A Brief History On August 22, 2006, Russian mathematician Grigori Perelman was awarded the Fields Medal for creating the proof of the “Poincaré conjecture,” but then he refused the award, explaining, “I’m not interested in money or fame; I don’t want to be on display like an animal in a zoo.” Digging Deeper Some other people that have refused awards include: Three people have refused their Oscar statuettes, including Dudley Nichols in 1936, George Scott in 1970, and Marlon Brando in 1973. Jean-Paul Sartre turned down the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964, as he previously refused France’s Legion of…
Author: Major Dan
Major Dan
Major Daniel Zar is a retired veteran of the United States Marine Corps. He served during the Cold War and has traveled to many countries around the world. Prior to his military service, he graduated from Cleveland State University, having majored in sociology. Following his military service, he worked as a police officer eventually earning the rank of captain prior to his retirement.
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A Brief History On August 21, 1791, a voodoo, or alternately “vodou,” ceremony at Bois Caïman, Haiti was the scene of the first major assembly of African slaves in Haiti, an event that led to the slave rebellion known as the Haitian Revolution. Digging Deeper White European colonial slave owners viewed the voodoo ceremonies as harmless exercise of the slave religion, making such rituals the only opportunity for large numbers of slaves to meet. Dutty Boukman, a voodoo priest and slave looked up to by other slaves, was named by a mysterious woman who appeared during the ceremony as the…
A Brief History On August 20, 1995, a horrific rail accident occurred on India’s Northern Railway. Known as the “Firozabad rail collision,” a train carrying 2,200 sleeping passengers ran into another train that stopped after hitting a giant Nilgai antelope. Officially 358 people died, although the count may have been higher. Digging Deeper There have been far worse rail accidents, including the “Bihar Train Disaster” in India of 1981, in which 500 to 800 people died, the 1917 “Ciurea Rail Disaster” in Romania which cost over 700 lives, and another 1917 disaster, the “Maurienne Derailment” in France, when 800 to…
A Brief History On August 17, 2023, we went and saw Meg 2: The Trench in 3D (RealD) as big monsters certainly deserve a big screen! We strongly recommend seeing such epic flicks on the big screen to get the entire movie experience from the film. To kill the suspense, yes, we liked the movie. Digging Deeper Despite criticism from reviewers picking the movie apart, you must remember, the film is not a documentary. Based on the 1999 novel, The Trench, by Steve Allen, you have to have a willful suspension of disbelief such as with movies like Godzilla or…
A Brief History On August 19, 1991, leader of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev was placed under arrest while on vacation in Foros, Ukraine. This first step in the action called “The August Coup” was the first step that resulted in the dissolution of the largest country in the world. Digging Deeper The USSR was formed in 1922 from the Russian Empire that disintegrated during World War I and included much of the old empire plus new territory to create a giant communist country consisting of a federation of 15 national republics. The Western democracies had an uneasy relationship with the…