Today in History ^06/03/17

June 3, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ Leave a Comment

U.S. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant poses at Cold Harbor, Virginia, in June 1864 during the American Civil War (© AP)

(1864) General Grant makes a tragic decision at Cold Harbor

Confederate forces are entrenched just 10 miles southeast of Richmond, capital of the Confederacy. Union General U. S. Grant orders a full frontal assault, despite his reinforcements not having arrived, and 7,000 Union troops are dead within an hour’s time in one of the Civil War’s bloodiest battles.

The Battle of Cold Harbor was fought from May 31 to June 12, 1864, with the most significant fighting occurring on June 3. It was one of the final battles of Union Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s Overland Campaign during the American Civil War, and is remembered as one of American history’s bloodiest, most lopsided battles. Thousands of Union soldiers were killed or wounded in a hopeless frontal assault against the fortified positions of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army.

Start date: May 31, 1864
End date: Jun 12, 1864

wiki/Battle_of_Cold_Harbor

Gangs of American sailors and marines armed with sticks during the Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles in June 1943 (© Anthony Potter Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

(1943) Military men target Latinos in L.A. rioting

Fueled by racism, and what’s perceived as the flaunting of wartime rationing rules, the Zoot Suit Riots flare in Los Angeles as white Marines and Navy sailors attack young Latino men. Other cities will see similar clashes between soldiers and minorities wearing the distinctive suit.

The Zoot Suit Riots were a series of attacks in June 1943 in Los Angeles, California, United States, by white American servicemen stationed in Southern California against Mexican American youths and other minorities who were residents of the city.

Date: 1943

wiki/Zoot_Suit_Riots

Aretha Franklin in concert (© Ron Howard/Redferns/Getty Images)

(1967) Aretha Franklin gets some R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Aretha Franklin hits No. 1 on the ‘Billboard’ Hot 100 singles chart with her version of Otis Redding’s ‘Respect,’ turning the song into a women’s anthem. Decades later, Rolling Stone will rank her recording as one of the five greatest songs of all time.

“Respect” is a song written and originally released by American recording artist Otis Redding in 1965. The song became a 1967 hit and signature song for R&B singer Aretha Franklin. The music in the two versions is significantly different, and through a few minor changes in the lyrics, the stories told by the songs have a different flavor. Redding’s version is a plea from a desperate man, who will give his woman anything she wants. He won’t care if she does him wrong, as long as he gets his due respect, when he brings money home . However, Franklin’s version is a declaration from a strong, confident woman, who knows that she has everything her man wants. She never does him wrong, and demands his “respect”. Franklin’s version adds the “R-E-S-P-E-C-T” chorus and the backup singers’ refrain of “Sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me…” Franklin’s cover was a landmark for the feminist movement, and is often considered as one of the best songs of the R&B era, earning her two Grammy Awards in 1968 for “Best Rhythm & Blues Recording” and “Best Rhythm & Blues Solo Vocal Performance, Female”, and was inducted in the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1987. In 2002, the Library of Congress honored Franklin’s version by adding it to the National Recording Registry. It was placed number five on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It was also included in the list of Songs of the Century, by the Recording Industry of America and the National Endowment for the Arts. Franklin included a live recording on the album Aretha in Paris (1968).

Album: I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You
Artists: Aretha Franklin · Otis Redding
Duration: 2:21
Genre: R&B / Soul, Soul

wiki/Respect_(song)

Valerie Solanas, 28, enters police headquarters after she was arrested for shooting Andy Warhol in New York on June 3, 1968 (© Jerry Haynes/NY Daily News Archive/Getty Images)

(1968) Pop art provocateur is nearly assassinated

Already well into his 15 minutes of fame, Andy Warhol, the king of Manhattan’s underground art-world elite, is shot at his famed workspace, The Factory. He will survive after a 5-hour operation, and his would-be assassin, Valerie Solanas, will be diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic.

Andy Warhol was an American artist, director and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationship between artistic expression, celebrity culture, and advertising that flourished by the 1960s, and span a variety of media, including painting, silkscreening, photography, film, and sculpture. Some of his best known works include the silkscreen paintings Campbell’s Soup Cans and Marilyn Diptych, the experimental film Chelsea Girls, and the multimedia events known as the Exploding Plastic Inevitable.

Lived: Aug 06, 1928 – Feb 22, 1987 (age 58)
Height: 5′ 11″ (1.80 m)
Periods: Pop art · Modern art
Education: Carnegie Mellon University (1945 – 1949) · Schenley High School (1942 – 1945)
Buried: St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Cemetery
Parents: Julia Warhola (Mother) · Andrej Warhola (Father)

wiki/Andy_Warhol

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Today in History ^03/10/17

March 10, 2017 by GµårÐïåñ

Illustration of the Roman naval victory over the Carthaginians at Mylae during the First Punic War (© North Wind Picture Archives/Alamy)

(241 BCE) Romans defeat Carthage to end the First Punic War

Two decades of conflict between Mediterranean goliaths end as the fleet of the Roman Republic captures or destroys half of the Carthage fleet. Nevertheless, two more wars between the powers are on the horizon.

The First Punic War was the first of three wars fought between Ancient Carthage and the Roman Republic. For more than 20 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy, primarily on the Mediterranean island of Sicily and its surrounding waters, and also in North Africa. The war signaled the beginning of a strategic transformation in the western Mediterranean. Carthage began the war as the great sea-power of the western Mediterranean, while Rome had but a small fleet of fighting ships. Over the course of the war, Rome built up a powerful navy, developed new naval tactics, and strategically used their navy, army, and local political alliances on Sicily in order to achieve a victory that expelled the Carthaginians from Sicily. The First Punic War ended with a treaty between Rome and Carthage, but years of bloodshed were to follow in the Second and Third Punic Wars before the strategic issue of power in the western Mediterranean was resolved in favor of Rome, and in the total destruction of Carthage.

Start date: 264 BC
End date: 241 BC

wiki/First_Punic_War

Postcard depicting the French Foreign Legion, Morocco, circa 1900 (© Art Media/Print Collector/Getty Images)

(1831) French Foreign Legion is founded

France’s King Louis Philippe establishes a new military unit that he hopes will corral mercenaries and misbehavers, attract foreign fighters, and bolster his North African colonial expansion.

The French Foreign Legion is a military service branch of the French Army established in 1831, unique because it was created for foreign nationals willing to serve in the French Armed Forces.

Flag :
Insignia :

wiki/French_Foreign_Legion

General Ulysses S. Grant poses at Cold Harbor, Virginia, in June 1864 during the Civil War (© AP)

(1864) Lincoln promotes Grant as head of Union armies

Hoping to improve upon a string of mediocre commanders in the Union’s fight against the Confederacy in the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln promotes Ulysses S. Grant to lieutenant general of the US Army. Grant’s aggressive fighting strategy will prove decisive in helping to secure the Union’s victory.

Ulysses S. Grant was the most acclaimed Union general during the American Civil War and was twice elected President. Grant began his military career as a cadet at the West Point military academy in 1839. After graduation he went on to serve with distinction as a lieutenant in the Mexican–American War. Grant was a keen observer of the war and learned battle strategies serving under Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott. After the war Grant served at various posts especially in the Pacific Northwest; he retired from the service in 1854. On the onset of the Civil War in 1861, Grant was working as a clerk in his father’s leather goods store in Galena, Illinois.

Born: Apr 27, 1822 · Point Pleasant, OH
Died: Jul 23, 1885 · Wilton, NY
Education: United States Military Academy
Highlights
1861: Going on the offensive, Grant took 3,000 Union troops by boat and attacked the Confederate Army commanded by General Gideon J. Pillow positioned at Camp Johnson in Belmont, Missouri on November 7, 1861.

1862: Resolved to take control of the Mississippi River from the Confederacy, President Lincoln and the Union Army and Navy were determined to take the Confederate stronghold Vicksburg in 1862.

1862: In early March 1862, Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck ordered Grant’s Army of the Tennessee to move southward up the Tennessee River to attack Confederate railroads.

1863: In January 1863, McClernand and Sherman’s combined XIII and XV corps, the Army of the Mississippi, successfully defeated the Confederates at Arkansas Post.

1863: Adm. David D. Porter’s navy ships had previously run the guns at Vicksburg on April 16, 1863, enabling Union troops to be transported to the east side of the Mississippi.

1863: When Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans was defeated at the Chickamauga in September 1863, the Confederates, led by Braxton Bragg, besieged the Union Army of the Cumberland in Chattanooga.

wiki/Ulysses_S._Grant_and_the_American_Civil_War

Tibetans gather during an uprising against Chinese rule March 10, 1959 in front of the Potala Palace (former home of the Dalai Lama) in Lhasa, the capital of Tibet (Xizang) (© AFP/Getty Images)

(1959) Massive uprising in Chinese-occupied Tibet

Tensions come to a head after 10 years of Chinese occupation, as some 300,000 Tibetans, fearful that the Dalai Lama is about to be kidnapped, surround his palace in Lhasa to protect him.

The 1959 Tibetan Uprising or 1959 Tibetan Rebellion began on 10 March 1959, when a revolt erupted in Lhasa, the capital of Tibet Area, which had been under the effective control of the People’s Republic of China since the Seventeen Point Agreement in 1951. Armed conflict between Tibetan rebels and the People’s Liberation Army had started in 1956 in the Kham and Amdo regions, which had been subjected to socialist reform. The guerrilla warfare later spread to other areas of Tibet and lasted through 1962.

Start date: Mar 10, 1959
End date: Mar 21, 1959

wiki/1959_Tibetan_uprising

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Today in History ^12/22/16

December 22, 2016 by GµårÐïåñ

(1849) Dostoevsky spared at last minute from firing squad

Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky stands before a firing line but as the guns are about to fire gets a reprieve and is sent into exile. A member of an underground intellectual group, he’d been condemned to die for antigovernment activities. He’ll go on to write ‘Crime and Punishment’ and ‘The Brothers Karamazov.’
On this day in 1849, a Russian court sentences Fyodor Dostoevsky to death for his allegedly antigovernment activities linked to a radical intellectual group. His execution is stayed at the last minute. Dostoevsky’s father was a doctor at Moscow’s Hospital for the Poor, where he grew rich enough to buy land and serfs. After his father’s death, Dostoevsky, who suffered from epilepsy, studied military engineering and became a civil servant while secretly writing novels. His first, Poor People, and his second, The Double, were both published in 1846-the first was a hit, the second a failure. Dostoevsky began participating in a radical intellectual discussion group called the Petrashevsky Circle. The group was suspected of subversive activites, which led to Dostoevsky’s arrest in 1849, and his sentencing to death. On December 22, 1849, Dostoevsky was led before the firing squad but received a last-minute reprieve and was sent to a Siberian labor camp, where he worked for four years. He was released in 1854 and worked as a soldier on the Mongolian frontier. He married a widow and finally returned to Russia in 1859. The following year, he founded a magazine and two years after that journeyed to Europe for the first time. In 1864 and 1865, his wife and his brother died, the magazine folded, and Dostoevsky found himself deeply in debt, which he exacerbated by gambling. In 1866, he published Crime and Punishment, one of his most popular works. In 1867, he married a stenographer, and the couple fled to Europe to escape his creditors. His novel The Possessed (1872) was successful, and the couple returned to St. Petersburg. He published The Brothers Karamazov in 1880 to immediate success, but he died a year later. FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY IS SENTENCED TO DEATH — Source: www.history.com/this-day-in-history/fyodor-dostoevsky-is-sentenced-to-death
(1864) Sherman gives Lincoln the city of Savannah as a Christmas present

Union Gen. William T. Sherman wires President Abraham Lincoln a message: “I beg to present you, as a Christmas gift, the city of Savannah.” The telegraph relieves Lincoln who had not heard from Sherman for weeks on his infamous March to the Sea across the South, but the capture of Savannah demonstrates the campaign’s success.
Sherman’s March to the Sea, more formally known as the Savannah Campaign, was a military campaign of the American Civil War conducted through Georgia from November 15 to December 21, 1864 by Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman of the Union Army. The campaign began with Sherman’s troops leaving the captured city of Atlanta, on November 15 and ended with the capture of the port of Savannah on December 21. His forces destroyed military targets as well as industry, infrastructure, and civilian property and disrupted the Confederacy’s economy and its transportation networks. Sherman’s bold move of operating deep within enemy territory and without supply lines is considered to be revolutionary in the annals of war. Start date: Nov 15, 1864 End date: Dec 21, 1864 — Source: wiki/Sherman’s_March_to_the_Sea
(1956) Ohio zoo welcomes the first gorilla born in captivity

Colo is born at the Columbus Zoo on this day in 1956. Her parents had been surreptitiously put together at night by a zookeeper going against his boss’s orders to keep them separated. The success of Colo’s birth will spur a captive-breeding program for western lowland gorillas in zoos.
Colo is a western gorilla widely known as the first gorilla to be born in captivity anywhere in the world and as the oldest gorilla in captivity in the world. Colo was born at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium to Millie Christina and Baron Macombo. She was briefly called Cuddles before a contest was held to officially name her. Colo’s name is derived from the place of her birth, Columbus, Ohio. Tomatoes are her favorite food. — Source: wiki/Colo_(gorilla)
(1984) Bernhard Goetz shoots four black youths on NY subway

Bernhard Goetz shoots four teens after one says to Goetz, “Give me $5.” All four survive but are seriously wounded. After nine days on the run, Goetz will turn himself in to police. A jury will rule he acted in self-defense, but one victim will win a $43 million judgment against the self-styled subway vigilante.
The 1984 New York City Subway shooting was a shooting in the New York City Subway, in which Bernhard Goetz shot four alleged muggers on a New York City Subway train in Manhattan on December 22, 1984. He fired five shots, seriously wounding all four men. Goetz surrendered to police nine days after the shooting and was eventually charged with attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment, and several firearms offenses. A jury found him not guilty of all charges except for one count of carrying Location: New York City, United States Date: December 22, 1984 Attack type: Mass shooting Weapons: Smith & Wesson Model 38 Non-fatal injuries: 4 Perpetrator: Bernhard Goetz — Source: wiki/1984_New_York_City_Subway_shooting
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Today in History ^11/15/16

November 15, 2016 by GµårÐïåñ

(1777) Thirteen colonies unite to form a new country

	The Second Continental Congress approves the Articles of Confederation, which unifies the 13 American colonies under a weak central government and names this new country the United States of America. The document, a precursor to the Constitution, will be ratified by the states on March 1, 1781. .
The Articles of Confederation, formally the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement among all thirteen original states in the United States of America that served as its first constitution. Its drafting by a committee appointed by the Second Continental Congress began on July 12, 1776, and an approved version was sent to the states for ratification in late 1777. The formal ratification by all thirteen states was completed in early 1781. Government under the Articles was superseded by a new constitution and federal form of government in 1789. — Source: wiki/Articles_of_Confederation
(1864) Gen. Sherman begins his March to the Sea

Union General William T. Sherman and his troops torch the captured city of Atlanta, leaving it a smoldering ruin before riding out to begin their five-week march through Georgia to the port of Savannah. In their wake, they’ll leave a trail of destroyed industry, ransacked private property, and a huge number of refugees..
Sherman’s March to the Sea is the name commonly given to the military Savannah Campaign in the American Civil War, conducted through Georgia from November 15 to December 21, 1864 by Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman of the Union Army. The campaign began with Sherman’s troops leaving the captured city of Atlanta, on November 15 and ended with the capture of the port of Savannah on December 21. His forces destroyed military targets as well as industry, infrastructure, and civilian property and disrupted the Confederacy’s economy and its transportation networks. Sherman’s bold move of operating deep within enemy territory and without supply lines is considered to be revolutionary in the annals of war. Start date: Nov 15, 1864 End date: Dec 21, 1864 — Source: wiki/Sherman’s_March_to_the_Sea
(1943) Nazis order Romani people to concentration camps

	Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler orders that Romani (or Roma) people and those with Roma blood are to be put on “the same level as Jews” and placed in concentration camps. In this genocide, known as the Porajmos, many of the Roma will go to Auschwitz, and about 500,000 of them will die during the Nazi reign of terror..
The Romani genocide or Romani Holocaust, also known as the Porajmos, Pharrajimos, or Samudaripen, was the planned and attempted effort, often described as a genocide, during World War II by the government of Nazi Germany and its allies to exterminate the Romani people of Europe. Under the rule of Adolf Hitler, a supplementary decree to the Nuremberg Laws was issued on 26 November 1935, defining Gypsies as “enemies of the race-based state”, the same category as Jews. Thus, the fate of Roma in Europe in some ways paralleled that of the Jews. Historians estimate that 220,000 to 500,000 Romani were killed by the Nazis and their collaborators, or more than 25% of the slightly fewer than 1 million Roma in Europe at the time. Ian Hancock puts the death toll as high as 1.5 million. In 1982, West Germany formally recognized that genocide had been committed against the Romani. In 2011 the Polish Government passed a resolution for the official recognition of 2 August as a day of commemoration of the genocide. — Source: wiki/Porajmos
(1984) Infant who received transplanted baboon heart dies

Month-old Baby Fae passes away 20 days after an operation to replace her deformed heart with one from a baboon. It was the first baboon-to-human heart transplant ever done. The case will spark vigorous debate about inter-species transplants and medical experimentation. .
Stephanie Fae Beauclair, better known as Baby Fae, was an American infant born in 1984 with hypoplastic left heart syndrome. She became the first infant subject of a xenotransplant procedure and first successful infant heart transplant, receiving the heart of a baboon. Though she died within a month of the procedure, she had lived weeks longer than any previous recipient of a non-human heart. Born: Oct 14, 1984 · Barstow, CA Died: Nov 15, 1984 — Source: wiki/Baby_Fae
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Today in History ^10/30/16

October 30, 2016 by GµårÐïåñ

(1864) Last Chance Gulch is renamed to something fit for a capital

	Four prospectors from Georgia have dubbed a gold-producing site near Prickly Pear Creek in Montana Territory, ‘Last Chance Gulch.’ But three months later, the population has swelled to more than 200 and a more refined name is called for. ‘Pumpkinville’ is dismissed in favor of ‘Helena.’ .
Helena is the capital city of the U.S. state of Montana and the county seat of Lewis and Clark County. Originally founded as a gold camp during the Montana gold rush, the city was established in 1864. Over $3.6 billion of gold was extracted in the city limits over a duration of two decades, making it one of the wealthiest cities in America in the mid-nineteenth century. The concentration of wealth contributed to the city’s prominent, elaborate Victorian architecture.long dried up, Helena’s Gold Rush history is reflected in its preserved architecture, from the spires of St. Helena Cathedral and the Queen Anne style Original Governor’s Mansion to the restored miner’s village of Reeder’s Alley and the oldest house in the city, … Population: 29,596 (2013) Area: 16.39 sq miles (42.45 km²) Colleges and universities: Carroll College · Helena College University of Montana · Montana University System-System Office — Source: wiki/Helena,_Montana
(1938) Martian spaceships land in Grover’s Mill, New Jersey

An Intercontinental Radio News bulletin interrupts regularly scheduled music programming, alerting listeners to a meteor strike in rural New Jersey. What follows is nothing less than a Martian invasion cooked up by the fiendishly clever Orson Welles and his Mercury Theatre players. .
George Orson Welles was an American actor, director, writer, and producer who worked in theatre, radio, and film. He is remembered for his innovative work in all three: in theatre, most notably Caesar, a Broadway adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar; in radio, the legendary 1938 broadcast “The War of the Worlds”; and in film, Citizen Kane, consistently ranked as one of the all-time greatest films. Lived: May 06, 1915 – Oct 10, 1985 (age 70) Height: 6′ 2″ (1.87 m) Spouse: Paola Mori (m. 1955 – 1985) · Rita Hayworth (m. 1943 – 1948) · Virginia Nicholson (m. 1934 – 1940) Partner: Oja Kodar (1966 – 1985) · Dolores del Rio (1938 – 1941) Children: Michael Lindsay-Hogg (Son) · Beatrice Welles (Daughter) · Rebecca Welles (Daughter) · Christopher Welles Feder (Daughter) Founded: Mercury Theatre — Source: wiki/Orson_Welles
(1974) Ali and Forman ‘Rumble in the Jungle’

	Former heavyweight boxing champ Muhammad Ali challenges reigning champ George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaïre, for a $5 million purse. In the heavily promoted fight, Ali introduces his ‘rope-a-dope’ style, taking punches against the ropes to wear Foreman down before Ali knocks him out in the eighth round..
The Rumble in the Jungle was a historic boxing event in Kinshasa, Zaire on October 30, 1974. Held at the 20th of May Stadium, it pitted the undefeated world heavyweight champion George Foreman against challenger Muhammad Ali, a former heavyweight champion. Attendance was about 60,000. Ali won by knockout, putting Foreman down just before the end of the eighth round. It has been called “arguably the greatest sporting event of the 20th century”. The event was one of Don King’s first ventures as a professional boxing promoter. — Source: wiki/The_Rumble_in_the_Jungle
(1991) A monster storm churns in the North Atlantic

A meeting of two weather systems turns malevolent as Hurricane Grace rotates north off the US Eastern Seaboard and is pulled into a nor’easter moving down from Canada. The resulting monster cyclone packs waves exceeding 100 feet, low pressure of 972 millibars, and 70-mph gales..
The 1991 Perfect Storm, also known as the The No-Name Storm and the Halloween Gale, was a nor’easter that absorbed Hurricane Grace and ultimately evolved back into a small unnamed hurricane late in its life cycle. The initial area of low pressure developed off Atlantic Canada on October 29. Forced southward by a ridge to its north, it reached its peak intensity as a large and powerful cyclone. The storm lashed the east coast of the United States with high waves and coastal flooding before turning to the southwest and weakening. Moving over warmer waters, the system transitioned into a subtropical cyclone before becoming a tropical storm. It executed a loop off the Mid-Atlantic states and turned toward the northeast. On November 1 the system evolved into a full-fledged hurricane with peak winds of 75 miles per hour, although the National Hurricane Center left it unnamed to avoid confusion amid media interest in the predecessor extratropical storm. It later received the name “the Perfect Storm” after a conversation between Boston National Weather Service forecaster Robert Case and author Sebastian Junger. The system was the fourth hurricane and final tropical cyclone in the 1991 Atlantic hurricane season. The tropical system weakened, striking Nova Scotia as a tropical storm before dissipating. Total fatalities: 13 Damages: $200 million USD (1991) Formed: Oct 28, 1991 Dissipated: Nov 02, 1991 Date: 1991 Affected areas: East Coast of the United States · Atlantic Canada — Source: wiki/1991_Perfect_Storm
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