A Brief History On March 14, 1964, Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby was convicted of killing the alleged assassin of President John F. Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald. Ruby was sentenced to death for the murder, which had been broadcast live on national TV, but on appeal a new trial was ordered that did not happen when Ruby died of a pulmonary embolism in 1967. Digging Deeper Born Jacob Leon Rubenstein in Chicago to parents of Polish/Jewish heritage, Ruby got in trouble as a juvenile but later served in the US Army during World War II. Moving to Dallas, Ruby was…
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A Brief History On March 13, 222, the Roman army hailed Severus Alexander as emperor, following the assassination two days earlier of his cousin Elagabalus. Digging Deeper In at least two excerpts from the biography of Alexander in the Historia Augusta, the emperor is described as having a disdain for jewelry. In the first, the biographer says, “All the jewels that he had he sold and the proceeds he deposited in the public treasury, saying that men had no need of jewels, and that the women of the royal household should be content with one hair-net, a pair of earrings,…
A Brief History On March 13, 1825, Pope Leo XII published an apostolic constitution called Quo graviora, a church law that forbade Catholics from becoming Freemasons. His order confirmed earlier papal edicts and was confirmed again in 2023. Digging Deeper The current status for any Catholic joining the Freemasons is that those “who enroll in Masonic associations are in a state of grave sin and may not receive Holy Communion.” Apparently the secret rites of Freemasonry are what Catholics object to. Freemasonry goes back to perhaps 1599 or as recently as the 1700s and is an organization of people that…
A Brief History Supernatural comedy fans, here is your chance to be among the first in Cleveland, Ohio to see Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire on Tuesday, March 19, 2024 at 7:00 PM at Cinemark At Valley View and XD on 6001 Canal Rd. in Valley View, OH 44125! For your chance to get a pass, please go to https://events.sonypictures.com/ and enter GHOSTBHH19 as the redemption code. Passes are first-come, first-serve. Only 35 pairs of passes are available. The theater is overbooked slightly to ensure a full audience. Therefore, seating is not guaranteed. So, please arrive early! Saving seats for other parties…
A Brief History On March 12, 1938, German troops marched into Austria and the absorption of Austria into Germany became a fact. Other countries have either merged or absorbed independent lands, either voluntarily or involuntarily, and today we look at some of those mergers. Digging Deeper A long lasting, but tenuous merger is the United Kingdom of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. This union was a work in progress from 1535 to 1801, until most of Ireland became independent in 1922. The USSR, which resulted from Russia transforming into a giant communist state in 1922, incorporated 21 “republics” and…