Neal Dow (March 20, 1804 – October 2, 1897) was an American
prohibition advocate and politician. He was elected president of the
Maine Temperance Union in 1850, and mayor of Portland the next year.
Soon after, largely due to his efforts, the state legislature banned the
sale and production of alcohol in what became known as the Maine Law. As
mayor, Dow enforced the law with vigor and called for increasingly harsh
penalties for violators. In 1855, his opponents rioted and he ordered
the state militia to fire on the crowd. One man was killed and several
were wounded. After public reaction to the violence turned against him,
he chose not to run again for mayor. He was later elected to two terms
in the state legislature, but retired after a financial scandal. He
joined the Union Army shortly after the outbreak of the American Civil
War in 1861 and became a brigadier general. He was wounded at the siege
of Port Hudson and later captured. After being exchanged for another
officer in 1864, Dow resigned from the military and devoted himself once
more to prohibition. In 1880, he headed the Prohibition Party ticket for
President of the United States.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Dow>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1556:
Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer, one of the founders of
Anglicanism, was burnt at the stake in Oxford, England, for heresy.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Cranmer>
1937:
The Papal encyclical Mit brennender Sorge, condemning
antisemitism and criticizing Nazism, was read from the pulpits of all
German Catholic churches.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mit_brennender_Sorge>
1963:
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary on Alcatraz Island in San
Francisco Bay, California—one of the world's most notorious and best
known prisons—was closed.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcatraz_Federal_Penitentiary>
1968:
War of Attrition: The Israel Defense Forces clashed with the
combined forces of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Royal
Jordanian Army in the Battle of Karameh.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Karameh>
1980:
Dallas aired its "A House Divided" episode which led to eight
months of international speculation regarding "Who shot J.R.?"
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_House_Divided_(Dallas)>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
greenwood:
1. A forest in full leaf, as in summer.
2. Wood that is green; in other words, not seasoned.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/greenwood>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Art is something absolute, something positive, which gives power
just as food gives power. While creative science is a mental food, art
is the satisfaction of the soul.
--Hans Hofmann
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hans_Hofmann>