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.

A Brief History On November 13, 1901, a British lifeboat crew answered the distress flares of a small ship in peril off the coast of Norfolk, England, only to suffer terrible hardships in attempting to launch their lifeboat from shore to go to the sailors in peril.  So hazardous were the conditions, that the lifeboat ended up being turned over on top of the crewmen, causing 9 of the heroic rescuers to drown.  Cases in which rescuers end up being killed or severely injured themselves are not at all rare, and today we will discuss a few such cases. Digging…

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A Brief History On November 11, 1918, a full century ago, an armistice took effect ending the fighting of World War I.  Later, a peace treaty would be signed officially ending the war, but neither the Armistice nor the Treaty of Versailles could end the suffering generated by World War I nor could they prevent the even bigger World War (II) that would follow.  Today we take a look at the costs of The Great War 100 years after the fighting (supposedly) ended. Digging Deeper The first line on the account of the cost of World War I is one…

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A Brief History On November 10, 1580, another chapter in the long, sorry story of the troubled relationship between the English and the Irish was written when the English Army finished a three day siege of Dún an Óir (Fort of Gold) at Ard na Caithne, Ireland, by beheading 600 of the defenders, including members of a Papal army contingent, just one of a long history of atrocities committed by both sides.  The Irish and their allies (including Spanish and Italians, as well as some Catholic Englishmen) were fighting for the Catholic Church with the blessings of the Pope against…

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A Brief History On November 9, 2018, the new blockbuster science fiction/action adventure film Overlord makes its US opening in theaters across the country.  Featuring US paratroopers vs. the German Army in France on the eve of D-Day, the film shows a surprising blend of realistic action scenes compounded by evil German experiments with enhancing the fighting ability of soldiers (a real life avenue of scientific interest during World War II and since) and German experiments into the reanimation of corpses to be used as super soldiers (not a real life scientific avenue, that we know of!).  We expected the…

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A Brief History On November 8, 1901, people once again proved that human beings are willing to riot over just about anything.  This time it happened in Greece and was precipitated by the publication of the Gospel of Matthew in a translation from Latin into the modern Greek vernacular (demotic Greek).  Known as “Black Thursday,” November 8, 1901 was the climax of the Gospel Riots and 8 of the rioters were killed.  (We have previously published numerous articles about riots, so if you are interested in checking out some of these ridiculous and sometimes deadly events, please use the search…

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