicago, Santa Barbara and Forbidden Suttee-11 Tales of December 4 ”.
