“BLACK TUESDAY” on October 29, 1929

“Black Tuesday”: hits Wall Street as investors trade 16,410,030 shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors, and stock tickers ran hours behind because the machinery could not handle the tremendous volume of trading. In the aftermath of Black Tuesday, America and the rest of the industrialized world spiraled downward into the Great Depression.

During the 1920s, the U.S. stock market underwent rapid expansion, reaching its peak in August 1929, a period of wild speculation. By then, production had already declined and unemployment had risen, leaving stocks in great excess of their real value. Among the other causes of the eventual market collapse were low wages, the proliferation of debt, a weak agriculture, and an excess of large bank loans that could not be liquidated.

Stock prices began to decline in September and early October 1929, and on October 18 the fall began. Panic set in, and on October 24—Black Thursday—a record 12,894,650 shares were traded. Investment companies and leading bankers attempted to stabilize the market by buying up great blocks of stock, producing a moderate rally on Friday. On Monday, however, the storm broke anew, and the market went into free fall. Black Monday was followed by Black Tuesday, in which stock prices collapsed completely.

After October 29, 1929, stock prices had nowhere to go but up, so there was considerable recovery during succeeding weeks. Overall, however, prices continued to drop as the United States slumped into the Great Depression, and by 1932 stocks were worth only about 20 percent of their value in the summer of 1929.

The stock market crash of 1929 was not the sole cause of the Great Depression, but it did act to accelerate the global economic collapse of which it was also a symptom. By 1933, nearly half of America’s banks had failed, and unemployment was approaching 15 million people, or 30 percent of the workforce. It would take World War II, and the massive level of armaments production taken on by the United States, to finally bring the country out of the Depression after a decade of suffering. History Channel / Wikipedia / Encyclopedia Britannica / FDIC.gov / PBS / New York Times / Boston Globe

Wikipedia  Photo: Black Monday - Black Tuesday: Wall Street Crash of 1929, ending the Great Bull Market of the 1920s and beginning the Great Depression.

Understanding Military Terminology - M-day

(DOD) Mobilization day; unnamed day on which mobilization of forces begins. Joint Publications 4-06 (Mortuary Affairs)

The Old Salt’s Corner

Sea Fever

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking, And a gray mist on the sea's face, and a gray dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life, To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

“I’m Just Sayin’”

What happens if you go on a survival course - and you don't pass?

“Thought for the Day”

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.”

~ Mark Twain

“What I Have Learned”

“Sometimes you’ll have to hold your nose, close your eyes, and jump off the high board.”

~ Anonymous

Bizarre News (we couldn’t make up stuff this good – real news story)

Two Minnesota elementary schools hire recess consultant

Two suburban-Minneapolis elementary schools this fall hired a consulting firm to advise officials on kids’ recess, and the leading recommendations (promoting “safety” and “inclusiveness”) were elimination of “contact” games in favor of, for example, hopscotch.

Some parents objected; “recess”, they said, should be more freestyle, unstructured. (More consultants’ advice: de-emphasize refereed “rules” games in favor of monitors who simply praise effort.) One Minnesota principal noted improvement - fewer fights and nurse visits now--but as one parent said, her child feels that recess is no longer really “playing”.

Minneapolis Star Tribune (10/05/2015) / Mercer Island Reporter (09/24/2015)

Mr. Answer Man Please Tell Us: Are Snakes Immune to Their Own Venom?

Despite a sketchy reputation, venomous snakes in the United States aren’t prone to going on biting sprees. Only about 8,000 people are attacked every year, with an average of five victims fatally succumbing to the toxins deployed via puncture wounds.

But what happens when two snakes face off against one another? Can their venom induce the same hemorrhaging and necrosis it does in their prey, or do they have a built-in immunity to their own flesh-tenderizing enzymes and paralyzing neurotoxins?

“The conventional wisdom is that they have circulating antibodies in their blood,” says Stephen Mackessy, Ph.D., a Professor of Biological Sciences at the University of Northern Colorado and an expert in venomous snakes. “This would protect them from their own venom, as well of venom from another snake in their own species.”

Hypothetically, if a speckled rattlesnake bit another speckled rattlesnake, the immunity they’ve built from being exposed to low levels of their own venom—kept in glands behind their eyes and secreted when they bite—would protect them from a fatal wound. (Even though the glands are closed, they still contain blood vessels that allow the venom to circulate in their system, causing mild exposure, Mackessy says.) But a speckled rattlesnake that meets up with a cobra might have a different day entirely.

“The more distantly related the species, the more probability it would be toxic,” Mackessy says. “If a rattlesnake and cobra bit one another, without prior exposure to their venoms to build immunity, they would probably kill each other.”

Because organized snake fights to the death are frowned upon in scientific circles, there isn’t likely to be a definitive answer on just how much immunity they have—just that there’s likely enough to ward off attacks from close relatives or self-contamination. “It makes sense,” Mackessy says. “If you have something dangerous you’re injecting, you want to be protected from injecting yourself.”

Encyclopedia Britannica • Naked Scientists • Mental Floss • Reddit • Reptiles Magazine • Wikipedia

Where Did That Saying Come From?

“More Than You Can Shake a Stick At:” Meaning: having more of something than you need.

History: Farmers controlled their sheep by shaking their staffs to indicate where the animals should go. When farmers had more sheep than they could control, it was said they had “more than you can shake a stick at”. English.StackExchange Crack That Whip, Whip It - Devo

NAVSPEAK aka U.S. Navy Slang

Great Mistakes: Common epithet used when complaining about RTC/NTC Great Lakes Illinois.

Green Scrubby: Mildly abrasive scouring pad. Also called a "Greeny Weeny". It's green, of course.

Green Table Tea Party: Captain's Mast, Non Judicial Punishment (see “Mast”).

Green Table Tea Party: A place at boot camp, normally a parking lot, where the company commander makes you do pushups, other forms of exercise, etc when you screw up.

Gripe: Slang for a MAF (Maintenance Action Form), which is written when something is wrong with an aircraft.

Just for you MARINE

Grease: (Vietnam) To kill.

Green Belt: A Marine with the mid-level of martial arts training in the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program.

Green Eye: Starlight Scope. The first generation of night vision equipment. First used in Vietnam, it was very large and very heavy.

Green Machine: A derogatory term used by Marines to mean the Marine Corps. Also used regularly by the Army to proudly describe the Army.

Green Side Out: The steel pot helmets before Kevlar came with a cover that had green camouflage on one side and brown on the other. The decision of which color was to be worn to a formation was often left to a second lieutenant who couldn't make up his or her mind resulting in frequent changes and confusion. The term came to mean the leadership was confused as usual.

Naval Aviation Squadron Nicknames

VT-28 - Training Squadron 28: “Rangers”
NAS Corpus Christi, Texas

Aircraft Nicknames

F-117 Nighthawk (Cockroach - they run away when the lights come on), Stinkbug) is a single-seat, twin-engine stealth attack aircraft that was developed by Lockheed's secretive Skunk Works division and operated by the United States Air Force (USAF).

The F-117 was widely publicized for its role in the Gulf War of 1991. Although it was commonly referred to as the “Stealth Fighter”, it was a strictly ground-attack aircraft. Lockheed Martin / Wikipedia

The Strange, Mysterious or Downright Weird

Stone Spheres of Costa Rica

What: Over three hundred spheres of varying size (ranging from a few centimeters to 2 meters in diameter) scattered throughout the island. The largest weigh 30,000 pounds. Most are made of basalt (volcanic rock), but some are made of limestone or sandstone. They date back to approximately between 200 BC and 1500 AD, and the locals call them Las Bolas.

They were discovered in modern times in the early 1930s, by employees of the United Fruit Company, while preparing new banana plantations. Some were blown up, probably in search of the gold that had been rumored in the Americas since it was discovered by Europeans in the sixteenth century.

The “ancient” locals said that the stone spheres were “Tara’s cannon balls”. Tara (Tlatchque) was the god of thunder and used a giant blowpipe to shoot the balls at the Serkes, gods of winds and hurricanes, in order to drive them out of that land. Many of the stones have been moved from their original locations.

The Mystery: Who made the spheres is still unknown, as is the purpose they serve. The exact age of the stones is unclear, and they have undergone centuries of wear and tear, so it is remarkable that they are still very circular. They are most likely man-made, but some claim that they could be natural formations.

Some of the stones have been blasted apart by people hoping to find something hidden inside, but so far, nothing has been found. Some theories suggest that the stones may have served as some sort of marker, celestial or religious. POM / Crysta Links / Wikipedia