Tintin in the Land of the Soviets (original French: Tintin au pays des Soviets) is the first volume of The Adventures of Tintin (Les Aventures de Tintin), the comics series by Belgian cartoonist Hergé. Commissioned by the conservative Belgian newspaper Le XXe Siècle as anti-communistpropaganda for its children's supplement Le Petit Vingtième, it was serialised weekly from January 1929 to May 1930. The story tells of young Belgian reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy (Milou), who are sent to the Soviet Union to report on the policies of Joseph Stalin's Bolshevik government. Tintin's intent to expose the regime's secrets prompts agents from the Soviet secret police, the OGPU, to hunt him down. Bolstered by publicity stunts including the April Fools' Day publication of a faked OGPU letter confirming Tintin's existence, Land of the Soviets was a commercial success, and appeared in book form shortly after its conclusion. Hergé continued The Adventures of Tintin with Tintin in the Congo (Tintin au Congo), and the series became a defining part of the Franco-Belgian comics tradition. He later came to regret the poorly researched, propagandist debut story, and prevented its republication until 1973. (Full article...)
1783 – A cataclysmic eruption of Mount Asama, the most active volcano in Japan, killed roughly 1,400 people and exacerbated a famine, resulting in another 20,000 deaths.
The Rainbow Bee-eater (Merops ornatus) is the only species of bee-eater found in Australia. The brilliantly coloured species averages 19–24 centimetres (7.5–9.4 in) in length.
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