National Hot Buttered Rum Day

Today’s Food History

on this day in…

• 1501 Leonhard Fuchs was born. He was a German botanist who compiled the first modern glossary of botanical terms. The plant and the color fuchsia were named for him.
• 1560 Gaspard Bauhin was born. A Swiss botanist who developed a binomial system of plant classification. He published ‘Pinax Theatri Botanici’, which was a compilation that included over 6,000 species that had appeared in works from Theophrastus, Dioscorides and many later herbals.
• 1705 John Ray (Wray) died. A leading 17th century English naturalist and botanist. He contributed to the advancement of taxonomy, and established the species as the basic unit of taxonomy.
• 1706 Benjamin Franklin was born. American diplomat, publisher, inventor, etc. Among his inventions were the Franklin stove and biofocal eyeglasses. He also published ‘Poor Richard’s Almanac.’
• 1890 Peter Henderson died. A Scottish-American scientist, known as the ‘Father of America Horticulture,’ he published ‘Gardening for Profit’ and ‘Gardening for Pleasure’.
• 1922 Betty Marion White was born. She was the actress who played the ‘Happy Homemaker’ Sue Ann Nivens on the Mary Tyler Moore TV show.
• 1929 Popeye the spinach loving sailor first appeared in the comic strip ‘Thimble Theatre.’
• 1997 Clyde W. Tombaugh died. An American astronomer who discovered the planet Pluto in 1930.  Born on a farm near Streator, Illinois, he made his first telescope from old farm equipment parts.
• 2001 Norway lifted a ban on exports of whale meat.

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