Browsing: June

A Brief History On June 9, 1856, 500 Mormons left Iowa and headed for Salt Lake City, Utah.  So eager to leave the religious persecution behind them, they started their trek on foot pulling 2 wheeled handcarts! Digging Deeper If you are familiar with the stories of Mormons walking to Utah and pulling handcarts, you might not know that only about 10 percent of the Latter Day Saints (what Mormons actually are called, or LDS) that traveled to Utah before 1868 made the trip on foot with handcarts.  The other 90 percent had horse, mule, or oxen drawn wagons. Although…

A Brief History On June 9, 1667, the Dutch Navy handed the British Royal Navy its worst defeat in its history in what is known as the Raid on the Medway.  The Dutch burned 13 British ships, including 3 of the largest (“capital ships”) and towed away 2 more large ships, including the Flagship of the Royal Navy, the HMS Royal Charles.  This raid was done in England, far up the river Thames and then up the river Medway at Chatham.  Bold raids such as this are sometimes spectacularly successful, and sometimes not so much.  Raids are surprise attacks of short duration,…

A Brief History On June 9, 1959, the USS George Washington was launched, the first ballistic missile carrying submarine, creating a new class of nuclear delivery weapons that would virtually guarantee mutual destruction in time of nuclear war.  Here we list 10 such milestones in modern  (19th through 21st Centuries) weaponry that can be considered “game changers.”  (The order listed is not necessarily by importance.) Digging Deeper 10. Ballistic Missile Submarine, 1959. Almost impossible to keep track of an entire enemy submarine fleet, either side in the Cold War would be subject to a surprise attack with much shorter notice…

A Brief History On June 8, 1972, Nick Ut of the Associated press took his famous photograph of a 9 year old Vietnamese girl running naked from a US napalm attack.  For this poignant photo Ut won a Pulitzer Prize.  Sometimes a photographer is just in the right place at the right time and takes the photo of a lifetime.  Here we list 10 great examples of the photographers’ art.  (Note: By its nature, this list is subjective!  That is why we do not presume to call them the “greatest.”  Also, because a picture already says a thousand words, we shall…

A Brief History On June 8, 2001, and then again on June 8, 2008, Japan was terrorized by a mass stabbing.  The first occurred at an Osaka elementary school, and 7 years later the next rampage took place in Tokyo. Digging Deeper The first perpetrator was a mentally unbalanced man who had been a juvenile delinquent.  Mamoru Takuma was known to roll cats in flammable material and light them on fire or throw them in a furnace.  As a sophomore in  high school he assaulted a teacher and was a drop out.  His father tried to get him psychiatric help,…