Today in History – Page 36 – Historical Easter Eggs

January 28, 1959 The Mystery of Dead Mountain

Their bodies were found under a large Siberian Pine, broken branches up to thirty feet suggesting that someone had climbed the thing, to look around. Or to get away from something.

In the world of mountaineering, climbers assign a grade to a boulder or climbing route, describing the degree of difficulty and danger, in the ascent. The group assembled in January 1959 were experienced Grade II hikers, off on a winter trek which would earn them a Grade III certification, upon their safe return. They were ten in number, colleagues from the Ural Polytechnic Institute in Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) Russia, bent on conquering Mount Otorten, in the northern Ural Mountains.The Northern Ural is a remote and frozen place, the Ural Mountains forming the barrier between the European and Asian continents and ending in an island chain, in the Arctic Ocean. Very few live there, mostly a small ethnic minority called the Mansi people.

In the Mansi tongue, Otorten translates as “Don’t Go There”.

No matter. This was going to be an adventure.The eight men and two women made it by truck as far as the tiny village of Vizhai, on the edge of the wilderness. There the group learned the ancient and not a little frightening tale of a group of Mansi hunters, mysteriously murdered on what came to be called “Dead Mountain”.

Nothing like a good, scary mystery when you’re heading into the woods. Right?On January 28, Yuri Yudin became ill, and had to back out of the trek. The other nine agreed to carry on. None of them knew at the time. Yudin was about to become the sole survivor of a terrifying mystery.

The leader of the expedition, Igor Dyatlov, left word that he expected to return, on February 12. The day came and went with no sign of the group but, no big deal. It was common enough to come back a few days late, from the frozen wilds of the Ural Mountains.By February 20. friends and relatives were concerned Something was wrong. Rescue expeditions were assembled, first from students and faculty of the Ural Polytechnic Institute and later by military and local police.

There were airplanes and helicopters, and skiers on the ground. On February 26, searchers found an abandoned tent on the flanks of Kholat Syakhl. Dead Mountain.

Mikhail Sharavin, the student who found the tent, described the scene: “the tent was half torn down and covered with snow. It was empty, and all the group’s belongings and shoes had been left behind.” The tent was cut up the back from the inside, eight or nine sets of footprints in the snow, leading away some 1,600 feet until disappearing, under a fresh fall of snow.

Dyatlov pass tent — “A view of the tent as the rescuers found it on 26 February 1959: the tent had been cut open from inside, and most of the skiers had fled in socks or barefoot”.

Despite winter temperatures of -13° to -30° Fahrenheit, most of these prints showed feet clad only in socks. Some were barefoot. One had a single shoe. Two bodies were found clad only in underwear, those of Yuri (Georgiy) Krivonischenko and Yuri Doroshenko, near the remains of a small fire.

Their bodies were found under a large Siberian Pine, broken branches up to thirty feet suggesting that someone had climbed the thing, to look around. Or perhaps to get away?Three more bodies were found leading back to the tent, frozen in postures suggesting they were trying to return. Medical investigators examined the bodies. One, that of Rustem Slobodin showed a small skull fracture, probably not enough to threaten his life. Cause of death was ruled, hypothermia.

It took two more months to find the last four bodies, buried under twelve feet of snow some 75-feet away. These were better dressed than the other five, indicating they were already outside when something went wrong. The condition of these last four, would change this whole story. There were unexplained traces of radiation on their clothes. The body of Nikolai Thibeaux-Brignolles showed massive skull fractures, with no external injury. Lyudmila Dubinina and Semyon (Alexander) Zolotaryov showed extensive chest fractures, as if hit by a car. Again, there were no external injuries. Both were missing their eyes. Dubinina was missing her tongue, and part of her face.With volumes of questions and no answers, the inquiry was closed in May, 1959. Cause of death was ruled “A spontaneous force which the hikers were unable to overcome“. Dead Mountain was ruled off limits, the files marked confidential. Case closed.

“A spontaneous force which the hikers were unable to overcome“.

Explanations have been offered from the mundane to the supernatural, but none made sense. Mansi hunters had killed them for encroaching on their territory. Except, there were no other footprints. This was the work of a Menk, a mythical Siberian Yeti, or an avalanche, or a super-secret parachute mine exercise, carried out by the Soviet military. There were reports of orange glowing orbs, in the sky. Some believe it was aliens.

How nine experienced mountaineers got caught out in a frozen wilderness or why their tent was cut from the inside, remains a mystery. Missing eyes and tongues may be explained away by small animals. Maybe. The massive internal injuries suffered by three of the victims, defy explanation. The place where it all happened has come to be known as Dyatlov Pass. What happened in that place remains an enigma, to this day.

January 27, 1925 Great Race of Mercy

Five children had already died by January 25, while Dr. Welch suspected more in the remote native camps. A telegram went out and an Anchorage hospital came up with 300,204 units of serum. Enough for 30 patients. A million units would be needed but this might be enough to stave off an epidemic until the larger shipment arrived, in February.

Diphtheria is a highly contagious infection caused by the bacterium Corynebacterium diphtheriae, with early symptoms resembling a cold or flu. Fever, sore throat, and chills lead to bluish skin coloration, painful swallowing, and difficulty breathing.

Later symptoms include cardiac arrhythmia with cranial and peripheral nerve palsies, as proteins form a leathery, white “pseudo membrane” on the throat and nasal tissues.

The disease is all but eradicated today in the United States, but diphtheria was once a major killer of children.

Spain experienced an outbreak of the condition in 1613. The year is remembered to this day, as “El Año de los Garotillos”. The Year of Strangulations.

A severe outbreak swept through New England in 1735. In one New Hampshire town, one of every three children under the age of 10 died of the disease. In some cases entire families were wiped out. Noah Webster described the outbreak, saying “It was literally the plague among children. Many families lost three of four children—many lost all”.

Dr. Curtis Welch practiced medicine in Nome, Alaska, in 1925. Several children became ill with what he first diagnosed as tonsillitis. More came down with sore throats, early sufferers beginning to die as Welch observed the white pseudo membrane of diphtheria. He had ordered fresh antitoxin the year before, but the shipment hadn’t arrived by the time the ports froze over. By January, all the serum in Nome was expired.

1024px-View_of_Nome,_Alaska_with_snow_on_ground — Nome as it looked, in 1916

There were 10,000 living in and around Nome at the time, 2° south of the Arctic Circle. Welch expected a high mortality rate among the 3,000 or so white inhabitants, but the 7,000 area natives: Central Yupik, Inupiaq, St. Lawrence Island Yupik and American Indians with lineage tied to tribes in the Lower 48, had no immunity whatsoever. Mortality among these populations could be expected to approach 100%.

The 300,000 units shipped as far as they could by rail, arriving at Nenana, 674 miles from Nome. Three vintage biplanes were available, but all were in pieces, and none would start in the sub-arctic cold. The antitoxin would have to go the rest of the way, by dog sled.

It was 9:00pm and −50°F on January 27, when “Wild Bill” Shannon and his nine dog team received the 20-pound cylinder of serum. The temperature was −62°F when Shannon reached Minto at 3:00am, hypothermic, with parts of his face blackened by frostbite.

Leonhard Seppala and his dog team took their turn, departing in the face of gale force winds and zero visibility, with a wind chill of −85°F.

Most sled dogs are retired by age twelve, especially team leaders, but Seppala trusted twelve-year-old “Togo” with the lead. Up the 5,000-foot “Little McKinley” and across the unstable ice of Norton Sound, visibility was so poor that Seppala couldn’t see the “wheel dog” – the dog nearest his sled. Much of the time, navigation in that frozen wilderness was entirely up to his lead dog.

sepp-and-togo (1) — Leonhard Seppala with Togo

With Seppala’s 8-year-old daughter and only child Sigrid at risk for the disease, stakes could not have been higher. Seppala and Togo ran a round-trip of 261 miles to make the next handoff on February 1, including 91 miles with the serum capsule.

Together the pair had covered twice as much ground as any other team, over the most dangerous terrain of the “serum run”.

Gunnar Kaasen and his team took the handoff, hitting the trail at 10:00 at night. At one point, hurricane force winds upended the sled, pitching musher and serum alike into the snow. Already frostbitten, Kaasen searched in the dark with bare hands, until he found the cylinder. Covering the last 53 miles overnight, the team reached Front Street, Nome, at 5:30am on February 2. The serum was thawed and ready by noon.

20 mushers and 150+ dogs had covered 674 miles in 5 days, 7½ hours, a distance that normally took the mail relay 2-3 weeks. Not a single serum ampule was broken.

Gunnar_Kaasen_with_Balto — Gunnar Kaasen with Balto

With 28 confirmed cases and enough serum for 30, the “Great Race of Mercy” had held the death toll at 5, 6 or 7, depending on which version you accept. Doctor Welch suspected as many as 100 or more deaths in the native camps, but the real number will never be known. An untold number of dogs died before completing the run. Several mushers were severely frostbitten.

Gunnar Kaasen and his lead dog “Balto” were hailed as heroes of the serum run, becoming the most popular canine celebrity in the country after Rin Tin Tin.

It was a source of considerable bitterness for Leonhard Seppala, who felt that Kaasen’s 53-mile run was nothing compared with his own 91, Kaasen’s lead dog little more than a “freight dog”.

A statue of Balto was erected in New York’s Central Park in 1925 where it stands to this day, though he is depicted wearing Togo’s “colors” (awards). Togo lived another four years, though he was never again able to run. He spent his last years in Poland Spring, Maine, and passed away on December 5, 1929 at the ripe old age of 16.

Seppala was in his old age in 1960, when he recalled “I never had a better dog than Togo. His stamina, loyalty and intelligence could not be improved upon. Togo was the best dog that ever traveled the Alaska trail.”

A month ago, near-100 years after serum run, Disney Film Productions released the film Togo, starring Willem Dafoe as Leonhard Seppala and “Diesel” as Togo, telling the story of two heroes of the serum run, of 1925.

Togo himself is stuffed and mounted, standing watch over the Iditarod museum headquarters in Wasilla, Alaska.

January 26, 2004 Exploding Whales

A whale washed ashore in Denmark sometime in 1991, when some bright bulb decided a poke here and a prod there would release the highly pressurized gasses of decomposition. Did I mention, Highly pressurized? Few among us can ever imagine how lucky we are, we were somewhere else and not in that time and place.

On November 12, 1970, a 45 foot, 8-ton, dead sperm whale washed up on the beaches near Florence, Oregon. State beaches came under the jurisdiction of the Department of Transportation at that time, and officials came down, to have a look.

Administrators discussed the matter with the US Navy and someone came up with a bright idea. It wasn’t every day they had to remove 16,000 lbs of rotting whale meat, from the beach. They’d remove the carcass the same way any self-respecting DOT would deal with a large boulder. They’d blow the thing to pieces.

Whale_WikiWorld — H/T, Offbeat Oregon History

The gulls and crabs could take care of cleanup if the pieces were small enough. The only trick was to use enough dynamite.

No one could know it at the time, but the incident had already reached its high water mark. From here on it would only be, downhill.

By sheer coincidence, there happened to be an ex-military guy around, Walter Umenhofer, who had explosives training. Ol’ Walt tried to tell the Sages of Florence that 20 sticks of dynamite would do the trick if they were put in the right place, but no one wanted to listen.

Someone had decided to use a half-ton of the stuff, and that’s what they were going to do.

It may have been the worst idea, since Rudolph Hess flew that plane into Scotland.

The appointed day was a “blast” in more ways than one. Spectators assembled in their hundreds, TV cameras rolling. There was a sense of anticipation. No one had ever seen a whale explode.

Spectators were backed off a quarter-mile and at last, the appointed hour had arrived. The plunger was pushed, the resulting detonation tearing through the whale like the proverbial hot knife, through butter. Thousands of reeking chunks soared trough the air, raining down over a square mile of buildings, houses and streets. Spectators ran for their lives through the evil, pelting rain.

Umenhofer was among the crowd that day. A great slab of the stuff the size of a coffee table came down from the sky, and landed on his brand new Oldsmobile 88. He’d just bought the car from a dealer running a “Whale of a Sale” deal. You can’t make this stuff up.

It turns out that exploding whales aren’t even that unusual. Iceland, Australia and South African authorities routinely blow up whale carcasses to avoid hazards to navigation. They’re usually towed out to sea, first.

There are even spontaneously exploding whales, when gasses build to a point of ripeness which can no longer be contained. It happened on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, where locals reported that blubber “hung in the trees for weeks”.

APTOPIX SENEGAL DEAD WHALES — Neighborhood residents look on as the body of a whale is removed with a bulldozer, on Yoff beach in Dakar, Senegal Wednesday, May 21, 2008. The bodies of at least 38 whales have washed up on a Dakar beach and wildlife officials say as many as 100 swam up close to shore. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

A whale washed ashore in Denmark sometime in 1991, when some bright bulb decided a poke here and a prod there would release the highly pressurized gasses of decomposition. Did I mention, Highly pressurized? Few among us can ever imagine how lucky we are, we were somewhere else and not in that time and place.

Denmark_exploding_whale.img_assist_custom — Exploding whale, Denmark, 1991

In 2014, reporters for The Atlantic spoke with Canadian fisheries scientist Jack Lawson, who warned: “The worst thing would be for a person to get too close to the whale and fall inside it: “The [whale] skin is starting to lose its integrity and if someone were to walk along, say, the chin — that is full of all that gas — they could fall in the whale. The insides will be liquefied. Retrieving them would be very difficult.”” “I have fallen through the side of a whale up to my chest,” Lawson added. “It’s not very nice.”

On this day in 2004, a ripened sperm whale exploded in the streets of Tainan City, in Taiwan. That time, they’d managed to get the thing onto a flatbed and were hauling it through town when the whale, went off. A memorable day was had by all, including passing pedestrians, nearby traffic and local shop keepers.Nigh on fifty years ago, folks in the Pacific Northwest learned an important lesson on the beaches of Florence. Nine years later, 41 dead sperm whales washed ashore on the nearby coast. This time, the things were burned and buried, where they lay.

January 25, 1949 The Candy Bomber

By November, what had begun as a trickle had turned to a confectionery avalanche. College student Mary Connors of Chicopee Massachusetts stepped up and offered to take charge of the flood. By now, this was a national project. Volunteers were assembled in their hundreds to collect candy and tie them to little cloth parachutes.

World War II ended on May 8, 1945 in Europe, leaving the three major allied powers (United States, United Kingdom and the Soviet Union) in place, in and around the former Nazi capital of Berlin. Representatives of the 3 met at Potsdam, capital of the German federal state of Brandenburg between July-August, hammering out a series of agreements known as the Potsdam agreement.

Built on earlier accords reached through conferences at Tehran, Casablanca and Yalta, the agreement addressed issues of German demilitarization, reparations, de-nazification and the prosecution of war criminals.

The Potsdam agreement called for the division of defeated Germany into four zones of occupation, roughly coinciding with then-current locations of the allied armies. The former capital city of Berlin was itself partitioned into four zones of occupation. A virtual island located 100 miles inside of Soviet-controlled eastern Germany.

During the war, ideological fault lines were suppressed in the drive to destroy the Nazi war machine. Such differences were quick to reassert themselves in the wake of German defeat. In Soviet-occupied east Germany, factories and equipment were disassembled and transported to the Soviet Union, along with technicians, managers and skilled personnel.

The former Nazi capital quickly became the focal point of diametrically opposite governing philosophies. Leaders on both sides believed that Europe itself, was at stake. Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov put it succinctly, “What happens to Berlin, happens to Germany; what happens to Germany, happens to Europe.”

West Berlin, a city utterly destroyed by war, was home to some 2.3 million at that time, roughly three times the city of Boston.

Differences grew and sharpened between the former allies, coming to a crisis in 1948. On June 26, Soviets blocked access by road, rail and water, to western occupation zones.

This was no idle threat. Of all the malignant governing ideologies of history, Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union has to be counted among the worst. These people had no qualms about using genocide by starvation as a political tool. They had proven as much during the Holodomor of 1932 – ’33, during which this evil empire had murdered millions of its own citizens, by deliberate starvation. To Josef Stalin, two million dead civilians was nothing more than a means to an end.

At the time, West Berlin had only 36 days’ worth of food, and 45 days’ supply of coal.With that many lives at stake, allied authorities calculated a daily ration of only 1,990 calories would require 646 tons of flour and wheat, 125 tons of cereal, 64 tons of fat, 109 tons of meat and fish, 180 tons of dehydrated potatoes, 180 tons of sugar, 11 tons of coffee, 19 tons of powdered milk, 5 tons of whole milk for the children, 3 tons of fresh yeast for baking, 144 tons of dehydrated vegetables, 38 tons of salt and 10 tons of cheese.

With electricity shut off by Soviet authorities, heat and power for such a population would require 3,475 tons of coal, diesel and gasoline.

All of this and more was going to be needed. Every. Single. Day.

What followed is known to history, as the Berlin Airlift. At the height of the operation, a cargo aircraft landed every thirty seconds, in West Berlin. Altogether, the USAAF delivered 1,783,573 tons and the RAF 541,937 on a total of 278,228 sorties. The Royal Australian Air Force delivered 7,968 tons of freight in over 2,000 flights.

Added together, the Berlin Airlift covered nearly the distance from Earth to the Sun, at a cost of 39 British and 31 American lives.

US Army Air Force Colonel Gail “Hal” Halvorsen was one of those pilots, flying C-47s and C-54 aircraft deep inside of Soviet controlled territory. On his days off, Halvorsen liked to go sightseeing, often bringing a small movie camera.

One day in July, Hal was filming take-offs and landings at the Templehof strip when he spotted some thirty children, on the other side of a barbed wire fence. He went over to speak with them, and felt impressed. It was normal for children to ask GIs “Any gum, chum?” or “Any bon-bon?” Not these kids. Dirty, half starved and possessed of nothing whatsoever, these kids had spirit. Halvorsen remembers:

“I met about thirty children at the barbed wire fence that protected Tempelhof’s huge area. They were excited and told me that ‘when the weather gets so bad that you can’t land, don’t worry about us. We can get by on a little food, but if we lose our freedom, we may never get it back.'”

Reaching in his pocket, Halvorsen found two sticks of gum. Wrigley’s Doublemint gum. Breaking them each into four pieces he gave them to the nearest children, only to watch them break the gum into smaller pieces, to share with their friends. Those who got none received tiny slivers of the wrappers themselves, small faces shining with joy at just a whiff of mint from the wrapper.

Halvorsen told the kids he’d be back tomorrow, on one of those planes. He’d have enough for them all, he said. You’ll know it’s my plane because I’ll wiggle my wings.

That night, Halvorsen, his co-pilot and engineer, pooled their candy rations. Even small boxes can’t simply be tossed out of a moving aircraft, and so, the three rigged handkerchiefs. Tiny little “parachutes”, for tiny little packages.

Halvorsen made such drops three times over the next three weeks and noticed each time, the group of children waiting by the wire, grew larger.

Newspapers got wind of what was going on. Halvorsen thought he’d be in trouble, but no. Lieutenant General William Henry Tunner liked the idea. A lot. “Operation Little Vittles” became official, on September 22.

What had begun between Halvorsen and his friends spread to the whole squadron. Word quickly crossed the ocean and children all over the United States gave up their own, for kids who had less. Soon, candy manufacturers themselves joined in.

“Christmas from Heaven: The Candy Bomber Story” with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra, Narrated by Tom Brokaw

Before long, pilots were dropping little packages, all over Berlin. They were the Rosinenbombers. Raisin Bombers. Halvorsen himself came to be known by many names, to the children of Berlin. “Uncle Wiggly Wings”. “The Chocolate Uncle”. “The Gum Drop Kid”. “The Chocolate Flier”.

Colonel Halvorsen’s work even earned him two letters, proposals of marriage, but he turned them both down. He was carrying on a romance by letter at this time, with Miss Alta Jolley. The couple would go on to marry in April of 1949, a marriage which would last, for fifty years. Alta Jolley Halvorsen passed away on this day in 1999 leaving her husband, 5 adult children and 24 grandchildren.

On this day in 1949, the Berlin Airlift had barely cleared the mid-point. The largest humanitarian airlift in aviation history would last until the blockade was lifted on May 12, 1949, and then some. Operation Little Vittles continued throughout the period, dropping an estimated 23 tons of candy from a quarter-million tiny little parachutes.

Over the years, many of those now-grown children have sought Halvorsen out, to say thank you and to tell stories. Tales of hope, and fun, of fond anticipation. All in a time and place when such things were very hard to find.

You never know, he said. “The small things you do turn into great things.”

January 23, 1828 A Virginia Housewife

In 1929, Little was known of the first known burial, at Arlington National Cemetery. Journalist Margaret Husted wrote about Randolph in the Washington Star newspaper. Descendants came forward and, piece by piece, the story of the first person buried at Arlington, came to light.

As the Civil War ground on to a fourth dreadful year, the church yards and burial plots of the formerly united states strained under the weight of carnage, produced by that war.

The former home of Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee and Robert Edward Lee (yeah, that Robert E. Lee) was made forfeit for non-payment of tax by the 37th Congress, the Mansion on the hill and surrounding grounds auctioned to the Federal government.

One day, the United States Supreme Court would rule the act an unlawful taking and compensate Lee family descendants.

For now, that’s a story for another day. As 1863 drew to a close, the property was destined to become the nation’s most hallowed ground and known to posterity, as Arlington National Cemetery.

The first interment on the Custis-Lee property was that of Private William Henry Christman of 67th Pennsylvania Infantry, laid to rest on May 13, 1864.

EPSON scanner image — Custis-Lee Mansion now Arlington House, at Arlington National Cemetery

Two more joined Christman before the day was done, fine young men cut down in the prime of life and laid to rest, never to know the triumphs and the tragedies of growing old. Before long, the trickle turned to a flood. By the end of the war between the states, their number exceeded 17,000 and rising.

Private Christman was the first military burial, but not the first. One had come before. When Private Christman went to his rest in our nation’s most hallowed ground, his grave joined that of Mary Randolph, laid to rest some thirty-six years earlier.

In 1929, cemetery workers were performing renovations on the Lee-Custis Mansion now known as the Arlington House, at the top of the hill. They couldn’t help but be aware of a solitary grave some 100-feet to the north, but little was known of its occupant.

Marked with the name of Mary Randolph, the stone was inscribed with these words:

“In the memory of Mrs. Mary Randolph,
Her intrinsic worth needs no eulogium.
The deceased was born
The 9th of August, 1762
at Amphill near Richmond, Virginia
And died the 23rd of January 1828
In Washington City a victim to maternal love and duty.”

“A victim to maternal love and duty”. It was a curious phrase but little else was known about Mary Randolph.

In 1929, journalist Margaret Husted wrote about Randolph in the Washington Star newspaper. Descendants came forward and, piece by piece, the story of the first person buried at Arlington, came to light.

Mary Randolph, a direct descendant of Pocahontas and John Rolfe, cousin to Thomas Jefferson, was the cousin of George Washington Parke Custis, adopted step-grandson of George Washington and the godmother of Custis’ daughter, Mary Anna Randolph Custis, wife of Robert E. Lee.

The last line of the inscription, “a victim to maternal love and duty” refers to Mary’s youngest surviving son, Midshipman Burwell Starke Randolph, who’d suffered a high fall from the mast in 1817, while serving in the US Navy. Both of his legs were broken and never healed properly. When Mary passed away in 1828, Randolph remarked that his mother had sacrificed her own life in care of his.

Mary Randolph is best known as the author of America’s first regional cookbook, “The Virginia House-wife” and known to some, as “The Methodical Cook”.

The Virginia Culinary Thymes writes “It is interesting to note that all the cookery at that time was done in kitchens that had changed little over the centuries. In Virginia, the kitchen was typically a separate building for reasons of safety, summer heat and the smells from the kitchen. The heart of the kitchen was a large fireplace where meat was roasted and cauldrons of water and broth simmered most of the day. Swinging cranes and various devices made to control temperature and the cooking processes were used. The Dutch oven and the chafing dish were found in most kitchens. The brick oven used for baking was located next to the fireplace. A salamander was used to move baked products around in the oven and it could also be heated and held over food for browning“.

Mary Randolph, wife of David Meade Randolph, was an early advocate of the now-common use of herbs, spices and wines in cooking.

Mrs Randolph’s recipe for apple fritters calls for slices of apple marinated in a combination of brandy, white wine, sugar, cinnamon, and lemon rind.

Randolph was well known as a Virginia cook and hostess, so much so that, during an 1800 slave insurrection near Richmond, the leader “General Gabriel” said that he would spare her life, if she would become his cook.

I’m thinking of those apple fritters. I believe ol’ Gabriel might have been onto something.

January 22, 1959 The Real Che

While Che himself made no secret of his blood-lust, Western Liberals appear pathologically incapable of regarding the man’s history, as it really was.

Valkyrie. Che. Two films, both produced by the Great Hollywood Myth Machine. Both released to US audiences in December, 2008. One tells the story of Claus von Stauffenberg, the disillusioned, war-crippled German patriot who led the plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. The other is Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, a middle-class Argentinian intellectual and accomplished athlete, despite a life-long problem with Asthma. One, the towering Aristocrat. The bearer of hereditary titles of nobility. The other the left-ish physician radicalized by the poverty of his day to become the Marxist Revolutionary.

Some 4,980 Germans were murdered for complicity real or imagined, in the Valkyrie plot. Many slowly strangled with piano wire, their death agonies filmed for the delectation of a Dictator. Von Stauffenberg himself met his end, before a firing squad.

Guevara breathed his last before a Bolivian firing squad. The similarity ends there.

Ernesto Guevara trained and motivated firing squads credited with the summary execution of 16,000 Cubans or more, since the Castro brothers swept out of the Sierra Maestro Mountains in 1959. It was around this time he acquired the nickname “Che” from an odd fondness for the verbal filler che, not unlike the Canadian English “eh” or some Americans’ fondness for the punctuating syllable “Right?”

Numbers are surprisingly inexact but Guevara is believed personally responsible for the murder of hundreds if not thousands, in the name of “Revolutionary Justice”. Guevara himself described in his diary, the murder of peasant guide Eutimio Guerra:

“The situation was uncomfortable for the people and for Eutimio so I ended the problem giving him a shot with a .32 pistol in the right side of the brain, with exit orifice in the right temporal [lobe].”

Such a cold and clinical description for a murder which surely splattered the blood and brains of the victim over his executioner, bespeaks a man at best thoroughly hardened to casual bloodshed and at worst, a stone psychopath.

Guevara wrote home to his father: “My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood…I’d like to confess, Papa, at that moment I discovered that I really like killing.”

As the proverbial fish who knew not that he was wet, Che Guevara believed the natural social order, was Marxism. “There are truths so evident” he would say, “so much a part of people’s knowledge, that it is now useless to discuss them. One ought to be Marxist with the same naturalness with which one is ‘Newtonian’ in physics, or ‘Pasteurian’ in biology.”

At one time signing letters home as “Stalin II”, Guevara became disillusioned with the Revolutionary zeal of even the Soviet Union, adopting instead the North Korea of Kim Il-sung as the ideal political order. God help anyone friend or foe whose politics came to disagree even slightly, with those of this “Man of the people”.

famous-photographers-Alberto.Korda_.1960.Che_-750x499 — Photographer Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez, who later used the name “Korda” liked to describe the Che image as encabronado y doliente (pissed off and pained) – H/T Smithonian.com

After seven years of the military dictator Fulgencia Batista, the Cuban people were in a “lynching mood”. On this day in 1959, the Universal Newsreel arrived in the United States, narrated by Ed Herlihy. In it, Fidel Castro can be seen asking an estimated one million Cubans if they approved of executions. The question was met with a booming response “¡Si!”.

Che was bitterly disappointed in the wake of what he saw as capitulation, following the Cuban Missile Crisis. To Che Guevara, millions of Cuban citizens added up to nothing more than “A people ready to sacrifice itself to nuclear arms, that its ashes might serve as a basis for new societies.”

While Che himself made no secret of his blood-lust, Western Liberals appear pathologically incapable of regarding the man’s history, as it really was.

“Crazy with fury I will stain my rifle red while slaughtering any enemy that falls in my hands! My nostrils dilate while savoring the acrid odor of gunpowder and blood. With the deaths of my enemies I prepare my being for the sacred fight and join the triumphant proletariat with a bestial howl!…Hatred as an element of struggle; unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human being beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine. This is what our soldiers must become” – Ernesto Ché Guevara

Then-candidate Barack Obama ignited social media indignation in 2008 when Houston campaign headquarters popped up, sporting a stylized image of Che Guevara.

For many of us, then-President Obama’s March 21, 2016 moment in Havana, Cuba defies understanding, unfolding as it did under a ten-story image of Che Guevara.

The BBC’s 2014 “History” is precious little more than a wet kiss.

Ernest Hemingway, who never saw a Leftist Revolution he didn’t like, was living in Cuba at the time of the revolution. Hemingway invited the young American journalist George Plimpton, to come for a visit. One afternoon, “Papa” summoned the young writer. “Come” he said, “there’s something you should see”. Plimpton arrived with a few others. After a short time mixing cocktails in flasks and collecting lawn chairs, the group was off. An hour outside of town. It was a grand adventure.

Setting up chairs as if they were there to watch the sunset, a truck appeared in the distance, a short time later. The group watched as bound men were unloaded from the truck and shot, their still-twitching bodies thrown back in the truck and hauled away. Over a long career in American journalism…Paris Review…PBS, George Plimpton never managed to write a word about the event though he did elevate himself to such a state of middling dudgeon, he declined to publish Guevara’s memoir, the Motorcycle Diaries.

Che_and_Fidel_Graffiti_Bergen_Norway — Street graffiti of Guevara wearing a Che t-shirt in Bergen, Norway.

The iconic photograph of the killer, taken by photographer Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez, is one of the most reproduced images of all time. More than the “Mona Lisa”. More than Marilyn Monroe standing over that grate, with skirts a-flying. It was Che, just Che, risen to the level of secular God. The Marxist High Priest of anti-capitalism, his image adorning the t-shirts and shot glasses of Social Justice Warriors and Hipsters from Berkeley to the Congo, from the East Village to Saigon.

Entire websites are devoted to peddling such garbage while not one of them, (NOT ONE!!!) gives a moment’s thought to the insensate character of glorifying such an image by such “capitalist” means.

Claus von Stauffenberg, the would-be assassin of one of the Great Tyrants of History, is all but lost to the popular imagination.

What a sick, sad, sorry commentary that is, on our popular culture.

January 21, 1968 Blue House Raid

It’s hard to think of anything goofier and at the same time more hellishly lethal, than the hare-brained political calculations of DPRK leadership. Somehow it made sense to these guys, that to assassinate the South Korean President and hurl his head from the official residence, would start a popular uprising leading to the re-unification of the Korean peninsula. Under DPRK government, no less.

By 1967, the Republic of Korea (ROK) had some 44,829 South Korean forces in Vietnam. An overwhelming force of NVA and Vietcong had the misfortune of surrounding a platoon of “Blue Dragon” Marines on February 15 of that year, a 10-to-1 numerical superiority near the village of Trà Bình. Poor visibility precluded air support and the fighting which followed was close, and personal. By the time it was over, 243 NVA lay dead. Korean Marines lost 15 men.

North Vietnam’s Commander-In-Chief put out an order to all his forces advising them: “Avoid ROK Marines at all costs.”

main-qimg-404a3b1b1d0f82a9b6fc20e5fba75c38 — ROK Marines of the 11th Company, 3rd Battalion, Blue Dragon Unit

Any combat veteran of the war in Southeast Asia will tell you. In Vietnam they faced a tough and disciplined soldier. POW interrogations of captured NVA revealed one Lieutenant Trung to be particularly hard core, a tough guy in a world of tough guys. One US Marine Corps Lieutenant of Korean ancestry dressed in the uniform of the Blue Dragon Marines and paid a visit to Lt. Trung’s cell.

Not a word or gesture passed between the two. The mere presence of a Blue Dragon was enough to get this guy talking. Korean fighters are no joke.

For two years, an elite, all-officer force of 31 North Korean commandos were trained in infiltration and exfiltration techniques, weaponry, navigation, concealment and hand-to-hand combat, with particular emphasis on knife skills. These were “Unit 124” commandos, highly trained and fanatically loyal soldiers, tough as rawhide and each prepared to die for the supreme leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, (DPRK), “Dear Leader” Kim Il-sung.

On January 17, 1968, Unit 124 infiltrated the 2½ mile demilitarized zone (DMZ), cutting the wire and entering South Korea. Their mission was to assassinate ROK President Park Chung-hee in his home, the Executive Mansion equivalent to the United States’ own White House, the “Pavilion of Blue Tiles” known as “Blue House”.

getImage — South Korean Executive Mansion and Office Complex – the Blue House

780px-Korea-Seoul-Blue_House_(Cheongwadae)_garden_0681&2&3-07 — Garden and Grounds of South Korean Executive Mansion

On the 19th, four brothers of the Woo family were out gathering firewood when they stumbled upon Unit 124. A fierce debate ensued among the commandos, as to what to do with these guys. Training dictated they be killed without hesitation, yet somehow that didn’t seem right. Wasn’t communist ideology supposed to be a “people’s movement”? Besides, it would take too long to bury the bodies in the rock-hard, frozen ground.

Tree — The crooked pine behind the presidential Blue House in Seoul is pock-marked with bullet holes, from the 1968 raid. Photo courtesy: AFP

The decision was made to convert the brothers, on the spot. Talk about goofy. After a suitably long harangue on the wonders of communist ideology, the Woo brothers wisely proclaimed themselves, converted. Thus released, the brothers went directly to authorities.

Unit 124 broke camp, for the next two days averaging 10kph over mountainous terrain, despite an average 70-pounds apiece in equipment.

Commandos made it to within 100 meters of Blue House on January 21, only to be challenged at a road block. The firefight broke out without warning, dissolving into a running gunfight and manhunt lasting for the next eight days. When it was over, 26 South Korean military and police personnel were dead along with two dozen civilians and another 66, grievously wounded.

Four Americans were killed in efforts to prevent Unit 124 members from re-crossing the DMZ.

29 commandos were killed or committed suicide. One escaped, back to North Korea. Only one, Kim Shin-jo, was captured alive.

History has a way of swallowing some events whole. Over in Vietnam, the Battle of Khe Sanh began the same day as the raid. Two days later, a US Navy technical research ship, the USS Pueblo, was captured by North Korean forces. The Tet Offensive broke out all across South Vietnam on January 30. In no time at all, the Blue House raid was forgotten.

Kim Shin-Jo’s interrogation lasted nearly a year, to learn how the raid had been carried out. Meanwhile, ROK authorities “recruited” their own commando assassination squad, as a bit of payback. The 31 members of “Unit 684” were recruited from among South Korean petty criminals, the sort of guys who “got into street fights”. A lot.

The three years’ “training” these recruits were subjected to on Silmido Island, off the coast of Inchon, was beyond brutal. Seven of didn’t live through it.

Silmido, a 2003 film produced by Kang Woo-suk

The raid was never carried out. North-South relations had thawed by August 1971, as the Silmido Island recruits staged an insurrection. 20 inmate/recruits were dead before it was over, shot to death by members of the ROK military or committed suicide, with hand grenades. The last four Unit 684 survivors were tried by a military tribunal for their role in the uprising and executed, in 1972.

The government buried the story. The tale of Unit 684 was all but unknown until the 2003 film Silmido, the first movie in South Korea to attract a box office of over 10 million viewers. In May of 2010, Seoul courts ordered the government to pay $231 million to the families of 21 members of Unit 684.

Kim Shin-jo became a citizen of the Republic of Korea in 1970. Kim’s parents were murdered by North Korean authorities and his relatives “purged”. Kim renounced his communist ideology and became an ordained minister with the Seoul “Sungrak” (“Holy Joy”) Baptist Church in Gyeonggi-do. He has a wife and two children.

I’m indebted for this story to a man who was a family friend, almost before my folks decided to start a family. I have known this man longer than I can remember and flatter myself to regard him as a personal friend. He was one of the interrogators, during both the Trung and the Kim episodes related above. Thank you, Victor, for your story. And for your service.

January 20, 1788 I have a Dream

“If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well.

If you can’t be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley. Be the best little shrub on the side of the hill.
Be a bush if you can’t be a tree. If you can’t be a highway, just be a trail. If you can’t be a sun, be a star. For it isn’t by size that you win or fail. Be the best of whatever you are”.

The “Anne” sailed from England in November 1732. On board were 114 colonists including General James Oglethorpe, intending to found the Colony of Georgia. The group headed south after a brief stay in Charleston, South Carolina. Landing at Yamacraw bluff, Oglethorpe’s party was greeted by Chief Tomochichi of the Yamacraws, along with two Indian traders, John and Mary Musgrove.

The Province of Georgia and its Colonial Capital of Savannah were founded on that date, February 12, 1733. The friendship which developed between Oglethorpe and Tomochichi kept the fledgling colony out of the Indian conflicts, marking the founding of most of the other colonies.

Oglethorpe was something of a Utopian, founding his capital around four wards, each containing eight blocks situated around its own central square. This was a place of religious freedom. 40 Sephardic Jews from Spain and Portugal arrived in July, the largest such group to-date to enter any of the colonies. It was a place of religious freedom for all but Catholics, that is. It was feared that Catholics would be sympathetic with Spanish authorities in control of Florida at that time, so they were prohibited.

There were four such prohibitions, the others being that there would be no spirituous liquors (that wouldn’t last long), no lawyers (do I need to explain?), and no slaves.

The experiment came to an end in 1754, when Georgia became a Royal Colony.

The low marshes of Savannah’s coastline are ideally suited as wild rice fields. Rice had originally come from its native Southeast Asia to West Africa, where the same strains were grown by European colonists. The rice industry failed in Africa, but the combination of English agricultural technology and African labor made the crop a mainstay of the early colonial economy.

In 1773, a slave named George Leile became the first black man to become a licensed Baptist preacher in Georgia. Leile’s master, himself a Baptist deacon, freed him before the Revolution and Leile preached to slaves on plantations along the Savannah River, from Georgia north into South Carolina.

Hundreds of blacks fled to occupied Savannah after the Revolution broke out, seeking safety behind British lines. Scores of them were transported to Nova Scotia or other colonies, and some to London. Leile and his family sailed with the British for freedom in Jamaica.

Andrew Bryan was the only one of the first three black Baptist preachers to stay, making his home in Savannah along with his wife, Hannah.

On January 20, 1788, Bryan brought official recognition to the First African Baptist Church and its 67 members, five years before the first “white” Baptist Church in Savannah. In 1802, Bryan founded the “Second Colored Baptist Church”, renamed the “Second African Baptist Church” in 1823.

General William Tecumseh Sherman read the Emancipation Proclamation to the citizens of Savannah from the steps of this church, promising “40 acres and a mule” to newly freed slaves.

The original church on Greene Square burned down in 1925. The church was completely rebuilt, and still contains its original pulpit, prayer benches and choir chairs.

“If it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well. If you can’t be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley. Be the best little shrub on the side of the hill.

Be a bush if you can’t be a tree. If you can’t be a highway, just be a trail. If you can’t be a sun, be a star. For it isn’t by size that you win or fail. Be the best of whatever you are”. – Martin Luther King, Jr.

In 1961, a guest preacher delivered a sermon at the Second African Baptist Church which he called “I have a Dream”. Two years later, the same speaker delivered his speech from the steps of the Lincoln memorial in Washington.

Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr’s 91^st birthday came and went last week, a date now remembered with its own national holiday. This August, the country will mark the 59^th anniversary of his speech on the Mall.

While a sorry collection of racial arsonists attempt to divide Americans against one another for their own political advantage, permit me this reminder of other words, spoken by Reverend King at a time when it took real courage to be a “civil rights” leader.

“In a real sense we must all live together as brothers, or we will all perish together as fools”.

Feature Image, top of page: Wright Square Savannah, final resting place of Tomochichi, leader of the Yamacraw

January 19, 1977 Tokyo Rose

FBI.gov states on its “Famous Cases” website that, “As far as its propaganda value, Army analysis suggested that the program had no negative effect on troop morale and that it might even have raised it a bit. The Army’s sole concern about the broadcasts was that “Annie” appeared to have good intelligence on U.S. ship and troop movements”.

There’s an old cliché that, if you speak with someone convicted of a crime, they will always say they are innocent. It’s an untrue statement on the face of it, but only two possible conclusions are possible. Either all convicts are guilty as charged, or someone, at some time, has been wrongly convicted.

To agree with the former is to accept the premise that government is 100% correct, 100% of the time.

Iva Ikuko Toguri was born in Los Angeles on July 4, 1916, the daughter of Japanese immigrants. She attended schools in Calexico and San Diego, returning to Los Angeles where she enrolled at UCLA, graduating in January, 1940 with a degree in zoology.

In July of the following year, Iva sailed to Japan without an American passport. She variously described the purpose of the trip as the study of medicine, and going to see a sick aunt.

In September, Toguri appeared before the US Vice Consul in Japan to obtain a passport, explaining that she wished to return to permanent residence in the United States. Because she had left without a passport, her application was forwarded to the State Department for consideration. Imperial Japan attacked the American anchorage at Pearl Harbor fewer than three months later. Toguri’s paperwork was still on someone’s desk.

Iva later withdrew the application, saying she’d voluntarily remain in Japan, for the duration of the war. She enrolled in a Japanese language and culture school to improve her language skills, taking a typist job for the Domei News Agency. In August 1943, she began a second job as a typist for Radio Tokyo.That November, Toguri was asked to become a broadcaster for Radio Tokyo on the “Zero Hour” program, part of a Japanese psychological warfare campaign designed to lower the morale of US Armed Forces. The name “Tokyo Rose” was in common use by this time, applied to as many as 12 different women broadcasting Japanese propaganda in English.

Toguri DJ’d a program with American music punctuated by Japanese slanted news articles for 1¼ hours, six days a week, starting at 6:00pm Tokyo time. Altogether, her on-air speaking time averaged 15-20 minutes for most broadcasts.

She called herself “Orphan Annie,” earning 150 yen per month (about $7.00 US). She wasn’t a professional radio personality, but many of those who recalled hearing her enjoyed the program, especially the music.

Shortly before the end of the war, Toguri married Felipe d’Aquino, a Portuguese citizen of Japanese-Portuguese ancestry. The marriage was registered with the Portuguese Consulate though she didn’t renounce her US citizenship. Toguri’s Zero Hour broadcast continued until the end of the war.

After the war, a number of reporters were looking for the mythical “Tokyo Rose”. Two of them found Iva d’Aquino.

Henry Brundidge, reporting for Cosmopolitan magazine and Clark Lee, reporter for the International News Service, must have thought they found themselves a real “dragon lady”. The pair hid d’Aquino and her husband away in the Imperial Hotel, offering $2,000 for exclusive rights to her story.

$2,000 was not an insignificant sum in 1945, equivalent to $23,000 today. Toguri lied, “confessing” that she was the “one and only” Tokyo Rose. The money never materialized, but she had signed a contract giving the two rights to her story, and identifying herself as Tokyo Rose.

RSJ42461_grande — Henry Brundidge, Clark Lee

US Army authorities arrested her in September, while the FBI and Army Counterintelligence investigated her case. By the following October, authorities decided the evidence did not merit prosecution, and she was released.

Department of Justice likewise determined that prosecution was not warranted and matters may have ended there, except for the public outcry which accompanied d’Aquino’s return to the US. Several groups, along with the noted broadcaster Walter Winchell, were outraged that the woman they knew as “Tokyo Rose” wanted to return to this country, and demanded her arrest on treason charges.

The US Attorney in San Francisco convened a grand jury and d’Aquino was indicted in September, 1948. Once again quoting fbi.gov, “Problematically, Brundidge enticed a former contact of his to perjure himself in the matter”.

The trial began on July 5, 1949, lasting just short of three months. The jury found d’Aquino guilty on one of fifteen treason charges, ruling that “[O]n a day during October, 1944, the exact date being to the Grand Jurors unknown, said defendant, at Tokyo, Japan, in a broadcasting studio of the Broadcasting Corporation of Japan, did speak into a microphone concerning the loss of ships.”

d’Aquino was sentenced to ten years and fined $10,000 for the crime of treason, only the seventh person in US history so convicted. She was released from the Federal Reformatory for Women at Alderson, West Virginia in 1956, having served six years and two months of her sentence.

President Gerald Ford pardoned her on January 19, 1977, 21 years almost to the day after her release from prison. Iva Toguri d’Aquino passed away in 2006, at the age of 90. Neither perjury nor suborning charges were ever brought against Henry Brundidge, or his witness.

January 18, 532 Nika Riot

Modern sport has seen its share of fan passion rising to violence, but the worst “futbol hooligan” pales into docility, compared with the crowd come to watch the chariot races. Imagine the worst fan violence of the modern era combined with aspects of street gangs and political organizations, each faction holding positions on the issues of the day and attempting to sway public policy by shouting slogans, between races.

Chariots go back to the earliest days of the Roman Republic, coming down from the ancient Greeks by way of the Etruscan empire. The mythical abduction of the Sabine women was carried out, while the Sabine men watched a chariot race. While Romans never used them as weapons of war, chariots were used in triumphal processions, pulled by teams of horses, tigers or dogs, even ostriches.

What the Greeks regarded as an opportunity for talented amateurs to rise within their chosen sport, the Romans saw as entertainment. A class of professional drivers rose to meet the demand.

Look up the Highest Paid Athlete of All Time and you’ll be rewarded with the knowledge that Michael Jordan amassed career earnings of $1.85 Billion, according to Forbes Magazine. Steve Forbes and Michael Jordan alike may be surprised to know. Spanish driver Gaius Appuleius Diocles amassed an astonishing 35,863,120 sesterces, equivalent to $15 Billion, today. Not bad for a man whose name suggests he probably began as a slave, freed by a guy named Gaius Appuleius.

The Hippodrome of the Byzantine era (from the Greek Hippos: Horse and Dromos: Path, or Way) was already the center of sport and social activity in 324. That was the year Emperor Constantine moved the seat of the Roman Empire east to Byzantium, calling the place, Nova Roma. New Rome. The name failed to catch on and the city came to be known as Constantinople.

The age of Constantine saw enormous expansion of the city which bore his name, including enlargement of the Hippodrome to an impressive 1,476-feet long by 427-feet wide with a seating capacity of 100,000. By way of comparison, the Empire State Building is 1,454-feet from sidewalk to the very tip of the spire. Mercedes Benz Stadium in Atlanta, home of Super Bowl LIII, has a rated capacity of 71,000 spectators.

There were four teams or “factions” (factiones), distinguished by the color of their uniform: Red, Blue, Green and White, and echoed by the colors worn by their fans. Twelve chariots would enter each race, three from each faction. Golden-tipped dolphins were tipped over, to count the laps. Each race ran seven.A raised median called a spina ran down the center, adorned with stone statuary and obelisks. Ganging up to drive opposing handlers into the stone median or the stands, whipping opponents and even hauling them out of their chariots was not only permitted, but encouraged.

It was the racetrack, or circus and the sport of chariot racing, that truly put the Fanatic in Fans. There are tales of poisoned horses and drivers. Lead tablets and amulets inscribed with curses, spiked through with nails and thrown from the stands. One such curse read:

I call upon you, oh demon, whoever you are, to ask that from this hour, from this day, from this moment, you torture and kill the horses of the green and white factions and that you kill and crush completely the drivers Calrice, Felix, Primulus, and Romanus, and that you leave not a breath in their bodies.

Racing chariots were as light as possible and extremely flimsy, to increase speed. With no suspension, even a bump could throw a driver into the path of oncoming teams. Clogs were built into lattice floors, to hold the driver’s feet. Teams of two (biga), three (triga) and four (quadriga) horses were common, but teams as large as six were not unheard of.

Though rare, ten-horse teams were known to take the field.

While Greek drivers held the reins in their hands, Roman charioteers wrapped them around the waist. Unsurprisingly, any driver thrown out would be dragged to death or trampled, unless able to cut himself free.

Crashes were frequent and spectacular, often killing or maiming driver and horse alike. Such wrecks were called naufragia, a Latin word translating as ”shipwreck”. As many as forty chariots crashed in one catastrophic pile-up, near Delphi.Modern sport has seen its share of fan passion rising to violence, but the worst “futbol hooligan” pales into docility, compared with the crowd come to watch the chariot races. Imagine the worst fan violence of the modern era combined with aspects of street gangs and political organizations, each faction holding positions on the issues of the day and attempting to sway public policy by shouting slogans, between races.

Distinctions between politics and sport, all but disappeared. Emperor Vitellius, a fan of the Blue faction, had citizens put to death in the year 69 for talking trash about his team. Ten years later, one fan threw himself on the funeral pyre of his favorite driver.

In 531, fans of the Blues and Greens were arrested for murder, following riots which broke out during a chariot race. The killers were sentenced to death and most were executed but two, escaped. On January 10, 532, the two men one Blue and one Green had taken refuge in a church, surrounded by an angry mob.

Emperor Justinian, a supporter of the Blues, was beset with problems. The war in the east was not going well with the Persians and at home, rampant corruption and public fury over confiscatory tax policy. Now this. Justinian resorted to that time honored technique to pacify the turbulent masses. Bread and Circuses. He announced a chariot race.

Bad idea.

It was a tense and angry crowd that arrived at the Hippodrome on January 13. By race #22 chants of “Blue” and “Green” were changed to angry shouts, directed at the Emperor. “Nίκα! Nίκα! Nίκα! (“Nika” translating as “Win!” “Victory!” or “Conquer!”).

Fury boiled over and anarchy turned to Riot. The Royal Palace was laid siege over the next five days and the city, laid waste. Even the magnificent Hagia Sofia, the foremost church in Constantinople, was destroyed.

Hagia_Sophia_Mars_2013 — Now a mosque in Istanbul, the beautiful Hagia Sofia was destroyed during the Nika riots of 532 and later rebuilt, by Emperor Justinian.

Rioters proclaimed the Senator Flavius Hypatius as their new Emperor and demanded the dismissal of key advisers. Soon Justinian himself prepared to flee for his life. He surely would have done so if not for his wife, the formidable Empress Theodora.

“Those who have worn the crown should never survive its loss”, she declared. “Never will I see the day when I am not saluted as empress. Who is born into the light of day must sooner or later die; and how could an Emperor ever allow himself to be a fugitive.”

The avenue of escape lay open to the Emperor but Theodora’s words, cut deep. Not to be deterred, the Empress closed the door on escape. “Royalty is a fine burial shroud” she said. “The Royal color Purple makes a fine winding sheet.”

With spine thus restored, Justinian formulated a plan. The popular eunuch Narses was sent with a bag of gold, into the lion’s den. Small and slight of build, unarmed but for those coins, Narses entered the Hippodrome and went directly to the Blue section. On this day in 562 Hypatius was in the very act of coronation when the eunuch spoke. Narses reminded the Blues that Hypatius was a Green while Justinian himself, supported their team.

Gold was distributed among the Blues and the trap was sprung. As Blue team supporters streamed out of the Hippodrome, Imperial troops led by the Generals Belisarius and Mundus fell upon the crowd, killing some 30,000 Blue and Green alike.Thus ends one of the great “backfires” in political history. Senator Hypatius was put to the sword and those who had supported the pretender, sent into exile. Justinian I would rule another 33 years, rebuilding Constantinople, muzzling the Senatorial Class which had caused him such grief and reconquering lost territories, in Italy.

Wealthy estates were confiscated outright and races were suspended for a period of five years. None were left to stand against this Emperor for a long and fruitful reign.

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

“Christmas from Heaven: The Candy Bomber Story” with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra, Narrated by Tom Brokaw

Sharing Today in History:

“In the memory of Mrs. Mary Randolph, Her intrinsic worth needs no eulogium. The deceased was born The 9th of August, 1762 at Amphill near Richmond, Virginia And died the 23rd of January 1828 In Washington City a victim to maternal love and duty.”

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

Silmido, a 2003 film produced by Kang Woo-suk

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

Sharing Today in History:

“In the memory of Mrs. Mary Randolph,
Her intrinsic worth needs no eulogium.
The deceased was born
The 9th of August, 1762
at Amphill near Richmond, Virginia
And died the 23rd of January 1828
In Washington City a victim to maternal love and duty.”