Today’s WOTD – 2 November 2012

Brobdingnagian

[brob-ding-nag-ee-uhn]

adjective
1. of huge size; gigantic; tremendous. For example: ‘He governed a brobdingnagian territory’.

noun
2. an inhabitant of Brobdingnag.

3. a being of tremendous size; giant.

Today’s aphorism

‘Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.’

– Mark Twain

On this day

2 November 1917 – British Foreign Secretary, James Balfour, presents a declaration of intent to establish a national homeland in Palestine for the Jewish people. It became known as the ‘Balfour Declaration’.

2 November 1936 – launch of the British Broadcasting Commission (BBC-TV). World’s first regular television service. Initially broadcasting with a radius of 25 miles. It was taken off-air from 1939 – 1946 because of World War II. Now known as BBC One.