Daily Content Archive
(as of Thursday, November 19, 2015)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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stevedore
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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HyphensA hyphen ( - ) is used primarily to join two or more words to form a new, compound word or to provide clarity when using certain affixes (such as prefixes). What is a hanging hyphen? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 CannibalismEvidence of human cannibalism suggests that the practice began thousands of years ago. Cannibalism, eating the flesh of the members of one's own species, is practiced ritually in some cultures, though in Western society people tend to turn to cannibalism only in situations of extreme starvation or when they are mentally ill. Historically, the Aztec Empire is the most famous example of a cannibalistic society. What country was once known as the "Cannibal Isles"? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Operation Uranus Begins (1942)In the summer of 1941, a wave of German forces swept into the Soviet Union and proceeded to conquer a vast amount of territory. Stopped at Stalingrad, the Germans became mired in one of the most significant battles of WWII and were ill-prepared for the deteriorating Soviet weather. The enormous Soviet counteroffensive, code-named Operation Uranus, overwhelmed them. Within days, their entire force at Stalingrad was encircled. What nearly delayed the artillery bombardment that began the offensive? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (1711)With an extraordinarily broad education, Lomonosov became a prominent figure of 18th-century Russia in many capacities. He was a poet, a language reformer, a chemistry professor, and founder of Moscow State University. He created the first colored-glass mosaics in Russia. He designed a telescope and hypothesized the presence of an atmosphere on Venus. He cataloged more than 3,000 minerals and explained the origin of icebergs. His experiments in physics contradicted what commonly accepted theory? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 It is art that makes life, makes interest, makes importance…and I know of no substitute whatever for the force and beauty of its process.Henry James (1843-1916) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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be in for a treat— To be guaranteed to receive or experience something unexpectedly pleasant or beneficial. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 National Bible Week (2017)This is a week devoted to encouraging people to read the Bible, in the belief that it will arouse a positive spiritual force in a world plagued with problems. National Bible Week is promoted by the National Bible Association (originally the Laymen's National Committee), a non-denominational group of businessmen founded in 1940 and devoted to the application of the Golden Rule in daily life. A huge audience listened to the NBC radio program that was broadcast to kick off the first National Bible Week scheduled for December 8-14, 1941; Pearl Harbor had been bombed just hours before. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: pulselight year - Not a length of time but a distance, the distance a pulse of light travels in one year (about 5.88 trillion miles). More... pea - Comes from Greek pison, "pulse, pease." More... asphyxia - Its original meaning was stoppage of the pulse. More... ictus - The beat of the pulse, based on the Latin word for "stroke." More... | |
| In the News | |
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Why Writers RunFrom Homer's The Iliad to A.E. Housman's poem about an athlete dying young, there's no shortage of literary depictions of running. “Move, as the limbs / of a runner do,” writes W.H. Auden. “In orbit go / Round an endless track.” There's also a long ... More... | |