Daily Content Archive
(as of Thursday, October 27, 2016)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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calumny
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Using En Dashes to Indicate a Range of ValuesThe most common use of the en dash is to connect two numbers, dates, or times to indicate a range that spans these figures. When it is used in this way, we can think of the en dash as representing what words? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Liver-Eating JohnsonJohn "Liver-Eating" Johnson was a so-called "mountain man" of the 19th-century American West. After fighting in the Mexican-American War, the hunter and trapper traveled west to Wyoming, where he became a legend. According to some accounts, Johnson's Native American wife was killed by members of the Crow tribe in 1847. He spent the next 20 years exacting his revenge, earning his nickname by supposedly cutting out and eating the liver of each man he killed. Did he ever make peace with the Crow? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Turkmenistan Gains Independence from the Soviet Union (1991)Following Turkmenistan's independence, the head of its Communist Party, Saparmurat Niyazov, became president. He developed a totalitarian cult of personality, isolating the Central Asian nation culturally and politically. Citizens were tested on their knowledge of Niyazov's autobiography and spiritual guide book, the Ruhnama—even on driver's license tests. Niyazov's successor later reversed many of his policies, including the decision to rename the months of the calendar after what? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Roy Lichtenstein (1923)Lichtenstein was an American artist best known for his brilliantly colored paintings in the style of large-scale comic strips, such as Whaam! and Drowning Girl. Originally an abstract expressionist, he turned to the New York-based pop art movement in the 1960s. In addition to his comic-book inspired panels, he created ironic pop art reinterpretations of famous paintings by artists such as Picasso. Which of his works was destroyed in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 All the learnin' my father ever paid for was a bit o' birch at one end and the alphabet at th' other.George Eliot (1819-1880) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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have skin in the game— To have a personal investment, usually monetary, in the pursuit of some goal or achievement, especially in business and finance. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 St. Vincent and the Grenadines Independence and Thanksgiving Day (2020)A group of islands in the West Indies, St. Vincent and the Grenadines gained independence from Britain on October 27, 1979, and citizens celebrate their freedom with this national holiday. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: spikepricket - A candlestick with a spike for holding up the candle (or the spike itself). More... barb - As any type of spike or projection, it is based on Latin barba, "beard"; it is also a piece of vertically pleated linen worn over or under the chin, as by nuns. More... brad - A small or thin wire nail, it is from Old Norse broddr, "spike." More... spike - Probably borrowed from Dutch spiker, "long sharp piece." More... | |