podpolia » History

A Pre-Typo Typo

admin — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 02:01:10 +0000

I’ve been working my way through some of Pennsylvania’s land records as part of the project I’m working on, and ran across a survey mentioning a county I’d never heard of before. Looks like the copyist was in a hurry.

Gorbachev Looks Back

admin — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 01:29:47 +0000

Drudge had an interesting link today to an interview the Guardian did with Mikhail Gorbachev recently. There are a couple of nuggets of new information about the chaos surrounding the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 – nothing too surprising, but things that give better insight into what was going on within the Soviet government before the coup. Gorbachev is an eminence grise in Russian politics, and deservedly so. He makes some interesting comments regarding liberalization in China as well as on Putin’s leadership as well. Definitely worth looking into, as the man quite obviously shows his vast experience as well as his sound political intuitions.

Putting The War On Terror In Perspective

admin — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 23:29:01 +0000

Now that Bin Laden is dead, we can finally start putting the past decade into perspective. Via Powerline I ran across this article that begins to do just that. It’s definitely good to be able to step away from the day-to-day skirmishes over politics of the moment and look at things in context.

Another Side Of The Story

admin — Wed, 04 May 2011 01:03:44 +0000

Rewatching the coverage of the September 11 attacks the other day, it made me wonder what the reaction of those students in that classroom in Florida thought about being front and center while history was being made. Apparently the folks at Time were wondering that too.
It’s difficult for me to realize that the little kids you see in that footage are the same age as the students I have every day in class. It’s hard for me to imagine what growing up in the shadow of the smoke rising from the Twin Towers and never knowing things to ever be any other way would be like. I suppose it would be similar to the Cold War in that respect, but even I can only barely remember the end of that – I was about the same age when it ended that these kids were when the war on terrorism began. Definitely food for thought there.

UPDATE 5/5/2011 21.20: CNN has been taking a look at comments made by their users on this subject as well, and their coverage of that is also rather illuminating. There are definitely views from all sides on the issue.

Inspiration 150 Years Old

admin — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 03:46:21 +0000

There’s quite a good story here from the New York Times – they have been covering the history of the Civil War 150 years on, and this article is an inspiring story of how slavery REALLY ended in America.

Frank Buckles

admin — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 18:11:49 +0000

The last surviving American doughboy is dead. Be sure to read the whole way through the article – some of the things the man experienced and remembered are phenomenal.

Rest in peace, sir.

Comparing Genocide

admin — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 20:15:07 +0000

Slate has a fascinating article here on the unmitigated evil of Stalin, and the comparison of him to Hitler. The author makes some excellent points, and dances around the key lesson given us by the mass murderers and Ukrainian cannibalism, but never quite gets there. I’ll copy in my comment on the article:

The author gets really close to the key revelation of these incidents here, but doesn’t quite get there. “That any human could cause or carry out such acts must mean many are capable of it” – yes, indeed. Man is capable of great acts of goodness, but within everyone is the potential for great evil as well. The murders that both Stalin and Hitler committed were not done by those men themselves – they had the willing cooperation of hundreds of thousands and the silent acceptance of millions to commit their crimes. What portion of the blame does the individual NKVD or Gestapo agent bear? What portion the average German or Russian who stood by in silence while their fellow men were butchered? For that matter, what portion of the blame do those in the west who idealized Hitler or Stalin and tried to align the western democracies with either of them? The vital lessons to take out of this is that EVERYONE is capable of evil, whether active or passive, and that evil is real, and must be confronted.

Today’s Find

admin — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 19:31:48 +0000

I was outside raking dead grass today, and something caught my eye:

I’m definitely no expert on prehistoric artifacts, but it looks to be a fairly late lithic point – not sure when, or even what style, but pretty cool nonetheless.

Repercussions of World War 2

admin — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 03:20:50 +0000

It’s hard to comprehend just how massive an event the Second World War was. There’s a fascinating story here about one man still trying to come to grips with his past, and how his early life was completely shaped by the Nazi conquest.

Cool Picture

admin — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 00:11:44 +0000

Regardless of what it really was, this picture from the Telegraph is pretty cool looking:

"Searchlights converge on an unidentified object over Los Angeles on February 25, 1942. The bright blobs around the flashes are anti-aircraft shells exploding."