Today is Saturday, Jan. 11, the 11th day of 2025. There are 354 days left in the year.
Today in history
On Jan. 11, 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt leveraged the Antiquities Act of 1906 to proclaim the Grand Canyon as a national monument; it would become a national park in 1919.
Also on this date
In 1861, Alabama became the fourth state to declare its secession from the Union.
In 1964, U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry issued “Smoking and Health,” a report that concluded that “cigarette smoking contributes substantially to mortality from certain specific diseases and to the overall death rate.”
In 2002, the first al-Qaida prisoners from Afghanistan arrived at the U.S. military’s Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba.
In 2010, Mark McGwire admitted to The Associated Press that he’d used steroids and human growth hormone when he broke baseball’s home run record in 1998.
In 2021, House Democrats introduced an article of impeachment against then-President Donald Trump, charging him with “incitement of insurrection” in the wake of the attack on the U.S. Capitol building five days prior.
Fun facts
Thioacetone is a chemical so stinky that a small amount causes nausea up to a half mile away. The smell is so bad it has been described as ‘fearful’.
J.R.R. Tolkien was nominated by fellow author CS Lewis for the 1961 Nobel Prize in Literature, but was overlooked because the jury said the quality of his storytelling wasn’t good enough.
Ancient Rome’s Circus Maximus is still the largest capacity stadium ever built. Historians estimate that it held anywhere from 250,000 to 300,000 spectators.
Aristotle’s Eudemian Ethics, which is about happiness and what makes life worth living, was only published for the first time in a modern language in 2011.
Lars Olof Göran Kropp was a Swedish mountaineer, the first Scandinavian to climb Mount Everest without oxygen. He made a solo ascent of Mount Everest without bottled oxygen or Sherpa support on 23 May 1996, after traveling there from Sweden by bicycle and foot.
Today’s birthdays
Filmmaker Alfonso Arau is 93. Golf Hall of Famer Ben Crenshaw is 73. Jazz guitarist Lee Ritenour is 73. Olympic swimming gold medalist Tracy Caulkins is 62. Filmmaker Malcolm D. Lee is 55. Singer Mary J. Blige is 54. Actor Amanda Peet is 53.
The Edge is compiled by Katie Clohessy. She can be contacted at kclohessy@lmtribune.com.
