The 1906 San Francisco earthquake struck the coast of Northern California at 5:12 a.m. on Wednesday, April 18 with an estimated moment magnitude of 7.9 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme).
High intensity shaking was felt from Eureka on the North Coast to the Salinas Valley, an agricultural region to the south of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Devastating fires soon broke out in the city and lasted for several days.
Thousands of homes were dismantled. As a result, up to 3,000 people died and over 80% of the city of San Francisco was destroyed.
The events are remembered as one of the worst and deadliest earthquakes in the history of the United States.
The death toll remains the greatest loss of life from a natural disaster in California's history and high in the lists of American disasters.
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💘💌 St. Valentine's Day in the Victorian era: A THREAD 💌💘
The history of the St. Valentine’s Day celebrations appears to have its roots in a pagan fertility festival known as Lupercalia.
Celebrated in ancient Rome between 13 – 15 February, the festival is said to have involved lots of naked folk running through the streets spanking the backsides of young women with leather whips, supposedly to improve their fertility.
At the dawn of the 19th century, Christmas was hardly celebrated – at least, not in a way we would recognise today. Many businesses didn't consider it to be a holiday.
Gift-giving had traditionally been a New Year activity, but moved as Christmas became more important to the Victorians.
🥚✨ Fabergé eggs (Part two: the Other Eggs): A THREAD ✨🥚
In the previous thread, I told you about the Imperial Fabergé eggs, which were the ones made for Russian Tsars Alexander III and Nicholas II as Easter gifts for their wives and mothers.
The Imperial eggs enjoyed great fame, and Fabergé was commissioned to make similar eggs for a few private clients, including the Duchess of Marlborough, the Rothschild family and the Yusupovs.
🥚✨👑 Fabergé eggs (Part one: Imperial eggs): A THREAD 👑✨🥚
A Fabergé egg is a jewelled egg created by the House of Fabergé, in Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire. Possibly as many as sixty-nine were created, of which fifty-seven survive today.
Virtually all were manufactured under the supervision of Peter Carl Fabergé between 1885 and 1917,the most famous being the fifty-two "Imperial" eggs, forty-six of which survive, made for the Russian Tsars Alexander III and Nicholas II as Easter gifts for their wives and mothers.
Rigó Jancsi is a traditional Hungarian cube-shaped chocolate sponge cake and chocolate cream pastry. It gained popularity in the former Austria-Hungary and is named after Rigó Jancsi, a famous Hungarian Romani violinist.
Clara Ward, Princesse de Caraman-Chimay and Jancsi met in 1896, while Rigo Jancsi played violin at a Paris restaurant, where Clara dined out with her husband, Prince Joseph. Between 1896 and 1898, newspapers wrote extensively about the marriage of the primás (first violinist)
Jancsi Rigó to the Belgian countess. The cake is a celebration cake wearing Rigó Jancsi's name and in honor of the romantic love story. Sources do not agree about the origin of the pastry:
🎃 From Samhain to Halloween: How the victorians celebrate this special occasion? : A THREAD 🎃
Halloween is viewed as a traditionally American cultural export enjoyed all over the world, but the spooky celebration actually has its roots in Ireland. It all dates back to ancient times when people across Ireland celebrated Samhain.
A traditionally Gaelic festival signalling the end of the harvest season and the beginning of the colder, darker nights that accompanied winter, Samhain was an annual night of celebrations that ran from October 31st to November 1st.