Sports Fact & Book Rec of the Day 1/8/2009

1/8/2007:
Florida spots Ohio State a touchdown on the opening kickoff and then annihilates the heavily favored Buckeyes, 41-14, to win the BCS national championship at Cardinals Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. Gators quarterback Chris Leak outplays his Heisman Trophy-winning counterpart, Troy Smith of OSU. Ironically, the Buckeyes help beat themselves when All-American wide receiver Ted Ginn Jr. suffers a twisted ankle in the wild celebration after his game-opening kickoff return TD and misses the rest of the game. It's the second national football title for Florida (1996), the Gators become the only school to be national champs in football and basketball simultaneously.

Birthdays:
Walker Cooper b. 1915
Bruce Sutter b. 1953
Dwight Clark b. 1957
Jason Giambi b. 1971
Mike Cameron b. 1973

Packers Fact:
The Packers beat the Philadelphia Eagles at Lambeau Field on Kickoff Weekend in 2007. The score was 16-13.

THAT WAR TO END WAR

After giving us bestselling novels set during the Civil War and the Revolutionary War, Jeff Shaara turns his talent for vivifying military history to World War I. “Black Jack” Pershing, the “Red Baron” Manfred von Richthofen, and marine private Roscoe Temple are three of the major characters who come alive in this engrossing narration of brutal, total warfare. The book has earned praise from such military masters as General Tommy Franks and General Wesley Clark.

TO THE LAST MAN: A NOVEL OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR, by Jeff Shaara (Ballantine Books, 2005)

Q: I take it that before this accident happend you lived with your brother-in-law and sister for about six months?

A: Yes.

Q: You got to know him quite well?

A: Yes.

Q: You saw him interact with your sister, and I believe they had one child?

A: I didn't see the actual interaction, but they did have one child.

actual courtroom testimony

ROLL CALL

HOW TOWNS GOT THEIR NAMES

Hurricane, West Virginia. A tornado destroyed a nearby forest in 1774. As the tornado neared, someone yelled to Cain, the town blacksmith, “Hurry, Cain.”

Bargaintown, New Jersey. Named by a land developer to lure settlers with the promise of cheap land.

Novi, Michigan. The sixth stagecoach stop outside Detroit was marked by a sign reading “No VI.” Most travelers thought it was a word (not an abbreviation and a Roman numeral).

Galveston, Indiana. Local lore says the town’s founder looked out his window while thinking up a name and saw a “gal with a vest on.”

ON THIS DAY

LALIBELA, ETHIOPIA

The ancient Orthodox Christian community of Ethiopia celebrates its Christmas today. Some of the most revered commemorations take place in Lalibela, where subterranean churches, carved into rock, have been in use since the 12th and 13th centuries.

BOING! BOING! THE RUBBER USED TO MAKE SUPERBALLS IS CALLED ZECTRON.