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Editorial cartoon supporting Quay

The 1899 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held by the Pennsylvania General Assembly starting on January 17, 1899, to fill the Senate seat occupied by Matthew Quay, the state's Republican political boss. Quay sought election to a third term, but was damaged by an indictment for financial irregularities. Although Republicans had a majority in the legislature, enough were opposed to Quay to deny him re-election. After 79 ballots, the session ended on April 20, the day Quay was acquitted, without the election of a senator. Governor William A. Stone appointed Quay to the seat, but the Senate refused to seat him. Quay blamed his fellow Republican boss, Senator Mark Hanna of Ohio, for this and revenged himself at the 1900 Republican National Convention by backing Thomas C. Platt's scheme to politically sideline Governor Theodore Roosevelt of New York by making him vice president, over Hanna's strong objection. The 1901 legislature elected Quay to the Senate and he served there until his death in 1904. (Full article...)

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On this day

January 17

Patrice Lumumba

1562 – Representatives of Catherine de' Medici, the regent of France, drew up the Edict of Saint-Germain, providing limited tolerance to the Protestant Huguenots.
1773 – On James Cook's second voyage, his vessel HMS Resolution became the first vessel to cross the Antarctic Circle.
1912 – Robert Falcon Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition reached the South Pole, only to find that Roald Amundsen's team had beaten them by 33 days.
1961 – Patrice Lumumba (pictured), a former prime minister of Congo-Léopoldville, was murdered in circumstances suggesting the support and complicity of the Belgian and US governments and the UN.
2002 – Mount Nyiragongo, a volcano in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, began an eruption that killed hundreds and left about 120,000 people homeless in the nearby town of Goma.

Henry of Asti (d. 1345)
Thomas Jaggar (d. 1953)
Zhao Ziyang (d. 2005)

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Today's featured picture

Kanayi Kunhiraman (born 1937) is an Indian sculptor. Born in the state of Kerala, he studied sculpture at the Government College of Fine Arts in Chennai, and was taught by K. C. S. Paniker. After a stint teaching at the Ethiraj College for Women, Kunhiraman moved to England for a three-year course at the Slade School of Fine Art. On his return to Kerala, he undertook a number of assignments and in 1976 became head of the sculpture department at College of Fine Arts Trivandrum. He went on to become the college's principal, remaining until 1978 when he became the chair of the Kerala Lalithakala Akademi. This portrait photograph of Kunhiraman was taken in 2019.

Photograph credit: Mullookkaaran

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