First Confidential

THIS DAY IN HISTORY - DECEMBER 2nd

Helen Keller, Quote

“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail.”

~ Helen Keller

Wikiquote (Helen Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) was an American author, political activist, and lecturer. She was the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.)

This Day in History

December 2nd, 1775

American Revolutionary War Collage American Revolutionary War, Grand Union - Stars and Stripes Flag

American Revolutionary War:
1775 - The USS Alfred becomes the first vessel to fly the Grand Union Flag (the precursor to the Stars and Stripes); the flag is hoisted by John Paul Jones.

Wikipedia  Paintings: Washington Crossing the Delaware, by Emanuel Leutz; Battle of the Chesapeake, French (left) and British (right) lines; Battle of Bunker Hill, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill by John Trumbull; The Defeat of the Floating Batteries at Gibraltar, September 13, 1782, by John Singleton Copley; Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau at Yorktown, 1781; "The surrender at Saratoga" shows General Daniel Morgan in front of a French de Vallière 4-pounder; Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown by (John Trumbull, 1797).
Grand Union - Stars and Stripes Flag


December 2nd, 1804

Napoleonic Wars: (1803–15) were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions Coronation of Napoleon: Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon I and Coronation of the Empress Josephine

Napoleonic Wars:
1804 - Coronation of Napoleon I; at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, Napoleon Bonaparte crowns himself Emperor of the French, the first French Emperor in a thousand years.
1805 - Battle of Austerlitz; French troops under Napoleon Bonaparte defeat a joint Russo - Austrian force.

Wikipedia  Painting: Battle of Trafalgar: The British HMS Sandwich fires to the French flagship Bucentaure (completely dismasted) in the battle of Trafalgar; Napoleon in Berlin (Meynier). After defeating Prussian forces at Jena, the French Army entered Berlin on 27 October 1806; Battle of the Bridge of Arcole Napoleon Bonaparte leading his troops over the bridge of Arcole, by Horace Vernet; Napoleon as King of Italy (Appiani); Napoleon Crossing the Alps (David). In 1800 Bonaparte took the French Army across the Alps, eventually defeating the Austrians at Marengo; Charge of the Russian Imperial Guard cavalry against French cuirassiers at the Battle of Friedland, 14 June 1807; Battle of Borodino as depicted by Louis Lejeune. The battle was the largest and bloodiest single-day action of the Napoleonic Wars; Napoleon's withdrawal from Russia, a painting by Adolph Northen; Wellington at Waterloo by Robert Alexander Hillingford; Napoleon is often represented in his green colonel uniform of the Chasseur à Cheval, with a large bicorne and a hand-in-waistcoat gesture.
Coronation of Napoleon I - Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon I and Coronation of the Empress Josephine


December 2nd, 1845

Manifest Destiny: US President James K. Polk announces to Congress that the United States should aggressively expand into the West

Manifest Destiny: United States President James K. Polk announces to Congress that the United States should aggressively expand into the West.

Wikipedia  Painting: William S. Jewett, The Promised Land—The Grayson Family, 1850, Terra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection, 1999.79.


December 2nd, 1899

Philippine-American War: Filipinos under Juan Cailles defeat Americans under Colonel Benjamin F. Cheatham at Mabitac

Philippine-American War:
1899 - Battle of Tirad Pass; termed "The Filipino Thermopylae", is fought.

Wikipedia  Image: Philippine-American War; 17th U.S. Infantry boarding a train for the front in the Philippines; Lt. Colonel Theodore Roosevelt on 1 July 1898. he is pictured along with his fellow 'Rough Riders'; Photographs of dead Filipino soldiers lying in trenches were often taken by U. S. soldiers and journalists and included in commemorative albums (F. Tennyson Neely, Fighting in the Philippines: A Photographic Record of the Philippine-American War (London, 1899); Sonnichsen, quoted in Russell Roth, Muddy Glory: America’s “Indian Wars” in the Philippines, 1899-1935 (West Hanover, MA, 1981); Soldiers of the Philippine Republic (From Leon Wolff, Little Brown Brother: How the United States Purchased and Pacified the Philippines (Garden City, NY, 1961)), photographs after p. 49); Satellite image of Philippines, NASA.


December 2nd, 1908

Child Emperor Pu Yi ascends the Chinese throne at the age of two

Child Emperor Pu Yi ascends the Chinese throne at the age of two.

Wikipedia  Photo: Puyi in 1922.


December 2nd, 1917

World War I: Collage

World War I:
1917 - An armistice is signed between Russia and the Central Powers at Brest-Litovsk and peace talks leading to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk began.

Wikipedia  Photo: Trenches on the Western Front; a British Mark IV Tank crossing a trench; Royal Navy battleship HMS Irresistible sinking after striking a mine at the Battle of the Dardanelles; a Vickers machine gun crew with gas masks, and German Albatros D.III biplanes. National Archives and Records Administration.


December 2nd, 1920

Turkish-Armenian War:

Turkish-Armenian War: Following more than a month of Turkish-Armenian War, the Turkish dictated Treaty of Alexandropol.

Wikipedia  Photo: Armenian Victims (The Armenians are an ancient people that have lived on the Armenian Plateau for more than 4,000 years. The Armenian homeland is located on the Armenian plateau, central and eastern Anatolia and southwestern Caucasia-in the highlands above Greater Syria and Mesopotamia to the south.)


December 2nd, 1930

Great Depression: After a steady decline in stock market prices since a peak in September, the New York Stock Exchange begins to show signs of panic

Great Depression: United States President Herbert Hoover goes before the United States Congress and asks for a U.S.$150 million public works program to help generate jobs and stimulate the economy.

Wikipedia  Photo: Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother depicts destitute pea pickers in California, centering on Florence Owens Thompson, age 32, a mother of seven children, in Nipomo, California, March 1936; Bud Fields and his family. Alabama. 1935 or 1936. Photographer: Walker Evans; Unemployed men vying for jobs at the American Legion Employment Bureau in Los Angeles during the Great Depression.


December 2nd, 1939

New York City's La Guardia Airport opens

New York City's LaGuardia Airport opens.

Wikipedia  Photo: Panoramic View of Manhattan, (credit AngMoKio); Aerial view of LaGuardia Airport in Queens (credit Watts, News); Liberty statue from below (credit Tysto).


December 2nd, 1942

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:
1942 - Manhattan Project; a team led by Enrico Fermi initiates the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.
1943 - Luftwaffe bombing raid on the harbour of Bari, Italy, sinks numerous cargo and transport ships, including an American Liberty ship the John Harvey, with a stockpile of World War I-era mustard gas.

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.


December 2nd, 1947

The Potsdam Conference: held at Cecilienhof, the home of Crown Prince Wilhelm Hohenzollern, in Potsdam, occupied Germany, from July 17 to August 2, 1945 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine (1947–1948): lasted from 30 November 1947, the date of the United Nations General Assembly vote for the Partition Plan for Palestine, to the termination of the British Mandate itself on 14 May 1948

Civil War in Mandatory Palestine: (1947 - 1948)
1947 - Jerusalem Riots of 1947; Riots break out in Jerusalem in response to the approval of the 1947 UN Partition Plan.

Wikipedia  Photo: Potsdam Conference; Clement Attlee, Harry Truman and Joseph Stalin at the Potsdam Conference, July 1945. (The Potsdam Conference: held at Cecilienhof, the home of Crown Prince Wilhelm Hohenzollern, in Potsdam, occupied Germany, from July 17 to August 2, 1945)
Civil War in Mandatory Palestine; Arab volunteers fighting in Palestine in 1947; Jewish soldiers at Katamon, Jerusalem; Jerusalem convoy, 1948.


December 2nd, 1956

Cuban Revolution Collage

Cuban Revolution:
1956 - The Granma yacht reaches the shores of Cuba's Oriente province and Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and 80 other members of the 26th of July Movement disembark to initiate the Cuban Revolution.
1961 - In a nationally broadcast speech, Cuban leader Fidel Castro declares that he is a Marxist - Leninist and that Cuba is going to adopt Communism.
1976 - Fidel Castro declares that he is President of Cuba replacing Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado.

Wikipedia  Photo / Map: The leadership of the Cuban revolution; Fidel Castro played the leading role in the Cuban revolution against Fulgencio Batista (1957) AFP; Fidel Castro leads men in a cheer, Cuba, 1957, Bettmann/ Corbis; Cuban Airlift to the United States (1959 and 1962); Resiste Cuba, homenaje a la revolución cubana y sus héroes música: Protesta-Por Cuba; Che Guevara and Fidel Castro ; Official caption: "Off loading Cuban refugees at the Miami sea buoy", photo dated 4 May 1964; Photo No. 7CGD-050464 #12; Guerrillero Heroico - Alberto Korda's famous photograph of Che Guevara; The popularized cropped version.


December 2nd, 1962

Vietnam War: Hovering U.S. Army helicopters</a> 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:
1962 - After a trip to Vietnam, United States President John F. Kennedy, United States Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield becomes the first American official not to make an optimistic public comment on the war's progress.

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


December 2nd, 1971

Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Fujairah, Sharjah, Dubai, and Umm Al Quwain form the United Arab Emirates

Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Fujairah, Sharjah, Dubai and Umm Al Quwain form the United Arab Emirates.

Wikipedia  Photo: Skyscrapers, Dubai credit © Catalin Marin, National Geographic; Dubai skyline from Zabeel park; Eighth Wonder of the World, credit © Maggie Steber, National Geographic; Sudden City, Dubai credit © Maggie Steber, National Geographic; Dubai clouds wins National Geographic prize, credit © Martin Croucher.


December 2nd, 1980

List of modern conflicts in the Middle East

Modern conflicts in the Middle East and terrorist attacks:
1980 - Four U.S. nuns and churchwomen, Ita Ford, Maura Clarke, Jean Donovan and Dorothy Kazel are murdered by a death squad in El Salvador.

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)


December 2nd, 1993

Space Shuttle program: STS-28 August 8-13, 1989, Space shuttle Columbia arrives at Launch Pad 39B after the rollout from the Vehicle Assembly Building the night before ● An electrical storm and driving rain preceded the first night launch of a shuttle mission on August 30, 1983 ● Columbia’s second mission launched on November 12, 1981. (Commanded by Joe H. Engle and piloted by Richard H. Truly, it was also the last time NASA flew a rookie crew and the external fuel tank was painted white.) Hubble Space Telescope: (HST) is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation

Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Endeavour (Mission STS-61); NASA launches the Space Shuttle Endeavour on a mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope.

Wikipedia  Photo: Space Shuttle program; STS-28 August 8-13, 1989, Space Shuttle Columbia arrives at Launch Pad 39B after the rollout from the Vehicle Assembly Building the night before ● An electrical storm and driving rain preceded the first night launch of a shuttle mission on August 30, 1983 ● Columbia’s second mission launched on November 12, 1981. (Commanded by Joe H. Engle and piloted by Richard H. Truly, it was also the last time NASA flew a rookie crew and the external fuel tank was painted white.) credit 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.