An uninspiring day? Not at all!

Casting around for inspiration this morning, in all the usual places: Favourites file, Wordpad, bookshelf, news on-line - I came up empty. Even the " Born on this day" pages seemed devoid of sparkling celebrity. Perhaps 28 February was always an unspiring day, I pondered. But then I noticed a name I recognised.

Linus Pauling. Chemist and humanitarian. An inspired man to whom we all must owe a debt of gratitude. Born 28 February 1901, in Portland, Oregon.

His natal Saturn in Capricorn is strong in its home sign, fitting for a man of science. Jupiter lies in Capricorn too. His natal Moon opposes Saturn from Cancer. I often notice an opposition between planets on the Cancer/Capricorn axis in charts of the famous.

Sun and Mercury in Pisces with Venus in Aquarius - a combination which could be tipped to produce "a humanitarian" . Linus Pauling was part of the Pluto in Gemini /Uranus in Sagittarius generation - a generation which gave us so many "greats".

"A couple of days after my talk, there was a man in my office from the FBI saying - Who told you how much plutonium there is in an atomic bomb? And I said - Nobody told me, I figured it out."
In the late 1940s, few Americans had any idea what the long-term effects of nuclear radiation might be, and their government wasn't telling them. Dr. Linus Pauling had already won renown for his application of modern physics to the problems of chemistry when he took on the unpopular task of informing the public about the dangers of nuclear weapons.
Pauling endured ostracism and ridicule for his uncompromising stand, but went on to win two Nobel Prizes: the 1954 award for Chemistry and the1962 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to end the open-air testing of nuclear weapons. To the end of his 93 years, Linus Pauling devoted himself to the cause of world peace, to the struggle against disease, and to educating the public about a multitude of health issues, from the hazards of smoking to the benefits of vitamin C. Pauling's work as a chemist would have been sufficient to earn him an honored place in the history of science, but his humanitarian efforts made him a beloved figure around the world.