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Sep 6, 2020 7 tweets 2 min read Read on X
#OnThisDay in 1666, the Great Fire of London was somehow extinguished after ravaging the city for five days. Over 80,000 Londoners were left homeless when, in the early hours of September 2, a fire that began in a bakery on Pudding Lane swiftly grew to devastate the entire city. Image
The fire had its seeds in the preceding year. June 1665 turned out to be unbearably hot. It encouraged the spread of diseases given the city's unhygienic conditions. A new wave of bubonic plague broke out. The subsequent dry spell acted as the catalyst for the Great Fire as well.
Based upon fragments of melted pottery excavated in Pudding Lane, temperature went up approximately to 1700 °C. One main reason why Londoners weren't properly aware was due to abundance of candlelights in wooden homes. In a populated city with open fires, that wasn't unusual.
Very near to Pudding Lane was Leadenhall Street, which housed the headquarters of the East India Company. When the fire started spreading, books, papers, goods, and treasure were hurriedly removed for safety. A letter written to Surat by directors attests to the minimal loss.
When news of the fire reached India, the Dutch in Cochin celebrated and burnt an effigy of King Charles II. The Anglo-Dutch Wars were already a threat. Constant skirmish with the Dutch meant treasury was empty. Charles II even thought that his citizens might rise up in rebellion.
London overcame the plague and the fire of 1665-66. The city was rebuilt thanks to the genius of Sir Christopher Wren. He also saved the king. In 1674, Charles II was presented with the Freedom of the City of London – the only reigning monarch ever to have received this honour.

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More from @PQL_official

Oct 2, 2020
On this day in 1869, #MahatmaGandhi was born in Porbandar, Gujarat.

In 1982, Richard Attenborough's film 'Gandhi' raked in eight Oscars. The film had an ensemble cast and crew, even in lesser roles. Many were already famous and many became legends in the years to come.

THREAD:
In 1962, Motilal Kothari, while working for the Indian High Commission in London, asked Richard Attenborough whether he would direct a film on Gandhi. He got Mountbatten to have a word with Jawaharlal Nehru who agreed with the script. The film is dedicated to all three of them.
Nehru's choice for the role of Gandhi was Alec Guinness. Peter Finch, Harvey Finney, Anthony Hopkins and even Dustin Hoffman were considered at one point of time. The role finally went to a certain Krishna Pandit Bhanji. Ben Kingsley, as he was better known, won an Oscar for it.
Read 18 tweets
Sep 27, 2020
#OnThisDay in 1962, 'Silent Spring', one of the most influential books of all time, was published. It takes its title from the ruinous imagery of John Keats' 1819 ballad 'La Belle Dame sans Merci'.

A Thread: Image
By the early 1960s, Rachel Carson was not an unknown author. Having trained as a biologist, she joined the US Fish and Wildlife Service. In 1951, she published 'The Sea Around Us' which was a bestseller.

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She would spend much of the next ten years focussing on harmful effects of pesticides and this is how she came across a newfound antagonist.

DDT had been around for quite some time. During the days of World War II, it was used to treat malaria.

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Read 11 tweets
Sep 26, 2020
"The Man Who Saved The World"

September 26, 1983. Stanislav Petrov, a lt. colonel in the Soviet Strategic Air Defence Forces, stations himself as the duty officer at the command centre of Oko, a brand new early warning system built to detect any nuclear attack from the US.

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It's half past midnight. All of a sudden, the warning light comes on. A siren starts screaming. This means a missile has been launched from US. A second warning light appears and the siren screams of another missile. Then a third, a fourth, a fifth. The writing is on the wall.

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Everyone in the room freezes for a while. Petrov finds himself in a dilemma. He has clear orders, i.e., pick up the phone and order an appropriate response. The window of reaction is so small that if a split second passes, there might not be any missile bases left in USSR.

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Read 8 tweets
Sep 19, 2020
Last week we added 13 questions from each of the 13 editions of the Indian Premier League, at #IndiaGyanKaBhandar to make #IndiaKnowledgeKaSuperpower.
The D-Day has come. As the nation gears up for the first match of #IPL2020, let's take a look at the answers of those questions: Image
2008

Which cricketer was CSK’s preferred choice for the role of skipper whose decision to represent the city he was brought up ultimately resulted in MS Dhoni being roped in as the most expensive player in the inaugural edition?

Answer: @virendersehwag

#IPL Image
2009

@Bazmccullum scored a mammoth unbeaten 158 runs in the very first match of the tournament. However, who was the first Indian to score a century in IPL?

Answer: @im_manishpandey, then 19-year old, while playing for RCB against Deccan Chargers.

#IPL Image
Read 15 tweets
Sep 16, 2020
Rome won the bid to host the 1908 Olympics. London took over hosting duties as the Italian government had to divert funds to the reconstruction of the city of Naples. The obstacle: Mt. Vesuvius erupted in April 1906. For Italians, April truly turned out to be the cruellest month. Image
The New York Times noted that the Neapolitans were rather glad. They said the eruption of Vesuvius was in preparation for the arrival of King Edward, who left Marseilles on April 3 on the royal yacht Victoria and Albert, accompanied by Queen Alexandra and were due a visit.

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The King and Queen did indeed visit Naples while the clean up operation was underway and later made a cash donation to aid recovery.

However, Queen Alexandra's tryst with Italy and the Olympics did not end here.

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Read 9 tweets
Sep 15, 2020
Agatha Christie turns 130 today.

From an unresolved mystery at a hotel in Mussoorie inspiring her debut novel to the adaptation of her long running play 'The Mousetrap', let us navigate through the many Indian connections of the Queen of Crime!

#Thread Image
Summer of 1911: Frances Garnett-Orme, a British spiritualist, arrived at Mussoorie's Savoy. She was followed by another spiritualist, E. Mountstephen. One day, while Eva had gone to Lucknow, Frances was found dead, with traces of poison. Eva went scot-free due to lack of evidence Image
The case intrigued the British populace in India and it reached Rudyard Kipling who sent the details of the mystery to his friend Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The facts of the case were passed on to Agatha Christie and the case was fictionalized into 'The Mysterious Affair at Styles'. Image
Read 12 tweets

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