NASA/Spacelink File Name:9_12_11.TXT

KEY DATES OCTOBER 1991


                            October 1991 Key Dates


Oct    1   NASA-the first day (1958). Arthur C. Clark published
           article on geosynchronous satellites in British
           magazine, "Wireless World" (1945).

       2   First flight of a pilotless aircraft (1918). Phineas
           Fogg's wager day (Around the World in 80 Days, 1872).
           Peary's 34-ton Greenland meteorite reaches the U.S.
           after a hard sea voyage (1897).

       3   First time a rocket reached outer space (1942) X-15
           reached 4520 mph, a record that still stands (1967).
           Mars is occulted by Venus (1590). Asteroid number 300,
           Geraldina, discovered (1890).

       4   Sputnik 1. The Space Age began (1957). First airplane
           flight longer than 0.5 hr, by Orville Wright (1905).

       5   Robert Goddard born (1882).

       6   First dirigible balloon race (1909). First attempt to
           cross Atlantic by balloon (1873).  George Westinghouse,
           inventor, born (1846). Earnest Walton, physicist, born
           (1903). Thor Heyerdahl, ethnologist, born (1914).

       7   Langley attempted to fly (1903). Niels Bohr, physicist,
           born (1885). Full Earth.

       8   First photograph of the backside of the Moon (U.S.S.R.,
           1959).

       9   Jansky announced radio waves coming from the center of
           our galaxy (1933).

      10   China Clipper became the largest plane in the U.S.A.
           capable of carrying 38 passengers and a crew of 5
           (1935). Lassell discovers Triton, Neptune's largest
           moon (1846). Fridtjof Nansen, Artic explorer, born
           (1861).

      11   T. Roosevelt became the first president to fly (1910).
           Pioneer 1 launched (1958).

      12   First crossing of the North Sea by balloon (1907).
           Rebellious space monkey lands in Siberia (1987).

      13   First airphoto from a balloon (Boston, 1860).

      14   Yeager broke the sound barrier (1947). Lemonnier
           observes Uranus, but fails to recognize it as a
           planet.  He will do so nine more times! (1750)

      15   Evangelista Torricelli, inventor born (1608).
           Evidence of another solar system announced (1986).

      16   Dictionary Day. Halley's Comet rediscovered (1982).
           Worst storm to hit England in 300 years (1987).
           Asteroid number 1500, Jyvaskyla, discovered (1938).

      17   New York received transatlantic radio broadcast
           (1907). Major earthquake hits San Francisco (1989).

      18   Asteroid 8, Flora, discovered (1847). Three comets
           discovered in one night (1987). Galileo mission to
           study Jupiter launched (1989).

      19   Goddard's Dream Day (1899). This was the day Goddard
           climbed a cherry tree and dreamed of space travel. He
           always remembered that day and celebrated it each year.

      20   First wedding in a balloon (Cincinnati, 1874). James
           Chadwick, discoverer of the neutron, born (1891).

      21   Meteor shower in Orion tonight, courtesy of Comet
           Halley. Alfred Nobel, inventor and humanitarian,
           born (1833). New England's worst hurricane strikes
           (1938).

      22   First recorded solar eclipse (China, 2136 B.C.).
           Considered to be an attack on the Sun by a dragon.
           Astoria becomes the first xerographic image (1938).
           First use of an aircraft in a war (1911).

      23   Atlantic Monthly publishes story by Edward Everett
           Hale about artificial satellites (1862).  Full Moon.

      24   Coast-to-coast telegraph service began (1861). Joan-
           Miriam becomes first single storm system to be
           designated a hurricane on both Atlantic and Pacific
           (1988). Lassell discovers Ariel and Umbriel, two moons
           of Neptune (1851).

      25   Air Service between New York and Los Angeles began
           (1930). (Flights were made only in the daylight,
           passengers lodged in hotels enroute for the night.)
           Richard Byrd, explorer and aviator, born (1888).

      26   Archbishop Ussher Day. He said, "On this day in
           the year 4004 B.C. the world was created."

      27   First launch of a Saturn 1 (1961). An eclipse
           observed from Boston (1780). Daylight Savings Time
           ends.

      28   Closet known approach to Earth by an asteroid, Hermes
           (1937). (This asteroid has never been seen again.)
           2000th successful launch to orbit or beyond by U.S.S.R.
           (1987). Sky and Telescope magazine is founded (1941).

      29   Enos, the chimp, orbited the Earth twice (1961).

      30   Orson Welles broadcast The War of the Worlds (1938).

      31   Samian Eve, Celtic calendar's last day of the year,
           a time when supernatural beings roamed the Earth.
           Mike Collin's birthday.