HOLY CROSS DAY

Holy Cross Day is also known as the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, Triumph of the Cross, or Holyrood Day (“rood” meaning “cross”. It commemorates the recovery of the Holy Cross on which Jesus was crucified. (It had been taken from Jerusalem by the Persians in a war in A.D. 614. In A.D. 629, Byzantine Emperor Heraclius recovered and returned the Cross to Jerusalem.) Holy Cross Day is one of four annual markers for the “Ember Days,” which occur on the first Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday following Holy Cross Day, Whit Sunday (Pentecost), the first Sunday in Lent, and St. Lucy Day. The Ember Days are special times for prayer, fasting, and the ordination of clergy in certain Christian denominations. The weather on each of the three Ember Days is supposed to foretell the weather for each of the three succeeding months. A Spanish proverb notes, “On Holy Cross Day / Vineyards are gay.”

1710s

• 1716: THE FIRST LIGHTHOUSE IN NORTH AMERICA, BOSTON LIGHT, WAS LIT

1740s

• 1741: COMPOSER GEORGE HANDEL COMPLETED THE MESSIAH

1810s

• 1814: FRANCIS SCOTT KEY WROTE “THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER”

1840s

• BORN 1849: IVAN PETROVICH PAVLOV (PHYSIOLOGIST)

1850s

• DIED 1852: AUGUSTUS WELBY NORTHMORE PUGIN (ARCHITECT)
• DIED 1852: ARTHUR WELLESLEY (1ST DUKE OF WELLINGTON)

1880s

• BORN 1883: MARGARET HIGGINS SANGER (FOUNDER OF THE BIRTH CONTROL MOVEMENT)
• 1886: TYPEWRITER RIBBON PATENTED

1890s

• DIED 1899: HENRY BLISS (FIRST AMERICAN AUTOMOBILE FATALITY)

1900s

• DIED 1901: WILLIAM MCKINLEY (25TH U.S. PRESIDENT)

1910s

• BORN 1915: DOUGLAS KENNEDY (“LONE RANGER” ACTOR)
• 1915: SOUND-ABSORBING MATERIAL PATENTED

1930s

• BORN 1934: KATE MILLETT (FEMINIST WRITER)
• 1938: THE WORLD’S LARGEST AIRSHIP, GRAF ZEPPELIN II, MADE ITS FIRST FLIGHT
• 1939: THE FIRST HELICOPTER FLIGHT WAS MADE BY IGOR SIKORSKY

1940s

• BORN 1947: SAM NEILL (ACTOR)

1960s

• 1968: ZOND 5 WAS LAUNCHED; 4 DAYS LATER IT BECAME THE FIRST SPACECRAFT TO CIRCLE THE MOON AND RETURN TO EARTH

1970s

• BORN 1971: KIMBERLY WILLIAMS-PAISLEY (ACTRESS)
• 1972: THE WALTONS PREMIERED ON CBS
• 1975: ELIZABETH ANN BAYLEY SETON, THE FIRST U.S. BORN SAINT, WAS CANONIZED BY POPE PAUL VI

1980s

• DIED 1982: PRINCESS GRACE OF MONACO (FORMER ACTRESS GRACE KELLY)

1990s

• 1994: WORLD SERIES WAS CANCELLED DUE TO STRIKE

2000s

• DIED 2006: MICKEY HARGITAY (ACTOR & WORLD CHAMPION BODYBUILDER)
• DIED 2009: PATRICK SWAYZE (ACTOR)

2010s

• 2010: ROGER CRAIG, A UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE GRADUATE STUDENT, WON $77,000 ON JEOPARDY!. IT WAS THE SHOW’S HIGHEST ONE-DAY TOTAL EVER.
• 2017: CRAYOLA ANNOUNCED CRAYON NAME “BLUETIFUL”

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