13 posts tagged “history”
I looked up my "year" and didn't find it entirely accurate mainly because I lived with older people (my parents) for two decades who would tell me about the Past what with its Communists and Bays of Pigs and Berlin Walls and Latin Masses and fifty-cent cheeseburgers.
However, I really like the idea of this list. Adults often have trouble understanding where younger people are coming from, and outlining these sort of "generational markers" could be helpful.
Already I think with some sadness that mine was the last generation of kids that could basically run around the woods unsupervised for hours in the suburbs, that know how to use a card catalog at the library, and make an honest-to-goodness mixtape. On a cassette tape!
Kids these days.....
Bletchley Park is the British equivalent of Langley in the U.S – it’s the central command for all codebreaking and encryption.
During World War II code breaking machines were developed on both sides, the most famous being the Enigma machine (an amazing story in itself).
These machines were the bridge between simple mechanical analog devices to the modern digital computers that we have today.
Ten machines called Colossus were built by the British to decrypt German message. These programmable computers worked by using statistical and mathematical analysis of data.
Even after the war, Colossus was kept confidential, and Churchill ordered the machines broken down into “pieces no bigger than a man’s hand”.
Now, Tony Sale of the National Museum of Computing has completed at 14 year long rebuild of the Colossus. When he began he only had some photographs of the machine. He tracked down still-living engineers who worked on the computer to help rebuild the machine.
Today they raced the Colossus and a virtual Colossus run on a modern PC to see which machine could decrypt a message faster. Unfortunately, the modern PC managed to crack to code first. On the other hand, your Dell or Mac probably never helped plan D-Day and win a world war.
This site has collected some amazing quotes of futures gone horribly mis-predicted (is that even a word?).
Gems include:
"That virus is a pussycat" - 1988 molecular biologist Dr. Peter Duesberg, regarding the HIV virus
"Reagan doesn't have that presidential look" 1960s, studio exec rejecting him for an acting role. Reagan of course was President, and a reasonably presidential-looking one at that.
"Sensible and responsible women do not want to vote" - 1905, President Grover Cleveland. US women were constitutionally guaranteed the right to vote in 1919.
"[It's] good enough for our transatlantic friends, but unworthy of the attention of practical or scientific men" 1878 British Parliament, regarding Edison's lightbulb (which, granted, did not work very well)
"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value" 1904, Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor Ecole Superieure de Guerre. Less than 20 years later, pilots were literally throwing bricks at each from the cockpits and have never looked back.
"There is practically no chance communications satellites will be used to provide better telephone, telegraph, television, or radio service inside the United States" 1961, FCC Commissioner. A few years later the first satellites of this type were launched. And now, we download ringtones.
"We stand on the threshold of rocket mail" 1959 Postmaster General. This is perhaps the greatest quote ever. I am pretty sure this is still a great solution - to something...
"The cinema is little more than a fad" 1916 Charlie Chaplin. Of course Chaplin later became a legendary actor and mogul.
"The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of messenger boys" 1878 Chief Engineer, British Mail
"Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia" 1800s physicist. Welcome to the age of the bullet train and the maglev. Speaking of which, America, where is ours? And can we call it the Very Big Speed, as the French do?
"The world potential market for copying machines is 5,000 at most" 1959 IBM, to the future founders of Xerox
Swastikas have gotten a bad rap, since they used to be primarily associated with peace, good luck, eternity, spiritual harmony, and even the creation and evolution of the cosmos.
This symbol can be found prominently in almost every ancient culture, from the early Americas, to India, Scandinavia, Korea with good meanings in every case. The Celts, Vikings, and South American indigenous people also used it. Additionally it can be found as a positive religious symbol in all the major world faiths including Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Islam, Christianity, and even Judaism. It often symbolizes the sun or comets, and can mean eternity and balance. It is also a typical motif in Greek keys, a form of Western geometric architectural decoration.
Hitler of course appropriated the swastika as a sign of his political party in the beginning of the 20th century. This was in keeping with his positive view of the Aryans (who were ancient invaders of India, not Germanic blue-eyed blonds) - as the swastika is a common symbol used in India.
Today in Western culture, the swastika has become a virtually taboo symbol. It has been removed from buildings where it features as an architectural motif, although in every case the sign dates to pre-Nazi appropriation of the swastika. Germany's strict anti-Nazi laws prevent the mark from being used, even on historical model airplanes. Even groups that show a crossed-out swastika as an anti-fascist statement have been investigated. Religious use of the swastika is permitted in Germany.
A few years ago, Microsoft released an emergency patch which was later determined to simply delete a swastika-like sign from one of the dingbat-like fonts. It came under fire not for deleting the symbol, but for releasing the correction as a "critical" update (i.e. one that will prevent computer security problems). Just recently, the US Air Force has agreed to spend quite a bit of money on camouflaging a set of barracks unintentionally laid out in a swastika shape. This was probably discovered because of the wide availability of satellite images.
Swastikas do remain in several places such as the floor of Amiens Cathedral in France, and the very strange Raelian cult's symbol is a swastika/Star of David hybrid. And of course, many of India's religions continue to use the symbol as a spiritual sign as well as Falun Gong, a Chinese group. Although this can cause confusion when these groups use the symbols in communities in the West, usually the matter is settled, and they are allowed continued use of the swastika as in Germany and Brazil. Swastika is also a town in Ontario, Canada that refuses to change its name, claiming that the name predates Nazi co-option of the word - the name was bestowed as a good luck symbol when gold was found there. The name of the mine? Lucky Cross.
This site seems really weird, but they have a good gallery of swastika images that are not related to Nazism as well as some that are. For example, World War I pilots carried swastika-shaped good luck charms and painted them on their planes, and even Coca Cola released a branded good luck charm. Not all the images are safe for kids and work.
The story is in Genesis which makes it part of Jewish and Christian tradition, and also of Islamic tradition where Noah is an important prophet. According to Islam, Noah took 70 people aboard the ark with him, in addition to his family, but humanity is not descended from them. Also, the seas and oceans are leftover from the flood. Some Jewish and Islamic versions also say that the body of Adam was brought on board, and that a giant came along too.
Other Middle Eastern faiths also believe the Flood story, including the modern Baha'i and Manichaeans all the way back to the ancient Mesopotamians who has several similar stories - an angry god who floods the earth, a man who is warned to build a boat with his family and the beasts.
Other faiths and cultures also have versions of this myth - the ancient Greeks, the Anglo-Saxons, Hinduism, Polynesia, China, the Aztecs, Inca, Maya, Native Americans, and the indigenous groups of the Andaman Islands, Indonesia, and Australia. In all of these there is a flood in which only a few people survive to repopulate the world. Cataclysmic floods, typhoons, and tsunamis have always been part of life for coastal people so perhaps it isn't so surprising that the story crops up everywhere.
Religious and also secular scholars throughout the ages up through the current time have been fascinated by the story. There are hundreds of years of speculation on the size, operation, and shape of the ark. The discovery of the animals of the New World threw a small wrench into the tale - these animals must have been on the ark too, right? Scholars spent time discussing waste disposal, air circulation, construction techniques, and which deck each animal was on - all in exacting detail. With the rise of natural philosophy in the Renaissance it became harder for many to justify a literal interpretation of the flood story what with all the biology and geography advances. Even advances in modern shipbuilding techniques called into question the ability to actual build a wooden boat to the Biblical specifications.
However, there are plenty of people of all faiths who believe in literal interpretations - for them this event probably happened around 2500 BC, so not that long ago really. A lot of these people believe that if the ark can be found, it will validate their beliefs about all sorts of issues including geology, evolution, and biology. Modern science refutes the tale as a literal event, and especially not such a recent one.
Regardless of agenda it seems there is no shortage of people who are looking for the ark today; the Bible says it landed in the Ararat mountains in modern day Turkey. Although expeditions and even some claims have been made, no one has yet found any ships in the mountains.
Marie Curie's discovery of radioactive elements caught the nation's imagination. Radioactivity was viewed as a new kind of energy and was assumed to have healing powers.
Products that touted radioactivity as a special ingredient included radium toothpaste that was meant to whiten your teeth; a radioactive box that supposedly measured your feet for perfectly fitting shoes; bath salts; luminous watch dials and other glowing instruments for airplanes, etc.; a food additive and preservative; dishes; radioactive water; condoms and other sex-related items intended to boost performance.
Radium products were sold as treatments for rheumatism and arthritis.
Today, radiation therapy is currently limited to cancer treatment, although you can still find radium springs around the world that tout the low levels of radiation as a health benefit.
The drug was first synthesized in 1874 in England, but it did not go anywhere until it was independently synthesized in Germany at Bayer Pharmaceutical. It was an accident; they were trying to make codeine, which is also derived from poppies.
Bayer trademarked the term heroin (so named because patients who took it felt "heroic"). As a German company, Bayer lost its trademark on heroin following World War I. During World War II Bayer was involved in extremely unsavory practices at the behest of the Nazi regime - one of its executives was convicted at Nuremberg. The company's other important inventions include aspirin, methadone, mustard gas, polyurethane, and polycarbonate.
Heroin was originally advertised as a non-addictive prescription painkiller and also as a children's cough syrup. Can you imagine?
Despite its very real painkilling effects, heroin is of course very dangerous and addictive, and it can easily be fatal. It has been used as a weapon by serial killers and in suicides in addition to the countless accidental overdoses.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) was very important to the beginning of the US. He is well known for his political importance before, during, and after the Revolutionary War. He's also known as an inventor, a scientist, a writer and satirist, and a ladies' man.
He was an early advocate for the abolition of slavery, the first Postmaster General, a founder of the country's first hospital, of the University of Pennsylvania, and the first volunteer fire department. He suggested Daylight Savings Time as a way to increase national productivity. He tried to make many spelling reforms, but they never caught on.
He invented a stove, bifocals, the lightning rod, and the glass harmonica (a musical instrument based on touching the wet rims of wine glasses, but laid out like a keyboard). He was the first to use the terminology "positive" and "negative" when referring to electric charges, and of course he showed that lightning was electricity. Despite being a polymath and able to speak 5 languages, he only went to school until age 10. He did eventually receive honorary degrees from Harvard, Yale, and Oxford Universities.
A contemporary parody of Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac about a long term trust fund that was intended to mock the overbearing optimism of Americans. However, Ben Franklin liked the idea in the parody so much that he bequeathed a thousand pounds each to his favorite cities of Boston and Philadelphia. The interest was to be disbursed every two hundred years. The Franklin Trusts today are worth several million dollars are used for loans and school funding.
Similarly to Thomas Jefferson, Franklin was unsure about Christianity. He liked its ideas but not the religious institutions. He did believe in God, but not necessarily the specific Christian God.
His mother's maiden name was Folger - those relatives would later go on to found Folger's Coffee
I just finished the excellent history Devil in the White City about the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition which took place in Chicago.
Back when Chicago was seen as nothing but a flammable, hog-butcherin' backwater town, the city struggled and triumphed to create the biggest world's fair ever.
It truly set the stage for the American century to come, and established many traditions and innovations that are still with us today.
Notable firsts at this event include: shredded wheat, Quaker Oats, the Ferris Wheel, "midway" as a place designation at fairs, Hershey's chocolate, Juicy Fruit gum, Cream of Wheat, the hamburger, official commemorative stamps, coins, and postcards, Aunt Jemima pancake mix, belly dancing, the Frontier Thesis, and a precursor to film. Pabst beer won its eponymous blue ribbon at the fair. Louis Comfort Tiffany made his name here.
The fair caught the country's imagination and later inspired Walt Disney, Frank Baum's Emerald City, the Arts and Crafts aesthetic movement. It established Nikola Tesla's alternating current as the American electrical standard.
The site is now the Museum Campus of Chicago - a series of museums along the beautiful lakefront - some of the museums are the original expo buildings. I grew up near Chicago, and they are bidding for the 2016 Olympics, so it was great to read about how pivotal the city was in shaping the 20th century.
At times Listerine has been sold as a floor cleaner, a cure for gonorrhea, cold and sore throat prevention, dandruff treatment, skin treatment for rashes and itches, aftershave, and antiseptics for small cuts.
Listerine also had a huge impact on modern culture: It invented the term "Always a bridesmaid, never a bride" in one of its innovative but typical scare tactic advertisements, which were very common in the early 20th century for all sorts of fashion and beauty products. More importantly, it invented the term and the condition of halitosis (chronic bad breath). Halitosis was presented to the public as a medical condition and of course Listerine was the cure; however, halitosis is not considered a true medical condition (though it might be a symptom). Either way, it's now in the dictionary.
Americans are sometimes perceived as obsessive germaphobes and personal hygiene fanatics (I had friends that used to shower twice a day, always). Although we probably needed it, 20th century scare advertising by companies like Listerine are at least somewhat responsible.
