Daily Content Archive
(as of Wednesday, June 12, 2019)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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illusionist
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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AdjectivesAdjectives are used almost exclusively to modify nouns, as well as any phrase or part of speech functioning as a noun. Some adjectives appear directly before (or sometimes directly after) the noun or pronoun they modify. What are these called? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 Pole of InaccessibilityA pole of inaccessibility is, due to its distance from geographic features that could provide access, a region’s most difficult-to-reach point. It is a geographic construct, not a physical phenomenon. The oceanic pole of inaccessibility, Point Nemo, lies in the S Pacific, 1,670 mi (2,688 km) from land. The northern pole of inaccessibility is at the approximate center of the most consolidated portion of arctic pack ice. How is the N American pole of inaccessibility used for US national defense? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Ronald Reagan Challenges Mikhail Gorbachev to "Tear Down This Wall" (1987)The Berlin Wall was erected in 1961 by the East German government and later extended along the entire border between East and West Germany. Built to prevent defections, it became a symbol of the Cold War. In 1987, US President Reagan visited Berlin to commemorate the city's 750th anniversary and used his speech to publicly challenge Gorbachev to destroy the wall. Two years later, it was dismantled in a failed bid by the Communists to retain power. Why did some Reagan staffers oppose his speech? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Eddie Adams (1933)Adams, a Pulitzer Prize-winning American photographer and photojournalist noted for his war coverage and portraits of celebrities and politicians, began his career as a combat photographer during the Korean War. His best known photograph, a harrowing image of the moment that South Vietnamese police chief Nguyen Ngoc Loan executed a Vietcong prisoner, Nguyen Van Lem, on a Saigon street in 1968, won the Pulitzer Prize. Why did he later apologize to the police chief for having taken the picture? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 I distrust Great Men. They produce a desert of uniformity around them and often a pool of blood too, and I always feel a little man's pleasure when they come a cropper.E. M. Forster (1879-1970) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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an honest buck— Honest, legal work or income. Often used in the phrase "make/earn an honest buck." Primarily heard in US. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 National Agriculture Fair at Santarem (2019)The most important agricultural fair in Portugal is held for 10 days in June each year at Santarém, capital of the rich agricultural province of Ribatejo. Although the focus of the Ribatejo Fair is on farming and livestock breeding, there is also a colorful program of bullfighting, folk singing, and dancing, as well as a procession of campinos, or bull-herders. Many other European countries exhibit farm animals and machinery at the Feira Nacional de Agricultura. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: kilnhovel - A conical building enclosing a kiln. More... oast - A kiln used to dry hops or malt or tobacco. More... battledore - Can refer to various tools, such as the paddle of a canoe or a utensil for inserting loaves into an oven or wares into a kiln. More... china - Comes from Persian chini, for the delicate and valuable ware first made in China; the word describes pieces made from certain kinds of clay that have been glazed, usually decorated, and fired in a kiln at high temperatures. More... | |