A Brief History On October 20, 2022, British Prime Minister Liz Truss was obliged to step down after only 49 days as head of government, the shortest reign of any British Prime Minister. Some other incredibly brief stints of being in charge include: Digging Deeper William Henry Harrison was President of the US for only 32 days, dying of some sort of cold or illness, possibly contracted from not wearing a coat or hat during his inauguration ceremony and two hour speech during cold and wet weather. Karl Dönitz got to be in charge of Germany in the final 24…
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A Brief History On October 19, 1943, Allied aircraft sank the German ship, MS Sinfra, killing about 2,000 Italian soldiers that had surrendered to the Germans on Crete when Italy changed sides during World War II. Digging Deeper The Italians that had served alongside the Germans had the choice of continuing to fight alongside the Germans or to become POWs. Many of the Italians on Crete chose to surrender. An additional 250 surviving Italians were executed after being rescued, for “undisciplined behavior” during the sinking. Many Italians were gunned down by Germans when the prisoners broke out of their holds…
A Brief History On October 18, 2019, a recent hike in subway fares served as the tipping point for disaffected citizens of Santiago, Chile, upset about a variety of social issues they had been protesting for the previous couple weeks turning into a full-scale set of riots and battles with authorities that claimed 36 lives, 11,564 injuries, and 28,000 people arrested. Digging Deeper We have previously discussed many riots over all sorts of seemingly minor causes, although few such social battles have matched the scale of the Chile Riots of 2019 to 2020. The massive protests caused Chileans to vote…
A Brief History On October 17, 2018, an 18-year-old student went on a shooting rampage at the Kerch Polytechnic College, in Crimea, killing 20 people and himself while wounding another 67. Digging Deeper As we have previously reported, mass shootings and school shootings are not an American phenomenon. Using a pump action shotgun, the shooter fired for about 15 minutes before ending his rampage. The teen also exploded a nail bomb, although several other pipe bombs that he had placed were deactivated by the responding military. Russia had illegally occupied the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, despite condemnation from other nations.…
A Brief History On October 16, 2010, a graduate student at Auburn University named a new species of fish Lepidocephalichthys zeppelini, because he thought a marking on the fish looked like a double necked guitar used by Led Zeppelin member Jimmy Page. Digging Deeper Obviously, it would be fun to be able to give a new species the name of your choice, and here are a few goofy sounding ones already taken: Gorilla gorilla gorilla, the Western Lowland Gorilla. If only they could all be so easy! Mini mum, Mini scule and Mini ature, three of the tiniest species of…