Word: zero
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...root of the problem seems to be whether centuries should be calculated absolutely on a mathematical basis or whether concessions to logic should be made to usage. If logic is enforced, the mid-century won't be until 1951 because since there is no year zero, a year wasn't up until the year two began...
Others argue that history is hany about whether there was a year zero or not and claim that as long as the matter is in doubt, it's just as well be consider a century as having started when the last two digits are zeroes...
Frozen Tears. Even if every U.S. soldier had received his winter issue before the first nip of cold, there would have been suffering. Units of the 7th Division, which had winter clothing, were fighting last week in 20-below-zero cold. The cold brought tears which froze on the men's faces. After a U.S. attack near the Manchurian border, medical officers reported as many casualties from cold as from enemy action. Only quick work by litter teams prevented those wounded by gunfire from freezing to death...
...winter day in Labrador some 30 years ago, a fur trader named Clarence Birdseye caught a fish, watched it freeze instantly in the 50° below zero temperature. Days later, he dropped the fish into a pail of water to thaw it out, was amazed to see the fish flip its tail and swim about. Birdseye decided that he had "unlocked one of nature's secrets"-and also hit upon a new way to preserve food. When he returned to civilization (i.e., his home in Gloucester, Mass.), he developed a mechanical quick-freezing process and thereby laid the foundation...
Within a radius of one mile of Union Square (Ground Zero), the city would appear to have been struck by a giant fist. Within that radius would be the lofty Empire State Building, the Metropolitan Life Insurance Building; the teeming cliff dwellings of Peter Cooper Village and Stuyvesant Town; Klein's department store; 14th Street's subway complex; a labyrinth of gas mains, water lines, telephone cables, electric wires; 55 elementary schools, high schools and trade schools; 17 universities and private schools; twelve of the city's hospitals...