Word: midnighters
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Alfred Ochs not only convinced the city to rename the intersection formerly known as Longacre Square, but he also threw a grand party to commemorate the milestone. The New Year's Eve soiree started with an all-day street festival, transitioned to a fireworks display ending with cheers at midnight from the crowd of more than 200,000. Previous New Year's Eve celebrations typically took place outside of Old Trinity Church in Manhattan's financial district. But by contemporary standards these weren't parties at all because there was no ball...
...decades, residents of U.S. cities would synchronize their pocketwatches using a giant globe that would descend from a pole in a public space to mark the exact hour. Ochs conceived of an ornate "time ball" that would descend just before midnight to mark the exact end of the year. The first ball to drop - an illuminated 400-pound iron-and-wood orb - was lowered from a flagpole. Tradition took root and the ball has heralded a new beginning almost every year since - in 1942 and 1943, during World War II, the ball was temporarily put out of commission...
Mounting Y2K hysteria overshadowed debate in the late '90s, as many worried less about what to call the next decade and more about whether there would be one. After the world failed to end at the stroke of midnight, linguistic experts promised that a nickname would bubble up over time. Despite creative attempts--including Ryan Guerra's decade-long quest to popularize the Unies via brochures and blog manifestos--none has. We've gotten by for so long calling this decade the 21st century--a term that will sound ridiculous in 50 years--that we might as well get started...
...chadors with their children, old men wearing black shirts customary for the mourning season, young and old, women and men, stood shoulder to shoulder in the cold winter air. The anticipation of Khatami's speech was enough to create a warm buzz such as that of worshipers outside midnight mass...
...grab Benedict's vestments even as she was being tackled by Giani, bringing the 82-year-old Pope down with them in a heap to the marble floor of St. Peter's Basilica during the opening procession of the evening mass. (Benedict had moved what was long the Midnight mass up to 10 p.m.). Caught in the scrum was Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, 87, of France, who broke his hip, and will require surgery. Commentators in Italy have been asking if there is a general security problem, with the Pope incident following an attack on Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi earlier...