Happy Throw Back Thursday Yonkersites, at 4:09 AM Yonkers is clear and 55 degrees with west winds at 8 mph, 54% humidity, the dew point is 39 degrees, the barometer is 29.9 inches and steady, and the visibility is 9 miles. Today Yonkers will be sunny to partly cloudy, a high of 68 degrees with west winds at 10 to 20 mph. Partly cloudy tonight, a low of 48 degrees with west winds at 5 to 10 mph. Sun-up occurs at 7:01 AM and descends gracefully beyond the Palisades at 6:23 PM. You’ll have 11 hours and 22 minutes of available daylight. Big Rock, Kane County, Illinois, Population: 658. At 3:14 AM CDT Big Rock is cloudy and 48 to 51 degrees. Big Rock will have considerable cloudiness overnight with occasional rain showers, a low of 46 degrees with light and variable wind. The chance of rain is 40%. Rain showers early Thursday with some sunshine later in the day, a high around 60 degrees with light and variable winds. The chance of rain is 50%. Partly cloudy skies Thursday night, a low of 39 degrees with light and variable winds. Biula, Lunda Sul Province, Angola, Population: 4,381. At 9:21 AM WAT Biula is fair and 73 to 79 degrees. Biula will have some sun this morning with increasing clouds this afternoon, a high near 90 degrees with light and variable winds. Considerable clouds this evening, some decrease in clouds late, a low near 65 degrees with light and variable winds. Dothan, Houston County, Alabama. At 3:26 AM CDT Dothan is clear and 65 to 66 degrees. Some clouds in Dothan overnight, a low near 65 degrees with light and variable winds. Thursday Dothan will have partly cloudy skies, a high around 90 degrees with light and variable winds. Clear skies Thursday night, a low near 65 degrees with light and variable winds. Today 10/09 In HISTORY (Courtesy of the History Channel): 1 - 1775 - American Revolution - Just a few short months after commanding British soldiers during the Battle of Bunker Hill, General Sir William Howe writes to the British-appointed secretary of state for the American colonies, Lord Dartmouth, to inform him of his belief that the British army should be evacuated from Boston to Rhode Island. From there, British forces could move expeditiously to the southern colonies, without having to go around Cape Cod. As Lord Dartmouth had previously received reports that men were needed in the southern colonies from the likes of Josiah Martin, the royal governor of North Carolina, and John Murray, the royal governor of South Carolina, he ordered General Howe to send officers stationed in Boston to North Carolina to assist Martin in the southern campaign. Martin had been directing Loyalist efforts in North Carolina from his ship Cruiser anchored in the Cape Fear River since a Patriot attack on his home in April 1775. When the residents of Mecklenburg County effectively declared their independence from the crown that May, Martin had sent a copy of their resolves to Britain, requested military supplies from Howes predecessor, General Thomas Gage, in Boston and plotted to arm the slaves of North Carolina to help put down any Patriot uprising. Word of Martins intent to incite a slave rebellion mobilized a successful Patriot attack against Martins headquarters at Fort Johnston on Cape Fear on July 20, 1775. Following the attack, Martin moved the Cruiser off the coast of North Carolina, where he continued to arm the Loyalists with British supplies. On February 27, 1776, the Patriots managed to defeat the Loyalists at Moores Creek Bridge before the Loyalists reached the coast to await a scheduled rendezvous with Cornwallis. With the Loyalists routed, Cornwallis chose not to land his men, aborting his intended southern campaign. Instead, he traveled north to join the successful British Battle for Long Island in August 1776. 2 - 1864 - Civil War - Union cavalry in the Shenandoah Valley deal a humiliating defeat to their Confederate counterparts at Toms Brook, Virginia. Confederate General Jubal Earlys force had been operating in and around the Shenandoah area for four months. Earlys summer campaign caught the attention of Union General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant, who was laying siege to Richmond and Petersburg, Virginia. Grant was determined to neutralize Early and secure the Shenandoah for the North. He dispatched one of his best generals, Philip Sheridan, to pursue the Rebels there. Sheridan took command in August 1864 but spent over a month gathering his force before moving against Early. He quickly turned the tables on the Confederates, scoring major victories at Winchester and Fischers Hill in September. Earlys battered force sought refuge in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, while Sheridan began systematically destroying the Shenandoahs rich agricultural resources. Sheridan used his cavalry, under the command of General Alfred Torbert, to guard the foot soldiers as they burned farms and mills and slaughtered livestock. Confederate cavalry chief General Thomas Rosser nipped at the heels of the marauding Yankee force, but Torbert refused to allow his generals, George Custer and Wesley Merritt, to counterattack. He insisted they continue to stick close to the Union infantry. Sheridan heard of this and demanded that Torbert attack. At dawn on October 9, Custer and Merritt and their respective forces attacked the two wings of the Confederate cavalry. Merritts 3,500 Yankees overwhelmed General Lunsford Lomaxs 1,500 troopers, but Custer had more difficulty. His 2,500 men faced 3,000 men under the command of Rosser, who was, coincidentally, a close friend of Custers at West Point before the war. Custer observed that the Rebels were protected by the high bank of Toms Creek, so he sent three of his regiments around Rossers flank. Both groups of Confederates broke in retreat. The Yankees pursued the defeated Confederates for over 20 miles, a flight called the Woodstock Races. The chase ended only when the Confederates reached the safety of Earlys infantry. The Yankees captured 350 men, 11 artillery pieces, and all of the cavalrys wagons and ambulances. Nine Union troopers were killed, and 48 were wounded. It was the most complete victory of Union cavalry in the eastern theater during the entire war. 3 - 1967 - Cold War - Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, better known to the world as Che Guevara, is executed by Bolivian armed forces on this day in 1967. Born in Argentina, Guevara was a professional revolutionary who became involved in the Guatemalan revolution of the 1950s. It was during this time that he discovered Marxism and became a fervent convert to the philosophy. Following the overthrow of the Guatemalan government by a U.S.-sponsored coup in 1954, Guevara traveled to Mexico where he joined up with Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro. In 1956, Castro, Guevara, and a small band of supporters landed in Cuba intent on overthrowing its government. When the initial attack did not succeed, Che joined Castro and the survivors in the wilds of Cuba, carrying on a guerilla war. In 1959, the Cuban government fell and Castro seized power. Guevara was put in charge of finance and economic planning for the revolutionary government. In 1960 he published Guerilla Warfare, in which he argued that armed struggle was necessary to free the masses from capitalistic exploitation. By 1965, he faded from public life in Cuba for reasons still not entirely clear. He then reappeared in 1966 in Bolivia where he hoped to bring about a revolution. In October 1967, he was captured and executed by Bolivian troops. This outcome satisfied the U.S. government, under the leadership of President Lyndon B. Johnson, which viewed him as a dangerous agitator and had assisted the Bolivian government in its efforts to end Guevaras challenge. Despite Ches death more than 30 years ago, his face is still familiar to millions around the world, adorning T-shirts, key chains, and posters. He is also a constant presence in Cuba, with his image painted on walls and buildings around the nation. Many compelling films have been made about the life of Che, including the 2004 Oscar-winning film The Motorcycle Diaries. 4 - 1963 - A landslide in Italy leads to the deaths of more than 2,000 people when it causes a sudden and massive wave of water to overwhelm a dam. 5 - 1974 - World War Two - German businessman Oskar Schindler, credited with saving 1,200 Jews from the Holocaust, dies at the age of 66. 6 - 1936 - Harnessing the power of the mighty Colorado River, Hoover Dam begins sending electricity over transmission lines spanning 266 miles of mountains and deserts to run the lights, radios, and stoves of Los Angeles. 7 - 1869 - President Ulysses S. Grant announces the death of former President Franklin Pierce. Pierce, whose presidency was remembered mostly for his failure to end the debate over slavery, had died the day before at his home in Concord, New Hampshire. 8 - 1969 - Vietnam War - The National Guard is called in as demonstrations continue in Chicago protesting the trial of the Chicago Eight. The trial had begun on September 24 and involved charges against David Dellinger, Rennie Davis, Thomas Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Lee Weiner, John Froines, and Bobby Seale for conspiracy to cross state lines with intent to cause a riot. These charges stemmed from the violent antiwar demonstrations in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. When the trial finally ended in February 1970, Judge Julius Hoffman found the seven defendants (Seale had been separated from the others for a separate trial due to his courtroom antics) and their lawyers guilty of 175 counts of contempt and sentenced them to terms of two to four years. Although the jury found the defendants not guilty on the conspiracy charge, the jury did find all except Froines and Weiner guilty of intent to riot. Those found guilty were sentenced to five years and a $5,000 fine, but none served time. In 1972, a Court of Appeals overturned the criminal convictions and eventually most of the contempt charges were also dismissed. Laird describes new orders to U.S. commanders in Vietnam U.S. Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, reporting on Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Earle Wheelers trip to Vietnam at a news conference in Washington, announces that U.S. commanders in Vietnam have been given new orders aimed at placing the highest priority on shifting the burden of the fighting to the South Vietnamese forces. Laird described the new tactics as protective reaction, but said that the new orders did not forbid U.S. commanders from seeking out and attacking enemy troops that posed threats. This was all part of the Vietnamization program announced by President Richard Nixon at the Midway Conference with South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu in June. 9 - 1970 - Vietnam War - The Khmer Republic is proclaimed in Cambodia. In March, a coup led by Cambodian General Lon Nol had overthrown the government of Prince Norodom Sihanouk in Phnom Penh. Between 1970 and 1975, Lon Nol and his army, the Forces Armees Nationale Khmer (FANK), with U.S. support and military aid, fought the Communist Khmer Rouge for control of Cambodia. During those five years of bitter fighting, approximately 10 percent of Cambodias 7 million people died. When the U.S. forces departed South Vietnam in 1973, both the Cambodians and South Vietnamese found themselves fighting the Communists alone. Without U.S. support, Lon Nols forces succumbed to the Khmer Rouge in April 1975. The Khmer Rouge promptly evacuated Phnom Penh and set about to reorder Cambodian society, which resulted in a killing spree and the notorious killing fields. Under the brutal rule of the Khmer Rouge, hundreds of thousands of Cambodians were murdered or died from exhaustion, hunger, and disease. 10 - 1915 - World War One - Austro-Hungarian forces capture the Serbian capital of Belgrade, assisted in their defeat of Serbian forces by German troops under the command of General August von Mackensen. It was not the first time during World War I that Austrian troops had occupied Belgrade. They had captured the city on December 1, 1914, effectively accomplishing what might have been their foremost war-making objective the previous summer: bringing the upstart Serbia to its knees after a Bosnian Serb nationalist shot and killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria during an official visit to Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital. As the American war correspondent John Reed observed during his visit to Serbia that winter, Austro-Hungarian forces reduced many areas of Belgrade to ruins, including its university: The Austrians had made it their special target, for there had been the hotbed of pan-Serbian propaganda, and among the students that formed the secret society whose members murdered the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Two weeks after the Austrians entered Belgrade, however, Serbian forces recaptured the city, taking 40,000 Austrian prisoners. By the autumn of 1915, though, Serbia’s prospects were dwindling, and at the end of September, the Austrian army—composed of both Austrian and German troops—stood to the northwest and north of Belgrade, reinforced by the German 11th Army nearby. On October 6, German and Austro-Hungarian troops under the command of General von Mackensen crossed the wide Danube River in heavy rains, closing in on Belgrade. Three days later, they entered and took control of the city, forcing the Serbs to evacuate. Though the Serbs planned to counterattack, their defeat was sealed only days later by the entrance into the war of Bulgaria, whose forces immediately invaded Serbia and Macedonia, the former Ottoman province in the Balkans it had long coveted. Bulgaria’s expressed reason for joining the Central Powers—aside from its economic relationships with Germany and Austria—was to annex Serbian territory. Its army neatly closed Serbian forces off from its allies, including a British and French force newly arrived in Greece for the purpose of aiding the Serbs. By the end of November, both Serbia and Macedonia were in the hands of the Central Powers. Of all the belligerent nations during World War I, Serbia suffered the greatest number of casualties in relation to the size of its population. Its losses were staggering: Of some 420,000 soldiers in September 1915, 94,000 were killed in action and another 174,000 were captured or missing, while undoubtedly great numbers of civilian casualties remained uncalculated. 11 - 1944 - World War Two - British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin begin a nine-day conference in Moscow, during which the war with Germany and the future of Europe are discussed. Germanys defeat now seemed inevitable, and Stalin was prepared to commit the USSR to intervening in the war against Japan once Germany had formally surrendered. This optimistic outlook enabled a significant portion of the talks to center on the relative spheres of influence of the two superpowers in a postwar European environment. Churchill ceded the disposition of Romania, which Stalins troops were liberating from German control even as the conference commenced, to the Soviet Union. But the British prime minister was keen on keeping the Red Army away from Greece. Britain must be the leading Mediterranean power. They made a deal: Romania for Greece. Churchill was more accommodating elsewhere, willing to divvy up the spoils of war. Yugoslavia could be cut down the middle, east for Russia, west for the West. Churchill also laid out a plan by which the German populations of East Prussia and Silesia would be moved into the interior of Germany, with East Prussia split between the USSR and Poland, and Silesia handed over to Poland as compensation for territories Stalin already occupied and intended to keep. But Churchill was insistent on one issue that would be harder to negotiate in 50-50 terms-freedom. Churchill wanted every nation to be free to select the government most amenable to its people, especially smaller, more vulnerable nations. Let them work out their own fortunes during the years that lie ahead. Churchill was frank about the Wests fear of expansionist communism. But none of what was discussed was carved in stone or even put on paper--a fact that would be all too obvious as the Cold War commenced. The four day Extended Yonkers Weather Forecast is: Friday, partly cloudy, 10% chance of rain, 65/51; Saturday, AM rain, 80% chance of rain, 58/45; Sunday, mostly cloudy, 10% chance of rain, 61/51; and Monday, showers, 50% chance of rain, 66/62. Linda Salvatore ONeill special alert in your area, ***A FLOOD WATCH IS IN EFFECT FOR JOHNSON COUNTY UNTIL 7 PM CDT FRIDAY NIGHT. *** Last night in sports, the only action occurring was in the National Hockey League with opening day. Mon 4-Tor 3, Bos 2-Phi 1, Van 4-CGY 2, and StL 4-LA 0. Tonight the Rangers travel to St. Louis to face the Blues and the Devils are at Philadelphia. In NFL Thursday Night Football the Colts take on the Texans in Houston. I am glad I double checked the Yonkers weather today, I transposed the high temp for today, initially I had the high for today as 86 instead of 68, I dont believe we had that many days at 86 or above, there were a few I recall. Everybody enjoy your Throwback Thursday and as always, keep safe, PUSH, and keep smiling!
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 08:48:49 +0000
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