Daily post that discusses fun, interesting and important events from today's date. Maybe you need a topic of conversation between family, friends or coworkers. Perhaps you need something to celebrate or remember. If anything, you can learn a thing or two, which is never a bad thing! Give me an upvote and/or follow to show you enjoyed this and I'll make sure to keep up with this.
What happened on April 24th?
US Library of Congress is established (1800)
On this date, the establishment of the Library of Congress occurred via President John Adams. He signed the legislation to appropriate $5,000 to purchase, as he said, “such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress.”
The Library of Congress, the oldest federal cultural institution in the US, is the national library of the country. It is housed in three buildings on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.
It is one of the largest libraries in the world with a collection of over 164 million items. It’s collections are universal and include materials in more than 450 languages. 2/3 of the books it acquires each year are in languages other than English.
Franck-Hertz experiment, quantum mechanics breakthrough, is presented (1914)
This experiment, presented to the German Physical Society on this date in 1914, was the first electrical measurement to clearly show the quantum nature of atoms.
The experiment used a vacuum tube that had electrons fly through mercury atoms. Upon collision, it was determined that the electron could lose only a specific quantity of kinetic energy before flying away. Faster electrons do not decelerate more or less, and slower ones simply bounce off the atoms without losing any significant energy.
This was a breakthrough because it proved to be consistent with Niels Bohr’s model of the atom proposed the previous year. This model assumed a positively charged nucleus surrounded by circular-orbiting electrons, similar to the structure of the solar system.
Hubble Space Telescope launched from shuttle Discovery (1990)
The Hubble Space Telescope, one of the largest and most versatile space telescopes, still in operation today, was launched into low Earth orbit on this day in 1990. While it is not the first space telescope, the name is probably the most known and is a vital research tool.
Hubble’s orbit outside the distortion of Earth’s atmosphere allows it to take very high resolution images, some of the most detailed visible light images ever. It’s research has lead to many breakthroughs in astrophysics, such as accurately determining the rate of expansion of the universe.
Hubble is in operation today and has had five subsequent repair missions since its launch. In fact, it’s the only telescope designed to be serviced in space by astronauts. It is predicted to last to operate until as late as 2040. It’s successor, the James Webb Space Telescope is scheduled to launch in May 2020.
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Hopefully you learned a thing or two. See you tomorrow!
nice post ... we all need know history
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