This day in history

[Lord Avalon]

Dec 16

1773 - Boston Tea Party

1944 - Battle of the Bulge begins

[Dis]

WTF??!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Order_No._11_%281862%29

given on Dec 17.

How in the hell did this man ever become prez?

[b etor]

he got a speeding ticket too.

[Saras]

Malmedy Massacre, day 2 of Battle of the Bulge (Wacht am Rein).

[Lord Avalon]

1777 - France recognizes the USA

1903 - First airplane flies @ Kitty Hawk, NC

1979 - Car breaks sound barrier

Driver Stan Barrett became the first person in the world to travel faster than sound on land. He drove the Budweiser Rocket car at a top speed of 739.666 in a one-way run at Rogers Dry Lake, California. The ultrasonic speed set an unofficial record, but an official record requires trips in both directions, whose speeds are averaged.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Dis
WTF??!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Order_No._11_%281862%29

given on Dec 17.

How in the hell did this man ever become prez?

he, er, learned better? IIUC as Prez there was no problem, he even appointed some Jew to high office of some kind.

http://www.adasisrael.org/about_us.htm

In 1876, President Ulysses S. Grant attended the dedication of Adas Israel's first permanent house of worship.

[Zkribbler]

Dec. 18, 1620:

Pilgrims land at Plymouth Rock.

"Bloody hell! We left from Plymouth. We've landed at Plymouth. We must've gone around in a bleedin' circle!"

[Lord Avalon]

Also Dec 18:

1865 - slavery abolished in US with ratification of 13th Amendment

1916 - birth of Betty Grable, the pin-up girl with the million dollar legs

1941 - Japan invades Hong Kong

1946 - birth of Steven Spielberg

[Dis]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


he, er, learned better? IIUC as Prez there was no problem, he even appointed some Jew to high office of some kind.

http://www.adasisrael.org/about_us.htm

In 1876, President Ulysses S. Grant attended the dedication of Adas Israel's first permanent house of worship.

that kind of **** really bothers me. It's why I'm not patriotic anymore. The constitution and Bill of Rights sound good in theory. But no one follows the damn thing!!

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Dis


that kind of **** really bothers me. It's why I'm not patriotic anymore. The constitution and Bill of Rights sound good in theory. But no one follows the damn thing!!

I dont understand, Abe Lincoln DID follow the damned thing.

I remain, as ever, patriotic.

[Zkribbler]

December 21, 1988
Pan Am Flight 103 explodes over Scotland

On this day in 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 from London to New York explodes in midair over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members aboard, as well as 11 Lockerbie residents on the ground. A bomb hidden inside an audio cassette player detonated in the cargo area when the plane was at an altitude of 31,000 feet. The disaster, which became the subject of Britain's largest criminal investigation, was believed to be an attack against the United States. One hundred eighty nine of the victims were American.

Islamic terrorists were accused of planting the bomb on the plane while it was at the airport in Frankfurt, Germany. Authorities suspected the attack was in retaliation for either the 1986 U.S. air strikes against Libya, in which leader Muammar al-Qaddafi's young daughter was killed along with dozens of other people, or a 1988 incident, in which the U.S. mistakenly shot down an Iran Air commercial flight over the Persian Gulf, killing 290 people.

Sixteen days before the explosion over Lockerbie, the U.S. embassy in Helsinki, Finland, received a call warning that a bomb would be placed on a Pan Am flight out of Frankfurt. There is controversy over how seriously the U.S. took the threat and whether travelers should have been alerted, but officials later said that the connection between the call and the bomb was coincidental.

In 1991, following a joint investigation by the British authorities and the F.B.I., Libyan intelligence agents Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah were indicted for murder; however, Libya refused to hand over the suspects to the U.S. Finally, in 1999, in an effort to ease United Nations sanctions against his country, Qaddafi agreed to turn over the two men to Scotland for trial in the Netherlands using Scottish law and prosecutors. In early 2001, al-Megrahi was convicted and sentenced to life in prison and Fhimah was acquitted.

In 2003, Libya accepted responsibility for the bombing, but didn't express remorse. The U.N. and U.S. lifted sanctions against Libya and Libya agreed to pay each victim's family approximately $8 million in restitution. In 2004, Libya's prime minister said that the deal was the "price for peace," implying that his country only took responsibility to get the sanctions lifted, a statement that infuriated the victims' families. Pan Am Airlines, which went bankrupt three years after the bombing, sued Libya and later received a $30 million settlement.

[Lord Avalon]

Dec 21, 1945 - General George S. Patton, Jr., dies, after suffering a broken neck in a car accident on Dec 9.

[Zoid]

On Dec. 21, 1879, Joseph Stalin was born.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Zoid
On Dec. 21, 1879, Joseph Stalin was born.

HB, Joe!

[Zkribbler]

December 23, 1888
Van Gogh chops off ear

On this day in 1888, Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh, suffering from severe depression, cuts off the lower part of his left ear with a razor while staying in Arles, France. He later documented the event in a painting titled Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear. Today, Van Gogh is regarded as an artistic genius and his masterpieces sell for record-breaking prices; however, during his lifetime, he was a poster boy for tortured starving artists and sold only one painting.

Vincent Willem van Gogh was born on March 30, 1853, in the Netherlands. He had a difficult, nervous personality and worked unsuccessfully at an art gallery and then as a preacher among poor miners in Belgium. In 1880, he decided to become an artist. His work from this period--the most famous of which is The Potato Eaters (1885)--is dark and somber and reflective of the experiences he had among peasants and impoverished miners.

In 1886, Van Gogh moved to Paris where his younger brother Theo, with whom he was close, lived. Theo, an art dealer, supported his brother financially and introduced him to a number of artists, including Paul Gauguin, Camille Pisarro and Georges Seurat. Influenced by these and other painters, Van Gogh's own artistic style lightened up and he began using more color.

In 1888, Van Gogh rented a house in Arles in the south of France, where he hoped to found an artists' colony and be less of a burden to his brother. In Arles, Van Gogh painted vivid scenes from the countryside as well as still-lifes, including his famous sunflower series. Gauguin came to stay with him in Arles and the two men worked together for almost two months. However, tensions developed and on December 23, in a fit of dementia, Van Gogh threatened his friend with a knife before turning it on himself and mutilating his ear lobe. Afterward, he allegedly wrapped up the ear and gave it to a prostitute at a nearby brothel. Following that incident, Van Gogh was hospitalized in Arles and then checked himself into a mental institution in Saint-Remy for a year. During his stay in Saint-Remy, he fluctuated between periods of madness and intense creativity, in which he produced some of his best and most well-known works, including Starry Night and Irises.

In May 1890, Van Gogh moved to Auvers-sur-Oise, near Paris, where he continued to be plagued by despair and loneliness. On July 27, 1890, he shot himself and died two days later at age 37.

He sold only one painting! I knew he was an abject failure during his lifetime, but one lousy painting, wow.