Jean-François Champollion was born in France in 1790 and is the man credited with deciphering the Rosetta Stone. The stone was found by Napolean’s forces in 1799 in the Nile Delta and has three versions of the same text in Ancient Greek, Demotic script, and Ancient Egyptian heiroglyphs. Champollion displayed a natural ability for languages […]
The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire occurred in New York City in March 1911 and caused the deaths of 146 garment workers. The main reason this fire was so deadly was because the owners of the factory had a policy which kept key doors locked in order to prevent thefts and unauthorized breaks. The workers ranged in […]
The historic flight took place in 1943 when United States Presiden Franklin Delano Roosevelt took a Boeing 314 Flying Boat across the Atlantic to a WWII strategy meeting with Winston Churchill in Casablanca. Although this was the first time a sitting president took a flight, this wasn’t the first trip made by FDR. He had […]
Évariste Galois was born in 1811 and died in 1832 after being shot in the abdomen in a duel at the age of twenty. Beginning in 1829 he composed multiple papers (and published one) on mathematics but was still denied entrance to the prestigious École Polytechnique, the leading French school of the time. He instead […]
Santiago Calavatra is a Spanish architect born in 1951. He knew he wanted to draw from an early age and began to study art at the age of 6. Finished with art school at the age of 17, he stumbled upon an architecture book and realized his future was in this profession. He received his […]
The Neustadt International Prize for Literature, sometimes referred to as the American Nobel, is awarded every other year by the University of Oklahoma’s World Literature Today. Like the Nobel, the award is based on an authors entire body of work. The award was founded in 1969 and it’s recipients include Gabo, Octavio Paz (both of […]
Tales of the mythical fox spirit originated in China and spread to Japan and Korea. They are known for their ability to shapeshift, most often taking the form of beautiful young women. Their main mischief is to seduce men and in some stories would consume their bodies or spirits. Modern adaptations include the Pokemon Ninetails […]
The Marshall Plan was officially called the European Recovery Program but was named after US Secretary of State George Marshall. The logic was that by helping to restore the economic strength of countries ravaged by the war the spread of Communism would be halted. The fear of Communism spread to both sides of the aisle […]
Edward VIII abdicated his throne in 1936 after less than a year as king in order to marry Wallis Simpson. The new king, George VI and Edward’s younger brother, created the title “Duke of Windsor” for the former king. Edward was the first and only Duke of Windsor; after his death the dukedom ramained vacant. […]
The most destructive river flood in United States History began in the summer of 1926 when heavy rains swelled the Mississippi River’s tributaries. Peak flooding occurred in Mound Landing, Mississippi and Arkansas City, Arkansas. Levees that had been put in place to control flooding hadn’t been designed with this volume of water in mind and […]
