Friday 23 July 2010

Martin Luther King, Jr.


Martin Luther King, JR. (January 15th 1929 - April 4th 1968) was an American pastor, activist and prominent leader in the African American civil right movement.


His mail legacy is securing progress on civil rights in the United States. In 1964, King became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end racial discrimination.


By the time of his death in 1968, he refocused his efforts on ending poverty and the Vietnam War, both from a religious perspective.


In 19968 Martin Luther King was shot dead in the Southern US city of Memphis, Tennessee, where he was to lead a march of sanitation workers protesting against low pay and poor working conditions.


He was shot in the neck as he stood on a hotel balcony and dies in hospital soon afterwards.


Police in Memphis were pit on alert for a "well - dressed" white man who is said to have dropped an automatic rifle after shooting and escaped in a blue car.


King, 39 at the time, had previously survived the bombing of his own home in 1956.


Martin Luther King, Jr. day was established as a US national holiday in 1986

Monday 5 July 2010

Game, set and match.

The Wimbledon tennis championship is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, it has been held at the All England Club in the London suburb of Wimbledon since 1877.
The tournament takes place over two weeks in late June and early July.

In 1875, lawn tennis, a game devised by Major Walter Clopton Wingfield a year or so earlier and originally called 'Sphairistike', was added to the activities of the All England Club.
In the spring of 1877, the club was re-titled 'The All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club' and signalled its change of name by instituting the first Lawn Tennis Championship.
The only event held in 1877 was the Gentleman's Singles, which was won by Spencer Gore, an old Harrovian rackets player. About 200 people paid one shilling each to watch the final.
The club then moved in 1922 to it's present site in Church Road.
In 1884, the All England Club added ladies' singles and gentleman's doubles. Ladies' doubles and mixed doubles were added in 1913. Until 1922, the reigning champion had to play only in the final, against whoever had won through to challenge him.
The Championship was first televised in 1937.

Rafael Nadal is the Gentleman's champion, after defeating Czech Tomas Berdych in straight sets. This is Nadal's second Wimbledon Gentleman's Singles title and the eighth slam of Nadal's career. This is the second time in Nadal's career that he has completed the French Open – Wimbledon double, which he did this back in 2008.

6 Facts about Wimbledon!

1. A wooden racket was last used at Wimbledon in 1987

2. During World War II, a bomb ripped through Centre Court at the All England Club and 1,200 seats were lost. Fortunately, they weren't filled at the time. Play finally resumed in 1946 but it wasn't until 1949 that the area was back in top shape.

3. Charlotte (Lottie) Dod became the youngest player ever to win a Wimbledon singles event when, in 1887, she won at the age of 15 years.

4. In 1930, Brame Hillyard became the first man to play wearing shorts. That was on court 10 - and Bunny Austin was the first to do so on Centre Court three years later.

5. The first-ever player to be disqualified from the men's doubles was Tim Henman in 1995, for hitting a ball in anger which struck a ball girl.

6. Only eight left-handed players, six men and two women, have ever won a Wimbledon singles title - the most recent being Goran Ivanisevic in 2001.

Thursday 1 July 2010

Edward VI of England

Edward VI ( 12 of October 1537 to the 6th of July 1553 ) became King of England and Ireland on the 28th of January 1547 and was crowned on the 20th of February at the age on nine.
During Edward's reign the government was run by Regency Council, because he never because he never reached maturity.
The council was led by his uncle Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of somerset ( 1547 - 1549), and the by John Dudley, 1st Earl of Warwick ( 1550 - 1553), who later became Duke of Northumberland.

In April 1552 Edward contracted measles and smallpox, he never properly recovered.
On the 6th of July 1553, Edward died of tuberculosis, an infectious disease causes by a bacterium called mycobacterium tuberculosis, that infects the lungs and the organs in the central nervous system.