Strong words: Almost a full week since Thanksgiving and still November out there …the year’s penultimate month is hanging tough, just like you, intrepid innovators!
We’re here to help you finish the month strong and power your way into the second half of this latest heavy-duty workweek. Read on, and let’s put some mental muscle behind all that hustle.
It was good while it lasted: But all good things must come to an end, especially on Throw Our Your Leftovers Day.
There but for the grace of Allah: Today is Wednesday, Nov. 29, and we begin with the International Day of Solidarity With the Palestinian People, the UN’s annual reminder – extra important in wartime – that the actions of extremists, terrorists, dictators and small-minded, self-centered chief executives rarely represent the will of the average Joe (or Ahmad, or whatever), who’s just trying to live a life.
Enough already: Focus your intolerance instead on expired edibles – Enemy No. 1 on Throw Out Your Leftovers Day, when we’re encouraged to let go of our Thanksgiving remains and other faded foodstuffs.
You’ll be thankful for the extra room in the fridge – it’s also National Lemon Cream Pie Day, fresh and sweet every Nov. 29.
Ground game: The Army-Navy football game was a fresh concept on this date in 1890, when the military academies squared off for the first time. (They’d play several times over the next four decades, but the pigskin classic didn’t become an annual affair until 1930, for those keeping score.)
Stop and go traffic: Also moving the ball was the first U.S. patent for a motorized traffic signal, awarded Nov. 29, 1910, to Illinois-based inventor Ernest Sirrine
Inside-the-box thinking: It was this date in 1935 when Austrian Irish physicist Erwin Schrödinger brought quantum orthodoxy to a screeching halt with his paradoxical Schrödinger’s cat theory, all about trapping a cat in a box with poison and a radioactive element. (No actual cats were harmed in the formulation of this infamous theory.)
Swingers: Sikorsky R-5 helicopter pilot Jimmy Viner lowers barge Captain Joseph Pawlik to safety during the first-ever helicopter-winch rescue.
How the winch saved Christmas: No humans were harmed during the first seaborne rescue employing a helicopter and a motorized rescue winch, performed 78 years ago today during a terrific storm over our very own Long Island Sound.
Great apes in spaaaaace: And it was Nov. 29, 1961, when NASA’s Mercury-Atlas 5 mission – carrying Enos, the first chimpanzee to orbit the Earth – blasted off from Cape Canaveral.
Although Enos circled Earth twice during his historic flight, he rides a perennial second seat to fellow NASA-trained ape Ham, who grabbed the first-chimp-in-space glory during a quick suborbital flight 10 months earlier.
Way, way too soon: Boseman was a hero to many, inside the MCU and beyond.
Panther pride: American actor Chadwick Aaron Boseman (1976-2020) – who earned numerous accolades for portraying real-life notables including Jackie Robinson and James Brown, but is remembered best for suiting up as a fictitious costumed superhero – would be 47 years old today.
Also born on Nov. 29 were Austrian mathematician and physicist Christian Andreas Doppler (1803-1853), who postulated (correctly) that observed frequencies of light and sound waves depend on the relative speed of the source and the observer; American novelist, short-story writer and poet Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888), remembered best for “Little Women” but also the creator of “Little Men” and other 19th Century classics; Portuguese neurologist António Moniz (1874-1955), who pioneered lobotomies and other forms of radical psychosurgery; British writer, literary scholar and lay theologian Clive Staples “C.S.” Lewis (1898-1963), who chronicled Narnia; and American sportscaster Vincent Edward “Vin” Scully (1927-2022), a silk-toned baseball romantic who voiced Dodgers games for 67 seasons.
Enter Sandman: And take a bow, Mariano Rivera! The retired Panamanian American baseball pitcher – Major League Baseball’s indisputable all-time-greatest closer, even more remarkable for doing it all with a one-pitch arsenal – turns 54 today.
Give Mo your best at editor@innovateli.com, where your news tips catch the corners and your calendar events are always right down the middle.
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BUT FIRST, THIS
Laura Harding: Unprecedented resource.
Putting affordable housing on the map: One of Long Island’s leading social-justice organizations has created an interactive digital-mapping tool designed to advance affordable and inclusive housing initiatives across New York State.
Syosset-based ERASE Racism has launched the Fair Housing Tool, which leverages dozens of metrics – including local health statistics, regional financial stability and a neighborhood’s housing quality – to identify good locations for new affordable-housing initiatives. The tool is designed for use by governments, developers and anyone else interested in rectifying New York’s statewide affordable-housing crisis.
According to a recent report by the NYU Furman Center, a majority of New York renters pay more for rent than they can afford – and the percentage of renter households qualifying as “severely rent-burdened” (more than 30 percent of income going to housing) has a devastating effect on the statewide workforce. “[This] is an essential new device for those interested in increasing affordable and inclusive housing,” noted ERASE Racism President Laura Harding. “It provides a level of analysis that has not been previously available and that is crucial to identifying the best places for such new housing.”
Deals on wheels: The Suffolk County Industrial Development Agency is pumping up a century-old, family-owned tire distributor with ambitious designs for a new headquarters.
The IDA has issued preliminary approvals for a tax-incentives deal benefitting B9 Oser Owner LLC, which wants to construct a 132,515-square-foot warehousing and distribution center in Hauppauge for Max Finkelstein Inc., a privately owned subsidiary of national auto-parts distributor U.S. AutoForce (itself a division of U.S. Venture Inc.). In addition to construction-phase jobs, the new facility figures to add six full-time positions to Max Finkelstein’s existing 45 full-timers – currently laboring in the circa-1919 company’s undersized Ronkonkoma headquarters – while pushing the company’s payroll past $3.2 million annually.
The IDA must still conduct a full review and issue final approvals, but those are mere technicalities for a project that “ensures a Long Island-based company remains and expands in the region,” according to Suffolk County Industrial Development Agency Acting Executive Director Kelly Murphy. “Providing assistance to businesses in this situation not only positively impacts our local economy, but also significantly benefits the Suffolk County residents employed by these companies,” Murphy added.
TOP OF THE SITE
Burning passion: Last week’s devastating fire isn’t the end for Shoreham’s Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe, according to supporters, but “a new beginning.”
Hear all about it: Exclusive one-on-ones with Long Island’s most ingenious innovators – welcome to Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast, where unique insights, brilliant ideas and good humor always set the tone. Listen to this!
VOICES
Nobody understands the Long Island innovation economy better than the mighty Voices rotation, our exclusive lineup of A-list insiders with front-row perspectives on the issues that matter most to you and your business. Expert insights on law, healthcare, commercial real estate, technology, media and more – pick a topic, choose a Voice and learn something important and new, right now!
STUFF WE’RE READING
Trending now: Behold, the “megatrend” – critical nightmare, marketing bonanza or both. Quartz goes with the flows.
Bending now: Which way does RFK Jr. lean, politically? Depends on when you ask. New York Magazine straightens out the spoiler.
Lending now: How Trump’s 11th-hour pardon of a family friend crashed the DOJ’s crusade against predatory lending. Business Insider uncovers fraud, with interest.
RECENT FUNDINGS
+ Vida Health, a California-based health-tech focused on virtual cardiometabolic care services, closed a $28.5 million financing round led by General Atlantic, Ally Bridge, Canvas Ventures and Hercules Capital.
+ Tidal Cyber, a Virginia-based cybersecurity platform, raised $5 million in seed funding led by Squadra Ventures.
+ March Biosciences, a Texas-based clinical-stage biotech, raised $4.8 million from Cancer Focus Fund.
+ Niron Magnetics, a Minnesota-based “clean Earth magnets” pioneer, raised $33 million in funding backed by GM Ventures, Stellantis Ventures, Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community and the University of Minnesota.
+ Orbit Technologies, a Washington-based neurostimulation-technology leader, raised $500,000 in pre-seed funding led by Dune VC.
+ Influence, a New York City-based venture-investing platform, raised $20.8 million in seed funding led by Alpha Praetorian Capital, The London Fund, ACME Innovation, Reeve Collins and Al Kahn.
Like this newsletter? Innovate Long Island newsletter, website and podcast sponsorships are a prime opportunity to reach the inventors, investors, entrepreneurs and executives you need to know (just ask St. Joe’s). Marlene McDonnell can tell you more.
BELOW THE FOLD (Missing In Action Edition)
Cloud cover: Google is scrambling as users report missing data — as much as six months’ worth.
Vanished: Personal data files are disappearing from the Google Drive cloud.
Taken: The modern conundrum of online shopping and stolen packages.
Lost: Airlines lose 2 million suitcases per year, but most are right here.
Find yourself: Please continue supporting the amazing institutions that support Innovate Long Island, including St. Joseph’s University, where students identify a clear path to their best possible selves. Check them out.
