Browsing: Society

A Brief History On July 17, 1918, in the latter stage of World War I, the RMS Carpathia, a ship made famous for rescuing 705 of the passengers of the infamous RMS Titanic when she sank in 1912, was torpedoed off the coast of Ireland by German submarine SM U-55 and sunk, losing only 5 lives in the process, a far different circumstance than the Titanic. Digging Deeper Carpathia, completed in 1903, was built for the Cunard Line of shippers, an intermediate sized ship not designed to compete with the very largest and fastest ocean liners, but to operate economically…

A Brief History On July 16, 1862, we commemorate the birthday of a significant African-American woman, Ida Wells (who first developed statistics on lynching in the US). In honor of this historic Black American Woman, today we choose to highlight the accomplishments of Eight Great Black American Women, having previously recognized “7 Great Black American Men.” Digging Deeper 1. Michelle Obama, first African American First Lady of the United States. Not only was Michelle Obama the first African American woman to serve as the First Lady of the United States by virtue of being married to President Barack Obama, she…

A Brief History On July 15, 1815, Emperor Napoleon I of the French surrendered to the British aboard the HMS Bellerophon. We have previously used this historic occasion to commemorate 10 ships that had nifty, martial sounding names that seemed likely to inspire their crews. (We have also noted goofy ship names in the past, “June 5, 1829: 10 Goofy Names for Ships”.) Today we name 10 More Ships with Cool Names since we certainly did not get all the good ones the first time. What ship names would you add to the list? (As previously noted, the British are…

A Brief History On July 14, 1938, Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. defied death and danger by flying his Lockheed 14 Super Electra around the world in a record time of 81 hours. Despite his great wealth, Hughes flew as a test pilot on airplanes under development and in record setting attempts, risking his wealthy life in the process. Throughout history, there have been rich people that take seemingly unnecessary chances with their lives either for the thrill of the event or because they are doing what they love. Today, we list some of those risk taking wealthy dare devils. Digging…

A Brief History On July 12, 2018, the world celebrates the safe rescue of a dozen Thai boys and their soccer team coach from what seemed like certain death deep in a flooded cave. Found huddled in the cave in Thailand 4 kilometers (!) deep into the mountain 9 days after entering the cave, the world was astounded to find out the entire team was still alive. The next several days chronicled a most unlikely and heroic rescue attempt with many countries and individuals lending money and expertise to the incredibly difficult rescue attempt. The miraculous rescue was completed on…