This Day in History

[Amnorix]

Today...

[patteeu]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

Maybe I should've named this thread "a date close to this date, in history". I'll start catching up...

[patteeu]

I don't know if it's like this everywhere, but many of the people I knew in the National Lawyers Guild might as well have been communists.

[Amnorix]

Originally Posted by patteeu

I don't know if it's like this everywhere, but many of the people I knew in the National Lawyers Guild might as well have been communists.

To be honest, I've never even heard of it.

[Amnorix]

June 10.

1190. Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, better known as Barbarossa ("red beard"), drowns in the river Saleph while attempting to lead an army to Jerusalem during the Third Crusade. Operation Barbarossa, the Nazi invasion of the USSR, was named after this charismatic German leader.

1692. Bridget Bishop is hanged at Gallows Hill near Salem, Massachusetts for "certaine Detestable Arts called Witchcraft & Sorceries", the first of the eventual 19 people hanged. Another person, a man, who refused to enter a plea was crushed to death by stone in an effort to get him to do so.

1898. Marines land on the island of Cuba during the Spanish-American War.

1935. Dr. Robert Smith takes his last drink, and founds Alcoholics Anonymous.

1940. Norway surrenders to the Nazis, a serious blow and surprising reversal for the British.

1944. Cincinnati Red Joe Nuxhall becomes the youngest person to ever appear in a major league baseball game. He is a spry 15 years of age.

[Amnorix]

June 11.

1184 BC. Troy is captured, sacked and burned by the Greeks. Note that there is considerable disagreement over which century, much less which precise date this occurred. This is the date calculated by Eratosthenes, an ancient Greek. But though he was much closer to the time of the event in question, he was still writing a thousand years after the fact, so take it with a massive grain of salt.

1776. The Contintental Congress appoints a committee of five to draft a declaration regarding its independence. Serving on the committee are Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston. The selection of the committee and decision of who would try to write the declaration are humorously memorialized in the musical 1776, where Jefferson is portrayed as a young man who ardently desires to return to his wife in Virginia and is instead "forced" to write the declaration by Adams.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYhjBcYnzvU


1920. At the Republican National Convention in Chicago, party leaders gather in a back room of the Blackstone Hotel to reach a consensus on their candidate for the Presidency, leading the Associated Press to first use the phrase "smoke-filled room". The party's nominee becomes Warren Harding, an unlikely candidate, who goes on to win the Presidency. Harding would have a fairly talent-laden Cabinet, but his administration is marked by corruption and he goes down in history as one of our more mediocre Presidents.

1938. The Nationalist Government of China intentionally floods the Yellow River to slow down or stop Japanese troops. Approximately 500,000 Chinese civilians are killed, as the government decided not to warn anyone about the flooding in order to surprise the Japanese.

1962. Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin successfully escape Alcatraz Prison. Their efforts are memorialized in Clint Eastwood's 1979 movie "Escape from Alcatraz".

[Amnorix]

June 12.

1775. British General Thomas Gage puts Boston under martial law, and declares that all colonists that put down their arms would be given pardons, with two exceptions. Samuel Adams and John Hancock, if captured, were to be hanged.

1939. The Baseball Hall of Fame opens in Cooperstown, New York.

1942. Anne Frank receives a diary for her 13th birthday. A month later the young Jewish girl and her family she will go into hiding to avoid increasing Nazi persecution.

1943. The Jewish Ghetto in Berezhany, western Ukraine, is liquidated. Nearly 1,200 Jews are led to the old Jewish cemetary and executed.

1964. Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life in prison for sabotage.

1967. The Supreme Court declares all laws prohibiting interracial marriage to be unconstitutional.

1987. At the Brandenberg Gate in Berlin, Germany, President Reagan challenges Mikhail Gorbachev to "tear down this wall".


1994. Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman are murdered in Los Angeles, California. Former NFL star OJ Simpson is later acquitted of the murder charges, but found liable in a civil action.

[Amnorix]

June 13

1373. The Anglo-Portugese Alliance between England (later succeded by the United Kingdom, and Portugal, goes into effect. It is the oldest known alliance still in effect.

1525. Martin Luther marries, in violation of Church celibacy rules.

1777. The Marquis de Lafayette, of France, lands to help Continental forces. He will prove instrumental in assisting the revolutionary movement.

1934. Hitler and Moussolini meet for the first time, in Venice, Italy. Il Duce is dressed in a military uniform and, underestimating Hitler as so many had, and would, treats him pompously. He very much viewed himself as the senior memory of the nationalist socialism, having already led Italy for over a decade, compared to Hitler's few months, at the time of the meeting. Hitler, having been given bad instructions by his ambassador, is wearing civilian dress and looks and feels out of place. Moussolini later refers to Hitler as a "silly little monkey".

1942. The US establishes the Office of Strategic Services, the progenitor of the CIA.

1944. The first V-1 "flying bombs" are launched by the Nazis at London. Only 4 of 12 reach their target. Later, over 100 rockets a day will be launched. The terror and resultant Allied strategic focus on their removal are utterly disproportionate to the threat posed by them.



1966. The Supreme Court hands down its ruling in Miranda v. Arizona, establishing "Miranda Rights."

1971. The New York Times begins publication of the Pentagon Papers.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

1777. The Marquis de Lafayette, of France, lands to help Continental forces. He will prove instrumental in assisting the revolutionary movement.

I hate this.

[Amnorix]

1971. The New York Times begins publication of the Pentagon Papers.

I doubt many here know what the heck the Pentagon Papers were, so I thought I'd expand on this a bit, as it's really a fascinating little nugget of history.

In the late 60s, America was of course tied up in the Vietnam War. The Defense Department commissioned a comprehensive review of US-Vietnam relations from '45 to '67. The review was completed in '68. One of the contributors to the report was Daniel Ellsberg, a military analyst with the Rand Corporation.

The report was classified top secret, and was not intended for publication or distribution.

In 1971, the New York Times began running excerpts from the report on its front page. The revelations caused a furor. A number of items in the report clearly showed that many senior politicians, including candidate LBJ and then President LBJ, had lied to the public about matters relating to Vietnam. The Nixon Administration brought a lawsuit seeking to stop publication by the NYT, a case that quickly rose to the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, the Administration also threatened anyone involved with felony treason under the 1917 Espionage Act.

To ensure open debate, then Democratic Senator Mike Gravel of Alaska entered 4,100 pages of the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record, where they enjoyed absolute privilege under the Constitution.

The upshot of this massive furor was a Supreme Court case that found expansively in favor of freedom of speech rights by newspaper publications and an American public that turned even more viciously on the Vietnam War.

Originally Posted by H.R. Haldemann, to Nixon, in the White House Tapes

To the ordinary guy, all this is a bunch of gobbledygook. But out of the gobbledygook comes a very clear thing: You can't trust the government; you can't believe what they say; and you can't rely on their judgment; and the implicit infallibility of presidents, which has been an accepted thing in America, is badly hurt by this, because it shows that people do things the President wants to do even though it's wrong, and the President can be wrong.

In response to the leaks John Ehrlichman would form what would become known as the "White House Plumbers", who would then play a prominent role in the Watergate fiasco.

Ellsburg, meanwhile, got off scot free after being indicted. In its absolute zeal to erase him, the federal government, under intense pressure from the White House, had managed to break every rule ever written for prosecutorial conduct, including illegal wiretaps and breaking into the offices of Ellsburg's psychiatrist in an attempt to find his file. The judge tossed the case out on its ear.

Originally Posted by United States District Court Judge Matthew Byrne, Jr.

The totality of the circumstances of this case which I have only briefly sketched offend a sense of justice. The bizarre events have incurably infected the prosecution of this case

[Amnorix]

June 14.

1777. Congress establishes the stars and stripes as the official flag of the United States. Eddie Izzard fans will recognize the importance of this.

1789. Whiskey distilled from maize, i.e. Bourbon Whiskey, is first produced by Baptist minister Elijah Craig, in Kentucky. Bourbon County, Kentucky to be precise. Hence the name. The Craig legend, however, is more than likely just that, only a legend.

1900. Hawaii becomes a US territory.

1938. Action comics releases its first issue, introducing Superman.

1940. Paris is occupied by the Germans. Ilsa goes to Viktor, who is desperately ill in a railroad car. Rick leaves the city by train without her, heartbroken.

1940. 728 Polish political prisoners are shipped to a newly opened concentration camp. The first residents of Auschwitz.

1954. President Eisenhower signs a bill into law adding the words "Under God" to the US Pledge of Allegiance which had been around for about 60 years.

1966. The Vatican abolishes the Index Librorum Prohibitorum -- the list of prohibted books, which had been in effect since 1557. Since many of the books are now considered the foundation stones of science and philosophy, presumably they determined that it wasn't making them too bright. Authors with works on the list include Kepler, Sartre, Voltaire, Victor Hugo, Kant, Hume, Descartes, Francis Bacon, Locke, John Milton, and Galileo.

1982. The Falkland Islands War ends. It is a resounding victory for the rights of sheep everywhere.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

1982. The Falkland Islands War ends. It is a resounding victory for the rights of sheep everywhere.

"We need the Falklands, for strategic sheep purposes!"

[Amnorix]

June 15

763 BC. Assyrians record a solar eclipse which is later used to fix many other events in Mesopotamian history.

1215. King John I puts his seal on Magna Carta.

1752. Ben Franklin proves that lightning is electricity.

1775. George Washington is appointed commander of the Continental Army.

1844. Charles Goodyear receives a patent for vulcanization, a process to strengthen rubber.

1846. The Oregon Treaty is signed by the US and the United Kingdom, fixing the 49th parallel as the boundary between the US and Canada west of the Rocky Mountains.

1864. Ulysses S. Grant and the Army of the Potomac reach the outskirts of Petersburg, Virginia. Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia, travelling on interior lines, has once again beaten Grant to his objective. Grant, who has already established his rabid tenacity, doesn't intend to leave, and both sides settle in for a siege.

Petersburg was a city just south of Richmond, and a main supply route into the city. Without Petersburg, Richmond, the Confederate Capital, could not survive. The siege was not a true siege, in which an objective is surrounded and all supplies are cut off. Rather, Petersburg was besieged, and the armies engaged in trench warfare. Eventually, over 30 miles of trenches were dug by the Union, which with superior resources and manpower, was constantly spreading the length of the line and causing Lee's troops to thin themselves out to avoid being outflanked. The siege would last for nine months, and the resulting Union victory was swiftly followed by the surrender of the entire Army of Northern Virginia.

1864. Arlington National Cemetary is established when the Union declares the 200 acres formerly owned by Robert E. Lee to be effectively forfeit, and starts burying the Union dead on the Confederate commander's former property. In 1882 the Supreme Court ruled that the act was illegal, and awarded the property to Lee's oldest surviving son, George Washington Custis Lee, who sold it back to the government for $150,000.

1882. Crown Prince Wilhelm becomes Kaiser Wilhelm II, the last Kaiser of Imperial Germany. Of course, Imperial Germany only lasted 47 years, so I guess it's not saying all that much.

1911. Tabulating Computing Recording Corporation is incorporated. It will later change its name to something you might find more recognizable: IBM.

1916. President Wilson signs a charter for the Boy Scouts of America, making them the only federally chartered youth organization.

[Amnorix]

June 16.

1858. Abraham Lincoln gives the House Divided speech. Surprisingly, it's not about tariffs.

Originally Posted by Abraham Lincoln

"A house divided against itself cannot stand." I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other.

Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new — North as well as South.

1903. Ford Motor Company is incorporated.

1904. Bloomsday. Irish author James Joyce begins his relationship with Nora Barnacle, and therefore uses this day to set the events of his novel Ulysses, all of which occur within this single date. The date is therefore celebrated as Bloomsday in Ireland, being named after Leopold Bloom, the protagonist of the novel.

1940. In a sad closing chapter of a French military hero from WWI, the 84 year old Henri Philippe Petain, Marshal of France, becomes Premier of Vichy France, which collaborated with the Nazis. Following the war, he is convicted of and sentenced to death by firing squad for treason, a sentence that is commuted to life imprisonment by his former protege Charles de Gaulle. He eventually dies, completely senile while inprisoned on an island off the Atlantic Coast of France. Calls are occassionally made for him to be reinterred at a site prepared for him near Verdun, the WWI battle where he achieved his greatest fame. Mount Petain, in the Canadian Rockies, was named for him in 1919, one of a number of other summits named for French military leaders of WWI, such as Foch, and Joffre.

1976. The Soweto uprising, a non-violent demonstration by 15,000 students in Soweto, South Africa, turns into days of rioting after police open fire.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Amnorix

Calls are occassionally made for him to be reinterred at a site prepared for him near Verdun, the WWI battle where he achieved his greatest fame.

Wow, I didn't know that, although I suppose I'm not surprised.

[Amnorix]

June 17

1631. Mumtaz Mahal dies during childbirth. Her husband, Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan I, will spend 20 years building a mausoleum for his beloved wife. We know it as the Taj Mahal.

1775. The Battle of Bunker Hill is fought. Although a tactical victory for the British, in that they took the hill, they suffered serious losses in doing so.

1932. The "Bonus Army" starts assembling in Washington DC. These were veterans of the First World War, who were seeking early payment of a bonus that had been promised to them. Eventually, they will be dispatched by military forces under the command of Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur. His aide, Dwight Eisenhower, will lament MacArthur's attitude toward the Bonus Army and the publicity-seeking methods MacArthur used.

1944. Iceland declares independence from Denmark and becomes an independent republic.

(I hope to have more to say on the Bonus Army later)