Posts Tagged ‘WWII’
History of the Summer of Love — 1967: Part 2, Sex
HISTORY OF THE SUMMER OF LOVE — 1967: PART 2, SEX “Make love, not war” and the call for “free love” represented a cultural shift in mores in 1967. Even The Beatles sang “All You Need Is Love.” If the ’60s was the time of the “sexual revolution,” the natural question is: who won? There were…
Read MoreHistory of D-Day: 78 Years Ago
HISTORY OF D-DAY Why has D-Day captured the imagination of American consciousness for over three-quarters of a century? Seventy-eight years ago, on June 6, 1944, the Allies launched an offensive on the Normandy coast of France to liberate continental Europe from the Nazi German occupation. On Twitter, the hashtag is #DDay78 D-Day was the largest invasion…
Read MoreHistory of Queen Elizabeth II: 70-Year Platinum Jubilee Celebration
HISTORY OF QUEEN ELIZABETH II Queen Elizabeth II of the UK has ruled for 70 years, marking her Platinum Jubilee celebration. While she took the throne on February 6, 1952, she was not coronated (officially “crowned”) until June 2, 1953, or 69 years ago today at Westminster Abbey. But what’s a year between friends? She…
Read MoreHistory of Memorial Day: Why We Fight
HISTORY OF MEMORIAL DAY: WHY WE FIGHT The world is different from what it was two decades ago as we celebrate Memorial Day. We have troops in countries that we didn’t have then, and after 9/11, we now remember why we fight. The History Channel often re-runs the HBO series Band of Brothers, the T.V.…
Read MoreHistory of Memorial Day: Which War?
HISTORY OF MEMORIAL DAY: WHICH WAR? Memorial Day was not universally recognized as a shared American Holiday until after World War I. But that’s not how it started in the United States. When did it begin? Civil War and Memorial Day Following the American Civil War or the “War Between the States,” as it…
Read MoreHistory of VE-Day: End of WWII in Europe 77 Years Ago
HISTORY OF VE-DAY Seventy-seven years ago today, World War II ended in Europe with the acceptance by the Allies of unconditional surrender from Germany on VE-Day. Or did it? May 7, 1945, VE-Day Adolf Hitler had committed suicide in his Berlin bunker a week earlier on April 30, 1945, as I describe in my…
Read MoreHistory of the Liberation of Dachau: April 29, 1945
HISTORY OF THE LIBERATION OF DACHAU: APRIL 29, 1945 I remember what my father had told me of his involvement in the liberation of Dachau shortly before he died in 1976. Some of his war buddies discovered the tribute site I’d created for him and called or emailed me to recount stories I’d not known…
Read MoreHistory of Holocaust Remembrance Day
History of Holocaust Remembrance Day Today, April 8, is Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is a part of Holocaust Days of Remembrance, established by the U.S. Congress as the nation’s annual commemoration of the Holocaust. The U.S. Army remembers the six million Jewish and millions of other victims of the Holocaust and honors the survivors’ resilience. In…
Read MoreHistory of Peter Pan: the Story Behind the Disney Classic
HISTORY OF PETER PAN All of this has happened before, and it will all happen again. So begins my favorite Walt Disney animated movie, Peter Pan, which debuted 69 years ago today on February 5, 1953. The original movie poster said: “It will live in your heart forever” …and indeed it has. Why was…
Read MoreHistory of The Olympics
HISTORY OF THE OLYMPICS While the modern Olympic Games go back to 1896, the ancient Olympic Games reach back as far as 776 B.C. and before. Though historians hang the beginning on that date, it seems the Games had been going on for several centuries before the 8th century B.C. Held initially in Olympia, Greece, the…
Read MoreHistory of the Liberation of Auschwitz: January 27, 1945
HISTORY OF THE LIBERATION OF AUSCHWITZ: JANUARY 27, 1945 January 27, 1945, was the liberation of the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, one of the most notorious camps of World War II, by the Soviet Red Army. This date is now known by the United Nations and the European Union as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. In America,…
Read MoreHistory of New Year’s Eve
HISTORY OF NEW YEAR’S EVE New Year’s Eve is the last day of the year, according to the Gregorian Calendar, and is known as Old Year’s Day, or St. Sylvester’s Day. You may remember reading that Emperor Constantine was considered the first “Christian” Roman Emperor? St. Sylvester is responsible for Constantine’s conversion in the 4th-century. …
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