• Election Day
• America Recycles Day
• American Education Week
• Thanksgiving Day
• Native American Heritage Week
• Ramadan

• Historic Events and Birthdays
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Election Day - November 4

Elections two months in a row!  Celebrate your right to pull that lever (or poke that chad)!  Find your polling place, registration & absentee information, plus candidates, propositions and much more at Smart Voter and Shape the Future.

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America Recycles Day - November 15

Of course that's not the only day to be recycling stuff, but it's a great time to responsibly get rid of some computers, mobile phones, or just about anything.

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American Education Week - November 16-22

"Focuses attention on the importance of education and all that it stands for."  See what's making headlines in the world of education, plus get parent resources and more at the National Education Association site.

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Thanksgiving Day - November 27

Infoplease Almanac tells you more than you probably ever knew about the holiday. Impress your friends!  Take a look!  It's about more than just turkey and football, though that's covered too.  Also try out some neato crafts for decorating the walls.

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Native American Heritage Month

Find out about the people who sat on the other side of the table on that first Thanksgiving, and others who are active today. 

Los Angeles County Public Library has put together some info for learning about and celebrating the holiday.

The National Park Service presents a site detailing monuments, buildings, and other places associated with the prehistory and history of Native Americans.

Also try the PLS Online Catalog for books by Sherman Alexie, Vine Deloria, James Welch and many others, or take a look for books of Edward Curtis' famous photographs.

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Ramadan

Ramadan
Ramadan is a time for inner reflection, devotion to God, and self-control of the year for over one billion Muslims throughout the world. Here is an explanation of the meaning of Ramadan.

Ramadan, the Month of Fasting
This page from the Learning Network explains how Ramadan is a "month of blessing" marked by prayer, fasting, and charity.

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Historical Events and Birthdays
This month we acknowledge the birthdays of authors, a journalist, an illustrator.

November 1
All Hallows or Saints' Day
"A legal holiday in Louisiana, this day after Halloween commemorates the blessed, especially those who have no special feast days."

November 1-2
Dias de Muertos, or, Day of the Dead
"Departed souls are remembered not with mourning but with a spirit of friendliness and good humor.  Cemeteries are visited and graves are decorated."

November 23
Totensonntag, or, Dead Sunday
German day for remembrance of the dead.

If you feel Halloween has passed too quickly, you might celebrate any of the above holidays by visiting the impressive cemeteries in Colma or the stately San Francisco Columbarium.  You could also plan a road trip by finding other famous or non-famous graves.  Or if you're uncertain whether a famous name has passed on or is still with us, look them up on the Dead People Server.

November 2
1734: Daniel Boone, frontiersman and statesman
http://www.lucidcafe.com/library/95nov/boone.html

November 7
1913: Albert Camus 90th Birth Anniversary
French writer and philosopher, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957.  Check the Online Catalog for the nearest copy of his classic philosophical essay The Myth of Sisyphus.

1926: Joan Sutherland, soprano (La Stupenda)
http://www.cygnet.co.uk/thedame/

November 8
1847: Bram Stoker, author
http://www.online-literature.com/stoker/

November 10
1483: Martin Luther, theologian
http://www.educ.msu.edu/homepages/laurence/reformation/Luther/Luther.htm

1769: Friedrich von Schiller, poet
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/schiller.htm
http://www.studiocleo.com/librarie/schiller/schillerpage.html

November 11
1744: Abigail Adams, First Lady
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/firstladies/aa2.html

November 12
1815: Elizabeth Cady Stanton
http://www.huntington.org/vfw/imp/stanton.html

November 13
1850: Robert Louis Stevenson
http://www.bartleby.com/people/StvnsnR.html

November 15
1887: Georgia O'Keefe
http://www.okeeffemuseum.org/background/index.html

November 19
1863: Lincoln's Gettysburg Address - 140th Anniversary
How much of it can you recite?  More than the first sentence (which is pretty long in itself)?  What's a 'score' anyway? (answer: 20)  Read the entire text and see why it was "later recognized as one of the most eloquent of the English language".  Or if you just can't absorb any information without canned graphics and bulleted outlines, check out The Gettysburg Address Powerpoint Presentation.

November 20
1925: Robert F. Kennedy
http://www.rfkmemorial.org/index.htm

November 21
1694: Voltaire
http://www.lucidcafe.com/library/95nov/voltaire.html

November 29
1832: Louisa May Alcott
http://www.alcottweb.com/

November 30
1874: Sir Winston Churchill
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/state/monarchs_leaders/churchill.shtml

 

Quoted descriptions in this document come from Chase's Calendar of Events, 2003.

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