On this day 37 years ago, the famed Hubble Space Telescope was launched into low Earth orbit by the Space Shuttle Discovery. Built by NASA with help from the European Space Agency, Hubble is still in operation today, as one of the largest and most versatile of its kind. WATCH an anniversary video… (1990)
Girl Spots Endangered Axolotl Under a Bridge in Wales and Family Mounts Extraordinary Rescue
A mom was left stunned when her 10-year-old daughter spotted a critically-endangered axolotl under a bridge in Wales—an exciting moment that made the family cut their vacation short to rescue and research the rare salamander.
Melanie Hill and her family were traveling around South Wales in their camper van when on April 10 her daughter Evie was playing down by the River Ogmore in Bridgend, and made the discovery.
The nature-loving youngster saw the nine inch (22cm) pale salamander nestled in the rocks after lifting up a discarded mat in the river. She immediately identified it from watching videos about them on Youtube.
She excitedly rushed to tell her mother, who would not believe her, and told her it was probably a newt or lizard.
“But she was about to make me eat my words—because now I have one in my kitchen,” she told SWNS news agency.
The clever girl knew what it was straight away after seeing its unique gills.
“I ran up to my mum shouting ‘I’ve found an axolotl, I’ve found an axolotl’—but she did not believe me at all.”
“She told me not to go back in the water, but then I went down to the bank and spotted it again. So I jumped in and caught it with my hands.”
The undaunted girl carried the amphibian back to the camper and said, “Sorry I broke the rules, but look, I’ve caught the axolotl’.”
“I really couldn’t believe it,” said her mom, who grabbed her sister-in-law’s gravy boat so Evie could put it down.
The next day they went to the nearest store to get a suitable container and contacted a local breeder, to get advice about the damage on the creature’s tail and stomach.
Although the discovery is being described as the first sighting of an axolotl “in the wild” in Britain, it was likely surviving in captivity as someone’s pet before ending up in the river.
The endemic species, Ambystoma mexicanum, thrived in Mexican lakes until the Aztecs began diverting their water, which dried up much of their habitat. Invasive species then ruined more of their wetland home located near Mexico City during the 20th century. Today only 50 to 1,000 adult individuals remain in the wild there.
Axolotls as pets, however, have seen an explosion in popularity in recent years, thanks to game like Minecraft and Roblox, with up to a million currently housed in captivity.
Specimens are used extensively in scientific research for their remarkable ability to regenerate parts of their bodies, including limbs, gills and parts of their eyes and brains.
GOOD AXOLOTLS NEWS: Perpetually-Smiling Endangered Amphibian Now Thrives in Artificial Wetlands in Mexico City
After getting advice on how to care for it, Evie’s mom said the axolotl is recovering well back at their home in Leicester, England.
“We spent hours doing our research on how best to keep it healthy and Evie has named him Dippy D—Dippy after the bridge where it was found and D for dragon, as it’s our Welsh Dragon.”
It is illegal to release or leave a non-native species in the wild, says Chris Newman, director of the National Centre for Reptile Welfare, who told the BBC that Evie probably saved Dippy’s life.
“It would not have lived very long if Evie hadn’t seen it,” he said. “Predatory animals would have had it for lunch, and it already had bite marks on its back.”
“I think she did a remarkable job to find him—and catching them is no mean feat,” he said. “They’re quite slippery, so I think she did really well.”
SHARE THE CURIOSITY With Nature Lovers on Social Media…
Seeds Can ‘Hear’ the Rain–And the Sound Waves Make Them Grow Faster Shows MIT Study
Seeds may come alive to the soothing sound of rainfall, sensing the drops while they are still beneath the surface, suggests a new study.
A series of experiments at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology demonstrated that rice seeds sprouted faster to the sound of rainfall.
The sound of falling droplets effectively shook the seeds out of a dormant state, stimulating them to germinate at a faster rate compared with seeds that were not exposed to the same sound vibrations.
The findings, published yesterday in the journal Scientific Reports, are the first direct evidence that plant seeds and seedlings can sense sounds in nature.
Rice seeds can germinate in either soil or water, and these experiments involved seeds submerged in shallow water.
The researchers suspect that many similar seed types may also respond to the sound of rain.
The MIT team found that when a raindrop hits the surface of a puddle or the ground, it generates a sound wave that makes the surroundings vibrate, including any shallowly submerged seeds.
The vibrations can be strong enough to dislodge a seed’s “statoliths”, tiny gravity-sensing organelles within certain cells of a seed. When the statoliths are jostled, their movement is a signal for seeds and seedlings to grow and sprout.
“The energy of the rain sound is enough to accelerate a seed’s growth,” said study author Professor Nicholas Makris.
“What this study is saying is that seeds can sense sound in ways that can help them survive.”
ALSO AMAZING: Animals React to Secret Sounds from Plants That We Couldn’t Hear – Until Now
Plants have evolved to sense and respond to many stimuli in their surroundings to help them survive: some plants snap shut when touched, some curl inward when exposed to toxic smells, and most respond to light, reaching toward the sun to help them grow.
Prof. Makris says plants can also sense gravity. A plant’s roots grow down, while its shoots push up against gravity’s pull.
One way that plants sense and respond to gravity is through their statoliths, which are denser than a cell’s cytoplasm and can drift and sink through the cell, like sand in a jar of water.
When a statolith finally settles to the bottom, its resting place on the cell’s membrane is a reflection of gravity’s direction and a signal for where a seed’s root or shoot should grow.
Makris became curious when Cadine Navarro, an MIT graduate, asked him about seeds and sound. They wondered if sound could be enough to jostle the statoliths and stimulate a seed to grow.
“I went back to look at work done by colleagues in the 1980s, who measured the sound of rain underwater,” explained Makris. “If you check, you’ll see it’s much greater than in the air.
“It has to do with the fact that water is denser than air, so the same drop makes larger pressure waves underwater.
“So if you’re a seed that’s within a few centimeters of a raindrop’s impact, the kind of sound pressures that you would experience in water or in the ground are equivalent to what you’d be subject to within a few meters of a jet engine in the air.”
The researchers suspected that such rain-induced sound waves might be enough to jostle statoliths and subsequently stimulate a seed’s growth—and they were right.
Growing 30-40% faster
They submerged around 8,000 individual seeds of rice in shallow tubs of water and exposed sections of them to dripping water.
ANCIENT SEED DISCOVERY: Scientists Grow Tree from 1,000-year-old Seed Found in Cave–May Be Lost Medicinal Plant in the Bible
The researchers varied the size and height of each water droplet to mimic raindrops during light, moderate, and heavy storms. They also used a hydrophone to measure the acoustic vibrations created underwater by the water droplets.
The team compared the measurements to recordings they took in the field, such as in puddles, ponds, wetlands, and soils during rainstorms. Comparisons confirmed that their water droplets in the lab were generating rain-induced acoustic vibrations like those found in nature.
The groups of seeds that were exposed to the sound of water drops were able to germinate 30% to 40% faster than the seed groups that were not exposed to rain sounds but were otherwise in identical conditions.
DID YOU KNOW? Glow-in-the-Dark Petunias Emit Bioluminescence Like Fireflies–Now For Sale in 48 States Online
The team also found that seeds that were closer to the surface could better sense the droplets’ sounds and grow faster, compared to more submerged or more distant seeds.
The researchers believe that there may be a biological advantage to seeds that can sense rain. If seeds are close enough to the surface to respond to the sound of rain, they are likely at an optimal depth to soak up moisture and safely grow to the surface.
The team then worked out calculations to see whether the physical vibrations of the droplets would be enough to jostle the seeds’ microscopic statoliths. They found that the experiments they performed on rice seeds were consistent with their calculations: the sound of rain can dislodge and jostle a seed’s statoliths.
“Brilliant research has been done around the world to reveal the mechanisms behind the ability of plants to sense gravity,” said Prof. Makris.
“It gives new meaning to the fourth Japanese micro-season, entitled ‘Falling rain awakens the soil.’”
LOOK: Plant Brought to the Office 14 Years Ago Has Grown into 600-Foot Monster
The team plan to investigate other natural vibrations and sounds, like wind, that plants may perceive.
SHARE THE AWE-INSPIRING STUDY With Gardeners on Social Media…
After Hiker Falls From Cliff, Dog is Left Behind Shivering Until Pilot Crowdfunds for Rescue Flight to Reunite Them
Jessica Johnston was lucky to have survived after plummeting from the top of a 180-foot waterfall while hiking in the mountains. But when she lost her footing—she also lost her dog.
They were enjoying one of the world’s richest landscapes, New Zealand’s South Island—with its rainforests, glaciers, fjords, and crystal-clear lakes. Every day was a new adventure camping with her border collie Molly.
Then, Johnston’s foot slipped and she fell down an 18-story waterfall. Somehow, Johnston survived. Rescuers arrived to help her, but Molly was nowhere to be found.
News of Molly’s plight spread quickly across New Zealand and a local helicopter company set up a crowdfunding campaign to support a search that would cost about $50 a minute.
Within eight hours, $11,500 had poured in—enough for Precision Helicopters to fund 3 trips. The company had previously rescued a cow on a cliff’s edge and a horse stuck in a swamp—and these guys hoped Molly would be next.
“HUGE thank you to so many people who have donated to get a search underway for Molly the dog,” Precision Helicopters posted to its Facebook page.
“Plan is to first search Tuesday in fine weather conditions with some sophisticated thermal imagery tech coming over from (the city of Christchurch) and a good team of volunteers.”
A little before 4 p.m. on March 30, Precision Helicopters Ltd. posted a video to its Facebook page that the search for Molly was underway. A blue helicopter flew up and over a mountain headed toward the waterfall where Johnston last saw her dog.
In just over an hour, there was another video worth sharing. A thermal imaging camera showed something wedged in between a pile of rocks. As the helicopter approached, the object became more apparent.
It was a bedraggled black and white dog, soaking wet and shivering. Molly.
A crewman, Wayne, climbed down from the chopper as it hovered near the rocks. He brought his search-and-rescue dog, a Jack Russell terrier named Bingo, to help keep Molly calm.
He offered the shivering dog a piece of sausage and then corralled her in one arm as he held Bingo in the other. Before long, they were all safely back inside the helicopter.
“MOLLY HAS BEEN FOUND!!” Precision Helicopters reported on Facebook.
The dog had survived a week in the wild, possibly eating some small animals to stay alive. All that was left was to reunite her with Johnston.
When they met again, Molly ran up to Jessica, who had a huge cast on her right arm, jumping up to lick her face. (Watch video of the rescue and heartwarming reunion below…)
The past week had pushed them both to the brink—and even beyond it, but with help from strangers and friends, they were back together again.
ANOTHER PAWSOME STORY: Half-blind, 12-yo Dog Fights off Hungry Bear to Protect Family and Pets in New Mexico: “She’s our little savior ’
“She’s been through a bloody rough week,” Johnston wrote on Facebook. “But with both of us back home, I can add this adventure to the list.”
SPREAD THE DOG KISSES AND REUNION VIBES By Sharing This Story to Your Social Media Network…
250 Millionth Tree Planted! Eco-Loving Search Engine Ecosia Hits Milestone For Earth Day
Reaching a stellar milestone just before Earth Day, Ecosia, the nonprofit search engine, is celebrating 250 million trees planted worldwide, becoming the world’s largest planter of native trees.
Since its founding in 2009, Ecosia has built the world’s largest network of local reforestation operations, numbering more than 200,000 tree planters and 125 organizations worldwide. Users’ clicks and searches, as well as the ad revenue they generate, translate to revenue which the company uses to organize tree planting.
These partnerships have allowed the tech company to focus on working with local experts to plant 1,600 native tree species, including 144 endangered or vulnerable species making them the leading contributors to threatened-tree conservation. These efforts are helping biodiversity hotspots recover and restoring ecosystems in communities for generations to come.
Founder Christian Kroll—together with Germany’s Federal Minister for the Environment—planted a tree to symbolize the 250 million milestone in front of the German federal parliament, the Reichstag, in Berlin where Ecosia is headquartered.
“All of our successes have come from this powerful on-the-ground movement, ” said Christian Kroll, founder of Ecosia. “From one click in 2009 to 250 million trees today, our global community supercharged our climate action.”
GNN has previously reported on Ecosia. The search online often targets countries that are the most biodiverse, where tree loss directly corresponds with species loss. This has caused them to launch projects in Nicaragua and Peru, Burkina Faso and Malawi, and Indonesia and Australia.
In 2018, for example, they created a tree nursery for 200,000 trees in Madagascar, to help create a forest corridor leading from an isolated habitat to the ocean. In 2019 they created a forest agriculture project in Borneo, to prevent locals selling the land to oil palm development.
That same year, Ecosia took measures to ensure that it can never be sold and that no one, including the founder, can profit or receive dividends from the company. This means that the business is set up purely to benefit the planet.
Growing trees and forests is a long term game that is more than just planting seedings. Some of Ecosia’s trees get planted because they guarantee future revenue for the community (e.g. fruit and nut trees or trees that boost harvest yields); these provide a strong incentive for the beneficiaries of these products to protect the trees long term. Other reforestation work provides returns on investment for financers. These are the most well funded.
However, not every tree has a straightforward financial return of investment and therefore making a case for long term investment is not clear cut. In fact, much of the deforestation today is the result of trees not being worth much in the eyes of economics.
RELATED: Peru is Protecting Machu Picchu By Planting One Million Trees to Guard Against Mudslides and Fires
This is why Ecosia’s work is so critical to reforestation. It can step in where return-seeking capital won’t. This allows vital ecosystems and communities to be supported without greenwashing or offsetting motives. A purpose company with only one shareholder: the planet.
Unique to any other tech company, Ecosia has a dedicated Tree Team; a group of forestry and nature conservation experts, social business experts, economists and social scientists, focused on finding the right partners to work with, collaborating with communities, and planting the right species to ensure our trees thrive. It is the only company in the world with a CTPO: Chief Tree Planting Officer.
MORE STORIES ABOUT TREES: Planting 30,000 Trees Surpasses Goal for Regenerating a Rainforest on the Isle of Man
“We care about our trees long term, not just for some pretty pictures of young saplings,” shared Pieter van Midwoud, Ecosia’s CTPO. “We have developed a vigorous monitoring program to analyse if projects that we started would benefit from further support. Ecosia as a purpose company is best placed to do this long term and we hope to grow millions of more trees.”
The next chapter for Ecosia is to make a bigger move into landscape restoration. Rather than solely assessing projects on factors that affect the long term benefits of trees—such as the water supply, fuel access and financial sustainability—the company has started to take a more active role in influencing those factors.
“We know that collaborating together with the local community is the only way to run a successful restoration project long term, so combining tree planting with complementary interventions that enable farmers and nature to have a bigger impact will be further strengthened,” said van Midwoud.
SHARE This Story With Your Friends, And Maybe Change Your Default Search Engine…
“What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul.” – Joseph Addison
Quote of the Day: “What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul.” – Joseph Addison
Photo by: Dmitrii Shirnin for Unsplash+
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Good News in History, April 23
112 years ago today, the first-ever baseball game was played at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Then known as Weeghman Park, its original occupants were the Chicago Whales, then known as the “Chi-Feds.” Wrigley Field is known for its ivy-covered brick outfield wall, the unusual wind patterns off Lake Michigan, the iconic red marquee over the main entrance, the hand-turned scoreboard, its location in a primarily residential neighborhood with no parking lots and views from the rooftops behind the outfield, and for being the last Major League park to have lights installed for night games. READ a bit more… (1914)
Teacher’s Opera Karaoke Goes Viral and Lands Him Audition on Britain’s Got Talent (WATCH His Nessun Dorma)
A teacher’s pub karaoke rendition of the opera classic Nessun Dorma was so good that it went viral—and also earned the attention of producers from Britain’s Got Talent.
37-year-old Benjamin Gillham had been out drinking in Liverpool, celebrating the birthday of his friend Laura Beever. The two went for drinks, and then decided to do some karaoke.
The duo rocked up to Cooper’s Town House pub on April 7th where they performed one song each before Beever signed Gillham up for the iconic Puccini aria “without him knowing.”
Captured on a phone video, Gillham puts on a magical display inside the small pub with an audience of 12 people, leading some (like the lady in white seated next to him) to tears before receiving a standing ovation.
The pub later uploaded the video on social media, and it has since racked up over 3 million views, with thousands of enthralled watchers leaving comments. (Watch the clip with its dramatic climax below…)
Gillham, from the Wirral Peninsula just outside the city, has since told how producers from BBC One’s The Voice UK and ITV’s Britain’s Got Talent have got in touch asking if he would like to apply to perform on their shows.
“The response has been incredible, social media can be soul-destroying but it has been really nice seeing all the comments about my voice,” said Gillham, who explained that Beever had asked him if he wanted to sing the aria, but then signed him up queued it up anyway after he declined.
“I had a couple of drinks, and there was a chance that the top notes wouldn’t have come out. But now I have her to thank, really as the video went viral.”
HIDDEN TALENTS: 55-Year-old Janitor Cleans Up on America’s Got Talent Winning $1M for Heart-Wrenching ‘Don’t Stop Believing’
He then became a creative arts teacher at special education school Foxfield School, in Merseyside, which he says he “loves.”
“Seeing the joy that music brings, it means too much to them, it is a lovely place to work.”
The singer says the video has reignited his passion for singing and hopes it will bolster his career.
As a teenager, Gillham dreamed of being a professional singer, and in fact did several auditions for The Voice, The X Factor, and Britain’s Got Talent, but was never accepted.
THE JOY OF SINGING: Watch Incredible Moment Young Opera Fan Stands Up During Soprano’s Verdi Performance to Sing Tenor Part
“No one expected the video to land the way it did. The standing ovation at the end, even the woman next to me who was reduced to tears.”
“It has been quite emotional for me receiving all the comments about my voice, and then to be contacted by the talent show was just an incredible feeling. I am looking forward to seeing what happens next.”
SING About This Man’s Hidden Talent, And The Just Rewards To Come…
First Ever Complete Skeletal Cast of 30-Foot Extinct Alligator–See it in Georgia
A museum in Georgia is now home to the world’s first complete and scientifically accurate mounted skeleton of Deinosuchus schwimmeri, one of the largest and most dangerous reptiles to ever live.
Deinosuchus schwimmeri, which walked the eastern United States 83 million to 76 million years ago, was a dinosaur-eating, school-bus-sized relative of modern alligators.
Measuring up to 31 feet (9.45 meters) long, the new Deinosuchus schwimmeri prototype was commissioned by the Tellus Science Museum in Cartersville, Georgia.
Made of casts from fossilized remains, it’s a special experience for Georgia children who visit the museum to understand how their state has changed over the millennia.
“Tellus is currently the only museum to have a cast of Deinosuchus schwimmeri, so this is an experience our visitors can’t get anywhere else,” Rebecca Melsheimer, the museum’s curatorial coordinator, told Columbus (Georgia) State University press.
“The scale of the dinosaurs and other creatures that lived during [the Late Cretaceous epoch] is hard to capture in words or pictures. We can tell you that Deinosuchus is 30 feet long, but seeing it is far more impactful.”
Deinosuchus schwimmeri was named after a scientist from CSU who has spent 40 years studying the genus and who worked for another 2 to ensure this new cast at the Tellus Museum is just what the animal would have looked like; as close to it as is possible achieve with just bones.
That scientist, David Schwimmer, saw his first Deinosuchus fossil in 1979, and it led to a career in Paleontology that saw him make major discoveries and publish seminal works on this apex alligator.
YOU’LL BE SURE TO LIKE:
- Fossil Remains of ‘Weird’ Creature with Twisted jaw and Sideways Teeth Discovered
- Chance Rediscovery of Fossils Found in the 1960s Retell the Story of Giant, Globetrotting Amphibian
- Cave of Wonders: Where Prehistoric Bees Made Nests in the Bones of Animals Eaten by Colossal Owls
With several Deinosuchus sites within 40 miles of Columbus, the area has been a rich bed of discovery for Schwimmer and the student researchers who have tagged along on his expeditions. Schwimmer said that proximity is also what makes the Tellus Science Museum a natural place for the first Deinosuchus fossil replicas.
“Bones and fossils tell us only part of the story,” Schwimmer said. “Fully assembled, life-size replicas become a blueprint for better understanding the dynamic animals that creatures like Deinosuchus really were.”
SHARE This Great Reason To Go To Columbus (Georgia) With Your Friends…
His ‘Granborghini‘ Project Gives Elderly People Joyrides in Supercars (WATCH)
An Englishman whose grandmother took her own life while suffering from loneliness has started a turbo-charged effort to reduce social isolation.
Called “Granborghini” the charity connects seniors and elderly in the UK with the owners of supercars made by Ferrari and Maclaren to give them a spin.
Organizer Mark Cody had always promised ‘gran’ he’d take her for a ride in a Lamborghini one day, but never got the opportunity. After, he made a promise to make sure others would have the same chance in the name of preventing future tragedies of isolation.
Cody says he didn’t know about the widespread epidemic of loneliness among retirees in the UK, but after learning about its pervasiveness, made a few phone calls and Granborghini was born.
“What started out a as daft idea, trying to do some good and raise awareness in a wild and exciting way for people who get forgotten about, has blown me away with the response,” Cody told the UK‘s ‘This Morning’ show.
“We’ve had people step out of the car and say ‘I feel like a rock star’ or ‘I feel 20 years younger,'” Cody then told the BBC. “It’s so heart-warming and overwhelming emotionally to see people’s reactions.”
Partnering with Mark is 82-year-old Betty Tynan, organizer of a small social group called Friendship Lunches, and also the first gran to get behind the wheel of one of the supercars.
HELPING THE ELDERLY:
- Watch London DJ Lead a Fabulous ‘Day Rave’ at Senior Center to Combat Loneliness
- ‘Call a Boomer’ Payphone Instantly Connects Youth with Seniors to Tackle Loneliness Across Generations
- Japan’s Yogurt Delivery Ladies Serve as a Support Net for Country’s Aging Population
One day, she and her friends were having a fundraising event and Cody was there with three supercars. As Tynan revealed recently, even though the opportunity was there to drive one, the members of the luncheon club were like wildebeest at the edge of the river waiting to see who’s the first one to jump in.
For starters, the low riding cars are a bit difficult to get in and out of you know. But Tynan is a social soul, and wanted to have a go immediately. The MacLaren’s owner, Robbin Gibbons, said he got involved with Granborghini in order to do exactly what he wanted to do when he bought the car: make people smile.
“They’ve got a good few cars here and I’m hoping to get in every one,” said Tynan. “It’s made our lives, doing this.”
WATCH one of the grans take a spin in a Lambo…
SHARE These Grannies’ Wild Ride With Your Friends…
Unlikely Prom King Is School Principal Who Disarmed an Active Shooter in the Lobby (WATCH)
At an Oklahoma High School, an unlikely candidate was recently crowned Prom King: Principal Kirk Moore.
Moore was recently hailed as a hero by the students after he disarmed a gunmen entering Pauls Valley High School, receiving a gunshot wound in the process.
Security camera footage captured the suspected gunman and former Pauls Valley student Victor Hawkins enter the school with a handgun and point it at several students in the lobby.
That’s when Moore came flying out of his office, tackling the young man to the ground before another staff member came and removed the weapon.
Moore was airlifted to the hospital to undergo treatment, and was up on his feet again not long after.
At the best night of their lives later that month, the students welcomed Kirk Moore to the dancehall to raucous applause where he received the crown.
Now in jail, Hawkins awaits trial on May 8th where he will face various firearms and shooting charges.
“The actions of the staff and the principal stepping in as soon as they saw a subject with a firearm saved lives,” Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation spokesman Hunter McKee said following the incident.
WATCH the principal disarm the shooter and be crowned Prom King below…
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“Earth provides enough to satisfy everyone’s needs, but not everyone’s greed.” – Mahatma Gandhi (Happy Earth Day!)
Quote of the Day: “Earth provides enough to satisfy everyone’s needs, but not everyone’s greed.” – Mahatma Gandhi (Happy Earth Day!)
Photo by: Harrison Schmitt aboard NASA’s Apollo 17
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Good News in History, April 22
Today is the 56th anniversary of Earth Day. Created at a time when water and air pollution were out of control—20 million Americans in colleges, schools, and communities observed the first Earth Day. READ how it came about… (1970)
The movement’s leader, Sen. Gaylord Nelson, directly credited this outpouring of public support for persuading US politicians that environmental issues had a voting constituency. Within two years, the country saw passage of the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the establishment of the EPA, the ban on DDT, and the reduction of lead from paint. The holiday is now celebrated annually around the globe.
MORE Good News on this Day:
- The Oklahoma Land Rush began at noon as thousands of homesteaders staked claims (1889)
- Happy 75th Birthday to British-American rock legend Peter Frampton, known for his double LIVE LP Frampton Comes Alive, and the hit, Show Me The Way (1950)
- Pink Floyd‘s legendary album, Dark Side Of The Moon, set the record for total consecutive weeks on the Billboard 200– 741 weeks over 14 years (1988)
- Japan‘s Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi apologized for Japan’s war record (2005)
- Sudan banned female genital mutation and made it a crime (2020)
Happy Birthday to Jack Nicholson who turns 89 years old today. Born in New Jersey, the actor has excelled in genres from satirical comedy to romance to dark portrayals of antiheroes and psychopaths. Working in Hollywood for more than 60 years, he has played the “eternal outsider, the sardonic drifter,” the rebels against social structure – and his 12 Academy Award nominations make him the most nominated male actor in the Academy’s history. Only he and Michael Kaine have been Oscar-nominated in every decade since the 60s.
Among his many memorable performances, including the colonel in A Few Good Men, Nicholson won the Oscar twice, for the 1975 drama One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and in 1997 for the romantic comedy As Good as It Gets. He also was named Best Supporting Actor in 1983 for Terms of Endearment. His talent in acting is nearly legendary, and multiple directors have gone out of their way to express this.
“Jack is particularly suited for roles that require intelligence. He is an intelligent and literate man, and these are almost impossible to act. In The Shining you believe he’s a writer, failed or otherwise,”—Stanley Kubrick.
“He’s what the Thirties and Forties stars were like. He can come on the set and deliver, without any fuss, without taking a long time walking around getting into it. “What do you want? Okay.” And he just does it straight off. And then if you want him to do it another way on the next take, he can adapt to that too,”—Tony Richardson.
“There is James Cagney, Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart, and Henry Fonda. After that, who is there but Jack Nicholson?”—Mike Nichols. (1937)
302 years ago today, Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant was born in Prussia. This revolutionary thinker saw rationality as inseparable from morality, and Kant’s formulation of humanity, in his famous “categorical imperative,” states that as an end in itself, humans are required never to treat others merely as a means to an end, but always as ends in themselves.
The tremendous influence of Kant’s moral thought is evident both in the breadth of appropriations and criticisms it has inspired and in the many real-world contexts in which it has found application.
One of his most famous pen strokes outlined in The Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals that one should “act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law.”
Kant believed that morality is the objective law of reason: just as objective physical laws necessitate physical actions (e.g., apples fall down because of gravity), objective rational laws necessitate rational actions. He thus believed that a perfectly rational being must also be perfectly moral, because a perfectly rational being subjectively finds it necessary to do what is rationally necessary. (1724)
104 years ago, Charles Mingus Jr., one of the greatest American jazz band leaders ever, was born in Arizona. Mingus played the double bass and piano, and composed in a soulful center of hard bop jazz surrounded by influences of gospel, blues, free jazz, and classical music. He was also an extreme man, and wielded a fearsome temper.
By the end of his twenties, he had already performed with Louis Armstrong and Charlie Parker, the latter influencing him enormously with his improvisation. His biggest influence was Duke Ellington, and Dizzy Gillespie commented that Mingus was very similar to a “young Duke.”
As a composer, Mingus released 55 albums, with another two dozen or more as a bass player, an instrument on which he is credited as one of the finest ever to play. None is more stunning than Epitaph, a work so long and complex he called it as such, and declared it was written “for my tombstone.” Wynton Marseilles, noticing a trumpet section, remarked that it looked like something purposely written for an advanced music studies book.
It’s 4,235 measures long, takes more than two hours to perform, and was only completely discovered during the cataloging process after his death. With the help of a grant from the Ford Foundation. Indeed it was first performed 10 years after Mingus’ death, but was a critical triumph.
Epitaph wasn’t the only uncovered gem in Mingus’ collection. In 1993, the Library of Congress acquired Mingus’s collected papers—including scores, sound recordings, correspondences, and photos—in what they described as “the most important acquisition of a manuscript collection relating to jazz in the Library’s history”. (1922)
35 years ago today, the Dave Matthews Band played their first–ever live concert when they appeared at the Earth Day festival in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The South-African-born guitarist/singer-songwriter was bartending at Miller’s bar when he was ‘blown away” by jazz musician LeRoi Moore on saxophone, and approached him, along with local drummer Carter Beauford (left), to record some demo tracks.
DMB’s 1994 debut studio album, Under the Table and Dreaming, brought Matthews and his four bandmates worldwide fame; the LP was eventually certified 6x platinum. The jazzy, melodic jam band later launched their own indie label, Bama Rags, and went on to sell more tickets and earn more money during 2000-2010 than any other act in North America—no kidding. Their 2018 album, Come Tomorrow, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, making DMB the first band to have seven consecutive studio albums debut on top. WATCH their music-video performance of Satellite, and check out their charity work… (1991)
– Photo shows DMB violinist and backing vocalist Boyd Tinsley with Matthews (right) and Beauford.
The band’s Bama Works Fund established in 1999, has raised over $52 million to support charities and NGOs, handing out over 2000 grants to local and international nonprofits. Matthews has also supported Farm Aid by performing at their annually concerts and serving on the Board of Directors.
During the pandemic, Dave has been performing in his house, streaming the acoustic shows live on various channels, and is featured on SiriusXM (the DMB channel) with his new Live From Home: By Request series.
Also, 56 years ago today, British yachtsman Robin Knox-Johnston became the first sailor to circumnavigate the globe non-stop and single-handedly.
He launched his solo voyage from the British Isles at age 29, in a 32-ft (9.8m) ketch. Despite losing his self-steering gear off Australia, he rounded Cape Horn and several months later arrived back in Falmouth, completing the trip in 312 days. He authored several books and completed his second solo circumnavigation in 2007 at age 68—and is still sailing (and won a trophy at age 75) from his home base in London.
The spark for the idea was a British newspaper announcing a trophy and prize money to the first person who could do it. Nine men set off in the first Golden Globe race—but only this former Navy man completed it, and he was knighted for the accomplishment. Such round-the-world races became a popular adventure sport. “The challenge is just as stiff as it was in my time; the only difference is they know it can be done.” Visit his website to learn more, and WATCH a video about the voyage… (1969)
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Book Fairies Giving Away 25,000 Books to New York’s Children Thanks to Big Donation
More than 25,000 books are on the way into the hands of underserved residents across New York City and Long Island.
They’ll be distributed across the boroughs by Book Fairies a nonprofit that since 2012 has donated 6 million books to Title I schools, educators, and community partners.
The donations come via the world’s largest online retailer of used books, ThriftBooks, which teamed up with the Book Fairies which hosts large-scale distribution events where community leaders and educators can go and get books that might otherwise be beyond budget.
25,000 books is a lot of weight, and on the ground at the Book Fairies central receiving and sorting area, it’s hard work dividing them between reading level and eventual destination. Volunteers sort the received books before using pallet jacks to move them around in large boxes.
Dan Schwartzberg, who works in media relations for the 4Media group which managed the press for the ThriftBooks donation, told GNN that he visited one of Book Fairies’ free book events and saw the impact of the organization first hand.
“They told me a story where a teacher grabbed a stack of books of the table and started crying because she asked for $150 from the school to buy these particular books for her kids and was denied but found them at Book Fairies for free,” Schwartzberg said.
MORE STORIES LIKE THIS: Eddie Van Halen’s Son Donates $100,000 to Kickstart Charity that Funds School Instrument Purchases
“Book Fairies has an incredible track record of getting books into the hands of children and families,” said Barbara Hagen, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for ThriftBooks.
“ThriftBooks is about more than just selling books, we’re focused on saving them and sharing them, and making sure that reading is something everyone has access to. Partnering with Book Fairies allows us to really turn that mission into action and opens up a life of books for so many children and their families.”
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Courtney Collins, Associate Executive Director for Book Fairies said that last year the organization was 28,000 books short of requests from various partners and schools, and that a gift of this size will have an incredible impact.
“That’s 25,000 opportunities to provide what we otherwise would not have been able to provide, so it’s going to change so many lives,” Collins said, noting that inadequate access to books is the number one cause of delayed child literacy.
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Groundbreaking Bowel Cancer Trial Had Zero Relapses for Patients After 33 Months
A small but substantial tweak to the treatment regime of bowel cancer demonstrated remarkable improvements in survival almost 3 years after surgery.
Changing the kind of drug and the delivery window showed substantial improvements over the previous pairing, and build on earlier results showing that the drug led to major tumor shrinkage in patients with stage 2 or 3 bowel cancer.
These latest findings, to be presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2026 in April, make up the results from the NEOPRISM-CRC clinical trial led by a team from University College London and UCL Hospital.
Patients were treated with a short course of the immunotherapy drug pembrolizumab before surgery instead chemotherapy after surgery. Initial results indicated that 59% of patients had no signs of disease after treatment with pembrolizumab and their operation.
Now 33 months later, none of the treated patients have experienced a return of their cancer. This includes those who had no signs of cancer after treatment and those who still had small amounts remaining, which did not grow or spread during follow-up.
“Seeing that no patients have experienced a cancer recurrence after almost three years of follow-up is extremely encouraging and strengthens our confidence that pembrolizumab is a safe and highly effective treatment to improve outcomes in patients with high-risk bowel cancers,” said Dr. Kai-Keen Shiu, Chief Investigator of the trial from UCL Cancer Institute and a Consultant Medical Oncologist at UCLH.
It’s expected that around 25% of patients who have the standard surgery and post-op chemotherapy will relapse after 3 years, but this study suggests that a short course of immunotherapy before surgery can provide more durable, long-lasting cancer control for this type of high-risk bowel cancer.
Alongside the survival data, researchers analyzed blood samples to better understand why the treatment is so effective and how to identify those most likely to benefit. They designed personalized blood tests that can show early on whether the treatment had worked and whether any cancer was still present in the bloodstream.
“What is particularly exciting is that we now may be able to predict who will respond to the treatment using personalized blood tests and immune profiling,” Dr. Shiu added. “These tools could help us tailor our approach, identifying patients who are doing well and may need less therapy before and after surgery versus patients at higher risk of disease progression or relapse who need additional treatment.”
Bowel cancer is the fourth most common cancer in the UK, with around 44,000 cases a year. In the United States, bowel cancer (also referred to as colorectal cancer) is the third most common cancer diagnosis and the second leading cause of cancer-related death for both men and women. For adults under 50, it is now the number one cause of cancer-related mortality.
Like many cancers, if bowel cancer is caught early, the chances of a positive outcome are high. 9 in 10 patients treated for stage 1 bowel cancer survive for 5 years or more, but specific sub-types of tumors don’t respond as well to treatment and are more likely to return. Five-year survival falls to 65% in stage 3 and 10% in stage 4 bowel cancer.
The NEOPRISM-CRC trial saw 32 patients recruited with stage 2 or 3 bowel cancer and a certain genetic profile (MMR deficient/MSI-high bowel cancer) borne by around 10% to 15% of bowel cancer patients from 5 hospitals around the UK.
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Patients were given up to 9 weeks of pembrolizumab prior to bowel surgery, instead of the usual treatment of surgery followed by 3 to 6 months of chemotherapy, then monitored over time.
“As a research team, we were thrilled to be able to follow patients very closely using the personalized blood tests,” stated Yanrong Jiang, first author of the latest abstract and clinical PhD student at the UCL Cancer Institute. “When tumor DNA disappeared from the blood, patients were much more likely to have no cancer remaining, and this matched the long-term results we’re now seeing.”
“In addition, we also saw that immune profiling from tumour tissue, before patients start their first cycle of treatment, can help to predict response. We hope these tests may be used to guide treatment decisions in a more practical and timely way.”
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73-year-old Christopher Burston said that 3 years after his treatment, he’s returned to normal activities while attending regular follow-up appointments.
“The recovery went fine. I didn’t have any problems. And since then, I’ve been feeling pretty much back to normal. I feel very lucky that I’ve reached the stage where my main problem is age rather than cancer or any illness,” he said.
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2 Litters of Kittens Discovered Living Atop a Shelf at Lowe’s – Soon Ready to Be Adopted
Employees at a Lowe’s in Pennsylvania were shocked after they went to retrieve a pallet high on a shelf and heard a chorus of frightened mewling.
Atop the boxes the pallet held, they discovered 7 kittens across two litters.
The store in Downingtown called Lucky Dawg Rescue shelter and explained their predicament.
Lisa Newton from the shelter received the call, and went down with her cat carrier to investigate.
“They directed me to the Garden Center and said they have 7 kittens, and I was surprised at that. And, they said, ‘two separate litters,'” Newton said to WPVI News.
“They had to get the forklift and go up and get them. One of the litters, you could tell that’s where the mom had delivered them.”
One can only imagine what a strange life it must have seemed for the little creatures as they opened their eyes—the whole world being confined to the box tops on the rectangular shelf, surrounded by a lethal drop to the floor below where strange, bipedal giants routinely chattered and walked about.
The store employees say two female stray cats frequent the Garden Center, and obviously liked it enough to have their litters there. Newton has since heard that the two cats are still around, so Lucky Dawg is planning to return and capture them for neutering.
As for the kittens, Forklift, Herb, Pallet, Planter, Grass, Lowe, and Rose will be available for adoption soon on the shelter’s website.
WATCH the story below from ABC 6…
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World’s Oldest Gorilla, Known for Her Dignified Manner, Celebrates 69
On April 13th, the world’s oldest gorilla celebrated her birthday with a vegetable feast at the Berlin Zoo.
Named Fatou, no one knows how she was taken from her home in Africa, but one story says she was brought to France by a sailor who later had to sell her to settle a bar debt.
The western lowland gorilla eventually arrived in Berlin via a French animal trader, and has far outlived any known member of her species from the wild.
The Berlin zoo cannot confirm the tale, but say that she did arrive in West Berlin Zoo in 1959 at the age of 2. Zookeepers naturally have no idea when she was born, but they picked April 13th as her birthday, and invited the Guinness World Records who recognized her as the world’s oldest gorilla.
“Fatou looks at you and looks right into your soul,” said Philine Hachmeister, a spokesperson for Zoo Berlin. “She has this dignity. She looks at you, and it’s like looking at your grandma. That’s what I’m thinking every time I go past her.”
She has more in common with a grandmother than just her demeanor. She doesn’t move very fast anymore, and suffers from a mixture of age-related maladies. Her eyesight is poor, she has arthritis, and she has to be careful about her blood sugar. This, unfortunately, precludes the routine eating of raspberries and blueberries which were her favorite food.
ZOO STORIES AND GORILLA BITES:
- Virunga National Park Sees Hundreds of Elephants Return and Rare Gorilla Twins Born During Hopeful Year
- Gorillas Use Chest Beating to Prevent Conflict, Not Provoke it, a New Study Finds
- Surgeons Perform First-Ever Surgery for Critically-Endangered Monkey Weeks Before She Gave Birth
Her teeth have mostly fallen out, so zookeepers must cook the majority of her food to make it easier for her to eat.
Compared to the more famous mountain gorilla, the western lowland gorilla is smaller, weighing between 150 and 300 pounds. They still live in large family groups, and are mostly peaceful creatures with incredible social sensitivity, mourning the loss of family members and taking care of their most vulnerable.
“I always say that they reflect some of the best things that we love most about our own species,” Tara Stoinski, president of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund, told the Washington Post.
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“The sea doesn’t reward those who are too anxious or too impatient.” – Mark Doty
Quote of the Day: “The sea doesn’t reward those who are too anxious or too impatient.” – Mark Doty, poet
Photo by: Aaron Burden
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Good News in History, April 21
60 years ago marked the first Groundation Day, now celebrated every year on April 21st, when hundreds of thousands of Rastafari celebrate the arrival of Emperor Haile Selassie in Jamaica in 1966. The great significance of this event in the development of the Rastafari religion is that, having been outcasts in society, its adherents gained a measure of respectability for the first time. With Rasta having become acceptable, reggae music became commercially viable, leading in turn to the further global spread of Rastafarianism. READ what the Marleys thought… (1966)
Evidence from Pompeii Reveals Roman ‘Automatic’ Weapon Used More Than 2,000 Years Ago
2,100 years ago, famed Roman general and one-time dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla laid siege to a rebellious Pompeii during a lesser-known conflict called the Social War.
On the day, Sulla brought along a special form of artillery. The contraption could fire multiple projectiles without needing either to reload or reengage the firing mechanism; in order words, it was the precursor to a machine gun.
Called the “polybolos,” meaning multiple launcher, Sulla’s artillery was something written about in prior Byzantine chronicles, but has never been confirmed to exit through archaeological evidence.
It was apparently designed by the Greek, Dionysius of Alexandria.
Recently, a team from the University of Campania in Italy, led by researcher Adriana Rossi, identified impacts on the city walls made by a large and powerful projectile. The quadrangular holes identified at two sites were identical to each other and closely spaced.
To press the gun metaphors further, Rossi and her team had found the Roman artillery officer’s “groupings.”
Published in the journal Heritage, the study brings together ballistics science and engineering with historical primary sources and intelligent software to reconstruct various impact scenarios. The result is a comprehensive analysis of what could be the first-ever evidence of the polybolos’ existence.
“The indentations—clearly of anthropic origin by number and morphology—bear no resemblance to the circular marks caused by spheroidal projectiles launched by ballistae or skilled slingers,” the authors wrote.
Ballistae used their large, horizontally-bowed arms drawn back by a cord to launch large stones to batter city walls and gates. The polybolos was not so much a siege engine as an anti-personnel weapon. Hypothetical drawings of the device make it appear to be a large stationary bow that shot heavy iron darts capable of piercing wooden barricades and shields.
“The artillery deployed during the assault was primarily intended for anti-personnel purposes, targeting defenders positioned along the ramparts and between the merlons, rather than to demolish the fortifications themselves,” the authors wrote.
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