Winds of change: Welcome, dear readers, to a surprisingly Autumnal August Wednesday.
Fall is in the air this week on Long Island, with refreshing breezes, uncharacteristically cool temperatures and marvelously mild humidity. With Labor Day rapidly approaching, schoolkids are counting the days and grownups are squeezing in some late-Summer PTO – yes, the change of seasons is approaching fast.
What’s not to love: It’s National Bacon Lovers Day, as if you need the excuse.
Flying high: But it’s only Aug. 20 and it’s still Summer, so we’re kicking off your hump-day newsletter with National Accessible Air Travel Day, an essential Summer vacation ingredient for voyagers of all kinds but especially people with disabilities.
We’re also winging it with World Mosquito Day, buzzing with information about the tiny, Summer-loving bloodsuckers, including new attempts to combat the spread of mosquito-borne diseases.
Not the healthiest menu of the year: You bring it home, now fry it up in a pan – it’s National Bacon Lovers Day, which is not National Bacon Day (Dec. 30) or International Bacon Day (the Saturday before Labor Day), but sizzles with the same salty energy.
And to top it off, it’s National Chocolate Pecan Pie Day – adding cocoa to crisped pecans and gooey, caramelly centers, and always begging to be crowned with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on Aug. 20.
Spin cycle: Adding some personal spin today are Kansas-based inventors A.E. Keith and the Erickson brothers, Frank and Charles, who applied to patent an updated rotary telephone on this date in 1896. (They’d land the patent in January 1898 – seven years after the spin-dial was originally patented by a frustrated undertaker.)
Stored knowledge: Also improving on older designs was master innovator Thomas Edison, who cut a few energy-storage steps and patented a newfangled battery 113 years ago today.
Secure borders: On that same day – Aug. 20, 1912 – President William Taft signed into law the Plant Quarantine Act, giving the U.S. Department of Agricultural the power to inspect incoming agricultural products, organize border quarantines and restrict entry of infested agricultural goods. (Today, that responsibility lies with U.S. Customs and Border Protection.)
Kickstarter: Legendary Native American athlete Jim Thorpe had a hand in the formation of the future NFL.
Kickoff: More focused on domestic beef was the American Professional Football Association, which would come to be known later as the NFL but was the APFA when it formed on this date in 1920 in Canton, Ohio.
Blastoff: And it was Aug. 20, 1977, when NASA launched the Voyager 2 space probe on a mission to explore outer planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.
The intrepid probe – actually the first of the Voyager twins to slip Earth’s surly bonds – has long-since exceeded its mission parameters. In 2018, it became the second human spacecraft (after Voyager 1) to leave the Solar System; it’s now about 13 billion miles from Earth, zipping along at a brisk 35,000 MPH and still beaming home data.
Chemical bond: Swedish chemist Jöns Jacob Berzelius (1779-1848) – who measured atomic weights, isolated multiple elements, fleshed out electrochemical theory and achieved immortality as a co-founder of modern chemistry – would be 246 years old today.
He loves a parade: Roker has been chronicling the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade since 1995.
Also born on Aug. 20 were Austrian geologist Eduard Suess (1831-1914), who invented the science of tectonics; American lawyer and politician Benjamin Harrison (1833-1901), who rode an electoral college victory to become the 23rd U.S. President; American sociologist and demographer Kingsley Davis (1908-1997), a descendent of Confederate President Jefferson Davis praised internationally as one of the 20th Century’s great social scientists; American actress and author Jacqueline Susann (1921-1974), who fought off cancer long enough to make history with “The Valley of the Dolls”; and English singer and songwriter Robert Plant (born 1948), the mythologically inclined frontman and unmistakable voice of Led Zeppelin (with an impressive solo career to boot).
You can call me Al: And take a bow, Albert Lincoln Roker Jr.! America’s weatherman – a Queens-born, award-winning journalist, television personality and author, now venturing into animated STEM content – turns 71 today.
Give the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade staple your best at editor@innovateli.com, where our five-day forecast shines brightest when you share news tips and calendar events.
About our sponsor: St. Joseph’s University-New York has provided a diverse population of students in the New York metropolitan area with an affordable education rooted in the liberal arts tradition since 1916. The independent and coeducational university provides a strong academic and values-oriented education at the undergraduate and graduate levels, aiming to prepare each student for a life characterized by integrity, intellectual rigor, social responsibility, spiritual depth and service. Through its Long Island, Brooklyn and online campuses, the university offers degrees in 100 majors, special course offerings and certificates and affiliated and pre-professional programs. Learn more here.
BUT FIRST, THIS
It all checks out: School officials join Optimum and Warner Bros. Discovery representatives Monday in Garden City.
Back(pack) to school: Long Island’s leading provider of high-speed Internet and television services is packing it in – for a good cause.
For the fifth straight year, Optimum – a subsidiary of Long Island City-based telecommunications titan Altice USA – and global media company Warner Bros. Discovery are teaming up to distribute school supply-stuffed backpacks to Long Island students. At a special ceremony held Monday at Garden City’s Cradle of Aviation Museum, 500 bookbags filled with water bottles, crayons, rulers, pens and other essentials were distributed to students from the Freeport, Uniondale and Hempstead school districts, with each district also receiving a $10,000 donation through Optimum’s partnership with national education nonprofit DonorsChoose.
The monetary donations will fund essential educational programs, classroom resources and extracurricular opportunities in each district, part of an “ongoing commitment to fostering academic achievement and long-term success for young innovators across Long Island,” according to a statement from Optimum, which is not done donating just yet: On Aug. 28, the Altice USA brand and Warner Bros. Discovery are scheduled to bring backpacks and another $10,000 stipend to Central Islip Senior High School.
A river runs through it: A two-building rental complex will straddle the Patchogue River, with a nod to the Brookhaven Industrial Development Agency.
The IDA has issued final approvals for an economic-incentives package benefitting Farmingdale-based contractor Ferrandino & Son, which will raise the bifurcated project on the north and south shores of the Patchogue River in the Village of Patchogue. The $260 million, 444,459-square-foot mixed-use development will replace a vacant steel plant, an aging autobody shop and a laundromat with matching four-story buildings containing a total of 141 one-bedroom units, 72 two-bedroom units and 49 studio apartments, along with two swimming pools and two gyms.
Twenty-seven total apartments will be designated affordable housing (for incomes below 80 percent of the area median income) and another 26 will be designated workforce housing (for incomes below 120 percent of the AMI), according to the IDA, which also trumpets the arrival of new retail and office spaces and a public riverwalk. “This project … will be a wonderful bookend for West Patchogue,” Brookhaven IDA Chairman Frederick Braun III said in a statement. “It will provide much-needed additional rental housing for our residents.”
TOP OF THE SITE
Horses of another color: The Debrief catches up with Pal-O-Mine Equestrian Founder and CEO Lisa Gatti, whose nonprofit brainchild – inspired by a Danielle Steel novel – fills a unique niche in Long Island’s social structure.
Best season ever: Another new episode of “Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast” drops next week … catch up first with Suffolk IDA honcho Kelly Murphy, prince of regional development Scott Burman, small-business guru Martha Stansbury and the other amazing guests who’ve graced our stupendous Summer season (and all our other seasons!). Dozens of engaging, educational and entertaining one-on-ones with innovation economy leaders are waiting for you right now.
VOICES
Voices Law Anchor Michael Sahn, managing member of Uniondale law firm Sahn Ward Braff Coschignano, details the government funding cuts, charter-school competition and new state mandates challenging Long Island public schools – and suggests some constructive solutions to help them overcome.
Something to say? Welcome to The Entrepreneur’s Edge, Innovate Long Island’s new promoted-content news feature platform – a direct link from you to our innovation-focused audience. Progressive product to promote? Singular service to sell? Sociopolitical position to push? Shine a bright light on the big picture, the little details and everything in between with The Entrepreneur’s Edge. Living on the edge.
STUFF WE’RE READING
Social studies: With AI rising, schools are struggling to blend in social-skill lessons. The Conversation goes soft.
Mind over matter: Successful innovation requires a particular way of thinking. Forbes sets minds.
It ain’t no IHOP: Tesla’s “retro-futuristic” diner is a West Hollywood flop. Salon orders in.
RECENT FUNDINGS
+ SpinLaunch, a California-based aerospace manufacturer developing a kinetic launch system for delivering space-based payloads, raised $30 million in funding led by ATW Partners and Kongsberg Defence and Aerospace.
+ Conduit, a Pennsylvania-based workforce-management platform, secured $375,000 in funding from the Richard King Mellon Foundation.
+ Softwear Automation, a Georgia-based robotics company focused on apparel manufacturing, raised $20 million in Series B1 funding led by Invest FWD.
+ Jump, a New York City-based fan-experience and sports-tech startup, raised $23 million in Series A funding led by Alexis Ohanian’s Seven Seven Six.
+ Gameto, a Texas-based clinical-stage biotech focused on reproductive health, raised $44 million in Series C funding led by Overwater Ventures.
+ Jocasta Neuroscience, an Arizona-based biotech focused on dementia and cognitive decline, raised $35 million in Series A financing led by True Ventures.
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). Gregory Zeller can tell you more.
BELOW THE FOLD (Rise Of The Robots Edition)
Two left feet: Fallen robots were sprawled all over the place at the first World Humanoid Robot Games.
Room for improvement: Robots may conquer the world, but first they’ll have to learn to stand up straight.
Pregnant pause: Chinese scientists are working on a “pregnancy robot’ that can carry and birth human babies.
R2D2, where are you? From scary to cute to downright heroic, ranking the 25 Best Movie Robots of All Time.
Flesh and blood and soul: Please continue supporting the innovative institutions that support Innovate Long Island, including St. Joseph’s University, where automatons need not apply – and the thoughtful preparation of well-rounded humans is never preprogrammed. Check them out.
