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THE SECOND BOER WAR
Was a costly victory for the British of Boer forces in South Africa. Awareness of the conflict among the people of the United States is evidenced in American popular culture. A Spanish-American War song, “Good-Bye, Dolly Gray,” was revived and became a much bigger hit than it had been just two years before. It was again a hit when it was recorded several times as American boys went off to fight World War I in 1917. -
TITANIC
The Titanic was a luxury vessel and the largest moveable man-made object of its time. It sank on April 15, 1912, off the coast of Newfoundland in the North Atlantic. Over 1,500 of the 2,240 passengers and crew lost their lives in the disaster. It remains a cautionary tale of the arrogance of builders that their creation could ever be flawless or impervious to harm. -
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THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION
The Great War is the watershed between the pre-modern and early modern era. As an example, all we have to do is look at Russia. Before World War One, it was an autocracy, very conservative, very religious, and only a few decades away from serfdom, which the rest of Europe abandoned in the Middle Ages. After the war, it was officially atheistic, communist, rapidly industrializing, and becoming one of two superpowers that dominated the 20th century. -
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ELVIS PRESLEY
Elvis Aaron Presley, known as Elvis Presley or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor, considered one of the most popular cultural icons of the 20th century. He is nicknamed "the king of rock and roll" -
THE HUNGARIAN REVOLUTION STARTS
Five thousand students crammed into a hall in Budapest and approved a manifesto that, among other things, called for the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Hungary, free elections, freedom of association, and economic reform. The following day, thousands filled the streets of the capital city, chanting “Russians go home!” and ending up in Hero Square, where they pulled down a giant statue of Stalin. -
THE VIETNAM WAR
Sometime in late 1957 or 1958, North Vietnam began organizing to support the communist struggle against Diem being waged by Southern communists. Economic improvements in North Vietnam allowed Ho to begin focusing more attention on the South. By 1959, the time was ripe for Hanoi to take the military offensive. In May 1959 a resolution was adopted in North Vietnam. -
APARTHEID ENDS
South Africa, despite abolishing apartheid in the 1990s, still stays very fraught with racial tension, making the United States’ experience of 2020 pale in comparison. A series of settlements and wars from over a hundred years ago and over hundreds of years still ripple South Africa today with their effects. But South Africa didn’t become what it is today by accident, though Europeans did settle it by accident … at least at first. -
VLADMIR PUTIN INVADES CHECHNYA
The Russian Federation invaded the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria in the Northern Caucasus. While tensions between Russia and Chechnya did not begin with Putin, Putin used the conflict to establish himself as Russia’s supreme leader.
