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Today in History 10/25 (Battle of Agincourt)

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The Battle of Agincourt in 1415 (© Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)(1415) Weary English soldiers outnumbered by French on St. Crispin’s Day
England’s King Henry V charges into a battle that sees his troops dangerously outnumbered by the French on the fields of Agincourt. Thickets of longbows send arrows flying at the French and before the day’s end the English secure one of their greatest, and most improbable, military wins.
The Battle of Agincourt (UK:; US:; French: Azincourt) was a major English victory in the Hundred Years’ War. It took place on 25 October 1415 in the County of Saint-Pol, Artois, some 40 km south of Calais. England’s unexpected victory at Agincourt against a numerically superior French army boosted English morale and prestige, crippled France, and started a new period in the war during which the English began enjoying great military successes.
Date: Oct 25, 1415

Map Agincort
The battle of Agincourt
wiki/Battle_of_Agincourt
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(1415) Weary English soldiers outnumbered by French on St. Crispin’s Day.
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1938 | Big bands get a big boo from the Archbishop as Swing music denounced
Catholic Archbishop Francis J.L. Beckman of Dubuque, Iowa, lets it be known that he is not a fan of a newfangled national craze. He claims it is “turned loose to gnaw away at the moral fiber of young people,” and that swing music will catapult fans down a “primrose path to hell.”
1978 | Michael Myers goes home for the holiday as ‘Halloween’ premieres
Moviegoers in Kansas City, Missouri, attend the premiere of John Carpenter’s low-budget horror film, titled appropriately enough for the season, ‘Halloween.’ Those expecting a cheesy gore fest are instead treated to a masterful take on the genre, and some of the best scares since ‘Psycho.’
1983 | Grenada invaded as Operation Urgent Fury sends US invasion force to Caribbean
The small Caribbean island nation of Grenada has been embroiled in a political power struggle for months, and with the revolutionary prime minister now murdered, the island is invaded by more than 7,000 troops in the largest US military engagement since Vietnam. The invading forces will claim victory within weeks.

Today in History 10/25/17

A patrol of US Marines during the invasion of Grenada in October 1983 (© DOD handout viaAP )(1983) Operation Urgent Fury sends US invasion force to Caribbean
The small Caribbean island nation of Grenada has been embroiled in a political power struggle for months, and with the revolutionary prime minister now murdered, the island is invaded by more than 7,000 troops in the largest US military engagement since Vietnam. The invading forces will claim victory within weeks.
The Invasion of Grenada was a 1983 United States–led invasion of the Caribbean island nation of Grenada, which has a population of about 91,000 and is located 160 kilometres north of Venezuela, that resulted in a U.S. victory within a matter of weeks. Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury, it was triggered by the internal strife within the People's Revolutionary Government that resulted in the house arrest and the execution of the previous leader and second Prime Minister of Grenada Maurice Bishop, and the establishment of a preliminary government, the Revolutionary Military Council with Hudson Austin as Chairman. The invasion resulted in the appointment of an interim government, followed by democratic elections in 1984. The country has remained a democratic nation since then.
Start date: Oct 25, 1983
End date: Dec 15, 1983
US Plan Grenada Urgent Fury
Operation Urgent Fury

wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada
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Today in History 10/22 (Pope John Paul II)

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Pope John Paul II blesses the faithful in St. Peter's Square from a Vatican City balcony after he was named pope in 1978 (© AP)(1978) Poland’s Cardinal Wojtyła inaugurated as pope
Elected six days earlier, Karol Józef Wojtyła, 58, is now inaugurated as Pope John Paul II, the first non-Italian pope in 455 years and the second youngest in history. His pontificate will last 26 years, take him to 129 countries, and lead to sainthood less than a decade after his death.
Pope John Paul II served as Pope and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 to 2005.
Lived: May 18, 1920 – Apr 02, 2005 (age 84)
Height: 5′ 10″
Buried: St. Peter’s Basilica
Education: Jagiellonian University (1953 – 1954) · Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (1947 – 1948)
Parents: Karol Wojtyła (Father) · Emilia Kaczorowska (Mother)
Siblings: Edmund Wojtyła (Brother) · Olga Wojtyła (Sister)
Highlights
  • 1967: In 1967, he was instrumental in formulating the encyclical Humanae vitae, which dealt with the same issues that forbid abortion and artificial birth control.

  • 1978: In August 1978, following the death of Pope Paul VI, Cardinal Wojtyła voted in the papal conclave, which elected Pope John Paul I. John Paul I died after only 33 days as pope, triggering another conclave.

  • 1979: In 1979 John Paul II visited the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland, where many of his compatriots (mostly Jews) had perished during the Nazi occupation in World War II, the first pope to do so.

  • 1984: In 1984 and 1986, through Cardinal Ratzinger (future Pope Benedict XVI) as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, John Paul II officially condemned aspects of liberation theology, which had many followers in South America.

  • 2000: In 2000, he was the first modern pope to visit Egypt, where he met with the Coptic pope, Pope Shenouda III and the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Alexandria.

  • 2005: In April 2005, shortly after John Paul II’s death, the Israeli government created a commission to honour the legacy of John Paul II.

Ivan Pavao II., grafiti u Rijeci (Mrtvi kanal)
Graffiti showing Pope John Paul II with quote “Do not be afraid” in Rijeka, Croatia
wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II
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(1978) Poland’s Cardinal Wojtyła inaugurated as pope.
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1797 | Parachuting pioneer as a gutsy Garnerin takes a plunge over Paris
Inspired by his time confined behind the high ramparts of a Hungarian prison, French balloonist André-Jacques Garnerin floats 3,200 feet above Paris, releases the hydrogen balloon from his new invention the parachute, and under a 23-foot wide canopy he descends safely to the ground.
1910 | Dr. Crippen convicted as a body buried in the basement leads to conviction
Months after Dr. Crippen’s spouse disappeared, police turn up human remains buried in the basement of his home. Today, after a sensational trial at London’s Old Bailey, it takes the jury only 27 minutes to find Hawley Harvey Crippen guilty of murdering his wife.
1964 | French existentialist turns down his Nobel Prize as Sartre wins
Arguably one of the most notable public intellectuals of the 20th century, Jean-Paul Sartre, is this year’s winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature for work the committee deems ‘filled with the spirit of freedom.’ The French philosopher exercises this same spirit and declines the honor.

Today in History 10/22/17

Engraving of Jacques Garnerin's parachute descent in 1797 (© Apic/Getty Images)(1797) A gutsy parachutist takes a plunge over Paris
Inspired by his time confined behind the high ramparts of a Hungarian prison, French balloonist André-Jacques Garnerin floats 3,200 feet above Paris, releases the hydrogen balloon from his new invention the parachute, and under a 23-foot wide canopy he descends safely to the ground.
André-Jacques Garnerin was a French balloonist and the inventor of the frameless parachute. He was appointed Official Aeronaut of France. Garnerin was born in Paris. He was captured by British troops during the first phase of the French Revolutionary Wars 1792–1797, turned over to the Austrians and held as a prisoner of war in Buda in Hungary for three years.
Born: Jan 31, 1769 · Paris, France
Died: Aug 18, 1823 · Paris, France
Spouse: Jeanne Geneviève Labrosse
Siblings: Jean-Baptiste-Olivier Garnerin (Brother)
First Parachute Schematics
Schematic depiction of Garnerin's first parachute used in the Parc Monceau descent of 22 October 1797. Illustration dates from the early nineteenth century.

wiki/André-Jacques_Garnerin
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Today in History 10/07 (Achille Lauro)

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Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro is docked in Port Said harbor in Egypt, in 1985 (© Mike Nelson/AFP/Getty Images)(1985) Terrorism on the high seas as cruise ship is hijacked
As the Italian cruise liner ‘Achille Lauro’ sails out of Alexandria, Egypt, four Palestinian Liberation Front terrorists hijack it, demanding a passage to Syria. The next day hijackers will murder a wheelchair-bound American tourist, Leon Klinghoffer, sparking worldwide outrage.
The Achille Lauro hijacking happened on October 7, 1985, when the Italian MS Achille Lauro was hijacked by four men representing the Palestine Liberation Front off the coast of Egypt, as she was sailing from Alexandria to Ashdod, Israel. A 69-year-old Jewish American man in a wheelchair, Leon Klinghoffer, was murdered by the hijackers and thrown overboard. The hijacking sparked the “Sigonella Crisis”.
Start date: Oct 07, 1985
End date: Oct 10, 1985
Location: MS Achille Lauro off the Egyptian coast
Attack type: Hijacking and hostage crisis
Deaths: 1
Weapons: Firearms and hand grenades

Americans who were held hostage aboard the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro depart from the base aboard a 438th Military Airlift Wing C-141B Starlifter aircraft. The aircraft stopped at Rhein-Main for refueling while en route to the U.S.
Freed hostages from Achille Lauro returning to the US by military aircraft
wiki/Achille_Lauro_hijacking
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(1985) Terrorism on the high seas as cruise ship is hijacked.
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1870 | Gambetta floats away from the chaos of a Parisian siege in a balloon
One of the greatest orators in French history, an enemy of his country’s imperial rulers, and a political dynamo par excellence, Léon Gambetta escapes a Paris under siege during the Franco-Prussian War by boarding a hot-air balloon and floating to relative safety in the city of Tours.
1955 | Ginsberg reads ‘Howl’ in San Francisco art gallery
“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,” begins Allen Ginsberg as he reads his new poem in public for the first time. Jack Kerouac and the crowd approve, but ‘Howl,’ a seminal Beat Generation work, will spark an obscenity trial.
1993 | Flood of ’93 ends when a swollen Mississippi River finally retreats
For the first time in 103 days, the Mississippi River at St. Louis, Missouri, falls below flood stage, marking the end to one of America’s most catastrophic disasters. Upwards of $20 billion in damage will be assessed after floodwaters recede from 30,000 square miles of the Midwest.

Today in History 10/07/17

Men canoe through the flooded streets of Keithsburg, Illinois, after the Mississippi River breached the town levee in 1993 (© Eugene Garcia/AFP/Getty Images))(1993) A swollen Mississippi River finally retreats
For the first time in 103 days, the Mississippi River at St. Louis, Missouri, falls below flood stage, marking the end to one of America's most catastrophic disasters. Upwards of $20 billion in damage will be assessed after floodwaters recede from 30,000 square miles of the Midwest.
The Great Mississippi and Missouri Rivers Flood of 1993 occurred in the American Midwest, along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and their tributaries, from April to October 1993. The flood was among the most costly and devastating to ever occur in the United States, with $15 billion in damages. The hydrographic basin affected over around 745 miles in length and 435 miles in width, totaling about 320,000 square miles. Within this zone, the flooded area totaled around 30,000 square miles and was the worst such U.S. disaster since the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, as measured by duration, area inundated, persons displaced, crop and property damage, and number of record river levels. In some categories, the 1993 flood even surpassed the 1927 flood, at the time the largest flood ever recorded on the Mississippi.
Start date: 1993
MO capital flood 93
US Army Corp of Engineers photo of the Missouri River's damage to US Highway 63, Jefferson City, Missouri, near the Missouri Capitol building during the "Great Flood of 1993". National Guardsmen created sandbag levees in the parking lot, but the building was still several feet above the water line. Unfortunately, the same could not be said of much of Jefferson City's northern area, and such scenes were repeated over a wide section of the central United States.

wiki/Great_Flood_of_1993
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Today in History 08/26 (Battle of Crécy)

Drawing of cannon used at the Battle of Crécy in 1346 (© Hulton Archive/Getty Images)(1346) Outnumbered English win at Crécy
As King Philip VI’s French forces move into position at the Battle of Crécy, they vastly outnumber the troops of England’s Edward III. But the English army makes pioneering use of the longbow rather than the more cumbersome and less effective crossbow used by the French and most other European infantries. Edward’s English forces also surprise their enemy by introducing the cannon as a battlefield weapon. This combined-arms approach secures a surprise victory against the much larger French army.
The Battle of Crécy, also spelled Cressy, was an English victory during the Edwardian phase of the Hundred Years’ War. It was the first of three famous English successes during the conflict, followed by Poitiers in 1356 and Agincourt in 1415.
Date: Aug 26, 1346

visualisation of the Battle of Crécy
Map of the Battle of Crécy
wiki/Battle_of_Crécy
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(1346) Outnumbered English win at Crécy.
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1533 | Conquistadors execute the Inca’s last leader
Three centuries of an advanced and flourishing empire in the highlands of South America come to a violent end as Spanish conquistadors at the order of Francisco Pizarro execute the final sovereign emperor of the Incas, Atahualpa. Spain will call its new colony ‘Peru.’
1791 | Fitch wins a patent for his steamboat
Entrepreneur-inventor John Fitch receives a US patent for his steam-powered boat, after years of experiments result in a craft that can travel at a top speed of 8 miles per hour. It’ll take two more decades and engineer Robert Fulton’s involvement before steamboats become a profitable enterprise.
1959 | Gasoline rationing leads to a Mini marvel
The British Motor Corporation shows off its newest auto, the ‘Mini.’ Developed as an answer to fuel rationing brought on by the Suez Crisis, the car gets great mileage, and although terrifically tiny at only 10 feet long, it can still seat four adult passengers.

Today in History 08/26/17

Drawing of Atahualpa, the last sovereign emperor of the Inca (© Universal History Archive/Getty Images)(1533) Conquistadors execute the Inca's last leader
Three centuries of an advanced and flourishing empire in the highlands of South America come to a violent end as Spanish conquistadors at the order of Francisco Pizarro execute the final sovereign emperor of the Incas, Atahualpa. Spain will call its new colony 'Peru.'
Atahualpa, also Atahuallpa, Atabalipa or Atawallpa was the ruler of Quito for five years before conquering the Inca Empire from his brother Huascar, the 13th Inca Emperor. After defeating his brother, Atahualpa became very briefly the last Sapa Inca of the Inca Empire before the Spanish conquest. Atahualpa inherited the Kingdom of Quito from his father the Sapa Inca Huayna Capac in 1525. Before Huayna died, he made a verbal testament to the people in his empire that he intended to divide his empire into two parts. Atahualpa would become king in the Northern section of the Inca Empire and Atahualpa's older half brother Huáscar would receive the Southern section as Sapa Inca. Huayna died from an infectious disease. Atahualpa ruled as King over the Northern section named Quito peacefully for 5 years, until his brother Huáscar, the 13th Sapa Inca, attempted to conquer the Kingdom of Quito by first annexing the Cañari region. Atahualpa became Inca emperor after he defeated and imprisoned Huáscar and massacred any pretenders to the throne at the close of the civil war. Later, while imprisoned by the Spaniards, Atahualpa gave orders to kill Huáscar in Jauja, thinking Huáscar would use the Spaniards as allies to regain his throne.
Born: 1502 · Cusco, Peru
Died: Jul 26, 1533 · Cajamarca, Peru
Siblings: Huáscar (Brother) · Túpac Huallpa (Brother) · Manco Inca Yupanqui (Brother)
Parents: Huayna Capac (Father)
Highlights
  • 1525: Atahualpa inherited the Kingdom of Quito from his father the Sapa Inca Huayna Capac in 1525.

  • 1532: In April 1532, Quizquiz and his companions led the armies of Atahualpa to victory in the battles of Mullihambato, Chimborazo and Quipaipan.

  • 1533: In accordance with his request, he was strangled with a garrote on 26 July 1533.

  • 1533: Atahualpa died on July 26, 1533 in Cajamarca, Peru.

wiki/Atahualpa
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