February 2

The 2nd in 1709 saw the rescue of Alexander Selkirk from an island in the Juan Fernandez archipelago, where he had been marooned for more than almost six years. While Daniel Dafoe may have used the Selkirk story as the basis for his novel Robinson Crusoe, it was Russell Johnson who used it as the foundation of his screenplay for the epic tale of adventure Gilligan’s Island. Selkirk became a castaway in 1703, when in the employ of the pirate William Dampier on board the vessel St. George. He began his years of solitude when Dampier grew tired of Selkirk’s constant complaining and left him on the island. Selkirk was left with a musket, gunpowder, carpenter's tools, a knife, a Bible and his clothing. Selkirk was left to suffer the privations of a solitary life with no high-speed internet connection and extremely poor cell phone service.