That happened fast: Wait … what? January is half-over already?
Strange but true, dear readers, as we reach Jan. 15, the approximate midpoint of the month and undeniable hump day of this busy week of socioeconomic innovation.
Round them up: Today, your 2020 diet comes full circle.
Smear campaign: Rejoice, America – it’s National Bagel Day, a bona fide carb-a-thon requiring no further introduction.
Mind your po’s and chu’s: And give them a nice Hangul in North Korea, where Jan. 15 is Korean Alphabet Day.
Back in the States, today is also Alpha Kappa Alpha day, which has nothing to do with alphabets and everything to do with the founding of the first national college sorority for African American women.
Exhibit A: Speaking of historic firsts, the British Museum – regaled as the world’s first national public museum – first opened on Jan. 15, 1759.
Fashion police: In a tale too whackadoo not to be true, well-to-do London haberdasher John Hetherington donned the world’s first top hat on this date in 1797 – only to be arrested for disturbing the peace and fined 500 pounds.
Going up: New York inventor Elisha Otis patented the steam-powered elevator on Jan. 15, 1861.
Other patents issued on this date include one in 1907 for Pennsylvania inventor Paul Wirt’s “Self-Filling Fountain Pen.”
Soviet union: It was Jan. 15, 1969, when the USSR spaceships Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 hooked up in orbit, marking the first docking of two manned spacecraft.
Two cosmonauts “space walked” between capsules during the mission, becoming the first (human) space travelers to leave from and return to Earth in different spacecraft.
Early “Days”: Sit on it.
Sunday, Monday…: And it was this date in 1974, when Richie, Fonzie and the rest of the “Happy Days” gang first beamed into America’s living room on the ABC Television Network.
Raise the cup: Frederick Arthur Stanley (1841-1908) – the 16th earl of Derby, sixth governor of Canada and namesake of the National Hockey League’s cherished championship trophy – would be 179 years old today.
Also born on Jan. 15 were Russian mathematician Sofya Kovalevskaya (1850-1891), a gender-busting pioneer remembered as Europe’s first female math professor; influential American psychologist Lewis Terman (1877-1956), who studied the gifted and set modern standards for the IQ test; Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis (1906-1975); Hungarian-American nuclear physicist Edward Teller (1908-2003), a key player in the development of the first atomic and hydrogen bombs; and U.S. civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968).
Floats back to you: Charo (left), with the intrepid crew of the Pacific Princess.
Cuchi cuchi: And take a bow, Maria Rosario Pilar Martinez Molina Baeza – the Spanish American actress, singer and flamenco guitarist known best as Charo turns 69 today.
Wish the frequent “Love Boat” passenger, the pillar of social justice and all the other Jan. 15 innovators well at editor@innovateli.com – story tips and calendar items always appreciated, please and thank you.
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BUT FIRST, THIS
Certainty: Adopted people have a right to access their birth certificates without interference, according to Albany.
Birth right: Adoptees (and their legal representatives) can now obtain certified copies of their pre-adoption birth certificates, under a new state law taking effect today.
The New York State Department of Health is now accepting requests from adoptees 18 years or older, born in New York State but outside of New York City, who want to receive copies of their birth certificate (NYC adoptees can contact the city Health Department). If the adoptee is deceased, direct-line descendants – children, grandchildren or great-grandchildren – may request a copy, as can “lawful representative of an adoptee or a lawful representative of a deceased adopted person’s direct-line descendant,” according to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office.
Before now, birth certificates were sealed after an adoption became legal – to obtain them, adoptees had to petition the courts and their biological parents, who had to consent to the release. But “every person has the right to know where they come from,” Cuomo said Monday. “After years of being denied this basic human right, adoptees will finally be able to obtain critical information about their origins, family histories and medical backgrounds.”
Where you live: Life-saving services are a little closer to home for East End patients, with the Peconic Bay Medical Center ceremoniously cutting the ribbon on the Corey Critical Care Pavilion and Kanas Regional Heart Center.
The Riverhead hospital officially dedicated the $67.8 million facility on Monday, following three years of construction. The pavilion includes a rooftop helipad, a 16-bed intensive/cardiac care unit and the expanded Kanas Regional Heart Center, which boasts state-of-the-art cardiac catheterization laboratories, multiple recovery rooms and a cutting-edge electrophysiology suite.
Monday’s grand opening spotlights the latest innovation at PBMC since the hospital joined the Northwell Health system in 2016 – and an important one for eastern Suffolk County heart patients, according to Stanley Katz, Peconic Bay’s cardiology chairman. “When you are dealing with someone’s heart, every second matters,” Katz noted. “Having these high-quality resources and topnotch services available to the East End has already proven to make a major impact on our community.”
TOP OF THE SITE
Law of the land: Catching up with LIA President Kevin Law, a longtime master architect of Long Island socioeconomics.
Lab partner: A new bioengineering laboratory on New York Tech’s Old Westbury campus is a nod to regional science (and workforce development).
Winning round: Hot on the trail of breakthrough vaccines, a poster child of Island innovation has completed an impressive $20 million funding round.
VOICES
Hang together: Or most assuredly you’ll hang separately, cautions modern media maestro David Chauvin, whose latest Voices column extolls the virtues of integration across all marketing platforms.
STUFF WE’RE READING
What’s mine is mine: The threat of foreign IP theft has many companies stashing away their best breakthroughs – bad news for innovation, Forbes warns.
This is a recording: Northwell is piloting “black box” technology in its operating rooms – a first for the nation, according to Health News Digest.
DIY AI: Why the Trump administration is hands-off on AI – and why such vague legislation is very risky, as calculated by Wired.
RECENT FUNDINGS
+ Zipari, a Brooklyn-based consumer-experience platform built specifically for health insurance, raised $22.5 million in a Series B funding round led by Vertical Venture Partners, with participation from Health Velocity Capital, Healthworx and Horizon Healthcare Services.
+ Vesta Healthcare, a New York City-based technology and clinical-services organization supporting caregivers, closed a $30 million Series A funding round co-led by Oak HC/FT and Deerfield Management Co., with participation from Lux Capital, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Generator Ventures, CareCentrix, Epstein Partners and Nationwide Ventures.
+ SurvivorNet, a NYC-based cancer media company, raised $10 million in Series B funding led by London-based asset manager Gatemore Ventures.
+ Sisense, a NYC-based analytics platform for builders, raised more than $100 million in a funding round led by Insight Venture Partners, Access Industries, Bessemer Venture Partners, Battery Ventures, DFJ Growth and others.
+ Outlier.org, a NYC-based digital education platform offering online courses with transferable college credits, raised $16 million in total funding, including an $11.7 million Series A round led by GSV Ventures, with participation from Harrison Metal, Tectonic Capital and Jackson Square Ventures.
+ Orchard, a NYC-based homebuying marketplace, raised $36 million in new equity funding led by Navitas, with participation from FirstMark, Juxtapose and Accomplice.
BELOW THE FOLD (Bobby McFerrin Edition)
Bobby McFerrin: Circular logic.
Note for note: McFerrin may be a “one-hit wonder,” but his creativity, influence and artistic generosity know no bounds (and we rather like his version of “Drive My Car.”)
Don’t worry: Ideas to help you stop overthinking and start growing.
Be happy: How to meet corporate needs and keep the humans happy.
When you worry you make it double: So gaze into the Crystal Ball Newsletter, a keep-calm, industry-by-industry outlook provided by resource-rich Nixon Peabody, one of the amazing firms that support Innovate LI. Check them out.
