The Russo-Turkish War of 1877 – 1878 marked the end of the Ottoman domination of the Balkans, and set off the dominoes which would change the religious and political balance of power throughout Europe. The Turks won the Crimean War against Russia in 1856, but the cost of victory was so high that it set …
The first mass market portable camera was invented by George Eastman in 1888. It used celluloid film to allow everyday people to capture everyday moments in their lives. Anyone could document anything. Eastman changed the world. He democratized it. He flattened command structures all around the world with his invention. Now normal people could participate …
Briefly, from the start of the revolution on 23 October 1956 and the ceasefire with the Soviet Union on 28 October, it looked as though Hungary would be allowed self-determination. On 4 November 1956 it became utterly clear that such a possibility was an absolute impossibility as Soviet tanks entered Budapest. Although it took another …
On 16 February 1971 his cremated remains were returned to Budapest and buried in a grave marked only with his initials. Not included on his epitaph, although he frequently proudly proclaimed it in public, was “Stalin’s Best Hungarian Disciple.” In the end, it was his dogged clinging to Stalinism which sealed his fate. The future …
Ox”The struggle now is for everything,” Greek Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas, 28 October 1940. At 3:00 in the morning on 28 October 1940, the Italian ambassador in Athens delivered a message to the Greek government. Allow the Italian army to enter Greece and occupy strategic positions, it said, or there will be war. “Alors, c’est …
It is well known that Mark Twain said “History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes,” while writing “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calavaras County.” This was an 1865 English rewriting of an ancient Greek-language frog tale set in classical Greece, two or three thousand years old. All these facts are well known. And yet, …
The Battle of Kumanovo, on 23 October 1912, marked the end of the Ottoman Empire in Europe – even if the Ottomans didn’t quite fully accept the loss until May 1913. It was a victory that shocked the Great Powers of Europe; that the small and seemingly backward nations of the Balkans- long viewed as …
When the Mau Mau leader Dedan Kimathi was captured on 21 October 1956, the military portion of the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya was effectively over. That did not end the British system of camps, called the “Pipeline“, nor did it end the systemized torture torture and brutality that played a large role in quelling …
It turned out, to the chagrin of the Soviet Union, that the July 1956 exiling of the ten-year authoritarian leader of communist Hungary, Matyas Rakosi, to the Soviet Union under the thin pretense of “necessary medical treatment” was not enough. By October 1956 Hungary was in full rebellion. World War II had not been kind to …
Bulgaria was not happy with the status quo at the end of the Second Balkan War. Nearly all the land she had gained in the First Balkan War had been shifted away, and Tsar Ferdinand had felt forced to sign the 1913 Treaty of Bucharest agreeing to those terms. So it was no real surprise …
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