"Prosperity tries the fortunate, adversity the great."
[Rose Kennedy]
Quote of the Day, from brainyquote.com (2021/03/09)
Article of the Day
The women's poll tax repeal movement in the United States was the attempt, predominantly led by women, to secure the abolition of poll taxes as a prerequisite for voting in the Southern states. After women were granted the right to vote in 1920, some Southern states introduced or expanded poll tax statutes in order to disenfranchise them. In response, women began organizing to repeal these laws (poster pictured), initially to little effect. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, both black and white women pressed at state and national levels for the abolition of these laws, and also filed lawsuits. Louisiana abandoned its poll tax law in 1932, and the number of women voters increased by 77 percent. Florida, Tennessee and Arkansas followed. In 1964, the Twenty-fourth Amendment was passed, prohibiting poll taxes as a barrier to voting in federal elections. The Supreme Court finally ended the struggle after four decades in its ruling on Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections in 1966. (Full article...)
Current Events

BBC One-minute World News
Fast briefed every day.
- India is trying to build its own internet (2021-03-09 01:06)
- Prosecutors' probe into Trump finances expands to include millions loaned for Chicago skyscraper (2021-03-09 00:49)
- 11 things we learned from Harry and Meghan's explosive interview (2021-03-08 23:58)
- Paul Walker's daughter, Meadow, opens for Givenchy at Paris Fashion Week (2021-03-08 23:55)
- Georgia Republicans advance limits to voting access after high 2020 turnout (2021-03-08 23:51)
Image of the Day

Source: Wikimedia Commons.
On this day: March 8
March 8: International Women's Day; National Heroes and Benefactors Day in Belize (2021); Aurat March in Pakistan; Commonwealth Day in the Commonwealth of Nations (2021)
- 1576 – A Spanish colonial officer wrote a letter to King Philip II containing the first mention of the Maya ruins of Copán (pictured) in present-day Honduras.
- 1658 – After a devastating defeat in the Second Northern War, King Frederick III of Denmark–Norway was forced to give up nearly half his Danish territory to Sweden to save the remainder.
- 1910 – French aviator Raymonde de Laroche became the first woman to receive a pilot's licence.
- 1924 – Three violent explosions at a coal mine near Castle Gate, Utah, killed all 171 miners working there.
- 1966 – Nelson's Pillar, a large granite pillar topped by a statue of Lord Nelson in Dublin, Ireland, was severely damaged by a bomb.
- Pope Celestine II (d. 1144)
- Bramwell Booth (b. 1856)
- José Raúl Capablanca (d. 1942)
Knowledge about Earth

Facts and Figures
- Age of Earth: ~ 4.568 billion years
- World Population: 7.3 billion (July 2015)
- Continents: 7 (Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia)
- Mean Radius: 6371.0 km
- Axial Tilt: 23,44°

Image Source: Wikipedia - License: Public Domain (thanks to NASA)

Our Solar System
Our solar system consists of
1 star (Sun) and 8 planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune).
- 1 AU (astronomical unit) is roughly the distance between Earth and the Sun (about 150 million kilometres).
- The space probe Voyager 1 was launched by the NASA in 1977 and is meanwhile (autumn 2015) about 133 AU away from Earth.

Image Source: Wikipedia - License: CC BY-SA 3.0
Why you should extend your general knowledge:
There are many reasons why one should or wants to extend his knowledge.
First you should consider that "general knowledge" is knowledge which a group of humans - who belong together regional, temporal or otherwise - owns. Thus, it describes a basic understanding of specific categories of knowledge.
As the English philosopher Francis Bacon said before: "Wisdom is Power" [Bacon 1597].