On this day in ....... 1789 (220 years ago today), in the South Pacific, members of the crew of the HMS Bounty mutiny by seizing a sleeping Captain William Bligh and setting him and his allies adrift. As stated here: "For the next 48 days, Bligh and his men will battle hostile natives, ferocious storms, and dwindling provisions before arriving in Coupang, Dutch East Indies." As many a moviegoer knows, the mutineers eventually would sail the Bounty (above right) to, and settle on, Pitcairn Island. (image credit)
... 1987, the former U.N. Secretary-General and current President of Austria, Kurt Waldheim, was barred from entry into the United States by order of the U.S. Department of Justice. As The New York Times reported, DOJ "cited evidence that Mr. Waldheim [left] had '''participated in activities amounting to persecution' of Jews and others in Greece and Yugoslavia during World War II." "And throughout his later years," The Times reported in his 2007 obituary, "Mr. Waldheim portrayed himself as an ordinary citizen who had been caught up in a maelstrom."
