First Confidential

THIS DAY IN HISTORY - NOVEMBER 12th

Norman Mailer, Quote

“Every moment of one's existence one is growing into more or retreating into less. One is always living a little more or dying a little bit.”

“We sail across dominions barely seen, washed by the swells of time. We plow through fields of magnetism. Past and future come together on thunderheads and our dead hearts live with lightning in the wounds of the Gods.”

~ Norman Mailer

Wikiquote (Norman Mailer (Norman Kingsley Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007) was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, film maker, actor and political candidate. His first novel was The Naked and the Dead published in 1948. His best work was widely considered to be The Executioner's Song, which was published in 1979, and for which he won one of his two Pulitzer Prizes. In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, Mailer's book Armies of the Night was awarded the National Book Award.)

This Day in History

November 12th, 764

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:
764 - Tibetan troops occupy Chang'an, the capital of the Chinese Tang Dynasty, for fifteen days.

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.

November 12th, 1028

Byzantine Empire Collage

Byzantine Empire (East Roman Empire):
1028 - Future Byzantine empress Zoe takes the throne as empress consort to Romanus Argyrus.

Wikipedia  Image: The Baptism of Constantine painted by Raphael's pupils (1520–1524, fresco, Vatican City, Apostolic Palace); Mural of Saints Cyril and Methodius, 19th century, Troyan Monastery, Bulgaria; Justinian I depicted on one of the famous mosaics of the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna; The Greek fire was first used by the Byzantine Navy during the Byzantine-Arab Wars (from the Madrid Skylitzes, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid); Alexios I, founder of the Komnenos dynasty.

November 12th, 1439

Plymouth, England, becomes the first town incorporated by the English Parliament

Plymouth, England becomes the first town incorporated by the English Parliament.

Wikipedia  Photo: English cottages in Plymouth, England; Coastline Near Plymouth, England; Plymouth Hoe Lighthouse; Plymouth Hoe, Devon at Night.

November 12th, 1555

Close-Up of the Clock Face of Big Ben Houses of Parliament Westminster London England Westminster's Big Ben rang for the first time in London

The English Parliament re-establishes Catholicism.

Wikipedia  Photo: Close-Up of the Clock Face of Big Ben Houses of Parliament Westminster London England; The Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament

November 12th, 1892

William 'Pudge' Heffelfinger becomes the first professional American football player on record, participating in his first paid game for the Allegheny Athletic Association

William "Pudge" Heffelfinger becomes the first professional American football player on record, participating in his first paid game for the Allegheny Athletic Association.

Wikipedia  Photo: William (Pudge) Heffelfinger, the First Professional Football Player, Heffelfinger during his day at Yale University; William Pudge Heffelfinger & Tom McClung. credit Penn State University.

November 12th, 1927

Russian Revolution Collage

Russian Revolution:
1927 - Leon Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party, leaving Joseph Stalin in undisputed control of the Soviet Union enters the provisional government of Bolshevik Russia.

Wikipedia  Image: The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union

November 12th, 1933

Hugh Gray takes the first known photos of the Loch Ness Monster

Hugh Gray takes the first known photos of the Loch Ness Monster.

Wikipedia  Image: Urquhart Castle with Loch Ness in the background; The Loch Ness "monster" - is an alleged plesiosaur-like creature living in Loch Ness, a long, deep lake near Inverness, Scotland (skepdic.com).

November 12th, 1936

In California, San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge

San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge California, opens to traffic.

Wikipedia  Photo: San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge; San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge Construction (1934, 2008). credit California DOT, AlamedaInfo.

November 12th, 1938

World War II, The Holocaust

World War II: Holocaust;
1938 - Madagascar Plan; Hermann Göring proposes plans to make Madagascar the "Jewish homeland", an idea that had first been considered by 19th century journalist Theodor Herzl.

Wikipedia  Photo: World War II, The Holocaust. Sources: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum USHMM, History 1900s, Internet Masters of Education Technology IMET, Techno Friends, Veterans Today, Concern.

November 12th, 1940

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

World War II:
1940 - Battle of Gabon; ends as Free French Forces take Libreville, Gabon and all of French Equatorial Africa from Vichy France forces.
1940 - German–Soviet Axis talks; Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov arrives in Berlin to discuss the possibility of the Soviet Union joining the Axis Powers.
1941 - Temperatures around Moscow drop to -12° C as the Soviet Union launches ski troops for the first time against the freezing German forces near the city.
1941 - Siege of Sevastopol; Soviet cruiser Chervona Ukraina is destroyed.
1942 - Naval Battle of Guadalcanal; Japanese and American forces begins near Guadalcanal in a three day battle.
1944 - The Royal Air Force launches 29 Avro Lancaster bombers in one of the most successful precision bombing attacks of war and sinks the German battleship Tirpitz with 12,000 lb Tallboy bombs off Tromsø, Norway.
Post World War II:
1948 - In Tokyo, an international war crimes tribunal sentences seven Japanese military and government officials, including General Hideki Tojo , to death for their roles in World War II.

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.

November 12th, 1969

Vietnam War: Hovering U.S. Army helicopters pour machine gun fire into a tree line to cover the advance of South Vietnamese ground troops in an attack on a Viet Cong camp 18 miles north of Tay Ninh, northwest of Saigon near the Cambodian border, in Vietnam on March 1965

Vietnam War:
1969 - My Lai Massacre; independent investigative journalist Seymour Hersh breaks the My Lai story.
1970 - Vietnamization; United States President Richard M. Nixon sets February 1, 1972 as the deadline for the removal of another 45,000 American troops from Vietnam.

Wikipedia  Photo: Vietnam War: Hovering U.S. Army helicopters pour machine gun fire into a tree line to cover the advance of South Vietnamese ground troops in an attack on a Viet Cong camp 18 miles north of Tay Ninh, northwest of Saigon near the Cambodian border, in Vietnam on March 1965. (AP Photo / Horst Faas) / Boston Globe

November 12th, 1970

In meteorology, a cyclone is an area of closed, circular fluid motion rotating in the same direction as the Earth (This is usually characterized by inward spiraling winds that rotate counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere of the Earth)

Cyclone:
1970 Bhola cyclone makes landfall on the coast of East Pakistan becoming the deadliest tropical cyclone in history; 167,000 die.

Wikipedia  Image: In meteorology, a cyclone is an area of closed, circular fluid motion rotating in the same direction as the Earth (This is usually characterized by inward spiraling winds that rotate counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere of the Earth) ● Emergency Management, Australian Government. ● Global tropical cyclone tracks. ● Emergency Information, Burdenkin Shire.

November 12th, 1979

Iran hostage crisis: in response to the hostage situation in Tehran, US President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all petroleum imports into the United States from Iran

Islamic revolution of Iran, Iran hostage crisis:
1979 - In response to the hostage situation in Tehran United States President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all petroleum Iran.

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.

November 12th, 2001

New York City, American Airlines Flight 587, an Airbus A300 en route to the Dominican Republic, crashes minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing all 260 on board and five on the ground

New York City: American Airlines Flight 587, an Airbus A300 en route to the Dominican Republic, crashes minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing all 260 on board and five on the ground.

Wikipedia  Photo: A few hours after American Airlines flight 587 crashed after taking off from New York's Kennedy Airport, the U.S. Coast Guard called on NOAA to dispatch an oil spill expert to determine if there was any pollution coming from the wreckage. The day after the crash NOAA's New York-area HAZMAT Scientific Support Coordinator, Ed Levine, boarded a Coast Guard reconnaissance flight to get an overview of the situation in Jamaica Bay, where parts of the aircraft came down. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

November 12th, 2003

Iraq War: The Persian Gulf War (2 August 1990 – 28 February 1991), codenamed Operation Desert Storm (17 January 1991 – 28 February 1991) commonly referred to as simply the Gulf War, was a war waged by a UN-authorized coalition force from 34 nations led by the United States, against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait

Gulf War - Iraq War:
2003 - In Nasiriya, Iraq, at least 23 people, among them the first Italian casualties of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, are killed in a suicide bomb attack on an Italian police base.

Wikipedia  Photo: USAF F-15Es, F-16s, and a USAF F-15 flying over burning Kuwaiti oil wells; Iraqi Army T-72 main battle tanks. The T-72 tank was a common Iraqi battle tank used in the Gulf War; F-15Es parked during Operation Desert Shield; The oil fires caused were a result of the scorched earth policy of Iraqi military forces retreating from Kuwait; Aerial view of destroyed Iraqi T-72 tank, BMP-1 and Type 63 armored personnel carriers and trucks on Highway 8 in March 1991.

November 12th, 2003

Shanghai Transrapid sets a new world speed record (501 kilometres per hour (311 mph)) for commercial railway systems, which remains the fastest for unmodified commercial rail vehicles

Shanghai Transrapid sets a new world speed record (501 kilometres per hour (311 mph)) for commercial railway systems, which remains the fastest for unmodified commercial rail vehicles.

Wikipedia  Photo: Shanghai Transrapid, Shanghai, China.