ONCE UPON A TIME: HISTORY AND FACTS

A Gallipoli Misconception  Many British, Australian and New Zealanders assume that Gallipoli is a sacred site only for their nations.  Yet, two-to-three million Turkish visitors journey to Gallipoli (Çanakkale) every year, largely to honour Kemal Atatürk, who is credited with halting the ANZAC advance on 25 April 1915 and founding the Turkish republic in 1923.  Turkish visitors commemorate at many sites unknown to us, and we at sites unfamiliar to them.  Some symbols of commemoration and national pride are easy to see. For example, the crowning height of ANZAC - Chunuk Bair - is adorned with a giant Turkish flag that is visible from all corners of the old battlefield. Other symbols are harder to discern but just as powerful. For instance, the Turkish national football team is renowned for aspiring to ‘defend like at Çanakkale’, in international matches, no doubt drawing inspiration from their forebears’ exploits. This statue of Corporal Seyit, is one striking example of a revered Çanak

During the 1980s, Carmelo “Carlo” Profeta was part of Roy DeMeo's famous crew, known as "The Murder Machine".  This crew of the Gambino family sold drugs in large quantities, stole luxury cars to resell them abroad, and its members killed 75 known people (the true number of people killed by this crew is actually estimated at nearly 200 people) around New York.  All these crimes lead to a trial in 1989. Profeta was sentenced to eight years in prison. After his release from prison, Profeta joined the Lucchese family and he and Private John "Johnny V" Vanasco (image) became good friends. They have since gone through thick and thin together. At the beginning of 2002, Profeta and Vanasco both extorted the manager of a fuel oil company, threatening him with bodily harm and even more if he did not approve their request. In September 2002, they were both convicted of extortion by a federal jury in Manhattan. In December 2003, a Brooklyn court again found the two men gui

29 Jun, 1941 - Germany invaded and occupied Lvov, in eastern Galicia, in the Ukraine. Thousands of people were slaughtered. At the start of World War II, Lvov changed hands, this time falling under the control of the Soviets, who entered the city on September 22, 1939 and immediately annexed it together with the rest of Eastern Galicia. Refugees poured into the city from German-occupied western Poland, and the Jewish population ballooned to more than 200,000.  In the summer of 1940, many of them were expelled to the remote regions of the Soviet Union. Under the Soviets, Lvov underwent a process of “Ukrainization,” whereby Jewish shopkeepers were forced to sell their stocks, and later liquidate their businesses, and synagogues were forced to close down. Schools were instructed to adopt Soviet curriculums, and the Ukrainian language was gradually introduced at the expense of Yiddish. However, about 100,000 Jewish refugees from western Poland gathered in Lvov during this time, which led t

This day, June 17th, in 1936 electrical engineer Edwin H. Armstrong demonstrated a revolution in radio broadcasting - FM! "Up until the late 1930s, AM (amplitude modulation) radio frequencies were the only ones available for those listening in. The broadcasts were typically full of static and created a problem for engineers to eliminate. While there were many ideas to get rid of the problem, they were met with little success until Armstrong began researching a solution. Through trial and error, he eventually was able to modify the frequency of audio signals and created a 'wide-band' FM (frequency modulation) system. At a conference of radio experts, Armstrong played a jazz phonograph record first at an AM frequency and then switched to FM. An article capturing this event from the San Bernadino Sun stated: '...if the audience of 500 engineers had shut their eyes, they would have believed the jazz band was in the same room.' It was later described as the most importa

This is Roopkund, a small glacial lake located at an altitude of about 5,029 metres in the Indian Himalayas. This lake wouldn't be particularly interesting were it not for the skeletons found in the shallows. Roopkund is frozen for most of the year, but when the snow and ice melts, the lake reveals a disturbing sight—skeletal remains belonging to hundreds of individuals, some of which still have flesh. In 1942 a forest ranger rediscovered the skeletons. Initially it was believed that all the remains belonged to a Japanese invasion force. There is also a local legend that tells of a king and his entourage perishing in a hailstorm. It was believed that all the skeletons were deposited in a single event, but carbon dating on the skeletal remains of 38 individuals, 23 males and 15 females, has revealed that some of the skeletons date to between c. AD 700 and 1000, while others date to c. 1800. The earlier individuals who died at Roop Kund had South Asian ancestry, but those of 1800 had

It’s Fossil Friday, so soar into the weekend with Archaeopteryx! When this dinosaur was first described in 1861, it caused a sensation.  Discovered shortly after Charles Darwin proposed the theory of evolution by means of natural selection, Archaeopteryx provided an example of evolution in action—a fossil that showed the transition between non-avian dinosaurs and birds.  The first Archaeopteryx fossils ever found included exquisitely preserved skeletons with clear imprints of wings and feathers, but also teeth and a bony tail.  Today, scientists think Archaeopteryx wasn’t able to fly very well, but the species still represents a turning point in paleontologists’ understanding of the relationship between ancient dinosaurs and modern birds in the design of both its body and brain.

The Inuit people can't be imagined without their signature parkas, fashioned from fur and hide of the local wildlife. One of the many reasons why early European voyages into the Arctic circle failed is because they were underprepared for the extreme weather conditions of the north.  They wore wool clothing, which kept them hot on the inside, but made them sweat a lot, which made their clothing freeze in the extreme temperatures. The Inuit never faced this problem, as they have been making their parkas from caribou deer or seal hide from as early as 22,000 BC (Siberia).  The production of these parkas took weeks, and the tradition of making them was passed down from mother to daughter, taking years to master. Depending on the geographical location of the tribes, the design of the parkas varied according to the types of animals available. Beadwork, fringes and pendants frequently decorated the clothing.  Roald Amundsen was the first explorer who outfitted his crew with Inuit clothing

The  Oerlikon 20 mm cannon The  Oerlikon 20 mm cannon  is a series of autocannons, based on an original German Becker Type M2 20 mm cannon design that appeared very early in World War I. It was widely produced by Oerlikon Contraves and others, with various models employed by both Allied and Axis forces during World War II. Many versions of the cannon are still used today OerlikonEdit In 1927 the  Oerlikon S  was added to the existing product line. This fired a still larger cartridge (20x110RB) to achieve a muzzle velocity of 830 m/s (versus 490 m/s for the original Becker 20x70RB gun), at the cost of increased weight and a reduced rate of fire (280 rpm). The purpose of this development was to improve the performance of the gun as an anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapon, which required a higher muzzle velocity. An improved version known as the 1S followed in 1930. Three sizes of gun with their different ammunition and barrel length, but very similar mechanisms, continued to be developed i

"Was The Trojan Horse Real?" Inside The Historical Debate: By Bernadette Giacomazzo| Erik Hawkins. According to ancient mythology, the Trojan Horse allowed the Greeks to capture the city of Troy, but historians differ on whether this famous wooden beast was actually real or not. According to ancient Greek history, the Trojan horse allowed the war-weary Greeks to enter the city of Troy and finally win the Trojan war. Legend has it that the horse was built at the behest of Odysseus, who hid inside its structure along with several other soldiers to ultimately lay siege to the city. So epic was its construction — and its purpose — that it was forever immortalized in classical works. But did it even exist? In recent years, historians have questioned whether the over-the-top display of Grecian military might was little more than a myth, constructed to make the Greek army seem more like a godly force and less like the mere mortals that they were.  Other classists suggest that the Gr

These children at the Theresienstadt ghetto and camp appeared to be happy and healthy. But this photograph was part of an elaborate hoax perpetrated by the Nazis. The International Red Cross inspected Theresienstadt on this day in 1944 after Denmark’s government demanded information about Danish Jews imprisoned there. To prepare for the visit, prisoners were forced to plant flowers and install benches and a playground. The Nazis deported thousands of prisoners to Auschwitz to alleviate overcrowding. The visitors saw well-dressed inmates, a soccer game, and musical performances in this “spa town.” Prisoners were pawns in the Nazis' choreographed show. “If anybody would have come two weeks later, there was nothing left. The swings were gone, the playpens were gone, the rocking horses were gone, and the children were gone—all into the gas chambers," said Marianka May, a Theresienstadt survivor. The Nazis resumed deportations after the visit. In total, two-thirds of the 140,000 Je

  The Top 6 Deadliest Genocides . Throughout human history, there have been several terrible genocides where millions of people lost their lives. These genocides were carried out with deliberate and systematic violence, targeting specific groups based on their ethnicity, religion, or politics. Even though these events are very dark, it’s important to talk about them so that we can prevent them from happening again. The top 7 deadliest genocides in history have left a lasting impact on the world and are still studied, discussed, and debated by historians and scholars today. From the Holocaust, which claimed the lives of 6 million Jews, to the Bengali Genocide, which resulted in the deaths of 3 million people, each of these genocides represents a harrowing chapter in human history. Here, we will examine the shocking reality of the top 7 deadliest genocides that shook the world to its core. 1 Moriori massacre The Moriori people were the indigenous inhabitants of the Chatham Islands, a sma

The Death of Ireland This will be a more personal post than I usually make.  The Great Famine has affected me from the first time I remember hearing about it in primary school. Understanding that it happened and there is nothing that can be done about it filled me with a helplessness which was expressed as anger. As a young child and later as a teenager it was something I was furious with. The famine brought hell to the island of Ireland. The story of those who died has become sterilised, without photos and names to put to the people, the babies and toddlers who were starved of life. Around the world there were gestures made to relieve the hunger but if we can be honest about it, the world failed these people. Worst of all the Irish landowners failed their own people. Each one of us is more likely to carry the tainted blood of those who did nothing than those who died in absolute agony, clutching their sunken chests. This picture is of my sons at a commemoration in East Clare. It is ma

The Dunfanaghy Workhouse, Co. Donegal  The Dunfanaghy Poor Law Union was declared on the 20th July 1841.  It covered an area of 200 square miles and was overseen by an elected Board of Guardians.   They represented Ards, Creenasmear, Creeslough, Crossroads, Doecastle, Dunfanaghy, Dunlewey, Gortahork, Magheraclogher and Meenaclady.  The population within the union at the time the 1831 census was taken was 15,793. The new workhouse was built circa 1843 and could accommodate 300 inmates. It opened in June of 1845 at the beginning of the Famine. The workhouse occupied six acres south west of Dunfanaghy; which was purchased in 1842 from Alexander Stewart. The building cost £4,350 plus £855 for fixtures and fittings. A loan was taken from the Poor Law Commissioners, which was then repaid by the local poor rates.  During the great famine of 1845-9, many workhouses were full to overflowing and set up soup kitchens to provide food for those outside.  The Workhouse closed in 1917 and the inmates

The Great Leap Forward was one of the most destructive man-made disasters in human history; causing at least 45 million unnecessary deaths. New data became available in the past few years that sheds light on how much worse the damage was than previously believed: “Between 1958 and 1962, China descended into hell. Mao Zedong, Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, threw his country into a frenzy with the Great Leap Forward, an attempt to catch up with and over-take Britain in less than fifteen years. By unleashing China‘s greatest asset, a labour force that was counted in the hundreds of millions, Mao thought that he could catapult his country past its competitors.  Instead of following the Soviet model of development, which leaned heavily towards industry alone, China would ‘walk on two legs': the peasant masses were mobilized to transform both agriculture and industry at the same time convening a backward economy into a modern communist society of plenty for all. In the pursuit o

Does he killed and ate his sibling? This image has haunted me since I first saw it in my studies of Marxist Socialist Reconstructionism. This boy was a victim of the Soviet Holodomor in Ukraine — the devastating man-made famine directly caused by government “re-distribution” policies. This is the face of starvation. Starvation in a year that was reported as a year of good harvests — except the Soviets would swoop in and make off with all “the people’s grain”. Parents who tried to find enough waste grain dropped in the fields or along roadways to feed their children were arrested, perhaps tortured in front of their children before being shipped off to the Gulag Archipelago to likely never be seen again — for the crime of defying the edicts of the Supreme Soviet. The best information I have found to date is that this was Ilario Nyshchenko, a resident of a small farming community, taken at some point after consuming his younger brother in a desperate attempt to stay alive. I’ve f

THESE PEOPLE MUST BE STOPPED. ANYONE THAT SIDES WITH THIS ABUSIVE POLICY SHOULD GIVE ME A WIDE BERTH. TRUMP DID NOT INHERIT THIS FROM OBAMA, Morning Mix Detained migrant children got no toothbrush, no soap, no sleep. It’s no problem, government argues.  Add to list   Children rest on the floor beneath aluminum-foil blankets at a U.S. Customs and Border Protection detention facility in McAllen, Tex., on June 17, 2018. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Rio Grande Valley Sector via AP) (CBP/(U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Rio Grande Valley Sector via AP)) By Meagan Flynn June 21 The government went to federal court this week to argue that it shouldn’t be required to give detained migrant children toothbrushes, soap, towels, showers or even half a night’s sleep inside Border Patrol detention facilities. The position bewildered a panel of three judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit on Tuesday, who questioned whether government lawyers sincerely believed t