FROM WIKIPEDIA COMMONS

The Sierra Club is an environmental organization with chapters in all 50 United States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded on May 28, 1892 in San Francisco, California by Scottish-American preservationist John Muir, who became the first president as well as the longest serving president, at approximately 20 years in this leadership position. The Sierra Club operates only in the United States and holds the legal status of 501(c)(4) nonprofit social welfare organization. Sierra Club Canada is a separate entity.

Traditionally associated with the progressive movement, the club was one of the first large-scale environmental preservation organizations in the world, and currently engages in lobbying politicians to promote environmentalist policies. Recent focuses of the club include promoting sustainable energy and mitigating global warming, as well as opposition to the use of coal, hydropower and nuclear power. The club is known for its political endorsements, which are often sought after by candidates in local elections; it generally supports liberal and progressive candidates in elections.

The Sierra Club is organized on both a national and state level with chapters named for the 50 states and two U.S. territories (Puerto Rico and Washington D.C.) California is the lone state to have numerous chapters named for California counties. The club chapters allow for regional groups and committees, some of which have many thousands of members. These chapters further allow for special interest sections (ex. Camera, Outings), committees (conservation and political), and task forces on a single issue with some kind of geography involved. While much activity is coordinated at a local level, the club is a unified organization; decisions made at the national level take precedence, including the removal and creation of Chapters, as well as recruiting and removing members.

In addition to political advocacy, the Sierra Club organizes outdoor recreation activities, and has historically been a notable organization for mountaineering and rock climbing in the United States. Members of the Sierra Club pioneered the Yosemite Decimal System of climbing, and were responsible for a substantial amount of the early development of climbing. Much of this activity occurred in the group’s namesake Sierra Nevada. The Sierra Club does not set standards for or regulate alpinism, but it organizes wilderness courses, hikes, and occasional alpine expeditions for members. In California, the club, through its outdoor recreation groups, is usually considered the state’s analogue to other state mountaineering clubs such as Mazamas, The Mountaineers, or the Colorado Mountain Club.

TODAY’S ALMANAC

Shavuot Begins

Shavuot begins at sundown on this day. Called the Feast of the Weeks in the Jewish calendar, Shavuot is a two-day holiday that was originally a harvest festival. It’s also a thanksgiving day to commemorate the Giving of the Law, the Torah, recalling when Moses and the Israelites received the Ten Commandments from God at Mount Sinai. Shavuot, which means weeks, always begins exactly seven weeks after Passover. Shavuot is known also as Yom Habikkurim, or “The Day of the First Fruits,” because Israel’s farmers would bring a bundle from their first harvest to the temple in Jerusalem as a token of thanksgiving to God. Spring harvests in Israel began with the barley crop at Passover. Each farmer would set aside the first of each type of fruit to ripen, tie it in ribbon, and all would be brought to the city, accompanied by a joyful, musical celebration.

Question of the Day

How should I cut the roses from my blossoming bushes?

When cutting roses that will be part of an in-house bouquet, cut as little of the stem as possible. It takes about six healthy leaves to make enough food to produce an average rose blossom, so you want to preserve as many leaves on the stem as you can.

Advice of the Day

When folly is bliss, ‘tis ignorance to be otherwise.

Home Hint of the Day

Before using the cooking stove in a summer house for the first time each season, check it over thoroughly. Mice sometimes nest in the drawer at the bottom of the stove.

Word of the Day

Alaska

Alaska’s name comes from an Aleut word meaning “great land.”

Puzzle of the Day

The lamb trots about by a creature whose name read backward or forward is always the same.

Ewe

Born

• King George III (British monarch) – 1738
• Tom Longboat (runner) – 1887
• Dennis Weaver (actor) – 1924
• Dr. Ruth Westheimer (sex therapist, author) – 1928
• Bruce Dern (actor) – 1936
• Robert Fulghum (author) – 1937
• Joyce Meyer (writer) – 1943
• Michelle Phillips (singer & actress) – 1944
• Noah Wyle (actor) – 1971
• Angelina Jolie (actress) – 1975
• Evan Spiegel (American businessman) – 1990

Died

• Giacomo Casanova – 1798
• Reinhard Heydrich (Nazi leader) – 1942
• Dorothy Gish (actress) – 1968

Events

• The Sierra Club was organized in San Francisco, California– 1892
• Henry Ford took his car out for a trial drive around the streets of Detroit– 1896
• Ernest Poole first to win Pulitzer Prize for novel– 1918
• Battle of Midway begins, leading to a great American Naval victory over Japan during WWII– 1942
• Hockey player Gordie Howe retired at age 52– 1980
• Tiananmen Square massacre– 1989
• Eric Ozolins caught a 13-foot-long hammerhead shark, with a girth of 80 inches, off the coast of Padre Island in Texas. The shark was then released.– 2017

Weather

• Early-season hurricanes wrecked ships from Cuba to New England– 1825

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