A Brief History On January 24, 41 A.D., the Roman emperor known as Caligula was assassinated by his own Praetorian Guard! Digging Deeper Digging deeper, we find Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (his actual name) usually referred to as Caligula or “little boot,” a nickname. By any name, Caligula is remembered as perhaps the worst of the worst of the Roman emperors, and his excesses are legendary! Although some of these excesses are probably exaggerations made by his enemies and detractors, the idea that his most loyal body guards would kill him should serve as a clue! (Imagine how bad…
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A Brief History On January 21, 1977, newly inaugurated President Jimmy Carter created perhaps the biggest controversy of his presidency by pardoning Viet Nam War era draft dodgers. Digging Deeper Digging deeper, we find the United States in the 1960s and 1970s severely divided over support for the war in Viet Nam. With Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Senator Eugene McCarthy and other prominent Americans vociferously opposed to the war, large portions of the population sided with them. The anti-war feeling went beyond just the political aspects and dove into the moral aspects for each individual soldier as well. The…
A Brief History On January 16, 1547, Ivan Vasilyevich IV was crowned Czar of All The Russias. Digging Deeper Digging deeper, we find Ivan not only becoming the first Czar (the Russian equivalent of Caesar, often spelled Tsar) but also getting the frightening moniker Ivan the Terrible! Ivan initially assumed the title Grand Prince of Moscow, what the Russian ruler was called then, when he was just 3 years old. He managed to crown himself Czar at age 17, somewhat precocious to say the least. Under Ivan’s forceful leadership, Russia expanded by conquering adjacent lands in central Asia and Siberia. …
A Brief History On December 29, 1916, possibly the most cracked clergyman of all time finally met his doom, having been poisoned, shot, and drowned, thereby rivaling Blackbeard for the claim of bearded bad-ass who most went out “like a boss”! Digging Deeper Digging deeper, we find the last royal court of Russia in the middle of turbulent times indeed, tangled in the morass of the First World War (or, at the time, The Great War) and the country on the brink of revolution. In addition to the horrible political situation, the royal family (Romanov) of Czar Nicholas II had…
A Brief History On this date, December 11, 1981, during a time of renewed tension in the Cold War, the United States was eager to help “friendly” countries resist communist rebellions and the USSR was doing all they could to “convert” non-communist countries to Marxism. With this backdrop, the U.S. had been training anti-insurgency forces in El Salvador and helped form the first such unit there. Unfortunately, this day saw a bloody and wrongly applied use of that force when the village of El Mozote and the area suffered the massacre of abut 900 innocent people. Digging Deeper Digging deeper,…