I’m watching the Artemis II pre-launch coverage with a mix of excitement and melancholy. It’s a great scientific project leading to wonderful things, but there’s a part of me ruing the fact that it’s NASA’s Artemis project, rather than The Lunar Resources Company’s Artemis Project.
For those of you who hadn’t heard of it, I was involved in a hybrid commercial/non-profit project called the Artemis Project in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Our goal was to build a colony on the Moon. We had the technology, we had the drive. The only thing we didn’t have was a method of bring in enough money quickly enough to actually do it, and eventually, we had to admit defeat.
But today, NASA is sending people back to the Moon, finally! I’m watching the coverage on TV, and on NASA’s web site, and thinking “Bummer! I should have planned to go to Florida a bit earlier.” Well, maybe I’ll be able to make it for the first peopled landing on the Moon.
Today’s Tough Trivia question: Ignoring the conspiracy theorists and science deniers, we know that twelve people have so far walked on Earth’s Moon. How many of them can you name? (Bonus: which of the Apollo missions did not land on the Moon?)
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Yesterday’s question was: In this history of the Supreme Court, only one person has resigned from the Court, and then later been reappointed to it. Who was it, and why did he resign the first time?
The answer is:
Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes.
Charles Evans Hughes, Sr. Born April 11, 1862, he was a lawyer, and the governor of New York (1907–1910). In 1910, President Taft appointed Hughes to the Supreme Court (he was unanimously confirmed by the Senate). In 1916, trying to reunify the Republican Party after the Theodore Roosevelt–William Howard Taft schism (which split the party and gave the presidential election of 1912 to Woodrow Wilson), party leaders asked Hughes to accept the nomination for president, and on June 10, 1916, he resigned from the court to campaign for the presidency (he is the only member of the Supreme Court to become a presidential candidate).
Hughes lost the election of 1916 in a fairly close vote, 49.2% to 46.1% (in the electoral college, the vote was 277 for Wilson, and 254 for Hughes). And then he went back to practicing law. In March 1921, new President Warren Harding appointed Hughes the 44th Secretary of State (he served for four years), and then once again returned to his old law firm.
On February 3, 1930, with Chief Justice Taft gravely ill, President Hoover nominated Hughes to be the next Chief Justice. The Senate confirmed Hughes by a vote of 52–26, and he took his oath of office on February 24, 1930. (Hughes’ son, Charles Jr., resigned as Solicitor General when his father became Chief Justice.)
On June 30, 1941, Hughes retired from the Supreme Court for the second time. He died on August 27, 1948.
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Ian’s Tough Trivia is a daily feature of this blog. Each day, I post a tough question, as well as the answer to the previous day’s question. At some point, I’ll offer a prize for whoever has the most correct answers, and another for whoever participates most often (I’ll take into account people coming in after the start: regular participation starting later is just as good as regular participation starting earlier). There may also be a prize for the funniest or most amusing wrong answer. Simply comment on this post with your answer. I’ll approve the comments after the next question is posted. Sure, you can probably find the answers by searching the web, but what’s the fun in that?
Financial support in the form of tips is very much appreciated: paypal.me/ianrandalstrock
Ian Randal Strock 