October 15

Are You Sure ... (October 15, 2020)

• ... that H. L. Hunley, often referred to as Hunley, was a submarine of the Confederate States of America that played a small part in the American Civil War; that Hunley was the first combat submarine to sink a warship, although Hunley was not completely submerged and, following her successful attack, was lost along with her crew before she could return to base; that the Confederacy lost 21 crewmen in three sinkings of Hunley during her short career, and that the ship's designer, Horace Hunley, died during the second sinking?

File:Are You Sure (15 Oct 2020).png

Screenshot: Are You Sure (October 15, 2020)

On This Day in History and Fiction

• 

  1608: Physicist and mathematician Evangelista Torricelli born. He will invent the barometer, make advances in optics, and work on the method of indivisibles.

• 

  1863: Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley sinks for the second time, killing all eight of her second crew, including Horace Hunley himself, who was aboard at the time, even though he was not a member of the Confederate military.

• 

  1894: The Dreyfus affair: Alfred Dreyfus is arrested for spying.

• 

  1965: Mathematician Abraham Fraenkel dies. He contributed to axiomatic set theory, and published a biography of Georg Cantor.

• 

  2015: Pink City voted Picture of the Day by the citizens of New Minneapolis, Canada.