THE ULTIMATE
On this day, May 19th 1909, Nicholas Winton was born.
Nicholas Winton was a British humanitarian known for rescuing 669 Jewish children from Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia just before the outbreak of World War Two. He created an organisation to find homes for the children and the safe passage of the children by train across Europe to Britain. He wrote to other countries, but only Sweden also took in the freed Jewish children. This way the children escaped the Nazis and the Holocaust, in which many of their parents perished. He refused to talk about his actions in Czechoslovakia, now the Czech Republic and Slovakia, for decades until his wife found his scrapbook with details of the children he had helped in the loft. Then in 1988 a BBC programme reunited him with many children, now adults, who he had saved. Nicholas was always modest about his role, saying that others had done the more dangerous work of collecting the children and putting them on the trains to safety. He also regretted the children he couldn't save, only a few on the last train out of Prague station survived the war. He also believed had other countries responded to his letters calling for homes for the children he could hae saved more. In 2003 he was knighted by the Queen for his services to humanity in saving Jewish children from Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia. In 2014 he was awarded the highest honour of the Czech Republic.
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On this day, May 18th 1969, Apollo 10 was launched by NASA.
Apollo 10 was the second Apollo mission to orbit the moon, and acted as a 'dress rehearsal' for the July 1969 moon landing by Apollo 11. Astronauts, Thomas Stafford, John Young and Gene Cernan, flew Apollo 10 31 times around the moon, and released the Apollo Lunar Module to descend towards the moon's surface, before returning to the Command Module at the stage where Apollo 11 would begin the descent stage to land on the moon's surface. The call signs for the mission were from the 'Peanuts' characters 'Charlie Brown' and 'Snoopy'; with 'Charlie Brown' being the nickname for the Command Module, that John Young remained in, and 'Snoopy' being the Lunar Module, which Thomas Stafford and Gene Cernan headed towards the moon surface in and back. You can see 'Charlie Brown' in London's Science Museum, as America's Smithsonian museum, based in Washington D.C. loaned it to London's Science Museum in 1978. On this day, May 17th 1749, Edward Jenner, was born in Berkely, Gloucestershire, as a doctor and scientist he pioneered the development of vaccines and vaccination.
Edward Jenner demonstrated that contact with cowpox could prevent people getting smallpox. Napoleon having had his troops vaccinated called Jenner one of the greatest 'benefactors of mankind'. The legend of the discovery is that Jenner recalled a rhyme telling of how milkmaids had the fairest faces, that they were immune to smallpox. Jenner tested the hypothesis and showed how and why it worked enabling an effective vaccine to be given to populations. With the milder version of cowpox building an immunity to disfigurng and potentially fatal smallpox. This may have built on similar observations of others, and the practice brought over from the Turkish court by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu of a form of innoculation that included the disease itself - which Jenner had been treated with himself at a young age. By 1979 the World Health Organisation declared smallpox eradicated around the world, apart from some secure vials in the USA and Russia. Not only was Jenner praised in his lifetime for his discovery by Napoleon, but also by the third President of the United States of America, Thomas Jefferson. On this day, May 15th 1859, Pierre Curie was born in Paris, France.
Pierre Curie is a scientist known for his studies into magnetism, and with his wife Marie Curie into radioactivity, being the first the use the term. They discovered the elements radium and polonium. With his student Pierre also discovered nuclear energy. In 1903 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics along with his wife Marie, and Henri Becquerel. On this day, May 14th 1973, the USA's NASA launched its first Space Station, Skylab.
The Soviet Union had already put a space station into orbit, Salyut. It was the only solely US funded Space Station, and was taken into orbit, by a Saturn V rocket - the last mission for the Saturn V, that had launched the Apollo lunar missions. Skylab contained both Solar and Earth observatories, as well as the laboratory space for over 80 experiments to bec onducted. It was serviced by three crews. One of the first jobs the service crews had to do, was carry out external repairs to the Space Station that occurred during the launch, by attaching sheets to act as shields, these are the golden blankets that appear in the images of the Skylab. It also lost one set of Solar Panels, which gives it its assymetrical shape, as only one set of side solar panels remained. The last crew of astronauts left in 1974, expecting more crews to be launched, however, this didn't happen and in 1979 Skylab orbit was pulled by the Earth's gravity back into the Earth's atmosphere where it broke up, with pieces scattering over Western Australia. On this day, May 14th 1607, the first permanent English settlement was established at Jamestown, Virginia, the beginnings of the United States of America.
The English settlers departed from the banks of the Thames in London in Deecember, and it took their three ships the Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery, four months to cross the Atlantic Ocean and make landfall on the coast of North America. Once on the coast they explored the area, and decided to build a settlement on an island in what they called the James River, which was away from the Atlantic Ocean, navigable (where boats could be used) and was easy to defend. The site was uninhabited by the Powhatan Native Americans, as it was seen as a swamp of mosquitoes unsuitable for farming. On unsuitable ground for farming, and with little agricultural experience amongst the settlers, whose main aim was hunting for gold, the settlement struggled to survive. Supplies from the local group of Powhatan Indians, ensured their survival, though relations with the Powhatan went through phases of friendship and warfare. The settlement also saw its settlers replaced by more colonists coming from England, and within four years the local Native Americans had been wiped out through warfare. Pocahontas the daughter of the Native American Chief of the region, befriended the English settlers, is said to have saved John Smith one of the seettlers' leaders from being executed; been taken hostage and converted to Christianity, and married John Rolfe, before travelling with Rolfe to England. As she was to travel back, with Rolfe and their son, Pocahontas died at Gravesend on the Thames, and was buried there in the local churchyard - where a statue of her now stands. John Rolfe began the successful cultivation of tobacco at the settlement, which became its main crop. The settlement was almost abandoned in 1610, but the leaving colonists were ordered to return, when more ships of settlers arrived from across the Atlantic Ocean, In many ways the Jamestown settlement that established the British colony of Virginia, and served for many years as its capital, began numerous features of the United States of America, its Anglo-Saxon (English/British) culture, such as its language, and the political system of rights and democracy. Whilst, it also led to th losses experienced by the Native American nations, as well as the use of slavery to grow plantation crops. On this day, May 13th 1862, at the height of the US Civil War, Robert Smalls, a Southern slave led an audacious bid for freedom by a group of slaves.
Smalls was a slave in South Carolina and he was assigned to steer a ship, the Planter, on duties in Charleston harbor, for the military of the Southern States, the Confederacy. He told the other slaves aboard of his plan, apart from one he didn't trust, and on May 13th 1862, they carried it out. As the white commanders went ashore on leave, he took command of the Planter, sailing the steamship carrying newly picked up artillery guns, and picking up family members of the slaves as he went, who were ready on another ship. Smalls knew that out beyond the harbour, was a naval blockade of the Northern United States navy. He was stealing the ship from the Confederacy, and aiming to take it across the Northern forces, where he and his fellow slaves would be free. Smalls, knew the harbour well, he knew the depths of the sea floor, he knew the defences surrounding the harbour, and he knew where mines had been placed - as he had been made to set the mines to thwart the Northern US navy. He also knew that if suspicion wasaroused other ships could give chase and the harbour guns could be turned on the Planter. He went to the extent of wearing a straw hat as the white commander did, and copying his mannerisms, so as not to arouse the suspicions of onlookers from the shore or other ships. He managed to sail the ship out of the harbour towards the Northern naval blockade, which meant further danger for his ship would be seen as a possible attack by the South. As they neared the Northern ships, they began to take aim, Smalls had the Planter's confederate flag run down, and replaced with a white sheet, that the family members had brought along. As they readied to fire the the Northern ships spotted the white flag, and waited. Robert Smalls had delivered his ship to the US Navy, he and the other slaves were free. In effect he had become the first African-American to command a US navy ship, the USS Planter. Smalls received a share of the 'prize' money for the capture of the ship, though even later in his life the amount he received was questioned as to whether it was really in line with the value of the ship. He went on to serve in the US Navy and Army, in the remainder of the Civil War, providing his knowledge of Charleston harbour and its defences to the North - so that within days they could launch a successful attack on an island at the harbour mouth. He encouraged the acceptance of African-Americans into the Northern military. Though, he served in a civilian capacity for the Northen Navy, he believed he had been commissioned as an officer, and late in life was awarded a pension equivalent to that of a captain. After the Civil War, he became a businessman, and entered politics, and in the era after the Emancipation Proclamation, and the Civil War Constitutional Amendments, but before the racist Jim Crow Laws took effect, he was elected to South Carolina's State Legislature (South Caroina's Parliament) and thence to the House of Representatives in the US Congress (equivalent to the UK's Parliament). On this day, May 12th 1820, Florence Nightingale was born in, Italy in the city of her name.
Florence became a pioneer of nursing and healthcare statistics, and gained celebrity status in Victorian as the 'Lady with the Lamp'. Against her family's wishes she trained to be a nurse in Germany, comleting her training in 1851. On reading of the casualties in the Crimean War 1854-56, she responds to a government call for nurses, and is given the headship of British female nurses in the East. She travelled from England to Constantinople, now Istanbul, and joined the hospital at Scutari, with her team of female nurses. However, their presence is unwanted by the male nurses already there. The conditions in the hospital were so bad and rat-infested that she realises that the soldiers are dying from the conditions rather than their wounds. When the female nurses were eventually allowed to care for the soldiers, Florence directed her team to improve the hygiene of the hospital. It was at this point that the Times newspaper ran a report of her checking on the soldiers in the night with her lamp, leading to her fame throughout Victorian Britain as the 'Lady with the Lamp'. She insisted on visiting the field hospitals to see the conditions there, where at the Balaklava hospital she was struck down with 'Crimean Fever'. During her time at Scutari, she developed the use of statistics to study the impact of the hospital's care, and to work out the health issues the hospital faced. Her devlopment of such statistics, and use of statistical diagrams, gave her the evidence to campaign for resources and aid from the government, as well as earning her membership of the Royal Statistical Society, the first female member. Back in Britain she continued to campaignfor the improvement of conditions in hospitals, establishing her own training school at St. Thomas' Hospital in London. The nurses who graduated from her training, then took her ideals and evidence based approach to sanitation across the country. Queen Victoria sent her a jewelled brooch designed by her husband Prince Albert. And Florence was made the first woman member of the Order of Merit, a group of 24 individuals and the Monarch. Florence Nightingale made nursing a respectable career, that was professionalised by training and she also pioneered the use of statistics in healthcare. On this day, May 11th 330 AD/CE, the Roman Emperor Constantine made Byzantium the new capital of the Roman Empire - that city also known as Constantinople, is now Istanbul - Turkey's most populous city, and the only city in the world to straddle two continents!
Istanbul sits on both sides of the Bospurous Strait, so one half is in Europe and the other in Asia. At times it has been the most populous city in the world, and the Hagia Sophia, seen in our picture, has been a cathedral and a mosque, now a museum, was once the largest building in the world. Constantine's desion to make Byzantium the new capital of the Roman Empire, moved the centre of the Empire eastwards. Constantine viewed it as a 'New Rome', though the name didn't take off, whilst Constantinople basically means the 'City of Constantine', whilst the city's current name Istanbul, is an alteration over time of the Greek 'In to the city'. Constantine was the first Christian Roman Emperor, who did numerous acts linked to Christianity during his rein, for example using the Chi-Ro symbol for Christ on the shields of his soldiers, only converted on his death bed. He was also acclaimed Roman Emperor when he was fighting as a general in Britain, the Roman soldiers declaring him Emperor at the city of Eboracum, now York in Northern England. Whilst, football fans may recall Istanbul as the city where in 2005 one of the most dramatic Champions League Finals occurred, with Liverpool 3v0 down by half-time and in disarray, they pulled the three goals back and won the European Cup on penalties. Some may say that Steven Gerrard, Liverpool's inspirational captain, was the Emperor that night! On this day, May 10th 1994, Nelson Mandela became Presdent of South Africa, following the first democratic elections, ending the 'apartheid' era.
Apartheid had been the systematic segregation of South African society on the basis of colour, whereby the Black majority population were denied their rights. Nelson Mandela became key to struggle against apartheid, at times pursuing nnon-violence, at others sabotage. He was imprisoned for 27 years, most famously on Robben Island. he was released by President F.W. de Klerk in 1990, and Mandela leading the African National Congress (ANC) party, steadily entered negotiations with the ruling National Party over the ending of Apartheid and a trsnsition to majority rule. For this work Mandela was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, along with F.W. de Klerk in 1993. Upon becoming President, Mandela, formed a government of National Unity, including members of de Klerk's National Party, and Inkatha party. He also strove for a peaceful future for South Africa, establishing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where all sides could explain the hurt they had suffered, and all sides could be be reconciled and come to understand each other, and their past experiences. Mandela redefined South Africa as a 'Rainbow Nation' where all peoples had a voice, rights and a share in power. |
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