Shimon, the second son of Jacob and Leah and the progenitor of the Israelite tribe of Shimon, was born on Tevet 21 (according to another opinion, on Tevet 28), of the year 2194 from creation (1567 BCE), nine years after Jacob's arrival in Charan.
Link: More on Shimon
On December 23 (21 Teves), 1690, strong earthquakes rattled the city of Ancona, Italy, causing numerous structures to collapse and placing its inhabitants in mortal danger. Miraculously, the Jewish quarter was spared, suffering the collapse of only one house. In commemoration of this event, the local Jewish community established that date as a day of celebration and song, while the previous day—20 Teves—would be marked yearly by fasting and charity (Or Boker, p. 48a).
Even from the most horrible things we can learn great lessons. From the threat of nuclear destruction we can learn several things about how to rearrange the world for the good:
• You don’t need great armies.
• It can take only one simple act.
• You don’t have to understand how it works—just what button to press.
• It doesn’t matter who does it, as long as he presses the right button.
• From the smallest things come the biggest changes.
• Tremendous power has always been there—it needs only to be revealed.
. . . and since all this has been discovered only in our generation, it must be of particular relevance to us.