FROM WIKIPEDIA COMMONS

Robert Dylan (born Robert Allen Zimmerman; May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career spanning more than 60 years. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s, when songs such as “Blowin’ in the Wind” (1963) and “The Times They Are a-Changin’” (1964) became anthems for the civil rights and antiwar movements. His lyrics during this period incorporated a range of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences, defying pop music conventions and appealing to the burgeoning counterculture.

Following his self-titled debut album in 1962, which comprised mainly traditional folk songs, Dylan made his breakthrough as a songwriter with the release of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan the following year. The album features “Blowin’ in the Wind” and the thematically complex “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall“. Many of his songs adapted the tunes and phraseology of older folk songs. He went on to release the politically charged The Times They Are a-Changin’ and the more lyrically abstract and introspective Another Side of Bob Dylan in 1964. In 1965 and 1966, Dylan drew controversy when he adopted electrically amplified rock instrumentation, and in the space of 15 months recorded three of the most important and influential rock albums of the 1960s: Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited (both 1965) and Blonde on Blonde (1966). His six-minute single “Like a Rolling Stone” (1965) expanded commercial and creative boundaries in popular music.

In July 1966, a motorcycle accident led to Dylan’s withdrawal from touring. During this period, he recorded a large body of songs with members of the Band, who had previously backed him on tour. These recordings were released as the collaborative album The Basement Tapes in 1975. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Dylan explored country music and rural themes in John Wesley Harding (1967), Nashville Skyline (1969), and New Morning (1970). In 1975, he released Blood on the Tracks, which many saw as a return to form. In the late 1970s, he became a born-again Christian and released a series of albums of contemporary gospel music before returning to his more familiar rock-based idiom in the early 1980s. Dylan’s 1997 album Time Out of Mind marked the beginning of a renaissance for his career. He has released five critically acclaimed albums of original material since then, the most recent being Rough and Rowdy Ways (2020). He also recorded a series of three albums in the 2010s comprising versions of traditional American standards, especially songs recorded by Frank Sinatra. Dylan has toured continuously since the late 1980s on what has become known as the Never Ending Tour.

Since 1994, Dylan has published eight books of drawings and paintings, and his work has been exhibited in major art galleries. He has sold more than 125 million records, making him one of the best-selling musicians of all time. He has received numerous awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, ten Grammy Awards, a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award. Dylan has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Pulitzer Prize Board in 2008 awarded him a special citation for “his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power”. In 2016, Dylan was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”.

TODAY’S ALMANAC

Question of the Day

Why is a nautical mile different from a land mile?The mile was originally a Roman linear measure of 1,000 paces — about 1,618 yards. (Its length has varied considerably at different periods and in different localities; the legal mile is now 1,760 yards, or 5,280 feet.) Such a linear measurement cannot be used at sea, so the nautical mile is based on the length of one minute of arc (or 1/60 of a degree) of a great circle of Earth. Owing to the fact that Earth is not a true sphere, the mile as thus defined varies considerably. Therefore, the British assigned it a standard value of 6,080 feet.

Advice of the Day

Collars around seedlings will help keep cutworms at bay.

Home Hint of the Day

To keep oil paint from skinning over, pour a little thinner on top of the paint, then close the lid tight. The fumes from the thinner leave no air in the can to cause the paint to dry out.

Word of the Day

DinkA soft return in tennis. The tennis ball will drop abruptly after crossing the net.

Puzzle of the Day

What do snowmen eat for breakfast?Snowflakes.

Died

• Nicolaus Copernicus (astronomer) – 1543
• William Lloyd Garrison (writer) – 1879
• Duke Ellington (jazz composer, pianist, & bandleader) – 1974
• Milton Shedd (co-founder of Sea World) – 2002
• Dick Martin (comedian) – 2008

Born

• Queen Victoria (British monarch) – 1819
• George Grey Barnard (sculptor) – 1863
• Bob Dylan (musician) – 1941
• Gary Burghoff (actor) – 1943
• Patti LaBelle (singer) – 1944
• Priscilla Presley (actress) – 1945
• Jim Broadbent (actor) – 1949
• Kristin Scott Thomas (actress) – 1960
• John C. Reilly (actor) – 1965
• Billy Gilman (country singer) – 1988

Events

• Canada’s first medical graduate, William Logie, awarded degree by McGill University– 1833
• Samuel Morse transmitted the first telegraphic message from the U.S. Supreme Court room, Washington, D.C., to Baltimore. The message: What hath God wrought– 1844
• The steamer, Victoria, sank in Thames River near London, Ontario– 1881
• Ohio Anti-Saloon League founded, Oberlin, Ohio– 1893
• First major league baseball night game was played in Cincinnati, Ohio– 1935
• Aurora 7 took flight. It was the second U.S. manned orbital space flight– 1962
• United States and USSR agreed to cooperate in space exploration– 1972
• Crop circle discovered in Haysville, Kansas– 2003
• Canada’s famous clock on the Peace Tower of the Parliament Buildings in Ottawa stopped for the first time– 2006

Weather

• Snowstorm across Kentucky with accumulations of 4 to 6 inches of snow– 1894
• Hail fell to a depth of 6 to 8 inches near Ada, Oklahoma– 1940
• Snow whitened the Green Mountains of Vermont– 1967

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