Browsing: Society

A Brief History On December 30, 1999, 56 year old former Beatle George Harrison was attacked in his own home by a stranger, later identified as Michael Abram, age 36.  Harrison was stabbed more than 40 times in the head and body, and suffered a punctured lung.  All that kept Harrison from being killed was his heroic wife, Olivia, who disabled Abram by beating him with a poker and a lamp. Digging Deeper Harrison had already been diagnosed with throat cancer in 1997, and later died of lung and brain cancer in 2001, something he attributed to his long habit…

A Brief History On December 29, 1860, the first British oceangoing ironclad warship, the HMS Warrior, was launched, but she was not the first such ship in World History. Digging Deeper Contrary to popular misconception that the US Navy USS Monitor and the Confederate States Navy CS Virginia (rebuilt from the Union wooden ship, USS Merrimac) were the first ironclad warships, iron armored floating batteries had already seen combat during the Crimean War, and the French ship, the Gloire, in service since 1859 was the world’s first ocean going warship.  In fact, the Monitor and Virginia were actually designed for…

A Brief History On December 27, 1922, the Imperial Japanese Navy commissioned the first aircraft carrier in the world that was designed and built as an aircraft carrier, the Hōshō. Digging Deeper Prior to the Hōshō, some ships such as the USS Langley CV-1 were converted (in 1920) to aircraft carriers from other warships or merchant ships.  The Royal Navy (British) Ark Royal is probably the first of what we would recognize as a more or less modern carrier, commissioned as a carrier in 1914 after being converted from a freighter that was in the process of being built in…

A Brief History On December 25, 1868, much maligned and embattled President of the United States Andrew Johnson issued a blanket pardon for all Confederate veterans of the US Civil War. Digging Deeper A Southerner himself, Johnson had been born in North Carolina and lived in Tennessee where he served as Governor and US Senator before becoming Abraham Lincoln’s vice-president in the 1864 election.  When Lincoln was killed and Johnson assumed the presidency in 1865, the Civil War was now over and Johnson was eager to get the South back into normal operation, allowing the former Confederate States to hold…

A Brief History On December 24, 1865, six former Confederate veterans of the recently concluded US Civil War formed the first known chapter of the Ku Klux Klan, an organization largely founded on the principles of White Supremacy and violence against African Americans and those not in agreement with Klan beliefs.  Klansmen were characterized by their scary apparel that hid the identity of the individuals, evolving into the familiar white robes and hoods. Digging Deeper As disaffected Confederate veterans across the South formed other chapters and similar organizations, a loose umbrella organization developed with former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest…