129 years ago today, Feng Youlan was born. This Chinese academic and philosopher was instrumental in reintroducing the Chinese classics of philosophy to the world. Critically for this form of Intangible World Heritage, as UNESCO describes it, he did so during a time of enormous upheavel, stretching from the fall of the imperial Qing Dynasty to after the Cultural Revolution, when the fervor for tearing down the old to build the new was at a fever pitch. READ more about what he accomplished… (1895)

Feng Youlan from the China Weekly Review’s “Who’s Who in China” column. 3rd Edition.

Upon his high school graduation in 1918, Youlan traveled to the United States where he studied at Columbia University under the famous pragmatist John Dewey. Feng gained his Ph.D. from Columbia in 1923 with a thesis entitled “A Comparative Study of Life Ideals.”

In 1934 while working as chair of a philosophy department, he published History of Chinese Philosophy in two volumes. In it he presented and examined the history of Chinese philosophy from a Western viewpoint, reigniting an academic interest in the Chinese classics of Zhu Xi and Cheng Yi, the Song Dynasty thinkers who themselves reignited interest in Confucianism in their day.

While censored by the Communist Party, Youlan never abandoned his path of studying the classics, and remained in Beijing under censorship until his death in 1990 at the age of 94.

MORE Good News on this Date:

405 years ago today, 38 colonists from Berkeley Parish, England, disembarked in Virginia and gave thanks to God, which is considered by many to be the first Thanksgiving in the Americas (1619)

143 years ago today, the first edition of the Los Angeles Times was published (1881)

The Montreal Canadiens ice hockey club, the oldest surviving pro hockey franchise in the world, was founded (1909)

The decision to join the United Nations was approved by the U.S. Senate, 65-7 (1945)

Journalist Terry Anderson, the last American hostage in Lebanon, was released after 7 years in captivity (1991)

In Angola, a truce was finalized between the government and UNITA rebels (1993)

Tens of thousands of people in Hong Kong protested for democracy, calling on the Government to allow universal and equal suffrage (2005)

An adult giant squid is caught on video for the first time by Tsunemi Kubodera near the Ogasawara Islands, 1,000 km (620 mi) south of Tokyo (2006)

Happy Birthday to actor Jeff Bridges, who turns 75 years old today. His portrayal of ‘The Dude’ in the 1998 cult classic The Big Lebowski earned him legions of fans and he won an Oscar ten years ago for Crazy Heart, which showcased his skill as a musician and singer. (Have you caught one of his concerts?)

2017 photo by Gage Skidmore, CC license

In 2019, he published his second photography book, Jeff Bridges: Pictures: Volume Two, containing more than 125 black-and-white pictures he’s taken with an obscure wide-angle camera on the sound stages of all his films. For the last 35 years, he’s been snapping selfies and candids of himself and co-stars like Streep, Clooney, and Timberlake, turning them into yearbooks, which he then hands out to cast and crew after the movie wraps.

What a life he’s led, with Oscar nominations for his roles inThe Contender, Starman, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Last Picture Show,and True Grit. He’s also the author of The Dude and the Zen Master and has been married for over 40 years to a woman who worked as a maid at the ranch where he was filming a movie. Aiming to help end childhood hunger, he co-founded the End Hunger Network. Watch him use the camera on Kimmel Live and talk about his big 70th birthday party. (1949)

 

68 years ago today, fate brought together four top performers of the 20th century in a Memphis, Tennessee, recording studio.

During a Sun Records session, Carl Perkins was playing with Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash, when a 21-year-old Elvis Presley visited the studio and jammed extensively while audio tapes captured nearly four dozen tracks, including classics like Love Me Tender, Don’t Be Cruel, Tutti Frutti’ and a few Christmas songs, too. Presley also led the jam session in renditions of gospel numbers from his youth.

A reporter who was present dubbed the four men the Million Dollar Quartet, and the nearly complete tapes from this legendary session were eventually released on CDs 31 years later. HEAR one of the songs. (1956)

 

109 years ago today, Henry Ford launched a ‘Peace Ship’ during World War I sailing toward Europe ”to get the boys out of the trenches by Christmas.”

The auto manufacturer chartered the ocean liner Oscar II and invited prominent peace activists to join him, hoping to create enough publicity to prompt the belligerent nations to convene a peace conference and mediate an end to the Great War.

An outbreak of influenza aboard the ship, mockery from the press, and infighting among the activists led him to abandon the mission once it reached Norway—but it forever cemented Ford’s reputation as a supporter of underdog causes.

He asserted that the Peace Ship’s expedition was successful on the grounds that it stimulated discussions about peace—and the press, upon his return, mostly agreed. The New York Herald wrote, “We need more Fords, more peace talks, and less indifference to the greatest crime in the world’s history”. (1915)

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