Google doodles

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Apr 16, 2019
Inji Aflatoun’s 95th Birthday







Today’s Doodle celebrates Inji Aflatoun, the Egyptian painter and author remembered as a trailblazing modern artist and pioneering feminist.

Born in Cairo on this day in 1924, Aflatoun was mentored by the Egyptian artist Kamel El-Telmissany, soaking up his introduction to modern art as well as his interest in social issues.

In 1942 Aflatoun exhibited with the avant-garde Art and Freedom Group. She then went on to co-found the League of Young Women in University and Institutes and wrote influential pamphlets like We Egyptian Women.

Aflatoun exhibitied her work around the world. In 1975, she helped organize the exhibition “Ten Egyptian Women Artists in Half a Century” in honor of the International Women’s Year. In 1986, she was awarded the medal ”Cavalier of the Arts and Literature” by the French Ministry of Culture.

Today, her work hangs in major collections and museums around the world.

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Apr 27, 2019
Abraham Valdelomar’s 131st Birthday







Today’s Doodle celebrates Abraham Valdelomar, the Peruvian writer, illustrator, and founder of literary journals who was a fixture of the cultural life centering around the Palais Concert, a famous café in downtown Lima.

Growing up in the small coastal town of Pisco, Peru, Valdelomar moved to the capital city with his family at age 5, and published his first magazine while still in school. By 1906, he was working as an illustrator for the magazine Applause and Whistles. While serving in the Peruvian Army, he chronicled the conflict with Ecuador for the publication El Diario. In 1913 he worked with the Peruvian Embassy in Rome, writing a newspaper column called “Chronicles of Rome.”

A witty caricaturist who authored books, short stories, essays, and journalistic pieces, Valdelomar is fondly remembered for his cuentos criollos, or local stories set in his beloved Pisco. The most famous of these is El Caballero Carmelo, the tragicomic tale of an old fighting rooster, first published in the newspaper La Nación de Lima.

In 1916, Valdelomar founded the literary magazine Colónida, which included his own work as well as that of a new wave of young literary talent in Perú, including the poet José María Eguren.

Today, Valdelomar’s legacy lives on through his prolific writings. His image also appears on Perú’s 50 Sol note, a testament to his standing as one of the country’s most esteemed authors.

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Apr 28, 2019
Na Hye-sok’s 123rd Birthday








Today’s Doodle celebrates the life and work of Na Hye-sok, Korea’s first female painter and a strong advocate of women’s empowerment.

Born in Suwon on this day in 1896, Na grew up in a prominent family who encouraged her independent spirit. During a time when most Korean women were expected to be strictly wives and mothers, she aspired to become an artist and author.

At age 17, she traveled to Japan to study Western oil painting at Tokyo Arts College, where she organized the Association of Korean Women Students. Refusing an offer of marriage arranged by her family, she took a job as a teacher.

After graduation, Na took part in a public protest resulting in her arrest. She fell in love with Kim Woo-young, the lawyer who was hired to defend her, and married him a year later. Afterwards, she continued to pursue her artistic career, and her work was even part of a special government-sponsored exhibition.

Na began to write essays critical of traditional Korean marriage, and she also published the first feminist fiction in Korea. She further shocked Korean society by advocating for women’s rights across a variety of topics widely considered taboo at the time. In the year 2000, the Seoul Arts Center organized a retrospective exhibit of her paintings. Today in Korea, Na is recognized for her art and her bold contributions to women’s empowerment.

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Apr 28, 2019
Evangelina Elizondo’s 90th Birthday







Today’s Doodle by Mexico City-based guest artist Valeria Alvarez celebrates Evangelina Elizondo, an actress who starred in movies, television shows, and musical theater during an era known as Mexican Cinema’s Golden Age. Born Gloria Evangelina Elizondo López-Llera in Mexico City on this day in 1929, the multi-talented artist was also an accomplished painter, author, and recording artist.

Elizondo’s big break came after being cast as the voice of Cinderella in the Spanish version of the Disney classic. She later made her stage debut dancing in the 1950 stage production of Mariano Azuelo’s Los de Abajo [The Underdogs] and also appeared in Mame and La Viuda Alegre [The Merry Widow] with Plácido Domingo.

Elizondo’s first on-screen appearance came in the 1951 film, Las locuras de Tin-Tan, with Germán “Tin-Tan” Valdés. She would act in over 75 films, specializing in comedies and musicals. “I do not like drama at all,” she said. “I do not want dramas in my life. What I've always wanted is to amuse the public, to whom I owe my career.” In 1995, she appeared with Anthony Quinn and Keanu Reeves in A Walk in the Clouds.

Elizondo also performed in several telenovelas, and her iconic character “Mamá Lena” in Mirada de Mujer was beloved by millions. She continued studying art throughout her life and also earned a degree in theology. The author of two books, she received a Harlequin Prize in 2014 for her contributions to Mexican culture.

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28 April 2021
Rogelio Salmona’s 92nd birthday







Today’s Doodle celebrates Colombian architect Rogelio Salmona on his 92nd birthday. Known for his visionary red-brick constructions in the capital city of Bogotá, Salmona is widely considered one of the most important figures in Latin American architecture.

Rogelio Salmona was born on this day in 1929 in Paris, France. But in the face of rising tensions in Europe, his family relocated to Bogotá in 1934. Salmona formed a strong attachment to his new home city until he returned to Paris in 1948 to apprentice under the legendary Swiss architect Le Corbusier.

Salmona eventually settled in Bogotá for the majority of his career, transforming the city with a unique blend of traditional global influences and modern aesthetics. Salmona first came to international attention with his Torres del Parque [Park Towers, 1964-1970], a curved apartment complex of exposed red brick in the center of the city, which is widely considered the architect’s masterpiece. Salmona continued to feature his signature brick fingerprint throughout his career, including in the sprawling Biblioteca Pública Virgilio Barco [Virgilio Barco Public Library, 2001] which remains one of his most famous structures.

With his innovative urban structures, Salmona is widely credited as a driving catalyst of the rebirth of Bogotá in recent decades. In addition to winning many significant architecture prizes throughout his prolific career, Salmona became the first Latin American architect to receive the prestigious Alvar Aalto Medal in 2003.

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28 April 2016
Girls' and Boys' Day 2016

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29 Apr 2016
48th Anniversary of first TV broadcasting of Les Shadoks










Nearly half a century later, France still fondly recalls Les Shadoks. With absurd maxims like “every advantage has its disadvantage, and vice versa," the bird-like creatures and their hilariously inane brand of logic struck a chord with French culture when they hit the screen in 1968.

Jacques Rouxel’s experimental and minimalist cartoon even proved divisive, as some saw nonsense where others found originality, comic genius, and important commentary on futility and French life. Hélène Leroux, who animated today’s Shadoks, used the occasion to bring her favorite Shadok’s proverbs to life. She writes:

“I particularly enjoyed the simplicity of the characters: Simple, rounded birds with long, thin legs, always going on nonsense adventures. In their daily lives, the Shadoks always refer to specific mottos they made up that parody real-life human principles: ‘If there are no solutions, then there are no problems,’ or, ‘to reduce the number of unhappy people, always beat up the same individuals,’ and of course, ‘I pump therefore I am.’ Like operators on a handcar that goes nowhere, Les Shadoks are famous for their endless and useless pumping. I thought it would be a great homage to represent some of these great Shadoks quotes with simple, looping animations.”

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30 Apr 2016
Claude Shannon’s 100th birthday






It’s impossible to overstate the legacy of Claude Shannon. The paper he wrote for his master’s thesis is the foundation of electronic digital computing. As a cryptographer for the U.S. Government during WWII, he developed the first unbreakable cipher. For fun, he tinkered with electronic switches, and one of his inventions--an electromechanic mouse he called Theseus--could teach itself to navigate a maze. If you’re thinking, “that sounds a lot like artificial intelligence,” you’re right. He regularly brushed shoulders with Einstein and Alan Turing, and his work in electronic communications and signal processing--the stuff that earned him the moniker “the father of information theory”--led to revolutionary changes in the storage and transmission of data.

Notwithstanding this staggering list of achievements in mathematics and engineering, Shannon managed to avoid one of the trappings of genius: taking oneself too seriously. A world-class prankster and juggler, he was often spotted in the halls of Bell Labs on a unicycle, and invented such devices as the rocket-powered frisbee and flame-throwing trumpet.

Animated by artist Nate Swinehart, today’s homepage celebrates the brilliance and lightheartedness of the father of modern digital communication on what would have been his 100th birthday.

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1 May 2016
Labour Day 2016





Labour Day is a public holiday honoring the many achievements of labor unions since the 1800s — in particular, the 8 hour working day. Reasonable wages, breaks, and paid vacation are all important to a fair and healthy economy. In some places, people spend the day protesting current labor conditions, attending public demonstrations, and events. Others attend festivals, concerts, or get together with family and friends. Some just spend the day not working.

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2 May 2016
Mario Miranda’s 90th birthday








Mario Miranda was a beloved cartoonist best known for his works in the Times of India and The Illustrated Weekly of India. Based primarily on the bustling cityscape of Mumbai, Miranda’s works often feature complex, multi-layered scenes. Humanity floods the canvas and yet each character maintains their individuality.

Our guest Doodler today is Aaron Renier, another artist known for portraying large crowds. “I approached Mario’s work by pretending I was drawing with him,” says Renier. “I chose his most popular style, very flat with criss-crossing interactions.” In this homage to Miranda, we see a rich litany of people, each unique in their perspective. “That is what I liked most about his work,” Renier explains, “trying to pick out who knows who, who's watching who, who's annoyed by who, who's enamored by who. Hopefully people will see something of [Miranda’s] spirit in it.”

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13 May 2016
Daeng Soetigna's 108th Birthday




Music can instantly transport a listener to a unique place and time. The melodic sounds of the angklung are no exception.

One rap of the hand on this Indonesian bamboo instrument, and we’re transported to the tranquil islands of Southeast Asia. For this, we can thank Daeng Soetigna, whose novel seven-note diatonic angklung brought the tones of Indonesia to an international audience. While the oldest known angklung dates back to the 17th century, it was Soetigna’s modifications in 1938 that lifted it out of obscurity and into orchestras, concerts, and classrooms around the world.

We celebrate Soetigna’s ingenuity, and contribution to modern musical education with this bamboo-themed doodle by Lydia Nichols.

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19 May 2016
Yuri Kochiyama's 95th Birthday








It’s with great pleasure that Google celebrates Yuri Kochiyama, an Asian American activist who dedicated her life to the fight for human rights and against racism and injustice. Born in California, Kochiyama spent her early twenties in a Japanese American internment camp in Arkansas during WWII. She and her family would later move to Harlem, where she became deeply involved in African American, Latino, and Asian American liberation and empowerment movements. Today's doodle by Alyssa Winans features Kochiyama taking a stand at one of her many protests and rallies.

Kochiyama left a legacy of advocacy: for peace, U.S. political prisoners, nuclear disarmament, and reparations for Japanese Americans interned during the war. She was known for her tireless intensity and compassion, and remained committed to speaking out, consciousness-raising, and taking action until her death in 2014.

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8 May 2016
Parent's Day in Korea

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6 May 2016
2016 Hockey World Championship







The Hockey World Championship is underway in Russia, and fans everywhere are teeming with anticipation. Will Russia reclaim its elite status? Will Canada defend its title as the ice hockey world champions? The stakes couldn’t be higher.

The sport is an institution in Russia, where the games were last hosted decades ago. Doodler Mark Holmes alludes to this in his depiction of players against the backdrop of the Russian flag.

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30 April 2012
Queen's Day 2012

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1 May 2012
Worker's Day/Labour Day 2012

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22 Apr 2012
Grace Cossington-Smith's 120th Birthday





Grace Cossington Smith [20 April 1892 – 20 December 1984] was an Australian artist and pioneer of modernist painting in Australia and was instrumental in introducing Post-Impressionism to her home country. Examples of her work are held by every major gallery in Australia.

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21 Apr 2012
Friedrich Fröbel's 230th Birthday




Friedrich Wilhelm August Fröbel or Froebel was a German pedagogue, a student of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, who laid the foundation for modern education based on the recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities. He created the concept of the kindergarten and coined the word, which soon entered the English language as well. He also developed the educational toys known as Froebel gifts.

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15 Apr 2012
Wilhelm Busch's 180th Birthday







Heinrich Christian Wilhelm Busch
was a German humorist, poet, illustrator, and painter. He published wildly innovative illustrated tales that remain influential to this day.

Busch drew on the tropes of folk humour as well as a profound knowledge of German literature and art to satirize contemporary life, any kind of piety, Catholicism, Philistinism, religious morality, bigotry, and moral uplift.

His mastery of drawing and verse became deeply influential for future generations of comic artists and vernacular poets. Among many notable influences, The Katzenjammer Kids was inspired by Busch's Max and Moritz. Today, the Wilhelm Busch Prize and the Wilhelm Busch Museum help maintain his legacy. The 175th anniversary of his birth in 2007 was celebrated throughout Germany. Busch remains one of the most influential poets and artists in Western Europe.

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9 Apr 2012
Elias Lönnrot's 210th Birthday






Elias Lönnrot was a Finnish physician, philologist and collector of traditional Finnish oral poetry. He is best known for creating the Finnish national epic, Kalevala, [1835, enlarged 1849], from short ballads and lyric poems gathered from the Finnish oral tradition during several expeditions in Finland, Russian Karelia, the Kola Peninsula and Baltic countries.

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4 Apr 2012
Senegal Independence Day 2012

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27 Mar 2012
Mies van der Rohe's 126th Birthday






Mies van der Rohe's architecture was the backdrop of my childhood. I grew up in downtown Chicago in the 1970s and 80s, and several friends lived in apartment buildings designed by Mies. In addition, Myron Goldsmith [one of Mies' students and associates], his wife and kids, were close friends of my family. For me, Mies wasn't precious or intellectual or challenging or even "modern;" his buildings were just places where people raised kids, worked at interesting jobs, and taught. As I grew older, I wondered why he lacked the public awareness and embrace of an architect like Frank Lloyd Wright.

Now, even though I have a more sophisticated knowledge of Mies' designs, I am a fan because of what his designs engage and inspire. Moving through them takes me past industrial materials and spare forms, and yields color, a relationship with nature, and vibrant interaction in the universal spaces.

Mies built S. R. Crown Hall, featured in today's Google Doodle, as a "home for ideas and adventures." Since its completion in 1956, it has been home to IIT's College of Architecture and has inspired students, lectures, dances, art exhibitions, and more. It is a lab for creation, which is fitting because the structure itself was a lab for Mies' breakthrough in the use of glass and steel-he defied expectations and proved his genius by using steel frames to hang a ceiling, rather than using supportive columns. The result was a revolutionary clear-span structure, 120 by 220 by 18 feet high, the premiere enclosed universal space.

Since assuming my role as Director of the Mies van der Rohe Society, I am in awe of what this space provokes. In 2006, we hosted an exhibition of mid-century Marimekko textiles and products. Visitors thought the building and the fabrics were so fresh and so now, they couldn't believe it had all been designed decades earlier. Four years later, we showed the largest-ever exhibition of Andy Warhol's Silver Clouds, a light-filled room for 1,000 helium-filled reflective balloons to interact with people of all ages. And every summer we host a day for hundreds of families to sprawl on the floor and use Legos to build their own creations.

The skyscrapers, wide-open lobbies, exterior plazas, and spare-but-useful living plans that define today's major cities are possible because of Mies and his "less is more" philosophy. Come visit S. R. Crown Hall, take a tour of the campus he designed for Illinois Institute of Technology, and have your own adventure in Mies' space.

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20 Mar 2012
Persian New Year 2012

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20 Mar 2012
First Day of Spring 2012

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19 Mar 2012
80th Birthday The Sydney Harbour Bridge









The Sydney Harbour Bridge is an Australian heritage-listed steel through arch bridge across Sydney Harbour that carries rail, vehicular, bicycle, and pedestrian traffic between the Sydney central business district [CBD] and the North Shore. The view of the bridge, the harbour, and the nearby Sydney Opera House is widely regarded as an iconic image of Sydney, and of Australia itself. The bridge is nicknamed "The Coathanger" because of its arch-based design.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge went on to be added to the Australian National Heritage List on 19 March 2007 and to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 25 June 1999.

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19 Mar 2012
Father's Day 19 March 2012

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18 Mar 2012
Mother's Day 2012 - Select Countries

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16 Mar 2012
Cesar Vallejo's 120th Birthday





César Abraham Vallejo Mendoza was a Peruvian poet, writer, playwright, and journalist. Although he published only three books of poetry during his lifetime, he is considered one of the great poetic innovators of the 20th century in any language. He was always a step ahead of literary currents, and each of his books was distinct from the others, and, in its own sense, revolutionary. Thomas Merton called him "the greatest universal poet since Dante". The late British poet, critic and biographer Martin Seymour-Smith, a leading authority on world literature, called Vallejo "the greatest twentieth-century poet in any language." He was a member of the intellectual community called North Group formed in the Peruvian north coastal city of Trujillo.

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16 Mar 2012
Doodle 4 Google 2012 - Ireland Winner

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16 March 2018
Celebrating George Peabody








Today we celebrate George Peabody, a man widely considered “the father of modern philanthropy.”
Born in 1795 to a poor family in Massachusetts, Peabody had only a few years’ worth of education before opening a local general store. His experience in the dry goods business expanded and led to international trade in London, where he would eventually work as a banker and settle in 1837. In that role, Peabody accumulated great wealth and his involvement in both the American and English business and social scenes provided him widespread recognition.

During his life, Peabody immersed himself in public causes, with a particular focus on educational initiatives. In fact, it was on this day in 1867 that he was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal after donating $2,000,000 [upwards of $30,000,000 today!] for the advancement of education, an act of generosity made all the more impressive by the fact that he left school at the age of 11. It’s believed that Peabody gifted over $8,000,000 in the course of his lifetime, about half of his $16,000,000 fortune.

Fun fact: Today's Doodle art is the result of a Doodle team volunteer mural project at George Peabody Elementary School in San Francisco, California! The mural currently resides in the student cafeteria.

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12 Mar 2018
Sir William Henry Perkin’s 180th Birthday





Born in England on March 12th, 1838, chemist Sir William Henry Perkin accidentally discovered “mauveine,” the first synthetic dye.

As an 18-year-old laboratory assistant, Perkin was cleaning out dark muck from a beaker after a failed experiment, when he noticed that the substance left a vivid purple stain when diluted with alcohol. Following his discovery, he focused on the patenting, manufacturing, and commercialization of this purple dye, which he named “mauveine.”

Perkin's timing was remarkable as the textile industry was at a high. Purple clothing was very much in style, but prohibitively expensive for most, not to mention quick to fade. Perkin’s strong and inexpensively produced mauveine finally made this once-exclusive color readily accessible, igniting a violet fashion frenzy - as seen in today’s Doodle by UK-based illustrator Sonny Ross. Even Queen Victoria herself wore a mauveine-dyed gown to the Royal Exhibition of 1862!

Wealthy and successful from his stint in manufacturing, Perkin eventually returned to laboratory research. He was even knighted in 1906, on the 50th anniversary of his serendipitous discovery.

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12 Mar 2018
Mauritius Independence Day 2018






Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about 2,000 kilometres [1,200 mi] off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It includes the main island [also called Mauritius], as well as Rodrigues, Agaléga and St. Brandon.The islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, along with nearby Réunion [a French overseas department], are part of the Mascarene Islands. The capital and largest city, Port Louis, is located on Mauritius, where most of the population is concentrated. The country spans 2,040 square kilometres [790 sq mi] and has an exclusive economic zone covering 2.3 million square kilometres.

By some accounts, Arab sailors were the first to discover the uninhabited island, around 975, and they called it Dina Arobi, but this has not been confirmed. The earliest confirmed discovery was in 1507 by Portuguese sailors, who otherwise took little interest in the islands. The Dutch took possession in 1598, establishing a succession of short-lived settlements over a period of about 120 years, before abandoning their efforts in 1710. France took control in 1715, renaming it Isle de France. In 1810, the island was seized by Great Britain, and four years later France ceded Mauritius and its dependencies to Britain. As a British colony, Mauritius included Rodrigues, Agaléga, St. Brandon, Tromelin, the Chagos Archipelago, and, until 1906, the Seychelles. Sovereignty over Tromelin is disputed between Mauritius and France, as it was not specifically mentioned in the Treaty of Paris. Mauritius remained a primarily plantation-based colony of the United Kingdom until independence in 1968.

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10 Mar 2018
Celebrating the Alishan Forest Railway





Imagine riding a train chugging along through a lush and misty forest. On your journey, you pass orchards of exotic fruits, taro fields, waterfalls, and soaring trees over a thousand years old….

This dream is a reality if you’re on board the Alishan Forest Railway, which makes its way through the Alishan National Forest, situated in the heart of Taiwan. Today’s Doodle celebrates the landmark on what is known as kickoff day for the Alishan "Cherry Blossom Season". Starting today, numerous visitors will take the forest rail up to the mountains to enjoy the beautiful cherry blossoms of Alishan.

The train travels from Chiayi [[a city on the west coast) to Fenchihu [a village high in the mountains], which takes about 2.5 hours. The Alishan Forest Railway is one of the Five Wonders of Alishan, and has even been proposed as a possible World Heritage Site.

Built in 1912, the railway’s original purpose was transporting timber out of the vast forest. Today, it whisks travelers along a scenic journey up to 2216 meters above sea level, traversing narrow zigzagging paths. Unique switchback tracks allow the train to move both forwards and backwards to climb especially steep mountain terrain. Along the route lies Zhaoping Park, one of the best spots for taking in cherry blossoms, particularly now and throughout the springtime season.

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9 Mar 2018
Paralympics 2018





The world’s eyes will once again turn to PyeongChang this week as the 2018 Paralympic games get under way! 80 countries around the world are sending their athletes to compete in the games, held from March 9 to 18 this year. Over 670 athletes, including more female athletes than ever before, have the chance to show their skills after years of hard work and training.

The lineup of the Paralympic games will include: alpine skiing, biathlon, cross-country skiing, ice hockey, snowboarding, and wheelchair curling. Over the next 10 days, more than 80 medals will be awarded across the sports.

Today’s Doodle represents athletes from each of the sports in competition, all racing together to capture a spot on the podium.

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8 Mar 2018
International Women's Day 2018






Those familiar with Doodles know that we frequently celebrate extraordinary women throughout history such as prominent inventors, scientists, writers, artists, activists, philanthropists, and so on. Today, we wanted to take the opportunity to celebrate the stories and voices of another group of extraordinary women—the everyday women living all over the world.

For today’s global, interactive Doodle, we reached out to 12 female artists of all backgrounds to share their personal stories in a series of visual narratives. Specifically, each story represents a moment, person, or event that has impacted their lives as women. While each artist tells a unique story, the themes are universal, reminding us of how much we often have in common. We hope that the combined power of words and images help bring these stories to life in a way that invokes feelings of understanding,
empathy, and spirit of the day.

This project has been an incredible journey for us, and we’ve been moved by the candor, intimacy, and bravery of our contributors’ stories. Translating these works across 80+ languages and sharing them across a global audience means so much to us, and we hope that readers will go about their day feeling as inspired as we do.

Special thanks to our storytellers, readers, and everyone involved in this project to celebrate such an important day. And last -but certainly not least- thanks to all the women in our own lives who continue to move and change the world with their own stories.

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6 Mar 2018
Gabriel García Márquez’s 91st Birthday







César Abraham Vallejo Mendoza was a Peruvian poet, writer, playwright, and journalist. Although he published only three books of poetry during his lifetime, he is considered one of the great poetic innovators of the 20th century in any language. He was always a step ahead of literary currents, and each of his books was distinct from the others, and, in its own sense, revolutionary. Thomas Merton called him "the greatest universal poet since Dante". The late British poet, critic and biographer Martin Seymour-Smith, a leading authority on world literature, called Vallejo "the greatest twentieth-century poet in any language." He was a member of the intellectual community called North Group formed in the Peruvian north coastal city of Trujillo.

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5 Mar 2018
Celebrating the Edelweiss Flower








Today's Doodle celebrates Leontopodium nivale – more commonly known as the edelweiss flower – which for centuries has beckoned soldiers, hikers, and other adventurers from the slopes of the highest mountains of Europe. The name edelweiss was first found in writing on this date in 1784, and is a direct German translation of the words ‘noble’ and ‘white’.

The flower only blooms in the summer months of June through September. Its characteristic double-star shape and wooly-white texture make it highly recognizable both in nature and in folklore.

Embarking on a quest to find the edelweiss requires bravery, determination, and a little bit of luck. Romance is also a central theme in the story of this flower because its white blooms are thought to represent deep love and devotion. In fact, the gift of an edelweiss was once the equivalent of giving an engagement ring, a true sign of adoration and faithfulness.

Once on the brink of extinction, the edelweiss is no longer at risk, and blooms more and more across the mountainous landscape of Europe.

Today’s Doodle was created by Kassel-based artist Rita Fürstenau and depicts the edelweiss flower in a traditional cross-stitch design.

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2 Mar 2018
Holi 2018








Red, yellow, blue, and green are a few of our favorite colors all year round, but today we’re putting them front and center for an extra special reason.

It’s time for Holi — the age-old festive ritual marking the end of winter, the coming of spring, and symbolically, the triumph of good over evil. Family and friends come together to feast, dance, and laugh together while dousing each other with colored powder and water.

Today’s Guest Doodle by Amrita Marino depicts dhol players amongst a cloud of color. These traditional drummers move from house to house, adding a peppy, musical touch to the day's festivities. The four main powder colors carry with them a piece of symbolism. Red signifies love and fertility; yellow is the color of turmeric, a natural remedy; blue represents the beloved Krishna; green symbolizes spring and new beginnings.

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3 October 2020
30th Anniversary of German Unity Day








Today’s Doodle, illustrated by Berlin-based guest artist Christoph Niemann, commemorates German Unity Day or Tag der Deutschen Einheit on the 30th anniversary of the country's reunification. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall in late 1989, government officials from East and West Germany signed an agreement on August 31, 1990, that consolidated the two countries into one nation. Known as the Unification Treaty, the historic resolution went into effect just over a month later on October 3rd, a date now celebrated each year as a national holiday across Germany.

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1 Oct 2020
Children's Day 2020 [1 October]

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1 Oct 2020
Chuseok 2020



Today’s Doodle, illustrated by Koreanguest artist Haleigh Mun, commemorates Chuseok also known in English as Korean Thanksgiving. Among the country’s most important holidays, Chuseok falls each year on the date of the harvest moon and is celebrated over a three-day period that includes the preceding and following days.

In keeping with Chuseok’s origins as a harvest celebration, culinary traditions are integral to the holiday. Among the most significant centerpiece dishes is songpyeon, small round rice cakes traditionally packed full of nutritious ingredients like sesame seeds, beans, and nuts and steamed along with an aromatic layer of pine needles. A lot can ride on the preparation of the dish—it is said that whoever crafts beautiful songpyeon will be met with good fortune.

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30 September 2016
Andrejs Jurjans’s 160th birthday





Today’s Doodle celebrates a man who, in many ways, carried Latvian music forward into the 20th century.

As the country’s first professional composer and musicologist, Andrejs Jurjāns delved into the Latvian folk music of the past while taking the sounds of his homeland to new heights. Throughout his lifetime, he collected and analyzed thousands of folk melodies, organizing them into an anthology that was published across six volumes. He also composed the first-ever Latvian symphonic works, including an instrumental concerto and a cantata, and was well-known for his choir arrangements.

When Jurjāns wasn’t crafting original pieces, he spent much of his time teaching. From 1882 — the year he finished his own schooling at the St. Petersburg Conservatory — to 1916, he shared his knowledge of music theory and more with students. Through his instruction, research, and composition, Jurjāns inspired many of the Latvian musicians who came after him. Today we pay tribute to that legacy on what would have been the composer’s 160th birthday.

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29 Sept 2016
Ladislao José Biro’s 117th birthday









You may not know the name Ladislao José Bíro, but you certainly know his most famous invention: the ballpoint pen.

Bíro was born in Budapest, Hungary, into a Jewish family. A journalist by trade, Bíro noticed how efficiently newspapers were printed and how quickly the ink dried – in stark contrast to his fountain pen. He worked with his brother, György Bíro, a chemist, to develop a new type of pen made up of a ball that turned in a socket. As the ball turned, it picked up ink from a cartridge and rolled to deposit it on paper, much like a newsprint roller transfers an inked image to paper.

Bíro presented the first prototype of the ballpoint pen at the Budapest International Fair in 1931, later patenting his invention in 1938. To this day, the ballpoint pen is still referred to as the “Biro” in several countries.

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26 November 2020
Frank Bailey's 95th birthday






Today’s Doodle, illustrated by West Yorkshire-based guest artist Nicole Miles, celebrates Guyanese-British firefighter and social worker Frank Bailey, who is widely considered the first Black firefighter of post-war London. Among his pioneering accomplishments in the name of diversity and inclusion, Bailey is also credited as one of the first Black social workers specializing in mental health in London’s Kensington and Chelsea borough.

Frank Arthur Bailey was born on this day in 1925 in British Guiana [[now Guyana), South America. He attended local schools and then took a job on a German trade ship, which brought him to New York. There he found work in a hospital where he staged a walkout in protest of the institution’s separate dining rooms for different types of employees. The subsequent integration of the dining facilities proved just one of Bailey’s many successful challenges to an unequal status quo.

Bailey moved to London in 1953 and caught wind that Black people were not being hired by the city’s fire service. Not one to stand idly by in the face of injustice, Bailey applied to join the West Ham Fire Brigade and made history when he was accepted into service. A lifelong advocate for workers’ rights, Bailey became a union branch representative before the repeated denial of promotions pushed him to leave his post in 1965.

Bailey then transitioned into social work and became the first Black legal advisor for Black youths at Marylebone Magistrates Court.

[9A]

2 October 2018
Grandparents' Day 2018 [Italy]

[9A]

1 Oct 2018
Celebrating Milton Santos







Geography is not usually considered a controversial academic discipline. But the Brazilian scholar Milton Santos created a different school of thought that saw geography in its totality, invested with critical meaning and value. During a career that spanned over 50 years, Santos argued for a “New Geography” that encompassed more than the physical features of the earth, addressing the lives of the people who live there, as well as the distribution of space and resources that shapes their lives.

Born on May 3, 1926, in the Brotas de Macaúbas section of Bahia, Santos was the son of two elementary school teachers, and as a result was educated at home. Though higher education was not easily accessible to Santos, he was motivated to study by his father’s reminders that they had descended from slaves. Santos continued his pursuit of education by teaching high school geography in order to pay for his university tuition . In 1958 he earned a PhD in Geography from the University of Strasbourg, returning from France to teach at the Catholic University of Salvador and the Federal University of Bahia.

After decades of contributions to his field, Santos became the first Brazilian to win the Vautrin Lud International Geography Prize, known as the “Nobel Prize for Geography”—on this day in 1994. The prestigious accolade had never been awarded to a scholar who wrote in a language besides English. Never one to rest on his laurels, Santos’ quest for knowledge continued with his groundbreaking book The Nature of Space, which won Brazil’s Jabuti Award in 1997. That same year he also received the title of Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Philosophy, Letters and Human Sciences of the University of São Paulo.

Neither old age nor illness dampened his passion for the ideas he believed in. In July 2000, Santos and some of his students at the University of São Paulo published a pamphlet titled ‘The Active Role of Geography: A Manifesto,’ which they distributed at a national Brazilian geographers’ meeting. The provocative text sparked a passionate debate, just as Santos intended about the societal effects of a given geography.

Although his work has not yet been as widely translated and distributed as he would have liked, Santos’ legacy stands as a brilliant scholar who cared deeply about ways to create a better world for all of humanity.

[9A]

1 Oct 2018
Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy's 100th Birthday








Attachment to your village, your hospital, your state or country—that must go. You must live in your soul and face the universal consciousness. To see all as one. To have this vision and work with strength and wisdom all over the world...to give sight for all."

-Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy

Known as Dr. V to colleagues and patients, Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy, founded the Aravind Eye Hospital, which started as an 11-bed facility and has grown into a network of clinics providing life-changing care to citizens of a nation struggling with high rates of blindness. Born on this day in 1918, Govindappa Venkataswamy was raised in Vadamalapuram, a rural village in Southern India. He began his education at a school with no paper or pencils—spreading sand from the riverbank on the ground, students would write with their hands. From such humble beginnings he went on to earn a B.A. in chemistry from American College in Madurai, an M.D. from Stanley Medical College in Madras in 1944.

Joining the Indian Army Medical Corps straight out of medical school, Dr. V’s plans for a career in obstetrics were derailed when he was stricken with rheumatoid arthritis so severe that he was confined to his bed for a year. Simple acts like walking or holding a pen became a serious challenge, but somehow he managed to return to school and study for a degree in ophthalmology in 1951. Despite his health issues, he learned how to perform surgery to remove cataracts—the leading cause of blindness. Dr. V could perform 100 surgeries in a day. Addressing the problem of blindness in a holistic fashion, he set up eye camps in rural communities, a rehab center for blind people, and a training program for ophthalmic assistants, personally performing over 100,000 successful eye surgeries. In 1973 he received the Padmashree award from the Government of India for outstanding service to the nation.

Facing mandatory retirement at age 58, Dr. V began the next phase of his career in 1976, establishing the GOVEL Trust in order to fund the first Aravind Eye Hospital. The 11-bed facility was financed by doctors mortgaging their homes and donating their own furniture. The vision was to devote six beds to those patients who could not pay anything and to cover those costs with the other five beds, serving patients paying only as much as they could afford.

Today Aravind Eye Hospital has nearly 4,000 beds performing over 400,000 eye surgeries each year, with 70% of patients paying little or nothing. This seemingly miraculous result has been made possible by a relentless focus on efficiency and good management. Dr. V lowered the cost of cataract operations to nearly $10 per patient. His team of paramedicals do most of the prep work required for each surgery, freeing doctors to do what they do best. Each year Aravind performs 60% as many eye surgeries as the NHS in Great Britain, doing so at one-one thousandth of the cost.

As Dr V said, “Intelligence and capability are not enough. There must also be the joy of doing something beautiful.”

[9A]

30 Sept 2018
Helia Bravo Hollis’ 117th Birthday






“I have done everything with love, passion, and courage,” said Helia Bravo Hollis in an interview with UNAM, the Mexican University where she studied and later headed the Biology department. “I have never worked for a salary. Everything has been for the research.”

Known to her students as La Maestra Bravo, Bravo Hollis made enormous contributions to the study of cacti in Mexico and worked tirelessly to found UNAM’s Botanical Gardens, where she served as director during the 1960s. Her passion for learning about nature was contagious to her students and earned her a great deal of respect among colleagues.

Born on this day in 1901, in the Mixcoac section of Mexico City, she first became interested in nature during Sunday walks with her parents. Her interest in the natural world led her to study Biological Sciences and obtain a Master’s degree from the UNAM, with a thesis on varieties of cactus found in Tehuacán, Puebla. An ambitious researcher, Bravo Hollis published her first book by 1937—the landmark study Las Cactaceas de México—which established her as a leading expert in the field.

During a 60 year career, she published nearly 170 articles, two books, as well as some 60 taxa descriptions and another 59 taxonomic revisions. A co-founder of the Mexican Cactus Society, Bravo Hollis discovered numerous species herself. The Ariocarpus bravoanus and Opuntia bravoana cacti are named after her. Her legacy lives on through the Helia Bravo Hollis Botanical Garden in Puebla, which is home to many endangered cactus species and has become a popular destination for students, scientists, and tourists alike.

[9A]

1 October 2019
Julio Jaramillo’s 84th Birthday



Today’s Doodle celebrates the life and music of Ecuadorian singer Julio Jaramillo, also known as El Ruiseñor de América, or “The Nightingale of the Americas.” Born to a working-class family in the bustling port city of Guayaquil on this day in 1935, Jaramillo grew up to become an international star who toured Latin America singing boleros, tangos, rancheras, and pasillos––the sentimental love songs that are often considered Ecuador’s national musical genre.

Jaramillo fell in love with music early, learning to play guitar as a youngster. After dropping out of school, he supported himself as a shoemaker, but longed to become a singer, sometimes serenading passersby in the city streets. Traveling to Colombia in hopes of gaining exposure, he once barged into a live radio broadcast, determined to make his voice heard and managed to impress listeners with his vocals. Back home in Ecuador, he recorded “Nuestro Juramanto” [“Our Oath”], a song about undying love that brought him international acclaim and remains to this day one of the most popular of his thousands of recordings.]

Jaramillo lived a colorful life, traveling the world, romancing many women, and appearing in the 1966 film Fiebre de Juventud [Youth Fever]. One of Latin America’s most acclaimed singers, he became a sort of unofficial ambassador for Ecuador in pop culture.

Since 1993, October 1st has been celebrated as Día del Pasillo Ecuatoriano, a national holiday honoring the musical form Jaramillo helped to popularize around the world. The singer’s legacy lives on at the Museo Municipal de la Música Popular Julio Jaramillo, welcoming visitors to his hometown all year long.

[9A]

2 October 2019
Waheed Murad’s 81st Birthday








Today’s Doodle, illustrated by Canada-based, Pakistan-born guest artist Anoosha Syed, celebrates the iconic Pakistani actor and producer Waheed Murad. Also known as “the Chocolaty Hero,” Murad’s blockbuster films electrified South Asian cinema throughout the 1960s and ’70s. Born in the former British India on this day in 1938, Murad was the only son of distributor Nisar Murad. After a brief appearance in the 1959 film Saathi, he began working with his father’s Film Art Productions, becoming the youngest producer Lollywood had ever seen.

Casting rising actress Zeba in an early lead role and helping her rise to stardom, Zeba, in turn, encouraged Murad to pursue acting. “I asked Waheed to become a leading man but his reply stunned me,” she recalled later. Waheed asked if she was mocking him, but after taking a role in the 1962 film Aulaad, he never looked back. The pair headlined many hit movies together, including Heera Aur Patthar in 1964 and Rishta Hai Pyar Ka, which was partially shot in London and Paris.

Murad went on to receive the Nigar Award for Best Producer and Best Actor for the 1966 romantic musical Armaan. The matinee idol was adored by many. He once found his white car covered with lipstick marks from female fans in Karachi.

During a career spanning a quarter-century, he appeared in more than 100 films, including Urdu, Punjabi, and Pashto productions. In November 2010, Murad was posthumously awarded the prestigious Sitara-e-Imtiaz [star of excellence] award by the Pakistani government for his outstanding contributions to the arts. To this day, Pakistan’s Waheedi Club organizes an annual film festival in his honor.