On May 25, 1935, the Big Ten Championships was held to determine the best track and field stars in the conference. J.C. Owens was born the son of a sharecropper and the grandson of a slave in Alabama. At age 9, his family moved to Ohio. His first teacher Read more
The first assassins in history were a legendary group of murderers associated with Middle East at the time of the Crusades. Since most of the evidence we have about the Assassins comes from sources that opposed them, it is hard to tell where the facts end and the legend Read more
In 1943, the Anglo-Americans invaded Italy because Churchill convinced Roosevelt that a cross-Channel invasion should be postponed until 1944. To appease Stalin, it was agreed that an Italian campaign would tie down German units that might otherwise face the Red Army. Churchill felt a strike at the “soft underbelly Read more
Part of Gen. Grant’s strategy to capture Richmond involved conquering the Shenandoah Valley. He assigned the task to Maj. Gen. Sigel. In May, 1864, Sigel moved south up the valley. His targets were the towns of Staunton and Lynchburg. Facing him was the army of Maj. Gen. John Breckinridge. Read more
On May 14, 1864, Gen. Grant and his Army of the Potomac were about a week into the Wilderness Campaign (sometimes called the Overland Campaign). It had fought two vicious battles in the Wilderness forest and at Spotsylvania Court House. Although stymied at both places by Gen. Lee’s Army of Read more
Lee surrendered to Grant on April 9, 1865, but fighting continued after that. The last battle of the Civil War was the Battle of Palmito Ranch in Texas. The Union and the Confederacy had small forces on the southern tip of Texas along the Rio Grande River. A gentleman’s Read more
Tycho Brahe was a famous astronomer who accurately measured the stars and planets before the telescope was invented. He improved the sextant and quadrant to make his measurements. He was the first to propose that comets were objects in space. He also was a believer in alchemy. His achievements Read more
John Sedgwick graduated from West Point in 1837. He served in the Seminole War, the Mexican War, and posts in the west. By the time the Civil War broke out, he was a brigadier general. He commanded a division in the Army of the Potomac in the Battle of Read more
The recent threat of balloons over America was not the first time America has been threatened by balloons. But in 1945, we didn’t have 24 hours news stations. In 1944, Major General Kusaba of the 9th Army Technical Research Laboratory developed a secret weapon that he thought would create Read more
In 1807, Napoleon sent an army into Spain. Supposedly, the French army was allied with the Spanish army in a campaign to conquer Portugal. But soon it became apparent that the French were also there to conquer Spain. Napoleon’s brother Joseph was put on the throne. England sent an Read more