Daily Content Archive
(as of Saturday, March 4, 2017)| Word of the Day | |||
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Numbered and Lettered ListsSimilar to quotation marks, parentheses are always used in pairs—we cannot have a single parenthesis (the name for one of the brackets on its own) without its match appearing elsewhere nearby. The one exception is when we structure a list in what way? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 OleanderOleander is an evergreen shrub that grows well in warm subtropical regions and is native to a broad area that extends from Morocco to China. Its fragrant flowers grow in a variety of colors, and it is widely used as an ornamental plant in landscapes and parks. It is also one of the most poisonous known plants and contains several toxic, sometimes deadly, compounds. Even its bark contains rosagenin, which is known for its strychnine-like effects. Why is oleander the official flower of Hiroshima? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Collinwood School Fire (1908)In one of the deadliest disasters of its kind in the United States, 172 children and three adults were killed when an elementary school caught fire in Collinwood, Ohio. Though the building's doors opened outward, they were fitted with regular door latches instead of panic bars, which hindered the evacuation. As the conflagration rapidly spread, many children became trapped. Within two years of the disaster, residents of Collinwood voted to make what dramatic change to their community? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Jack Sheppard (1702)A popular English criminal who served as the basis for the character Macheath in John Gay's The Beggar's Opera, Sheppard was arrested and imprisoned five times in 1724 alone. The first four times, he escaped. The fifth time, he was executed. Because his crimes were all non-violent, he was well liked, especially by the lower classes, and he became a fixture in the folklore of the era. His execution resembled a party, with the 22-year-old stopping to do what on his way to the gallows? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Sometimes I wonder why God ever trusts talent in the hands of women, they usually make such an infernal mess of it. I think He must do it as a sort of ghastly joke.Willa Cather (1873-1947) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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be here to stay— To become permanent or firmly established; to be a normal part of everyday life, especially after once being abnormal or unusual. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Bahrain Spring of Culture (2024)In recent decades, the government organizations of Bahrain have worked toward making its national arts program as robust as its oil industry. The Spring of Culture Festival, held every March in the capital city of Manama, helps fulfill this cultural mission and promotes tourism to the country. Thanks to its reputation as a meeting place between the East and the West, Spring of Culture is able to attract performers from all over the world. National, regional, and international artists converge on Manama to perform poetry readings, music, theater, and dance. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: recognizerecognition mark - A distinctive one that makes an animal or bird easy to recognize by others of the same species. More... cognizance - Latin gnoscene, "know," begat cognoscere, "get to know; recognize," and it moved through French connoissance to English to become cognizance. More... sentence sense - The ability to recognize a grammatically complete sentence. More... appreciate, recognize, understand - The use of "appreciate" should involve valuing something or understanding it sympathetically; when there is no value or sympathy, use "recognize" or "understand"; appreciate first meant "set at a price; appraised." More... | |