This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: Guardian (UK)
June 14, 2009
Queen turns down invitation to opening of major new museum in Athens built to house Acropolis treasures.
A bitter new row over ownership of the Elgin marbles has erupted, threatening to eclipse the inauguration this week of a major new museum in Athens designed to house the contested masterpieces.
Just days before the opening of the €130m (£110m) New Acropolis Museum, officials in Athens and London were this weekend engaging in barbed exchanges over the classical treas
Source: BBC
June 16, 2009
The future of a hotel where Scott of the Antarctic planned his ill-fated expedition, has been secured by being taken over by a UK chain.
The 64-bedroom Royal Hotel in St Mary Street, Cardiff - which employs 30 people - has been rescued after six months in administration.
Now Legacy Hotels and Resorts have secured a three-year management deal..
Source: BBC
June 16, 2009
The funeral has been held of Millvina Dean, the last survivor of the sinking of the Titanic, who died aged 97.
Miss Dean was nine weeks old when the liner sank after hitting an iceberg in the early hours of 15 April 1912, on its maiden voyage from Southampton.
A private service, attended by family and friends, took place in Southampton on Tuesday.
Miss Dean died on 31 May at the care home in Netley Marsh, near Southampton, where she lived.
Source: BBC
June 16, 2009
Former US President Jimmy Carter has said he had to "hold back tears" while viewing destruction on a visit to Gaza.
He is due to meet leaders from Hamas, which controls Gaza but is considered a terrorist group by western countries.
The veteran politician is expected to hand over a letter for captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit from his family.
While Mr Carter is not visiting in an official capacity, many in Gaza hope he has the ear of US Presi
Source: Daily Press
June 10, 2009
Same brashness. Same spontaneity. Same lightning-rod remarks.
If you were thinking the Rev. Jeremiah Wright had been tempered by a national backlash that nearly derailed Barack Obama's trip to the White House, guess again.
In an exclusive interview at the 95th annual Hampton University Ministers' Conference, Wright told the Daily Press that he has not spoken to his former church member since Obama became president, and he implied that the White House won't allow Obama
Source: Press Release
June 16, 2009
HOHENWALD, Tenn.—The possibility that famed explorer Meriwether Lewis committed suicide has been the source of considerable speculation since his death in October 1809. Some historians and scholars insist Lewis was mentally ill and shot himself to death. Others, however, firmly believe that he was murdered.
Whatever the case, collateral descendants of Lewis just want to know the truth.
“If it turns out Meriwether Lewis committed suicide, his relatives will not be ashame
Source: Truthout.org
June 15, 2009
From 1961 to 1971, the US military sprayed Vietnam with Agent Orange, which contained large quantities of Dioxin, in order to defoliate the trees for military objectives. Dioxin is one of the most dangerous chemicals known to man. It has been recognized by the World Health Organization as a carcinogen (causes cancer) and by the American Academy of Medicine as a teratogen (causes birth defects).
Between 2.5 and 4.8 million people were exposed to Agent Orange. The spraying cover
Source: Time
June 15, 2009
The notion goes back to 1922, when a bond brokerage in New York City hired Edgar Lawrence Smith to put together a pamphlet explaining why bonds--and certainly not stocks--were the best long-term investment. At the time, this was conventional wisdom on Wall Street. Bonds were for investment, stocks for speculation--and, in those pre-SEC days, for manipulation. But when he investigated the historical record, Smith recounted later, "supporting evidence for this thesis could not be found."
Source: AP
June 15, 2009
Thomas Richardson II was a wealthy, 18th-century Newport merchant and captain, a slave trader and member of the city’s privileged elite who, researchers say, manufactured rum on his waterfront property and ventured to the Caribbean and Africa.
That much is already known. But his backyard may hold many more clues to his life and that of other merchants of the time.
A team of excavators who have already spent two summers at the Richardson property, digging up everything f
Source: Press Release
June 9, 2009
The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation announced today that it will launch an online Global Museum on Communism on June 16. The museum can be previewed at www.globalmuseumoncommunism.org.
The Museum will have numerous interactive features including the emotional stories of victims who suffered the most heinous crimes in history, essays on Communism by leading historians, a Gallery of Heroes who fought against Communism, in
Source: Times (UK)
June 16, 2009
Part of an ancient human skull has been recovered from the North Sea in an area described as a drowned Stone Age hunting ground.
The bone fragment is believed to belong to a late Neanderthal man and has been dated at around 60,000 years old.
It is the first time that an ancient human fossil has been found below the sea. Its discovery is likely to intensify scientific interest in the area, known as the Zeeland Ridges, where the skull was buried.
Previousl
Source: Daily Mail (UK)
June 15, 2009
Tony Blair is set to be quizzed as part of an inquiry into the Iraq War announced by his successor Gordon Brown.
The former Prime Minister, who led Britain to war, said that if asked he would 'of course' appear before the panel.
But Mr Brown has been accused of an 'Establishment stitch-up' after announcing the inquiry will meet in secret and blame no one.
It will also have no legal powers to demand documents, compel anyone to attend or require witnesses to
Source: Deutsche Welle
June 15, 2009
Florence Hartmann, who was spokeswoman for the former chief war crimes prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, between 2000 and 2006, is accused of having disclosed confidential information about the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in a book and an article published after she left her post.
The publications allegedly cite confidential documents and court decisions made during the trial of former Serbian leader, Slobodan Milosevic, which implicate the Serbian st
Source: AP
June 15, 2009
A century and a half later, we still don't know quite what to think of John Brown.
Brown, historians agree, aimed to be a hero. He believed his plan was the necessary means to a righteous end: Storm a federal arsenal, seize thousands of weapons, arm a guerrilla force and start the revolution that would end slavery.
Yet the first casualty of his 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry was a free black man, a baggage handler who bled to death on the street while Brown's raiders grabbe
Source: HNN Staff
June 15, 2009
A few months ago we reported that the NYT had adopted a new practice of dating articles. Although you might find an article published in the June 15, 2009 paper version of the Times, the newspaper might consider the official date the day before when the article was posted online.
That change made sense given the realities of online publishing, but it made historians' lives more difficult: Readers following historians' footnotes would have to guess whether it was the paper edit
Source: Salon
June 12, 2009
According to the Federal Reserve's "Flow of Funds" report, released Thursday, the net worth of households in the United States is $50.4 trillion. That's $1.3 trillion less than the total at the beginning of 2009, and $14 trillion less than at the beginning of the recession in December 2007.Numbers that huge are hard to grapple with, so here's a simple way to think about it. U.S. households are abou
Source: http://www.grd.usace.army.mil
June 12, 2009
Baghdad,Iraq – In its continuing commitment to the implementation of the Strategic Framework
Agreement, the Gulf Region Division, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers helped return an Iraqi artifact to
the Government of Iraq earlier this month.
The artifact — a 27-year-old bronze tablet built in the era of Saddam Hussein and dedicated to an
Unknown Soldier — was turned over to the Iraqi High Tribunal for storage in its secure document
storage facility in the Inte
Source: Archeology Magazine
June 15, 2009
An ancient Chinese city wall with a history of more than 14 centuries is being eaten away by a kind of mite in Xi'an, capital of northwestern Shaanxi Province, archaeologists have said.
Experts were surprised to find it had been the mites undermining the wall at the Hanguang Entrance Remains Museum during their one-year research for further protection.
"The discovery is the world's first of this kind. The mites had damaged the wall seriously," said Li
Source: BBC
June 11, 2009
Men and women from the Irish Free State who fought in World War Two have not been given the respect they deserve, a historian has said.
A new study by the University of Edinburgh has found more than 3,600 soldiers from the south of Ireland died on active service during WWII.
Their names join those of almost 3,900 fallen combatants from Northern Ireland on a roll of honour being unveiled at Trinity College Dublin on Friday.
The study estimates that in the
Source: Chicago Trib (Click here to see graphic)
June 15, 2009
As President Barack Obama flies Monday to Chicago for a midday speech on health-care reform, the round trip on Air Force One will run about $236,000, according to government estimates of the operating costs for one of the top symbols, and perks, of the presidency.
But that does not include such expenses as Secret Service protection, motorcades and helicopter transports.
