August 7, 2023
QUOTE
Learning is not virtue but the means to bring us an acquaintance with it. Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful. Let these be your motives to action through life, the relief of the distressed, the detection of frauds, the defeat of oppression, and diffusion of happiness.
--Nathanael Greene
BIRTHDAYS
1742 – Nathanael Greene, General
1884 – Billie Burke, Actress and singer
1955 – Wayne Knight, Actor, comedian and voice actor
1975 – Charlize Theron, Actress
IN MEMORY
1957 – Oliver Hardy, Actor, singer, and director
2004 – Red Adair, Firefighter
2005 – Peter Jennings, Journalist and author
2021 – Markie Post, Actress
IN ON THIS DAY
1782 – George Washington orders the creation of the Badge of Military Merit to honor soldiers wounded in battle, later renamed to the more poetic Purple Heart.
1786 – The first federal Indian Reservation is created by the United States.
1789 – The United States Department of War is established.
1978 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter declares a federal emergency at Love Canal due to toxic waste that had been disposed of negligently.
1990 – First American soldiers arrive in Saudi Arabia as part of the Gulf War.