Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

August 20, 1908: 500,000 Aussies turned out to welcome the arrival of the Great White Fleet to Sydney. The reception was so warm that hundreds of sailors went on unauthorized absence. USS Kansas stayed extra days to round up stragglers, offering a $10 bounty on every sailor returned. AWOL sailor = big bucks!



The fleet's welcome began before daylight on the morning of Thursday, August 20th with site-seers coming out on steamers as far as 30 miles to meet the fleet in the dark. By the time they reached the headlands of Botany Bay.

The Great White Fleet sent around the world by President Theodore Roosevelt from 16 December 1907 to 22 February 1909 consisted of sixteen new battleships of the Atlantic Fleet. The battleships were painted white except for gilded scrollwork on their bows. The Atlantic Fleet battleships only later came to be known as the "Great White Fleet."





This must have been an amazing spectacular scene to have witnessed!





Everything you want to know about The Great White Fleet Visits Sydney, Australia


August 20, 1953: U.S. Confirms Soviet Claim on H-Bomb Test




Today is National Radio Day.



After being decommissioned in 1955 and later sold in 1961 from Portland, Oregon, the WWII cargo ship USS Deal (AKL-2) became a "pirate radio station" operating in the North Sea as M/V Olga Patricia > renamed again to "Laissez Faire" (Let it be) off the coast of England. Offshore pirate radio enabled broadcasters to circumvent national regulations.

This ship has a legendary history of: war, tropical islands, foreign ports, ownership of Army, Coast Guard, later Navy in 1947, converted to a pirate radio station at Dade Drydock Corporation, Miami, Florida in March 1966, renamed multiple times and fish, specifically menhaden, and finally years later the scrap yard in 2011.

How do we know?

By the powers of the Internet.

Svenn Martinsen sent an inquiry to Bay Weekly from Norway. Martinsen sought photos of former AKL/FS ships now being used as fishing boats by Omega Protein Inc. of Reedville, Virginia. Specifically, he wanted to know about the Earl J. Conrad Jr. He’d been one of the excited kids who listened to radio broadcasts from the ship in 1966-’67. “I love those stations created by Don Pierson, of Eastland, Texas,” said Martinsen.

Thus our story began.

How World War II ships came to catch Chesapeake menhaden

See the Wiki external links for more on the pirate radio ship.


August 20, 1977: James Burke filmed what has been seen as "the greatest shot in TV history" during the launch of Voyager 2 at Cape Canaveral for his BBC documentary series Connections. "Destination the moon... or Moscow."




Uncertain of where you're going? Welcome to Uncertain, Texas, a place with a name as curious as the town itself. Tucked along the edge of Caddo Lake, it’s known for its beauty, but not for the clarity of how it got its name.

One story says it started as "Uncertain Landing," because steamboat captains never knew if they could actually tie up their boats there. Another tale claims it comes from the old days, when nobody knew for sure whether they lived in Texas or the United States before the border was finalized. Folks who weren’t sure where they belonged sure didn’t mind—it meant fewer taxes to pay.

Then there’s historian Fred Dahmer’s version. He said he’d heard the name came from a bit of small-town paperwork gone sideways. When the local council applied for township status, the form asked what name they wanted for their community. Since they hadn’t agreed on one, they simply wrote down "uncertain." And, naturally, the government took them at their word. The population as of 2020 is 85 and it's been gradually decreasing since 2010.


Steamboats, loaded with goods destined for the developing west, traveled through Caddo Lake in route to Jefferson, Texas. Because of fluctuating water levels, mooring was often "uncertain." Caddo Lake was the site of the world's first off-shore drilling platform for oil in 1911. Pioneering this unique endeavor was the J. M. Guffey Petroleum Company later known as Gulf Oil Company and now Chevron.


Turks & Caicos: Spend your days snorkeling and your nights forgetting government exists.


Turks & Qataris: Spend your days dodging drone strikes and your nights justifying child martyrdom. Your GPS can’t save you here.




News Update with an important snippet from Down Under.