Michael Fassbender, born April 2, 1977 in Heidelberg, Germany, has portrayed X-Men super-villain Magneto in four movies: X-Men: First Class; X-Men: Days of Future Past; X-Men: Apocalypse; and X-Men: Dark Phoenix. He has also appeared in the Alien franchise for which he received a Saturn nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
Fassbender has been nominated for two Academy Awards for his performances in Steve Jobs and 12 Years a Slave. He has won 79 awards with a total of 161 nominations.
Lili Elbe, born Einar Wegener December 28, 1882 in Vejle, Denmark, was a transgender woman, who is the first person to receive a uterus transplant. She began painting under her birth name and married Gerda Gottlieb in 1904. Gottlieb was also a painter and she and Lili moved to Paris in 1912, where Elbe cold live more openly as a woman, passing herself off as Gottlieb's sister-in-law.
Elbe considered suicide before learning about sex reassignment surgery, which was highly experimental at the time. In 1930, she traveled to the Hirschfeld Institute for Sexual Science in Germany, and went through four surgeries. The first was a removal of the testicles, and the second implanted an ovary into her abdomen. The third operation removed the penis and the scrotum.
The fourth surgery which took place in 1931 was for Elbe to receive a transplant uterus and construct a vaginal canal, making her one of the first transgender woman to under go a vaginoplasty surgery. Her immune system rejected the transplanted uterus, causing an infection. She died in September 1931 three months after the surgery.
The LGBTQ+ film festival MIX Copenhagen gives out four Lili Awards each year, named for Elbe. She painted many successful images before stopping after the transition.
Bion 10, or Kosmos 2229, a Russian spacecraft as part of a multinational effort, was launched December 29, 1992. It carried two monkeys, plants, cell cultures, insects, and amphibians. The Rhesus monkeys were trained to activate food and juice dispensers, to operate a foot pedal to study muscles responses, and to make hand and head movements in response to visual stimuli.
The countries involved were Canada, France, Germany, Lithuania, Netherlands, China, Russia, Ukraine, US, Uzbekistan, and the European Space Agency.
The spacecraft orbited Earth for almost 12 days, before landing successfully on January 10, 1993.
Darmstadtium was first created November 9, 1994 at the Institute for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, Germany. Researches bombarded a lead (Pb-208) target with nickel (Ni-62) and created a single atom of the isotope darmstatdium-269. Using heavier isotopes of nickel, they created 9 atoms of Ds-271, confirmed by its decay and the daughter elements.
So far, 10 isotopes of darmstadtium have been reported, with Ds-281 being the most stable, with a half-life of about 12.7 seconds. Due to such a short life span, chemical characteristics have not been determined. However, Ds is extremely radioactive. It is named after the city Darmstadt, where it was discovered.
Dr. Ulf Merbold, born June 20, 1941 in Germany, is a retired European Space Agency astronaut and went into space three times.
His first mission was aboard Columbia (STS-9) as payload specialist in November-December 1983. He is the first non-US citizen to reach orbit in a US spacecraft.
His second mission was aboard Discovery (STS-42) as payload specialist in January 1992. The main goal of the mission was to study microgravity on different organisms.
His third and final mission was aboard Soyuz TM-20 as research cosmonaut to the space station Mir in October 1994. He participated in a month-long expedition Euromir 94. He returned to Earth in November 1994 on Soyuz TM-19.
Jean-Jacques Favier, born April 13, 1949 in Kehl, Germany, is a French astronaut for the National Centre for Space Studies (CNES), the French space agency. He went into space once, aboard Columbia (STS-78) in June-July 1996 as a payload specialist. He spent almost 17 days in space.
Johann Sebastian Bach, one of the greatest composers of music in any era, was born March 21 (or March 31, depending upon which calendar you're referencing), 1685 in Eisenach in present-day Germany.
He wrote so many pieces of music it's difficult to condense his life into a few sentences. He passed away in 1750.
Here is one of my most favorite pieces of music of all time.
Ulrich Walter, born February 9, 1954 in Iserlohn, Germany, went into space once, aboard Columbia (STS-55) as a payload specialist in April-May 1993. The mission carried the German Spacelab into orbit.
Reinhard Furrer, born November 25, 1940 in an area of Germany which is now Austria, went into space aboard the space shuttle Challenger (STS-61-A) as a payload specialist in October-November 1985.
He was killed in a plane crash during an air show in Berlin when the pilot lost control of the plane in 1995.
Gerhard Thiele, born September 2, 1953 in Germany, went aboard Space Shuttle Endeavour (STS-99) as a mission specialist in February 2000. He retired from the European Space Agency in October 2005.
Klaus-Dietrich Flade, born August 23, 1952 in Germany, visited the Mir space station in March 1992. His mission started aboard Soyuz TM-14 on March 17 and returned aboard Soyuz TM-13 on March 25.
Hans Schlegel, born August 3, 1951 in Germany, is an ESA astronaut and has been into space twice on space shuttle missions.
His first trip into space was aboard Columbia (STS-55) as a payload specialist in April-May 1993. It was an international cooperative effort between the United States, Germany and nine other nations.
His second and final trip was aboard Atlantis (STS-122) as a mission specialist in February 2008 to the International Space Station. He performed an EVA with fellow astronaut Rex Walheim for 6 hours and 45 minutes.
STS-42 crew (L-R): Stephen Oswald, Roberta Bondar, Norman Thagard, Ronald Grabe, David Hilmers, Ulf Merbold, William Readdy
STS-42 mission patch
Space Shuttle Discovery (STS-42), launched January 22, 1992, carried seven astronauts into space to study the effects of microgravity on different organisms. Its crew consisted of Commander Ronald Grabe, Pilot Stephen Oswald, Norman Thagard, William Readdy, David Hilmers, Roberta Bondar (CSA) and Ulf Merbold (ESA).
Merbold, Germany's first astronaut, made his second flight on STS-42. Roberta Bondar was Canada's first female astronaut and this was her only space flight.
Reinhold Ewald, born December 18, 1956 in Germany, went into space aboard Soyuz TM-25 in February 1997 to the space station Mir. He returned on Soyuz TM-24 about 3 weeks later. It is his only trip into space.
Henry Gerber, born June 29, 1892 in Bavaria, Germany, was an early advocate for gay rights in the U.S. He emigrated to the United States in 1913 and settled in Chicago because of its large German immigrant population.
He founded the group Society for Human Rights (SHR) with John Graves, an African-American clergyman, and was granted a charter by the State of Illinois on December 10, 1924, becoming the first documented gay organization in the U.S.
Gerber also created the first known American gay publication called Friendship and Freedom, which was the SHR newsletter. However, at the time all gay publications were considered obscene until 1958 and the Friendship and Freedom last only two issues.
He died in Washington, DC December 31, 1972, at the age of 80.
ABC and just about every other news outlet on the planet is reporting that Germany will not meet its climate goals set for 2020. According to the Paris Climate Agreement, Germany aimed to reduce its greenhouse emissions by 40% compared to 1990 levels. It seems now they will only obtain a 32% reduction.
Therefore, everyone's calling them a failure, they won't be able to be a leader in climate change, they're unable to take drastic steps.
No, achieving 32% is still an improvement. Period.
That's almost a third lower emissions, and that doesn't happen by accident. Whatever Germany is doing works! I think the failure in here is in over-estimating the results their programs would have.
According to the German website dw.com, Germany is still ahead of the rest of the EU!
In 1919, German film director Richard Oswald directed, produced and co-wrote the movie Anders als die Andern (Different from the Others), which is the first movie to present a sympathetic view of gays in film.
The movie centers on Paul Korner (played by Conrad Veldt), a successful violinist who falls in love with one of his students, Kurt Sivers (played by cutie Fritz Schulz). Their relationship is discovered by an acquaintance of Korner, Franz Bollek (played by Reinhold Schunzel), who in turn blackmails Korner.
Korner agrees to pay him but keeps it a secret from Sivers. Unfortunately, Sivers finds out when Korner decides to stop the blackmail payments and a fight with Bollek ensues. Sivers disappears, going it alone. I doubt if this was meant to be but the fight is a bit of comic relief.
Korner is inconsolable without Sivers and tries to 'cure' himself with hypnotherapy, but it is just a scam. He attends a lecture with Sivers' sister Else. The Doctor (played by Magnus Hirschfeld) talks about homosexuality and other similar topics, about how it is not a mental condition but determined physically.
Korner reports Bollek for blackmail but is arrested himself. In retaliation, Bollek outs Korner. The Doctor testifies on behalf of Korner. The judge is sympathetic toward Korner and sentences him to a week in prison. Bollek is sentenced to 3 years for his crime.
Afterward, Korner finds out he has been ostracized and rejected by his friends and family. He is no longer employable so he commits suicide. Kurt Sivers hears about his death and rushes to his side, but Korner's family blames him for his suicide.
Sivers decides to kill himself, too, but the Doctor stops him delivering a final speech:
"You have to keep living; live to change the prejudices by which this man has been made one of the countless victims. ... [Y]ou must restore the honor of this man and bring justice to him, and all those who came before him, and all those to come after him. Justice through knowledge!" I watched the movie on Youtube (with Italian narration) and found it to be somewhat ahead of its time. Especially currently, we seem to have fallen backwards to more primitive times. One of the lines from the movie talks about how Napoleonic code laws against homosexuality were dropped after the French Revolution since they were seen as a violation of fundamental human rights. Another that stuck with me: May justice prevail on this grave injustice, so science defeats superstition, and love wins over hatred. Isn't that awesome!
Der Eigene, the world's first homosexual magazine, was first published by Adolf Brand in Berlin, Germany from 1896 to 1932. I looked for a translation of 'eigene' and found several: 'Of one's own', 'The Unique', 'The Self-Owners' and 'The Exceptional'.
Volume 6 of the periodical contain some of the earliest material of gay life in San Francisco.
In 1933, with Adolf Hitler in power, the publisher was raided by Nazi forces and all its assets and materials needed to publish were seized.
Seated (L-R): Terence Henricks, Steven Nagel, Charles Precourt;
Standing (L-R): Bernard Harris, Hans Schlegel, Jerry Ross, Ulrich Walter
Mission patch
Space Shuttle Columbia (STS-55), launched April 26, 1993, carried the second reusable German Spacelab into orbit. The first one flew on STS-61-A in October 1985. Its crew consisted of Commander Steven Nagel, Pilot Terence T. Henricks, Jerry Ross, Charles Precourt, Bernard Harris, Ulrich Walter and Hans Schlegel (both from the German Aerospace Center [DLR]).
The crew conducted almost 90 experiments from over 11 countries, during the 10-day trip.
We left Passau, Germany mid-day and sailed down the beautiful Danube River to Linz, Austria. Bridges were rather low and sometimes, I felt I could touch them.
We saw several medieval castles and buildings along the way.
Beautiful churches in every village.
Engelhartszell, Austria.
This is a different village from the picture above, but it seems they have the same style church!
