Face the Nation

The Islamic call to prayer being recited. Picture taken during the First Balkan War (1912-1913), Barata region of Bulgaria @facethenation

“What is created by one human mind can be unraveled by another,” said the young linguist Yuri Knorozov and cracked the Maya code (pre-Columbian Maya civilization of Mesoamerica) in the early 1950s, a task that was considered impossible by the leading scholars of the day @facethenation

💡George Cove's third solar panel on September 1909@facethenation George Cove, a forgotten solar power pioneer, may have built a highly efficient photovoltaic panel 40 years before Bell Labs engineers invented silicon cells. In 1909, Technical World Magazine wrote that “such a machine is cheap and indestructible as a kitchen range. Even in its present and somewhat crude and experimental state, given two days of sun, it will store sufficient electrical energy to light an ordinary house for a week. The inventor has proved this now for months in his establishment”. George Cove did not understand how his solar generator worked, and neither did anyone else at the time. It was only with Einstein’s work on the photoelectric effect (in 1905) and later work in quantum mechanics (1930s and beyond) that the concept of a semiconductor bandgap was realized. 😱

William Harvey Carney was awarded the Medal of Honor 🎖 for heroic actions in battle during the Battle of Fort Wagner in 1864. Though wounded severely twice, he never allowed the Flag 🇺🇸 he was carrying to touch the ground @facethenation Carney was born a slave in 1840 in Norfolk, Virginia. He was able to escape slavery and made his way to the north settling in Massachusetts. In March 1863 he joined the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry during the American Civil War. The first black soldier to earn the Medal of Honor.

Outgoing German chancellor Angela Merkel receives farewell military honors at "Grosser Zapfenstreich" in Berlin, Germany, December 2, 2021 @facethenation The "Grosser Zapfenstreich" has become the unofficial farewell ceremony for defense ministers, presidents and chancellors.

Fast-paced and glamorous world of Formula One in the 1960's. Françoise Madeleine Hardy was born in Paris on January 17, 1944. Hardy remains a popular figure in music and fashion, and is considered an icon of French pop @facethenation

During the first World War, a 16-year-old Walt Disney (pioneer of animated cartoon films) left school and attempted to enlist in the army. He was rejected for being underage, but managed to find employment with the Red Cross as an ambulance driver in 1917. While overseas, Walt Disney found time to develop his artistic skills. He decorated vehicles with cartoons (visible in the photo). At age 19, when Disney was done working for Red Cross in France, he moved back to Kansas City where his brother Roy got him a job as a newspaper artist at Pesmen-Rubin Art Studio. @facethenation

Janet Armstrong and her sons Mark and Rick, watch the launch of Apollo 11 mission to the moon, commanded by her husband, astronaut Neil Armstrong on July 16, 1969 @facethenation

Neil Armstrong and family before the Apollo 11 mission, 1969 @facethenation

Concorde, the first supersonic passenger-carrying commercial plane. The Concorde made its first transatlantic crossing on September 26, 1973. This plane could cross the Atlantic in 3.5 hours @facethenation Amateur footage, shot by a bystander, of the doomed Concorde taking off in flames moments before the July 25, 2000. Concorde crash marked a bitter milestone in the history of commercial supersonic flight.

May 1, 1941 Stalin’s Commissar for Defense Semyon Timoshenko is warmly greeting the Nazi delegation in Red Square @facethenation It was the 608th day of Word War II. Half of Europe under occupation, thousands lost their lives. Germany invading the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa, June 22, 1941

BepiColombo🛰 is a spacecraft on a roundabout journey to Mercury@facethenation A sequence of images taken by the selfie cameras on BepiColombo as it neared Earth ahead of its flyby on April 9, 2020, less than a day before the closest approach 🌏