Over a century ago, masks were controversial during the 1918 flu pandemic

Edward Condon

 

(Wikipedia) Edward Uhler Condon (March 2, 1902 – March 26, 1974) was a distinguished American nuclear physicist, a pioneer in quantum mechanics, and a participant in the development of radar and nuclear weapons during World War II as part of the Manhattan Project.
The Franck–Condon principle and the Slater–Condon rules are co-named after him. He was the director of the National Bureau of Standards (now NIST) from 1945 to 1951. In 1946, Condon was president of the American Physical Society, and in 1953 was president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Edward Condon was born on March 2, 1902, in Alamogordo, New Mexico to William Edward Condon and Carolyn Uhler Condon. Continued

Rick Husband

(Wikipedia) Rick Douglas Husband (July 12, 1957 – February 1, 2003) was a U.S. Air Force Colonel, pilot, and astronaut who was Commander of Space Shuttle Columbia mission STS-107.
He and the rest of the crew of STS-107 were killed when Columbia disintegrated during reentry into the Earth's atmosphere. Husband is a recipient of the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
Husband was born on July 12, 1957, in Amarillo, Texas. He attended Belmar Elementary School, Crockett Junior High School, and he graduated from Amarillo High School in 1975.
Husband earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from Texas Tech University in 1980, and a Master of Science degree also in Mechanical Engineering from Fresno State University in 1990. Continued

Wilbur Scoville

(Wikipedia) Wilbur Lincoln Scoville (January 22, 1865 – March 10, 1942) was an American pharmacist best known for his creation of the "Scoville Organoleptic Test", now standardized as the Scoville scale. He devised the test and scale in 1912 while working at the Parke-Davis pharmaceutical company to measure pungency, "spiciness" or "heat", of various chili peppers.
... In 1922, Scoville won the Ebert prize from the American Pharmaceutical Association and in 1929 he received the Remington Honor Medal. Scoville also received an honorary Doctor of Science from Columbia University in 1929. Continued

"an orangutang, God-denying, Bible-destroying, evolutionist professor"

 

(Texas State Historical Association) On this day in 1930, at a rally in the courthouse square in Canyon, J. Frank Norris, Baptist pastor and editor of The Fundamentalist, denounced Professor Joseph Leo Duflot of West Texas State Teachers College (now West Texas A&M University) for teaching evolution and for his "modernist" philosophy. Duflot, the organizer and chairman of the sociology department, had already been dismissed by the First Presbyterian Church of Canyon in 1921 for allegedly mixing evolution with the Genesis account of creation and questioning the veracity of certain passages in the Bible. Continued

Lucianosaurus

Probably not.

(Wikipedia) Lucianosaurus is an extinct genus of amniote of unknown affinities, known only from teeth.
Initially described as a basal ornithischian dinosaur subsequently reclassified as a member of the clade Archosauriformes ...
Fossil remains of Lucianosaurus were first found in Late Triassic strata in Eastern New Mexico, United States.
The generic name refers to Luciano Mesa (34.980121°N 104.150048°W) in Guadalupe and Quay counties of New Mexico where the teeth of Lucianosaurus were first uncovered and identified. Continued

One Hundred Years Ago: The 1918 Flu Pandemic

(CDC) The 1918 influenza pandemic was the most severe pandemic in recent history. It was caused by an H1N1 virus with genes of avian origin. Although there is not universal consensus regarding where the virus originated, it spread worldwide during 1918-1919.  In the United States, it was first identified in military personnel in spring 1918.
It is estimated that about 500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected with this virus. The number of deaths was estimated to be at least 50 million worldwide with about 675,000 occurring in the United States. Continued

Robert Goddard

Goddard in Roswell

(Wikipedia) Robert Hutchings Goddard (October 5, 1882 – August 10, 1945) was an American engineer, professor, physicist, and inventor who is credited with creating and building the world's first liquid-fueled rocket.
... With new financial backing, Goddard eventually relocated to Roswell, New Mexico, in summer of 1930, where he worked with his team of technicians in near-isolation and relative secrecy for years. He had consulted a meteorologist as to the best area to do his work, and Roswell seemed ideal.
Here they would not endanger anyone, would not be bothered by the curious, and would experience a more moderate climate (which was also better for Goddard's health). The locals valued personal privacy, knew Goddard desired his, and when travelers asked where Goddard's facilities were located, they would likely be misdirected. Continued

Donald Enlow

Photo: ADA

(Wikipedia) Donald H. Enlow (January 22, 1927 – July 5, 2014) was an American scientist known for his contributions to field of orthodontics through his work and understanding of the process of growth and development, especially of the human facial structure.
He was born in Mosquero, New Mexico in 1927 to Martie and Donald C. Enlow. Continued

Harrison Schmitt

 

(Wikipedia) Harrison Hagan "Jack" Schmitt (born July 3, 1935) is an American geologist, retired NASA astronaut, university professor and former U.S. senator from New Mexico.
In December 1972, as one of the crew on board Apollo 17, Schmitt became the first member of NASA's first scientist-astronaut group to fly in space. As Apollo 17 was the last of the Apollo missions, he also became the twelfth person to set foot on the Moon, and as of 2015, the second-to-last person to step off of the Moon (he boarded the Lunar Module shortly before commander Eugene Cernan). Continued

Paul Modrich

(Wikipedia) Paul Lawrence Modrich (born June 13, 1946) is an American biochemist, James B. Duke Professor of Biochemistry at Duke University and Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
He received a Ph.D. degree in 1973 from Stanford University and a B.S. degree in 1968 from MIT. He is known for his research on DNA mismatch repair. Modrich received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2015, jointly with Aziz Sancar and Tomas Lindahl.
 Modrich was born on June 13, 1946, in Raton, New Mexico ... Continued

R.I.P. Alan Bean

(Wikipedia) Alan LaVern Bean (March 15, 1932 – May 26, 2018; CAPT, USN, Ret.) was an American naval officer and naval aviator, aeronautical engineer, test pilot, and NASA astronaut; he was the fourth person to walk on the Moon.
He was selected to become an astronaut by NASA in 1963 as part of Astronaut Group 3.
… Bean was born March 15, 1932, in Wheeler, the seat of Wheeler County in the northeastern Texas Panhandle. Continued

Underground wonderland

 

(Albuquerque Journal) ... Now, Northup, 69, and Lipinski, 68, both Ph.Ds, Northup in biology and Lipinski in nuclear engineering, are active members of the Fort Stanton Cave Study Project (FSCSP), a nonprofit organization whose mission, carried out in cooperation with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, is to conduct and promote the exploration, public education, scientific research and environmentally sound management of  Fort Stanton Cave in Lincoln County. Continued

Robert H. Goddard

Goddard in Roswell

(Wikipedia) Robert Hutchings Goddard (October 5, 1882 – August 10, 1945) was an American engineer, professor, physicist, and inventor who is credited with creating and building the world's first liquid-fueled rocket.
... With new financial backing, Goddard eventually relocated to Roswell, New Mexico, in summer of 1930, where he worked with his team of technicians in near-isolation and relative secrecy for years. He had consulted a meteorologist as to the best area to do his work, and Roswell seemed ideal.
Here they would not endanger anyone, would not be bothered by the curious, and would experience a more moderate climate (which was also better for Goddard's health). The locals valued personal privacy, knew Goddard desired his, and when travelers asked where Goddard's facilities were located, they would likely be misdirected. Continued

How to Make a Pinhole Camera to Safely View the Eclipse

Eclipse, Tucumcari, New Mexico 2012.

(Sierra Sun Times) You don't need fancy glasses or equipment to watch one of the sky's most awesome shows: a solar eclipse. With just a few simple supplies, you can make a pinhole camera that lets you watch a solar eclipse safely and easily from anywhere. Continued

Also: NM State parks provide chances to see eclipse

Carolyn Shoemaker

(Wikipedia) Carolyn Jean Spellmann Shoemaker (born June 24, 1929) is an American astronomer and is a co-discoverer of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9.
She once held the record for most comets discovered by an individual.
Carolyn Jean Spellmann was born in Gallup, New Mexico, United States. Continued

Paul Modrich

(Wikipedia) Paul Lawrence Modrich (born June 13, 1946) is an American biochemist, James B. Duke Professor of Biochemistry at Duke University and Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
He received a Ph.D. degree in 1973 from Stanford University and a B.S. degree in 1968 from MIT. He is known for his research on DNA mismatch repair. Modrich received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2015, jointly with Aziz Sancar and Tomas Lindahl.
 Modrich was born on June 13, 1946, in Raton, New Mexico ... Continued

Infant Mortality

 

According to the NIH, "The U.S. infant mortality rate declined by 93% during the 20th century, from approximately 100 infant deaths per 1,000 live births in 1900 to 6.89 in 2000."

Can Prairie Dogs Talk?

Photo by Carol Highsmith (Library of Congress)

(NYTimes) ... Beyond identifying the type of predator, prairie-dog calls also specified its size, shape, color and speed; the animals could even combine the structural elements of their calls in novel ways to describe something they had never seen before. No scientist had ever put forward such a thorough guide to the native tongue of a wild species or discovered one so intricate. Prairie-dog communication is so complex, Slobodchikoff says — so expressive and rich in information — that it constitutes nothing less than language. Continued

"Losing Eden: An Environmental History of the American West" by Sara Dant

(Santa Fe New Mexican) ... “Native peoples generally lived lightly on the land but sometimes pressed it beyond its carrying capacity,” she writes. “When Europeans and later Americans arrived, then, they were engaging not with undisturbed nature, as so many argued until the 1990s, but these immigrants nevertheless portrayed the West as an ‘Eden’ or Promised Land destined for them. … For some, the West fulfilled this divine ‘land of milk and honey’ vision, but for many, the region constituted a harsh and unforgiving desert of aridity and struggle.” Continued