OT - Now THAT was a good year!
 

New idea for a sort of game thread here at FOFC.

The poll above, sadly, includes no gimmick trout options. It does, however, include four different years from history - selected more or less at random by yours truly.

The object of the contest is to have a discussion and vote over which of the years was "the best year" by whatever means we want to decide.

Feel free to use the internet as a tool, and to share links or other evidence to support your claim. I'll set the poll to last for two days... and after that we will declare a winner.

I'll start the ball rolling.

Wikipedia is a valuable resource for looking up particular years.

1818

April 4 - The United States Congress adopts the flag of the United States as having 13 red and white stripes and one star for each state (20 stars) with additional stars to be added whenever a new state is added to the Union.

March 11 - Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is published

The American flag in its current form is set up, and a classic of 19th century literature is published? A winner in my book!

1883.

Edison discovered the Edison effect which lead to the diode.

Greenwich Mean Time was established as a standard in the US for telegraphy.

The Kama Sutra was translated into english.

Tesla invented the first induction motor.

We had sex, time, electronics and machinery all advanced in one year. Is there any doubt?

Heck, the induction motor alone wins this thing over a sci fi monster and a piece of cloth. :P

Dola -

Frankenstein is sci fi? I'd say so. In the year it was written it was describing a possible technology that didn't exist yet. The fact that it still doesn't exist doesn't mean that it isn't sci fi.

Yes, the book is other things as well but I've always considered it more sci fi than horror. I've considered it more drama than horror too. Forget the movies, this was one compelling book.

I'd never knock this book. I love Frankenstein, I really do but I love sex, computers and clocks more. ;)

1715
May 4: A French manufacturer debuts the first folding umbrella.

November 25: 1st English patent granted to an American, for processing corn. Thomas Masters, a Pennsylvania Quaker, and his wife Sybilla applied for a patent in 1715, [...] for a donkey-driven and a water-powered engine for shelling and pulverizing maize into meal.

The Englishman John Lethbridge develops a one-man completely enclosed diving suit: essentially, a reinforced, leather-covered barrel of air, equipped with a glass porthole for viewing, and two arm holes with watertight sleeves.

Astronomer Edmund Halley correctly predicts the results of a solar eclipse over southern England and discovers M13, a star cluster in the Milky Way.

Off topic but I love the song It Was a Very Good Year by Frank Sinatra. Too bad it's the only freaking song by the legend not on Napster.

okay, the Kama Sutra puts 1883 over the top... it gets my vote:D

1883 - Had all the stuff they did in the others years, plus more.

Yeah, the standard I used was which year would I have thought the best if I lived in it. I'm not one for living in the dark ages, so the later in time the better. But I can see people having a different standard for determining the best year, i.e. biggest accomplishments, standard of living, etc.

Hmmmm... while I certainly left things open to your interpretation as to what makes a year the "best" - I don't think there's much point to a game where the comparison is based on standard of living. Of course in any such contest, the most recent year wins.

My intent, as most gathered, was to focus instead on the accomplishments or achievements of that year... the things that happened that year that made it good or even great. Inventions, battles, arts and literature, notable births... that sort of stuff.

Far be it for me to give instructions on how to vote - but the game only has worth if taken in that context, I think.

I don't think that's necessarily true, Quiksand. Don't you think most people would rather live in 1920s rather than after October 1929?

Standard of living had to be better prior to the great depression.

why don't we ask Bucc? - he's the only guy here to see all 4 of those years firsthand...

As long as you lived near the Beer Baron.