April 20, 1999

Columbine High School massacre

On this day in 1999, two teenage gunmen kill 13 people in a shooting spree at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, south of Denver. At approximately 11:19 a.m., Dylan Klebold, 18, and Eric Harris, 17,

dressed in trench coats, began shooting students outside the school before moving inside to continue their rampage. By 11:35 a.m., Klebold and Harris had killed 12 fellow students and a teacher and wounded another 23 people. Shortly after noon, the two teens turned their guns on themselves and committed suicide.
The crime was the worst school shooting in U.S. history (until 33 people, including the gunman, were killed in the Virginia Tech shooting on April 16, 2007) and prompted a national debate on gun control and school safety, as well as a major investigation to determine what motivated the teen gunmen. In the days immediately following the shootings, it was speculated that Klebold and Harris purposely chose jocks, minorities and Christians as their victims. It was initially reported that one student, Cassie Bernall, was allegedly asked by one of the gunmen if she believed in God. When Bernall said, "Yes," she was shot to death. Her parents later wrote a book titled "She Said Yes," honoring their martyred daughter. Apparently, however, the question was not actually posed to Bernall but to another student who had already been wounded by a gunshot. When that victim replied, "Yes," the shooter walked away.
Subsequent investigations also determined that Harris and Klebold chose their victims randomly. Their original plan was for two propane bombs to explode in the school's cafeteria, potentially killing hundreds of people and forcing the survivors outside and into the gunmen's line of fire. When the bombs didn't work, Harris and Klebold went into the school to carry out their murderous rampage.
There was speculation that Harris and Klebold committed the killings because they were members of a group of social outcasts called the "Trenchcoat Mafia" that was fascinated by Goth culture. Violent video games and music were also blamed for influencing the killers. However, none of these theories was ever proven.
Columbine High School reopened in the fall of 1999, but the massacre left a scar on the Littleton community. Mark Manes, the man who sold a gun to Harris and bought him 100 rounds of ammunition the day before the murders, was sentenced to six years in prison.
In the aftermath of the Columbine shootings, many schools enacted "zero tolerance" rules regarding disruptive behavior and threats of violence from students.

Source: This Day In History

Last night my husband and I were watching Casablanca and this scene got me thinking...

Ilsa: [laughs ironically] With the whole world crumbling, we pick this time to fall in love.

Rick: Yeah, it's pretty bad timing. Where were you, say, ten years ago?

Ilsa: [trying to be cheerful] Ten years ago? Well, let's see... [remembers, smiles]

Ilsa: Oh, yes, I was having a brace put on my teeth. Where were you?

Rick: Looking for a job.  

So I started thinking...hmmm they had braces back then? I wonder when the first braces were invented and what they were like?

 I MUST INVESTIGATE...

Go check out Wikipedia > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dental_brace

A Brief History of Braces when Metal Mouth really described it...

If you think the desire for straight teeth is a trapping of modern society, think again! Extreme Makeovers may be new, but "braces" date as far back as ancient man! Early History Even ancient people wanted straight teeth! According to the AAO (American Association of Orthodontists), archaeologists have discovered mummified ancients with crude metal bands wrapped around individual teeth. To close gaps, it has been surmised that catgut did the work now done by today's orthodontic wire! Later, in 400-500 BC, Hippocrates and Aristotle both ruminated about ways to straighten teeth and fix various dental conditions. Straight teeth have been on our minds a very long time! While Greece was in its Golden Age, the Etruscans (the precursors of the Romans) were burying their dead with appliances that were used to maintain space and prevent collapse of the dentition during life. Then in a Roman tomb in Egypt, a researcher found a number of teeth bound with a gold wire -- the first documented ligature wire! At the time of Christ, Aurelius Cornelius Celsus first recorded the treatment of teeth by finger pressure. Despite all this evidence and experimentation, no significant events in orthodontics really occurred until the much later, in around the 1700s (although dentistry as a whole made great advancements in the interim). It should be noted that in Medieval times, specialized barbers often performed dental "operations", extractions, and procedures such as blood-letting. Let's be glad we live in the 21st Century! Important Breakthroughs Even before George Washington wore his famous wooden teeth, dentists were thinking about ways to correct bad bites. In 1728, French Dentist Pierre Fauchard published a book called the "The Surgeon Dentist" with an entire chapter on ways to straighten teeth. Fauchard used a device called a "Bandeau," a horseshoe-shaped piece of precious metal which helped expand the arch. French Dentist Ettienne Bourdet followed Fauchard in 1757 with his book "The Dentist's Art", also devoting a chapter to tooth alignment and appliances. Bourdet was the dentist to the King of France. He further perfected the Bandeau, and is also the first dentist (on record) who recommended extraction of premolars to alleviate crowding. He was also the first to scientifically prove jaw growth. Here's a link to a series of pages with some fascinating illustrations of early expansion devices. Scottish surgeon John Hunter wrote (among other surgical books) "The Natural History of the Human Teeth" in 1771, clearly describing dental anatomy. Hunter coined the terms bicuspids, cuspids, incisors and molars.  His second book, "A Practical Treatise on the Diseases of Teeth", described dental pathology.  Although teeth straightening and extraction to improve alignment of remaining teeth has been practiced since early times, orthodontics as a science of its own did not really exist until the mid-1800s.  In 1819 Delabarre introduced the wire crib, which marked the birth of contemporary orthodontics. The term orthodontia was coined by Joachim Lafoulon  in 1841. Gum elastics were first employed by Maynard in 1843. Tucker was the first to cut rubber bands from rubber tubing in 1850. And in the late 1800s, Eugene Solomon Talbot was the first person to use X-rays for orthodontic diagnosis. But all this was nothing compared to advances in orthodontics in the 20th Century. Daddy-O (as in Orthodontic) Historians claim that several men deserve the title of being called "The Father of Orthodontics." Fauchard certainly took orthodontics out of the dark ages, but these men really put maloclussion on the map. One man was Norman W. Kingsley, a dentist, writer, artist, and sculptor.  In 1858, he wrote the first article on orthodontics, and in 1880, his book "Treatise on Oral Deformities" was published. The second man who deserves credit was a dentist named J. N. Farrar who wrote two volumes entitled "A Treatise on the Irregularities of the Teeth and Their Corrections". Farrar was very good at designing brace appliances, and he was the first to suggest the use of mild force at timed intervals to move teeth.  In America in the early 1900s, Edward H. Angle devised the first simple classification system for malocclusions, which is still used today (Class I, Class II, and so on). His classification system was a way for dentists to describe how crooked teeth are, what way teeth are pointing, and how teeth fit together. Angle contributed significantly to the design of orthodontic appliances, incorporating many simplifications. He founded the first school and college of orthodontics, organized the American Society of Orthodontia in 1901 (which became the AAO in the 1930s), and founded the first orthodontic journal in 1907. A journal and website bearing his name still thrive today. His highly praised reference book, "Malocclusion of the Teeth" went through seven editions. In the wake of all these advancements, the field of orthodontics and dentofacial orthopedics eventually became a respected dental specialty in its own right. Other innovations in orthodontics in the late 1800s and early 1900s included the first textbook on orthodontics for students, published by J.J. Guilford in 1889, and the use of rubber elastics, pioneered by Calvin S. Case (some believe it was H. A. Baker). The First Metal Mouths What did braces look like a century ago? In the early 1900s, orthodontists used gold, platinum, silver, steel, gum rubber, vulcanite (and occasionally, wood, ivory, zinc, copper, and brass) to  form loops, hooks, spurs, and ligatures. Fourteen- to 18-karat gold was routinely used for wires, bands, clasps, ligatures, and spurs, as were iridium-platinum bands and arch wires, and platinized gold for brackets. Why gold? It is malleable and easy to shape. Gold had its drawbacks, however -- because of its softness it required frequent adjustments, and it was expensive! Anyway, you guessed it -- these bands wrapped entirely around the each tooth -- the original "metal mouth" was real gold or silver! How's that for bling? In 1929, the first dental specialty board, the American Board of Orthodontics, was born. On a side note, the first synthetic (nylon)-bristle toothbrush was invented in 1938. Around this time, stainless steel became widely available, but using it for braces was considered somewhat controversial. It wasn't generally accepted as a material for orthodontic treatment until the late 1950s/early 1960s! In addition, you may be surprised to learn that x-rays were not routinely used in orthodontic treatment until the 1950s! Advancements in the 1970s Braces continued to wrap around the teeth until the mid 1970s, when direct bonding became a reality. Why did it take so long for dentists to invent the modern bonded bracket? The adhesive! The bonded bracket was actually invented earlier, but the formulation for the adhesive wasn't perfected until almost a decade later. At first, bonded brackets were (of course) made of metal. Like any new method, it took a while for the direct bond bracket to catch on -- which is why some people may remember wearing the old "wrap around" metal braces into the late 1970s. Around this time, the self-ligating bracket also appeared on the scene. Self-ligating brackets don't need tie wires or elastic ligatures to hold the arch wire onto the bracket -- they are held on by a "trap door" built into each bracket. As early as 1935, the idea of a self-ligating brackets began to take shape. Over the years many designs were patented, but few were commercially available until Ormco created the Edgelock system in 1972. As the 1980s and 1990s progressed, many companies created their own versions of self-ligating brackets and improved upon the idea by offering both passive and active resistance on the arch wire. Nowadays, we have a number of self-ligating choices, such as Orec's Speed Braces, Ormco's Damon System, GAC's In-Ovation, and Adenta's Evolution. In the 1970s, Earl Bergersen, DDS created the passive Ortho-Tain appliances, which guide jaw growth and help correct orthodontic problems and malocclusions in both children and adults. The Ortho-Tain appliances look like custom plastic mouthguards, and are worn mainly at night, or for only a few hours each day. In many cases, people have been able to correct (or greatly  diminish) many types of orthodontic problems with these removable custom-made appliances. Around 1975, two orthodontists working independently in Japan and the United States started developing their own systems to place braces on the inside surfaces of the teeth -- lingual braces. These "invisible braces" offered people the results of bonded brackets with one big advantage -- they were on the inside of the teeth, so nobody else could see them!  In America,  the late Dr. Craven Kurz of Beverly Hills California developed the Kurz/Ormco lingual system. In Japan, Professor Kinya Fujita, of Kanagawa Dental University invented his own lingual system, and continues to make great advances in the lingual method.  It takes special training to treat a patient with lingual braces, and many American orthodontists in the 1970s and 1980s were reluctant to use the method -- but orthodontists in other countries readily embraced it, and continued to make advancements with new techniques. Recently, lingual braces have become more popular because technology has made them more comfortable. One example is iBraces, a company which custom-fabricates brackets for a patient's teeth with the aid of digital computer imaging. Lingual braces were the "invisible" braces of choice until the early 1980s, when "tooth colored" esthetic brackets made from single-crystal sapphire and ceramics came into vogue. Nowadays we also have brackets made from a combination of ceramic and metal -- giving the patient a strength of metal with esthetic look of less noticeable "tooth colored" braces. Recently, a European company even invented a ceramic bracket that is self-ligating! Invisible Braces via Silicon Valley As far back as 1945, orthodontists realized that a sequence of removable plastic appliances could move teeth toward a predetermined result. Some orthodontists even made simple plastic "aligner trays" in their offices for minor adjustments. But it took an adult who'd just had braces to take the concept a step further. Invisalign was the brainchild of Zia Chishti and Kelsey Wirth, graduate students in Stanford University's MBA program. Wirth had traditional braces in high school (she reportedly hated them). Chishti had finished adult treatment with traditional braces and now wore a clear plastic retainer. He noticed that if he didn't wear his retainer for a few days, his teeth shifted slightly -- but the plastic retainer soon moved his teeth back the desired position. In 1997, he and Wirth applied 3-D computer imaging graphics to the field of orthodontics and created Align Technologies and the Invisalign method. With a boost from ample Silicon Valley venture funding, Align soon took the orthodontic industry by storm. Dentists and other dental companies were skeptical at first, because neither Chishti nor Wirth had any professional dental training. Invisalign braces were first made available to the public in May, 2000 and proved extremely popular with patients. Soon similar products began appearing on the market, made by GAC, 3-M Unitek, Ormco, OrthoClear, and others. The Future: Technology Continues to Advance As technology enhances our daily lives, it also continues to advance the science of orthodontics. More and more companies are utilizing digital computer imaging to make orthodontic treatment more precise. The SureSmile system by OraMetrix, for example, takes a detailed 3-D model of a patient’s teeth and helps the orthodontist develop a precise treatment plan for tooth movement. The orthodontist's treatment plan then drives a highly accurate robotic process to customize the arch wires needed for treatment. This often shortens treatment time and gives highly accurate results. NASA developed one of the late 20th century's most dramatic orthodontic breakthroughs: heat-activated nickel-titanium alloy wires. At room temperature, heat-activated nickel-titanium arch wires are very flexible. As they warm to body temperature they become active and gradually move the teeth in the anticipated direction. Because of their high-tech properties, these wires retain their tooth-moving abilities longer than ordinary metal wires and need less frequent attention from the orthodontist. Many orthodontists now employ heat-activated wires in their treatment plans. What does all this mean for the orthodontic patient of the future? As companies develop more precise, high-tech materials and methods, your braces will be on for a shorter period of time, be smaller and less visible, result in less discomfort, and give great results. We've sure come a long way from the wrap-around "metal mouth" -- and that's something we can all smile about! The following references and websites provided information, images, (and in some cases, whole sentences)  for this article. Thanks to: www.braces.org and the AAO staff www.angle.org and the article Orthodontic Biomaterials: From the Past to the Present by Robert P. Kusy, PhD www.thinkquest.org www.ibraces.com www.ada.org www.orametrix.com www.invisalign.com www.angleeast.org www.oz.net/~markhow http://www.bay13.net http://www.globalmednet.com/do-cdrom/Origins/Traction/df001.htm The Journal of the Canadian Dental Association, Lingual Orthodontics:History, Misconceptions and Clarification by Paul H. Ling, DDS, MDS, MOrthRCS   The British Orthodontic Society's Journal of Orthodontics, Self-Ligating Brackets: Where Are We Now by N. W. T. Harradine American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentalfacial Orthopedics, Orthodontics in 3 Millenia article series by Norman Wahl (special for the AAO Journal) "Der Zahnbrecher von Gerard Honthorst" Lithograph by Franz Hanfstaegl after the painting by Gerard Honthorst The National Museum of Dentistry in Baltimore, MD No, the statue didn't really have braces. I Photoshopped them in. As if you couldn't tell.

 

Source for the above article: A Brief History of Braces, http://www.archwired.com/HistoryofOrtho.htm

Pretty interesting! See watching movies can be a good thing! They can teach you things or even make you go and investigate something you heard about :D

Well as you can see I'm not a completely random person there are usually reasons why I look something up or ask a questions HAHA

I know this seems completely random, but I started reading To Kill A Mockingbird yesterday and in chapter 2 page 26 it came to a scene where the teacher Miss Caroline was walking by a student and something crawled out of his hair and Little Chuck Little says to her "There ain't no need to fear a cootie, ma'am. Ain't you ever seen one?..." And in the book they referred to the child with the cootie as the cootie's host and it got me thinking about all those school days where the imaginary illness "cooties" seemed to be running rampant and I was always curious as to what cooties was referring to and never even knew it was a "real" thing, or at least mentioned somewhere else, until now when I came across it in Harper Lee's story. So are you yourself wondering "Yeah what is a cootie, why do so many children run around saying "eww he/she's got cooties"" So I decided to investigate...

Link: Cooties @ Wikipedia > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooties

The above link is a short description from Wikipedia, but I want to continue the investigation in more depth, "Where else is the word cootie used in popular culture?" and "Where is the word cootie derived?" Let's continue...

 

Source for above definition: Dictionary.com > http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cootie

Cooties in popular culture

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As with any cultural convention, or fondly remembered concept from childhood, cooties are often referenced in movies, music, on television, in novels and on the internet. References range from physical manifestation as fantastical creatures to more realistic portrayal as a cultural convention and to the traditional interpretation as lice.

Television

Cooties have been referred to in a number of episodes of The Simpsons. In one episode ("") Bart claims they come from "a girl's butt" and in "The Wandering Juvie" Bart is told by Gina that there is no such thing as cooties (as well as a variety of fake "cootie-repelling" type items such as cootie insurance, which Bart appears to have bought). In another episode, Tennis the Menace, Homer asks a Cootie Catcher "Do I have cooties?" He then opens a tab and reads "No." followed by "Wow this home testing kit has saved me a fortune!" There is also an episode in The Simpons where Bart gives Milhouse his cootie shot by punching him.

Cooties is also mentioned in a Friends episode, during Season 5, when Joey referred to Rachel as having the cooties because Ross was selling all of his belongings which Rachel may have touched or come in contact with.

Cooties feature in the 1990s television series Dexters Laboratory, as small, girly insects with curly snouts that inhabit the bedroom of Dexters older sister, Dee Dee.

In one of the episodes of Codename: Kids Next Door, where the KND scientists believed that their underwater science lab is quarantined because of cooties.

In the Bobbys World'' episode "Cooties", kids start avoiding Bobby, believing he contracted cooties when he was kissed by Jackie.

On an episode of the Cartoon Network program Cow & Chicken, Chicken was kissed by a girl named Whiney. This leads everybody to believe that Chicken has a particularly lethal strain of cooties known as "Whiney Cooties". Symptoms included his beak falling down, his butt dissolving, his eyeballs popping out of his head, and his beak shriveling.

In one episode of the Cartoon Network program The Powerpuff Girls, cooties were featured prominently, since at first, they are the main weakness of the Rowdyruff Boys, as they explode when the Girls kiss them in order to defeat them. However, later on, when they are resurrected by Him, they are given anti-cootie vaccinations to make them immune to the Girls' kisses.

The MTV2 show Wonder Showzen featured an episode called "health" where a character called Wordsworth comes down with a case of the cooties; his friend Him uses it to his advantage and sells Wordsworth's encrusted cootie sores as snack treats.

One of the supposed cures "Circle Circle Dot Dot" is a song by Jamie Kennedy and Stu Stone that was featured on their MTV show Blowin' Up. The song references cooties.

Movies

In the 1995 Hollywood hit, Pulp Fiction, cooties are mentioned in the context of sharing a drinking straw.

Irwin catches cooties and mono from kissing Mandy in Billy and Mandy's Big Boogey Adventure.

In the movie Grease cooties are mentioned when Jan passes the bottle of wine to Sandy.

Literature

Calvin, of the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, does not seem to worry about catching cooties from close contact with individuals. However, he fears that he will catch them when he is the only boy on a playground full of girls. Apparently he believes that they are received from airborne transmission, as he begins breathing through his shirt and shouting "Air filter! Air filter!". In the same strip, Susie Derkins, one of the secondary characters who Calvin is with at the time, assures him that "Stupidity produces antibodies." Cooties are also mentioned when Hobbes is explaining that being in love means that when you see the object of your affection; your heart crushes your innards, makes you sweat, shorts the circuits to the brain and makes you babble like a cretin. As Calvin hears this he says that happened to him once, but that he thought that it was the cooties.

Cooties are mentioned as lice in a child's hair in "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee.

Music

"Cooties" was also one of the competitive song and dance numbers in the Broadway Musical, Hairspray. It was sung by Amber announcing that her rival Tracy Turnblad has cooties. The song incorporates "Circle, Circle, Dot, Dot, Dot" as a dance move. In the motion picture, the song is sung by jazz vocalist Aimee Allen in the background of the dance-off in one of the final scenes, and is not sung by the character Amber.

Name of a Columbia, Missouri band known as the Cootie Shot Scandal.

Kooties is also a funk rock band from Australia

Frank Zappa - Dinah-Moe Humm: "So I pulled on her hair, Got her legs in the air, An' asked if she had, any cooties on there; (Whaddya mean cooties! No cooties on me!)"

Cootie Shot is a punk band based in northeast Pennsylvania.

Circle Circle Dot Dot - Jamie Kennedy and Stu Stone

Source for above article > http://www.lumrix.net/health/Cooties.html  

 

September 30, 1927


Babe Ruth hits 60th homer of 1927 season
On September 30, 1927, Babe Ruth hits his 60th home run of the 1927 season and with it sets a record that would stand for 34 years.

George Herman Ruth was born February 6, 1895, in Baltimore, Maryland. He was the first of eight children, but only he and a sister survived infancy. Ruth’s father was a saloon keeper on Baltimore’s waterfront, and the young George, known as "Gig" (pronounced with soft g’s) to his family, was known as a troublemaker from an early age. At seven, his truancy from school led his parents to declare him incorrigible, and he was sent to an orphanage, St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys. Ruth lived there until he was 19 in 1914, when he was signed as a pitcher by the Baltimore Orioles.

That same summer, Ruth’s contract was sold by the Orioles to the Boston Red Sox. His new teammates called him "Babe," short for baby, for his naiveté, but his talent was already maturing, and he was almost immediately recognized as the best pitcher on one of the great teams of the 1910s. He set a record between 1916 and 1918 with 29 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings in World Series play, including a 14-inning game in 1916 in which he pitched every inning, giving up only a run in the first.

To the great dismay of Boston fans, Ruth’s contract was sold by the Red Sox to the New York Yankees before the 1920 season by Red Sox owner Harry Frazee, so that Frazee could finance the musical No, No, Nanette. Ruth switched to the outfield with the Yankees, and hit more home runs than the entire Red Sox team in 10 of the next 12 seasons. "The Sultan of Swat" or "The Bambino," as he was alternately known, was the greatest gate attraction in baseball through the 1920s until his retirement as a player in 1935.

The 1927 season featured a fearsome Yankees lineup of power hitters known as "Murderer’s Row" that included Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Tony Lazzerri and Bob Meusel. Ruth led the American League in home runs throughout the year, but did not appear to be within reach of his record 59 home runs, set in 1921, until he hit 16 in the month of September, tying his record on September 29. On September 30, in the last game of the season, Ruth came to the plate against lefty Tom Zachary of the Washington Senators in the eighth inning. With the count at 2-1, Ruth launched a Zachary pitch high into the right-field bleachers, and then took a slow stroll around the bases as the crowd celebrated by tearing paper into confetti and throwing hats into the air. Upon assuming his position in right-field for the ninth inning, those seated in the bleachers waved hankies at the famed slugger; Ruth responded with multiple military salutes.

During Ruth’s career with the New York Yankees, the team won four World Series and seven American League pennants. After getting rid of Ruth, the Red Sox did not win a World Series until 2004, an 85-year drought known to Red Sox fans as "the Curse of the Bambino."

Ruth died of throat cancer on August 16, 1948. His record for career home runs was not broken until Hank Aaron hit his 715th home run on April 8, 1974, 39 years later.

September 30, 1889


Wyoming legislators write the first state constitution to grant women the vote
On this day in 1889, the Wyoming state convention approves a constitution that includes a provision granting women the right to vote. Formally admitted into the union the following year, Wyoming thus became the first state in the history of the nation to allow its female citizens to vote.

That the isolated western state of Wyoming should be the first to accept women's suffrage was a surprise. Leading suffragists like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were Easterners, and they assumed that their own more progressive home states would be among the first to respond to the campaign for women's suffrage. Yet the people and politicians of the growing number of new Western states proved far more supportive than those in the East.

In 1848, the legislature in Washington Territory became the first to introduce a women's suffrage bill. Though the Washington bill was narrowly defeated, similar legislation succeeded elsewhere, and Wyoming Territory was the first to give women the vote in 1869, quickly followed by Utah Territory (1870) and Washington Territory (1883). As with Wyoming, when these territories became states they preserved women's suffrage.

By 1914, the contrast between East and West had become striking. All of the states west of the Rockies had women's suffrage, while no state did east of the Rockies, except Kansas. Why the regional distinction? Some historians suggest western men may have been rewarding pioneer women for their critical role in settling the West. Others argue the West had a more egalitarian spirit, or that the scarcity of women in some western regions made men more appreciative of the women who were there while hoping the vote might attract more.

Whatever the reasons, while the Old West is usually thought of as a man's world, a wild land that was "no place for a woman," Westerners proved far more willing than other Americans to create states where women were welcomed as full and equal citizens.