Today:
Scattered sprinkles. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 67. Calm wind becoming west around 5 mph in the afternoon.
Tonight:
Partly cloudy, with a low around 49. Calm wind.
Mostly sunny skies will follow through much of the new week, with highs in the 60s and lows in the upper 40s.
Courtesy of HistoryNet:
1633 The tobacco laws of Virginia are codified, limiting tobacco production to reduce dependence on a single-crop economy.
1861 A furious Governor Sam Houston storms out of a legislative session upon learning that Texas has voted 167-7 to secede from the Union.
1878 Birth of Hattie Caraway, first woman elected to the U.S. Senate.
On This Day: Germany wages unrestricted sub warfare during WWI
On Jan. 31, 1917, Germany announces it will wage unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships, including passenger carriers, in war-zone waters.
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On January 31, 1917, Germany announces it will wage unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships, including passenger carriers, in war-zone waters. File Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
On January 31, 1968, Viet Cong guerillas raided the U.S. Embassy in Saigon as part of the Tet Offensive during the Vietnam War. File Photo courtesy the U.S. Army
On January 31, 2001, a Scottish court meeting in the Netherlands convicted a Libyan man, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. UPI/Crown Office | License Photo
January 15, 2021
Lt. Col. Gerald Peter Foss took his last flight Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2021. He was born June 18, 1932, in Lake Forest, Ill. At just five months, Gerry moved to his parents’ old neighborhood in Oslo, Norway. He stayed there throughout the German occupation and returned to the U.S. in 1951. Fluent in English, German, Swedish and Norwegian, Gerry enlisted in the U.S. Air Force at the height of the Korean War. He graduated from pilot training and was commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant.
Gerry logged over 11,000 hours in the air during his military career. He flew numerous aircraft including B-26, SA-16, C-7, C-124, C-133 and helicopters. He flew worldwide airlifts, including North and South Poles. He also served as commander of a rescue unit in Tan Son Nhut and Bien Hoa during the Vietnam War. His final assignment was chief of current intelligence in Northern Europe, NATO. He retired from the Air Force with the rank of lieutenant colonel, having served his c
By LTC Craig Roberts, USAR, Ret.
Nov 2013 Soldier of Fortune
In the early morning hours of January 31st, 1968, Communist forces across South Vietnam began an offensive that would later become known as the “Tet Offensive.” For months the attacks against American and South Vietnamese bases had been planned and organized. The North Vietnamese generals, led by Minister of Defense Vo Nguyen Giap, had planned the attack to coincide with Vietnam’s Lunar New Year, a holiday season where many of the South Vietnamese troops would be home on leave, or at least not on duty at their various bases.
The plan was bold. For the Saigon attacks Giap formulated a coordinated attack with missions to seize and neutralize key command and control centers, armor and artillery depots at Go Vap, take over the Cholon sector of Saigon, neutralize Tan Son Nhut Air Base in Saigon, and at the same time destroy the Newport Bridge that linked Saigon to L