The First Book of Factoids | Page 8

have been robbed of 10 days.
But this was merely a convenient fiction. The Spring Equinox in the Gregorian calendar was, indeed, celebrated on March 21 in perpetuity. But, according to the Julian calendar, in the 17th century it arrived on March 11th, in the 18th century on March 10th, in the 19th century on March 9th, and in the 20th century on March 8th - 13 days earlier that even the erroneous date adopted by the Nicea Council.
The Gregorian calendar was controversial in Protestant countries. Britain and its colonies adopted it only in 1752. They had to drop 11 days from the civil calendar and move the official new year from March 25 to January 1. For centuries, dates followed by OS ("Old Style") were according to the Julian calendar and dates followed by NS ("New Style") according to the Gregorian one. Sweden adopted the Gregorian Calendar in 1753, Japan in 1873, Egypt in 1875, Eastern Europe between 1912 to 1919 and Turkey in 1927. In Russia it was decreed by the (bourgeois) revolutionaries that thirteen days would be omitted from the calendar, the day following January 31, 1918 becoming February 14, 1918.
It was Pope Pius X who, in 1910, changed the beginning of the ecclesiastical year from Christmas Day to January 1, effective from 1911 onwards.
All that time, the Christian Orthodox continued to observe the Julian calendar. In 1923, a Conference of Orthodox Churches in Constantinople reduced the number of leap years every 900 years and attained a discrepancy between the calendar and the natural solar year of merely 2.2 seconds per year.
According to this calendar, the Spring Equinox will regress by one day every 40,000 years.
They, too, had to drop 13 days to bring the Spring Equinox back to March 21st. Hence the gap between December 25 (Gregorian calendar) and January 7 (revised Julian-Orthodox calendar).
http://serendipity.magnet.ch/hermetic/cal_stud/cal_art.htm
http://www.greenheart.com/billh/julian.html
Canada
Following a series of rebellions, the British North American colonies achieved self-government in 1848. But the economic situation was dire. The colonies, immersed as they were in the 1847 global depression, could no longer rely on protective tariffs once the British repealed the Corn Laws. Famished and disease-stricken Irish immigrants flooded the new state. Young men in Canada West left in droves for the United States due to a shortage of agricultural land.
The 1849 Gold Rush brought tens of thousands of gold diggers from the USA to Canada. Riots erupted in Montreal. A Rebellion Losses Bill, intended to compensate some of the victims of the 1837-38 rebellion, further drained the country's dilapidated resources.
By 1849, many Canadians were clamoring to join the United states. An Annexation Association was founded to promote unification with the prospering southern neighbor. The two versions of an Annexation Manifesto were signed by the entire business community in Montreal and Quebec and by the nationalists, who, contrary to their name, were republicans who preferred the USA to the British crown.
http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/2/18/h18-2005-e.html
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&ArticleId=A0 000230
Canada, Invasion of
The U.S. military developed a "Joint Army and Navy Basic War Plan--Red" in the 1920s. The detailed Plan was augmented and amended in the 1930s. It envisioned the invasion of Canada by the United States to hurt the interests of the United Kingdom. Later, the Plan called for the US military to invade Bermuda and Britain's Caribbean assets. Australia and New Zealand were singled out as British allies and enemy powers.
The document was declassified in 1974. It was only the last of many such color-coded contingency plans.
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mcanadawar.html

Candidate

White in Latin is "candicans". Pure white, bright, shining - is "candidus". Hence the English words "candid" and "candidate". The word "candidus" is derived from "candere" - glow, shine, be white, or guileless. Hence the
words candle, incandescent.
Political candidates in Rome wore a chalk-powdered white toga.
http://www.hyperdictionary.com/dictionary/candidate
http://faculty.whatcom.ctc.edu/lthomp/personal/wordfor.htm

Capone, Alphonse ("Al")
The "fact" that Alphonse ("Al") Capone (1899-1947) evaded justice numerous times and was finally indicted for income tax evasion in 1931 - is untrue. It is a partial myth.
As his FBI file (see link below) makes clear, Capone was apprehended and did time in prison prior to his conviction for tax fraud.
In the 1920s, the FBI was not authorized to investigate gangsters and organized crime.
Capone's first arrest - by the FBI - was for contempt of court. He posted bond and was released.
Then, in May 1929, as the FBI recounts: "Al Capone and his bodyguard were arrested in Philadelphia for carrying concealed deadly weapons. Within 16 hours they had been sentenced to terms of one year each. Capone served his time and was released in nine months for good behavior on March 17, 1930.
On February 28, 1936, Capone was found guilty in Federal Court on the Contempt of Court charge and was sentenced to six months in Cook County Jail. His appeal on that charge was subsequently dismissed."
At first, Capone pleaded guilty to tax evasion charges - but he later changed his plea when the judge informed