Today is also, among other things, Universal Day of Culture and World Art Day. Now, culture, aka Kulcha, is many things to many people, some of them are addressed by implication and reference by today's featured artist, Bessie Smith:

Up in Harlem every Saturday night
When the high-browns get together it's just too tight
They all congregate at an all night strut
And what they do is tut-tut-tut

Oh Hannah Brown from way cross town
Gets full of corn and starts breaking 'em down
Yes at the break of day
You can hear old Hannah say

'Gimme a pigfoot and a bottle of beer
Send me again, I don't care, I feel just like I wanna clown
Give the piano player a drink because he's bringing me down

Art, however, is what it is. If it could be defined, then it would not be art. Picasso famously noted that it is a lie which shows us the (way to the) truth.

On this day in history:

1755 – Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language was published.

1817 – Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet and Laurent Clerc founded the American School for the Deaf.

1865 – President Abraham Lincoln died.

1892 – The General Electric Company was formed.

1912 – The RMS Titanic sank

1923 – Insulin became generally available for use by people with diabetes.

1924 – Rand McNally published its first road atlas.

1936 – The Arab revolt in occupied, misnamed "Mandatory" Palestine began.

1945 – Bergen-Belsen was liberated.

1947 – Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color line with the Dodgers.

1952 – First flight of the Boeing B-52

1960 – Ella Baker led a conference that led to the creation of SNCC.

1989 – the Tiananmen Square protests began

1994 – The Marrakesh Agreement creating the WTO was adopted, further empowering corporations and corporatists.
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2013 – Two bombs exploded near the finish line at the Boston Marathon

2019 – The cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris was seriously damaged by a fire.

Some people who were born on this day:

e^iπ+1=0

~~ Leonhard Euler

1452 – Leonardo da Vinci, painter, sculptor, architect
1707 – Leonhard Euler, mathematician and physicist
1793 – Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve, astronomer
1800 – James Clark Ross, captain and explorer
1841 – Joseph E. Seagram, whisky baron, founded the Seagram Company Ltd
1843 – Henry James, author
1858 – Émile Durkheim, sociologist, psychologist and philosopher
1877 – William David Ross, philosopher
1889 – A. Philip Randolph, activist and unionist
1894 – Bessie Smith, singer and actor
1904 – Arshile Gorky, painter and illustrator
1907 – Nikolaas Tinbergen, ethologist and ornithologist
1915 – Elizabeth Catlett, sculptor and illustrator
1924 – Neville Marriner, violinist and conductor
1930 – Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, educator, politician, first elected female head of state
1933 – Roy Clark, musician and television personality
1965 – Linda Perry, singer and songwriter, non-blond musician and record producer

Some people who died on this day:

“Three o'clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do.”

~~ Jean-Paul Sartre

1927 – Gaston Leroux, journalist and author
1980 – Jean-Paul Sartre, philisopher
1986 – Jean Genet, novelist, poet and playwright
2000 – Edward Gorey, poet and illustrator
2001 – Joey Ramone, singer and songwriter
2002 – Damon Knight, author

Some Holidays, Holy Days, Festivals, Feast Days, Days of Recognition, and such:

Jackie Robinson Day (United States)
Tax Day, (United States, Philippines)
Universal Day of Culture
World Art Day

Today's Tunes

Universal Day of Culture, eh?

Bessie Smith

The Titanic

Joseph Seagram

Neville Marriner

Linda Parry

Ok, it's an open thread, so it's up to you folks now. So what's on your mind?

Cross posted from http://caucus99percent.com

Open Thread, Bessie Smith, Art, Culture, Sartre, Genet, Linda Parry