September 1, 2007

That fall of 2007, gas ran $2.80 a gallon and Bush was in the White House — the U.S. was also navigating an increasingly complicated presence in Pakistan, with American officials quietly preparing contingency plans in case President Musharraf lost his grip on power. On the cultural front, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" by J.K. Rowling was still dominating the fiction bestseller lists after its July release, and "Mad Men" had just taken home the Emmy for Outstanding Drama Series, introducing audiences to the advertising world of 1960s Manhattan. The Boston Red Sox swept the Colorado Rockies to claim the World Series title, while Japan's SELENE spacecraft — one of the most sophisticated lunar probes ever built — successfully launched on a mission to map the Moon's surface in greater detail than any previous mission had achieved.