Then Came the Last Days of May Quiz

May 22, 1930 is the date of birth of Harvey Milk, who was elected in November of 1977 to be a member of the San Francisco Board of supervisors as the first openly gay person elected to public office in California. He served for nearly a year, championing the rights of local neighborhoods, before being assassinated along with the city's mayor on 27 November 1978. His killer, a disgruntled former fellow Board member, was found guilty of a reduced charge of manslaughter due to mental disturbance; in evidence of this mental state, the defense pointed out that he had gone on a junk food bender the previous night (out of character for someone who was very conscious of eating healthily), a defense which quickly became known as the Twinkie defense.

The case led to the removal of diminished capacity as a defense against a criminal charge in California, although it could still be taken into consideration during sentencing. Despite Harvey Milk often being described in terms of his sexuality, his major focus was on the need to have the needs of the people recognised, because he saw the neighbourhood community as a powerful uniting force for society. This was demonstrated by his work in getting more bus stops, having potholes repaired efficiently, and passing an ordinance requiring people to pick up dog droppings from the street - thus reducing one of the most common sources of complaint from city residents about quality-of-life issues.

Harvey Milk Day was declared a day of special significance for public schools in 2009, shortly after Barack Obama awarded Milk a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom. The Harvey Milk Foundation organises the day's activities "to empower local, regional, national and global organizations so that they may fully realize the power of Harvey Milk's story, style, and collaborative relationship building ... [and] envisions governments that celebrate the rich and universally empowering diversity of humanity, where all individuals - gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, racial and ethnic minorities, the elderly, the young, the disabled - all who had been excluded can fully participate in all societal rights without exception." (taken from the Harvey Milk Foundation site)

While many countries around the world have a Constitution Day (commemorating variously the anniversary of the signing or promulgation of a new nation's constitution, or the change from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy), it is only in Germany where the celebration is on 23 May.

The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany was enacted on 23 May 1949, with the approval of the occupying Allied Powers from WWII, marking the foundation of what was then commonly known as West Germany. It was called Basic to indicate that it was provisional, pending the reunification of Germany. When the country was reunified in 1990, this framework was retained to apply to the entire nation, with the Allies relinquishing all further say in the country's government.

What is considered to have been the first patriotic (as opposed to colonial) government of Argentina came into being with the creation of the Primera Junta on 25 May 1810, part of what is known as the May Revolution. This group, which removed the Spanish Viceroy from his position, actually only represented Buenos Aires at the time, but other parts of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata were included in December's Junta Grande. At the time, they were establishing themselves as a local government with loyalty to the Spanish crown (which was at the time under siege in the Napoleonic Wars), but over time the movement to full independence progressed, with the Argentine War of Independence lasting from 1810 until 1818.

Primer gioberno patrio (Anniversary of the First National Government) commemorates the establishment of the Primer Junta, while 9 July is Independence Day, celebrating the declaration of independence by the Congress of Tucumán on that date in 1816.

This is the official name of what is colloquially called National Sorry Day, an ongoing recognition of the impact of colonisation on indigenous Australians, people with some of, if not the, oldest civilisations on the planet. It was first observed by a number of community groups on 26 May 1998, one year after the publication of the tabling of a Parliamentary report ('Bringing Them Home') on the era which has come to be known as the Stolen Generations. In that year, virtually none of the recommendations had been acted on, and the Prime Minister of the time had flatly refused to issue an apology on behalf of the government for past actions and inactions; it was not until 13 February 2008 that the next Prime Minister issued a formal apology for the forced removal of thousands of Indigenous children from their families.

Over subsequent years, Sorry Day observances have grown in number and size. Some of them focus on protest against the fact that indigenous people remain massively disadvantaged (with much higher rates of children taken into state care, shorter life expectancies, and significantly lower levels of physical, mental and financial wellbeing), while others focus of the process of Reconciliation. This spirit was behind the official change of name in 2005 to refer to a National Day of Healing. The 2017 Uluru Statement from the Heart, a petition produced at the First Nations National Constitutional Convention that outlined what indigenous leaders saw as a possible path, was released on 26 May.

Again, many countries celebrate the abolition of slavery (although there can be quite a significant gap between the legal declaration and the actual realisation), it is in the Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe, Saint Barthélemy and Saint Martin (all part of the French overseas department of Guadeloupe before 2007) that this is on 27 May. France abolished slavery on 27 May 1848, which had significant import for these islands, where the colonial economy had flourished with the use of slave labour.

French settlers displaced the Spanish in the early part of the 17th century, and in 1644 the first slaves arrived to work the sugar and coffee plantations. By the time the French crown took over from the plantation owners as rulers of the islands in 1674, the institution of slavery was firmly established, and continued through a number of slave rebellions, including that of Jean-Baptiste Labat in 1703, which established a sugar refinery that provided a sound financial basis for the economy. During the French Revolution slavery was abolished briefly, before being restored under Napoleon before its final abolition in 1848. Of course, the plantations still needed cheap labour, so indentured workers from France's Indian colony of Pondicherry were imported.

Sounds like something from a science fiction movie, doesn't it? The Derg was a Marxist-Leninist junta that ruled in Ethiopia between 1974 (when they deposed emperor Haille Selassie) until the government was officially 'civilianised' in 1987 with the establishment of a constitution; the same group, however, remained in effective power until 1991. It was a time of unrest, including the Ethiopian Civil War and the Eritrean War of Independence.

In 1991 a number of rebel forces managed to form a coalition which ousted the Derg administrators, with President Mengistu fleeing the country on 21 May, and Addis Ababa being captured on 28 May. this was followed by the arrest of around 2000 Derg officials. In December 2006 seventy-three were found guilty of genocide, and sentenced to death, a sentence which was commuted in 2010 to imprisonment, with most of those who had been incarcerated being released in 2011, after having been imprisoned for twenty years. Those who had fled abroad, or who escaped to lead ongoing rebellions from within the country, did not have their sentences commuted.

The Day of Greatness, to use the English translation of this day of celebration in Pakistan, is a commemoration of the nuclear tests conducted on 28 and 30 May 1998, making Pakistan the seventh nation to develop nuclear weapons, and the first Islamic nation to do so. The development of the weapons was enabled by Chinese assistance, ostensibly for the development of the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant. The public tests came a few days after neighbouring India had conducted its second set of nuclear tests.

The first celebration of Youm-e-Takbir primarily involved bestowing medals on those responsible for the Chagai tests, and presentation of Chagai medals is a standard part of the annual festivities, along with military parades, patriotic singing and other such activities.

Oak Apple Day is the name by which the official Restoration Day, commemorating the restoration of the Stuart Monarchy when James II returned to London following his overseas exile on 29 May 1660, was more commonly known. The oak reference is to an event in which Charles II escaped the Roundhead army by hiding in an oak tree, following the Battle of Worcester. His supporter thereafter sported sprigs of oak to indicate their allegiance.

The public holiday was abolished under the Anniversary Days Observance Act of 1859, but local celebrations are still held, especially in parts of the country where Royalists predominated. These may include Civil War re-enactments, processions whose participants wield oak apples (a kind of gall that grows on oak trees) and oak leaves, decoration of public monuments, tea parties, and assorted other festivities.

Why is a terrorist attack on an Israeli airport remembered in Puerto Rico? You may well ask, and the answer is simple, if not intuitive: 17 of the 26 people who died were Christian pilgrims from Puerto Rico, along with eight Israelis and one Canadian.

The Lod Massacre took place on 30 May 1972 when three members of the Japanese Red Army who had been recruited to act on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine attacked the terminal of Lod Airport (now known as Ben Gurion International Airport), near Tel Aviv. Because security officials were on guard for a Palestinian attack, they were taken by surprise when the Japanese passengers on a flight from Rome opened their violin cases and opened fire. One of the three was shot by one of his comrades, one died when a grenade exploded accidentally, and one escaped after being wounded, but was subsequently captured.

The legislature of Puerto Rico passed a bill making Lod Massacre Remembrance Day an official entry on the calendar in 2006, with the first celebration of the day coming in 2007, on the 35th anniversary of the massacre. In 2012 a Lod Massacre Memorial, with the names of the victims, was set up adjacent to the Holocaust Memorial south of the Capitol Building.

Holidays in Spain may be religious or secular, as well as being national, regional or local. Each municipality is allowed to have a maximum of 14 public holidays each year, with a maximum of 9 set nationally and a minimum of two set locally. So the exact celebrations vary from year to year, as well as between regions.

Castile-La Mancha Day is celebrated in this large central autonomous community with its administrative capital in the city of Toledo. The autonomous community was established in 1982, as part of a Spanish governmental administrative restructure. While autonomy was declared on 16 August, the regional day is celebrated on 31 May because the regional courts sat for the first time on that day in 1983. The regional holiday was therefore celebrated for the first time in 1984.