Nicolas Rodriguez Ri (1896 - 1978)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during Nicolas' lifetime.

In 1896, in the year that Nicolas Rodriguez Ri was born, in April, the first study on global warming due to CO2 - carbon dioxide - in the atmosphere was published by Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius. Arrhenius concluded that human activity due to the Industrial Revolution would amplify CO2 in the atmosphere, causing a greenhouse effect. His conclusions have been extensively tested in the ensuing 100+ years and are still seen to hold true.

In 1903, when he was just 7 years old, the silent film, The Great Train Robbery opened. Although it was filmed in Milltown, New Jersey, it was a Western. Twelve minutes long, the film used a lot of innovative techniques - some scenes were hand colored and composite editing, on-location shooting, and frequent camera movement were used. Its budget was $150 (about $4000 currently) and was the most popular film until 1915 when Birth of a Nation was released.

In 1913, at the age of 17 years old, Nicolas was alive when Henry Ford installed the first moving assembly line for the mass production of an entire automobile. It had previously taken 12 hours to assemble a whole vehicle - now it took only two hours and 30 minutes! Inspired by the production lines at flour mills, breweries, canneries and industrial bakeries, along with the disassembly of animal carcasses in Chicago’s meat-packing plants, Ford created moving belts for parts and the assembly line was born.

In 1921, at the age of 25 years old, Nicolas was alive when on November 11th, the first burial was held at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery. The body of an unknown soldier - selected by Army Sgt. Edward F. Younger who was highly decorated for valor and received the Distinguished Service Cross in "The Great War" - was brought back from France (World War 1) and placed in the newly completed tomb. President Warren G. Harding officiated at the interment ceremonies.

In 1978, in the year of Nicolas Rodriguez Ri's passing, on July 25th, Louise Brown, the first "test-tube baby", was born at Oldham Hospital in London. Louise was conceived through IVF (in vitro fertilization), a controversial and experimental procedure at the time.