A Brief History On July 21, 1973, Israeli agents of the Mossad killed a waiter in Lillehammer, Norway, seeking revenge for the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre of Israeli athletes. The hapless victim was innocent and had nothing to do with the terrorist event, and the murder was just another blunder by a country attempting to conduct spy games. Over the years there have been some egregious errors by secret agencies, and here we list 10 of those “oops” moments. Digging Deeper 10. Soviet Gift to US Found to be Bugged, 1952. The Soviet organization, Young Pioneers, gave the US ambassador…
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A Brief History On April 14, 1772, the building tension toward open rebellion of Americans against the British erupted in New Hampshire in an incident known as The Pine Tree Riot. The dispute at the core of this incident concerned the protection of Eastern White Pine trees of 12 inches or greater diameter, setting these aside for the exclusive use of British shipbuilders. Obviously, colonists thought they had better uses for the wood growing in their own backyard! Digging Deeper Britain, an island nation of immense naval power, had largely stripped its own land of trees suitable for building ships,…
A Brief History On July 18, 1969, Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy of Massachusetts, possibly the next Democratic presidential nominee, drove his Oldsmobile off a bridge over Chappaquiddick Creek, killing his passenger, a young woman not his wife. This scandal mixing a woman and booze may well have cost Kennedy a chance to ever earn the Democratic presidential nomination that he felt was his. Many times over the years famous politicians have tainted their legacies by sexual scandal, and here we list 10 of the most egregious and most famous indiscretions. Today, when surveillance video and cell phone recording capability are…
A Brief History On July 17, 1791, hero of the American Revolution, the Marquis de Lafayette, Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier (you can see why he is usually just called “Lafayette”) led the French National Guard against a riotous mob of around 10,000 angry French revolutionaries, gunning down about 50 of the rebels in the action. (The mob had started throwing stones and then shooting at the soldiers.) Digging Deeper Lafayette returned to France a hero after aiding George Washington and the Americans in defeating the British during the American Revolution, only to find France torn between loyal…
A Brief History On July 16, 1862 and July 16, 1882, we commemorate the birthdays of 2 significant African-American women, Ida B. Wells (who first developed statistics on lynching in the US) and Violette Neatley Anderson (the first African-American woman to practice law before the United States Supreme Court). In honor of these historic Black American Women, today we choose to highlight the accomplishments of Seven Great Black American Men, people that young Americans can look up to, especially African-American youths. The order listed has no significance. Digging Deeper 7. Booker T. Washington. A multi-faceted man as an educator, author,…