A Brief History On June 21, 1734, a 29 year old African woman was executed for setting her slave master’s house on fire which spread through Montreal in New France, what is now Canada. Digging Deeper Born a slave in Madeira around 1705 and named Marie-Joseph Angélique by a Flemish man that bought her and sold her to a Frenchman in Montreal around 1725, Marie was not submissive and tried to escape with a White indentured servant she had taken as a lover in 1733. The White servant was jailed, and Marie was returned to domestic duties, although her sale…
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A Brief History On June 16, 2019, over 2 million people in Hong Kong protested the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance, an extradition law enacted by the Chinese communist government of Hong Kong as well as alleged police brutality. The protests had started over a variety of reasons months earlier and continued until disrupted by the pandemic of 2020. Digging Deeper Ever since Hong Kong reverted to Chinese control in 1997, protests have been a frequent event on that fabled island and its associated territory. Some other massive protests vying for the “largest” in history include: The Baltic Way human chain across…
A Brief History On June 12, 2009, incumbent Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was announced the winner of the national election over three challengers, a result hotly disputed by millions of Iranians and protested in many countries around the world. Digging Deeper In the US, the presidential elections of 2000 and 2020 have been hotly debated, but apparently other countries experience the same or similar lack of confidence in election integrity. In 2024, the Russian presidential election was a romp for incumbent Vladimir Putin, especially after stifling any opposition. It seems few people in or out of Russia take their elections…
A Brief History On June 8, 1949, the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four by English writer Eric Blair, writing as George Orwell, was published, telling a story of a dystopian future where an intrusive government controls all, sees all, and wages never ending war. Digging Deeper Modeled after the regimes of the USSR under Stalin and Germany under Adolf Hitler, the novel terrified a generation about the dangers of big government and what the future might hold. Politicians and others often referred to the work in an effort to prevent the creep of government power. Some other novels that have shaped public…
A Brief History On June 6, 2023, the Russian army blew up the Ukrainian Kakhovka Dam on the Dnieper River in Southern Ukraine. The dam was breached by the Russians in order to create an obstacle to an expected Ukrainian offensive. Sadly, 58 people were killed in the resultant flooding. Digging Deeper While dams sometimes fail without human help, during war time the destruction of dams is not an uncommon tactic. At other times, dams may be intentionally destroyed for environmental reasons or to prevent a potential accident with an old and or failing dam. An enormous dam removal project…