First Confidential

THIS DAY IN HISTORY - FEBRUARY 11th

Leó Szilárd, Quote

“Be nice to people on your way up, because you're going to meet them all on your way down.”

~ Leó Szilárd

Wikiquote (Leó Szilárd (February 11, 1898 – May 30, 1964) was a Hungarian-American physicist, and probably the first scientist to take seriously the idea of actually developing atomic bombs; he drafted the famous letter sent by Albert Einstein to U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt that was largely responsible for initiating the Manhattan Project to develop nuclear weapons during World War II.)

This Day in History

February 11th, 660 BC

Japan: an island nation in East Asia (Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south - The characters that make up Japan's name mean 'sun-origin', which is why Japan is sometimes referred to as the 'Land of the Rising Sun'

Japan:
660 BC - Traditional date for the foundation of Japan by Emperor Jimmu.

Wikipedia  Image: Japan: an island nation in East Asia (Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south - The characters that make up Japan's name mean 'sun-origin', which is why Japan is sometimes referred to as the 'Land of the Rising Sun'.

February 11th, 55

Roman Empire Decline and Fall of Rome

Roman Empire:
55 - Tiberius Claudius Caesar Britannicus, heir to the Roman Emperorship, dies under mysterious circumstances in Rome. This clears the way for Nero to become Emperor.
244 - Emperor Gordian III is murdered by mutinous soldiers in Zaitha (Mesopotamia). A mound is raised at Carchemish in his memory.

Wikipedia  Image: Relief from a 3rd-century sarcophagus depicting a battle between Romans and Germanic warriors; the central figure is perhaps the emperor Hostilian / Depiction of the Menorah on the Arch of Titus in Rome.

February 11th, 1531

Henry VIII; Coat of Arms and Seal of Henry VIII of England; Catherine of Aragon as a young widow, by court painter Michael Sittow, 1502; Anne Boleyn, Henry's second queen; a later copy of an original painted 1534; Jane Seymour<, Henry's third wife; Anne of Cleves, Henry's forth wife by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1539; Catherine Howard<, Henry's fifth wife, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1540; Catherine Parr, Henry's sixth and last wife

Henry VIII of England is recognized as supreme head of the Church of England.

Wikipedia  Painting: Henry VIII Coat of Arms and Seal of Henry VIII of England; Catherine of Aragon as a young widow, by court painter Michael Sittow, 1502; Anne Boleyn, Henry's second queen; a later copy of an original painted 1534; Jane Seymour, Henry's third wife; Anne of Cleves, Henry's forth wife by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1539; Catherine Howard, Henry's fifth wife, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1540; Catherine Parr, Henry's sixth and last wife.

February 11th, 1808

Anthracite is a hard, compact variety of mineral coal that has a high luster. It has the highest carbon content, the fewest impurities, and the highest calorific content of all types of coals, which also include bituminous coal and lignite

Jesse Fell burns anthracite on an open grate as an experiment in heating homes with coal.

Wikipedia  Photo: Anthracite is a hard, compact variety of mineral coal that has a high luster. It has the highest carbon content, the fewest impurities, and the highest calorific content of all types of coals, which also include bituminous coal and lignite.

February 11th, 1812

1812 Massachusetts governor Elbridge Gerry: (gerrymandering is a practice that attempts to establish a political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating geographic boundaries to create partisan or incumbent-protected districts)

Massachusetts governor Elbridge Gerry "gerrymanders" for the first time.

Wikipedia  Image: Gerrymander (originally written Gerry-mander) was used for the first time in the Boston Gazette on March 26, 1812. The word was created in reaction to a redrawing of Massachusetts state senate election districts under the then-governor Elbridge Gerry. (Gerrymandering is a practice that attempts to establish a political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating geographic boundaries to create partisan or incumbent-protected districts.)

February 11th, 1861

Lincoln Memorial: an American national monument built to honor the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln - located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. across from the Washington Monument American Civil War: Battle of Antietam; Stone Bridge at Antietam Battlefield - Sharpsburg, Maryland American Civil War, Battle of Mobile Bay: at Mobile Bay near Mobile, Alabama, Admiral David Farragut leads a Union flotilla through Confederate defenses and seals one of the last major Southern ports

American Civil War:
1861 - United States House of Representatives unanimously passes a resolution guaranteeing noninterference with slavery in any state.

Wikipedia  Image: ● Lincoln Memorial; an American national monument built to honor the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln - located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. across from the Washington Monument.
● The northern army led by George McClellan and the southern army led by Robert E. Lee met at Antietam Creek, Maryland in September, 1862. It was a bloody battle where 13,000 Confederates and 12,000 Union troops died in just one day. McClellan had hesitated to attack before the battle thus letting the southern troops regroup. Also, he had saved reserves and refused to use them at the end of the battle thinking that Lee was holding reserves for a counterattack, even though those reserves didn't exist. The Union victory stopped Lee's northward advance and was a turning point in the war.
● Battle of Antietam / Stone Bridge at Antietam Battlefield - Sharpsburg, Maryland
● Battle of Mobile Bay (1890) by Xanthus Russell Smith.
● Although photography was still in its infancy, war correspondents produced thousands of images, bringing the harsh realities of the frontlines to those on the home front in a new and visceral way. The Atlantic.

February 11th, 1916

Emma Goldman, 1911 Photo by T. Kajiwara / Library of Congress

Emma Goldman is arrested for lecturing on birth control.

Wikipedia  Photo: Emma Goldman "The most dangerous woman in America" 1911, by T. Kajiwara, Library of Congress.

February 11th, 1937

The 1936–1937 Sit-Down Strike changed the United Automobile Workers (UAW) from a collection of isolated locals on the fringes of the industry into a major labor union and led to the unionization of the domestic United States automobile industry

United Auto Workers union stages its first sit-down strike.

Wikipedia  Photo: The 1936–1937 Sit-Down Strike changed the United Automobile Workers (UAW) from a collection of isolated locals on the fringes of the industry into a major labor union and led to the unionization of the domestic United States automobile industry.

February 11th, 1939

World War II: Second firestorm raid on Germany, the Royal Air Force conducts an air raid on the town of Kassel, killing 10,000 and rendering 150,000 homeless World War II: Battle of Leyte Gulf; Battle of Leyte Gulf; The first kamikaze attack: A Japanese plane carrying a 200-kilogram (440 lb) bomb attacks HMAS Australia off Leyte Island World War II: German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944) World War II: Eastern Front (World War II); was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945

Pre World War II:
1929 - Lateran Treaty; Fascist Italy and the Vatican.
World War II:
1939 - Lockheed XP-38 Lightning flies from California to New York in 7 hours 2 minutes.
1942 - Battle of Bukit Timah; is fought in Singapore.
1943 - General Dwight Eisenhower is selected to command the allied armies in Europe.

Wikipedia  Photo: Bombing of Dresden in World War II; August Schreitmüller's sculpture 'Goodness' surveys Dresden after a firestorm started by Allied bombers in 1945. USS Bunker Hill was hit by kamikazes piloted by Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa and another airman on 11 May 1945. 389 personnel were killed or missing from a crew of 2,600; Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa, who flew his aircraft into the USS Bunker Hill during a Kamikaze mission on 11 May 1945; Kamikaze Missions - Lt Yoshinori Yamaguchi's Yokosuka D4Y3 (Type 33 Suisei) "Judy" in a suicide dive against USS Essex. The dive brakes are extended and the non-self-sealing port wing tank is trailing fuel vapor and/or smoke 25 November 1944.
German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944), credit German History in Documents and Images GHDI.

Eastern Front (World War II); Germans race towards Stalingrad. August 1942; Soviet children during a German air raid in the first days of the war, June 1941, by RIA Novosti archive; Soviet sniper Roza Shanina in 1944. About 400,000 Soviet women served in front-line duty units Caucasus Mountains, winter 1942/43; Finnish ski patrol: the invisible enemy of the Soviet Army with an unlimited supply of skis; Men of the German Engineers Corps cross a river which is swollen after the first autumn rains, to strengthen bridges linking the German positions on the central front in Russia. by Keystone / Getty Images. October 1942; Russian snipers fighting on the Leningrad front during a blizzard. Photo by Hulton Archive / Getty Images, 1943; German soldiers surrendering to the Russians in Stalingrad, the soldier holding the white flag of surrender is dressed in white so that there could be no doubt of his intentions, a Russian soldier is on the right of the photograph. by Keystone / Getty Images, January 1943.

February 11th, 1953

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg: Ethel Greenglass Rosenberg (September 25, 1915 – June 19, 1953) and Julius Rosenberg (May 12, 1918 – June 19, 1953) were American communists who were convicted and executed on June 19, 1953, for conspiracy to commit espionage during a time of war (Their charges were related to the passing of information about the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union)

United States President Dwight Eisenhower refuses a clemency appeal for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

Wikipedia  Picture: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg; Ethel Greenglass Rosenberg (September 25, 1915 – June 19, 1953) and Julius Rosenberg (May 12, 1918 – June 19, 1953) were American communists who were convicted and executed on June 19, 1953, for conspiracy to commit espionage during a time of war. (Their charges were related to the passing of information about the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union.)

February 11th, 1953

Cold War: often dated from 1947–1991, was a sustained state of political and military tension between the powers of the Western world, led by the United States and its NATO allies, and the communist world, led by the Soviet Union, its satellite states and allies Cold War: in Moscow, downed American U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers is sentenced to ten years imprisonment by the Soviet Union for espionage

Cold War:
1953 - Soviet Union breaks off diplomatic relations with Israel.

Wikipedia  Photo: Lockheed C-130 Hercules; RAF Menwith Hill, a large site in the United Kingdom, part of ECHELON and the UKUSA Agreement; New Zealand nuclear test, British nuclear tests near the Malden and Christmas Islands in the mid-Pacific in 1957 and 1958; Nevada nuclear tests, Nevada Division of Environmental Protection Bureau of Federal Facilities.
U2, Lockheed TR-1 in flight.

February 11th, 1978

China: the world's most populous country, covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometres, second-largest country by land area (China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; Great Wall China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic)

China:
1978 - Censorship: the People's Republic of China lifts a ban on works by Aristotle, William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens.

Wikipedia  Photo: China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; © Great Wall of China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic.

February 11th, 1979

Iran hostage crisis: Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini orders the release of 13 female and black American hostages being held at the US Embassy in Tehran

Islamic revolution of Iran establishes an Islamic theocracy under the leadership of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Wikipedia  Photo: The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic crisis between Iran and the United States where 52 Americans were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979, to January 20, 1981, after a group of Islamist students and militants took over the American Embassy in Tehran in support of the Iranian Revolution. President Carter called the hostages "victims of terrorism and anarchy", adding that the "United States will not yield to blackmail". The hostages were formally released into United States custody the following day, just minutes after the new American president Ronald Reagan was sworn into office.

February 11th, 1997

Space Shuttle Discovery blasts off on STS-95 with 77-year old John Glenn on board, making him the oldest person to go into space Hubble Space Telescope: (HST) is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation

NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) Space Shuttle program:
1997 - Space Shuttle Discovery lifts off for mission STS-82 to service the Hubble Space Telescope.

Wikipedia  Photo: Space Shuttle Discovery, NASA.
Hubble Space Telescope; Artist's concept of the star Fomalhaut and the Jupiter-type planet that the Hubble Space Telescope observed. A ring of debris appears to surround Fomalhaut as well. The planet, called Fomalhaut b, orbits the 200-million-year-old star every 872 years. credit: ESA, NASA, and L. Calcada (ESO for STScI); Infrared Array Camera (IRAC), Visible Light (2006-04-26); Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) credit NASA.

February 11th, 2011

Egyptian revolution: Arab Spring; Millions of anti-government protesters demonstrate in Liberation Square, Cairo, Egypt

Arab Spring: Egyptian revolution; The first wave culminates in the resignation of Hosni Mubarak and the transfer of power to the Supreme Military Council after 18 days of protests.

Wikipedia  Photo: Millions of anti-government protesters demonstrate in Liberation Square, Cairo, Egypt.

February 11th, 2014

EA military transport plane crashes in a mountainous area of Oum El Bouaghi Province in eastern Algeria, killing 77 people.

Algerian Air Force C-130 crash: A military transport plane crashes in a mountainous area of Oum El Bouaghi Province in eastern Algeria, killing 77 people.

Wikipedia  Photo: An Algerian military transport plane is seen after it slammed into a mountain in the country's rugged eastern region. Mohamed Ali/AP

February 11th, 2016

List of modern conflicts in the Middle East

Modern conflicts in the Middle East, social unrest and terrorist attacks:
2016 - Ad Dair shooting; A man shoots six people dead at an education center in Jizan Province, Saudi Arabia.
2015 - Murder of Özgecan Aslan; A university student was murdered as she resisted an attempted rape in Turkey, sparking nationwide protests and public outcry against harassment and violence against women.

Wikipedia  Photo: Middle East satellite image, NASA. ● Camels are seen early morning on a beach in the Marina area of Dubai October 16, 2008. (Steve Crisp, Reuters) ● A portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad burns during clashes between rebels and Syrian troops in Selehattin, near Aleppo, on July 23, 2012. (Bulent Kilic, AFP / GettyImages) ● Egyptians gather in their thousands in Tahrir Square to mark the one year anniversary of the revolution on Jan. 25, 2012 in Cairo Egypt. Tens of thousands have gathered in the square on the first anniversary of the Arab uprising which toppled President Hosni Mubarak. (Jeff J Mitchell, Getty Images) ● Black smoke rises above the Tehran skyline as supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi burn tires and other material in the streets as they fight running battles with police to protest the declared results of the Iranian presidential election in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 13, 2009. (Ben Curtis, AP) ● The Iron Dome defense system fires to interecpt incoming missiles from Gaza in the port town of Ashdod, Thursday, Nov. 15, 2012. (Tsafrir Abayov, AP)