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: History Today
February 2, 2009
Two months ago, the body of Wladyslaw Sikorski, the Prime Minister of the Polish government in exile in London during the Second World War, was exhumed in order to find the cause of his mysterious death. Prosecutors were specifically investigating a communist sponsored crime in the belief that he was murdered by the government of the Soviet Union at a time of increasingly tense diplomatic relations between Poland and the Soviet Union. Prior to his death, Sikorski had notably called for an invest
Source: BBC
February 3, 2009
It is an iconic images of the Troubles.
The hunched figure of Father - now Bishop - Edward Daly waves a white handkerchief as he attempts to escort marchers carrying the fatally injured Jackie Duddy away from the gunfire during Bloody Sunday.
The 17-year-old became the fourth person to die that day, and the handkerchief - which had been used to staunch his bleeding - was later returned to Jackie's family along with his clothes.
Kept safe by his family fo
Source: Newsday
February 2, 2009
One of three known letters written by Gen. George Washington about his Long Island spy network in the American Revolution is scheduled to be auctioned in Manhattan next week.
Stony Brook University, which already owns one of the historically important letters about the Setauket Spy Ring, is hoping to add a second to its colonial document collection at the Feb. 12 sale by Christie's.
The 1780 letter, owned by an unnamed private collector, was written by the commander of
Source: Hartford Courant
February 1, 2009
Norwich officials are renewing the search for whoever stole a large portrait of Abraham Lincoln from the entrance of Norwich Ckty Hall about 15 years ago.
The picture has been missing since 1994, when someone cut it from its large Victorian frame and left with it in the middle of the night.
The case was assigned to the detective division, but police came up empty with every lead they followed.
Part of the difficulty, authorities say, is that they could no
Source: The Hindu
February 1, 2009
Archaeologists cleaning a drain to flush out rainwater from an explored part of the ancient Indus Valley city of Moenjodaro have been pleasantly surprised to come across artefacts and other objects of much cultural value at the World Heritage site.
Well-defined structures of old drains were discovered along with certain old artefacts during the digging, which was necessitated to prevent rainwater stagnating at the world heritage site.
An object called an "elliptic
Source: UPI
February 1, 2009
Japanese efforts to find the remains of soldiers imprisoned by U.S. troops in World War II have gotten a boost by an archival find, officials said.
A list has been found at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration containing the names and burial sites of about 6,000 Japanese soldiers who died after being taken prisoner in the Pacific Theater, The Yomiuri Shimbun reported Sunday.
The list reveals burial grounds were located across a wide area, with sites in
Source: IHT
February 1, 2009
Ordered to bury 16 bodies in the dead of night in 1978, a wary young army officer did his best to remember the location, quietly counting the paces from the unmarked mass grave to the roadside.
He gathered from his fellow soldiers that they had just buried Afghanistan's first president, Sardar Mohammad Daoud Khan, and his family. His assassination, during a Communist coup in those tumultuous days, precipitated three decades of war in Afghanistan, a succession of conflicts that are s
Source: Thaindian News
February 2, 2009
Archaeologists have found over 50 ancient rock engravings in Tonga, which may shed some light on the pre-Polynesian Lapita peoples who voyaged across the Pacific.
The petroglyphs, including stylised images of people and animals, were found emerging from beach sand at the northern end of Foa Island, late last year, the Matangi Tonga newspaper reported.
The site on Foa Island is an amazing piece of artwork, with over 50 engraved images. Having an average height of 20 to
Source: BBC
February 1, 2009
It was one of the key events of the 20th century. Thirty years ago, religious leader Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran from exile and launched an Islamic revolution. The BBC's John Simpson was on the plane that flew the Ayatollah to Tehran.
When the revolutionary disturbances of 1978 broke out, Ayatollah Khomeini was being kept under tight control as an exile in the Shia holy city of Najaf, in Iraq.
Iraq was already being run by Saddam Hussein. Then the Shah of Iran
Source: Foxnews
February 2, 2009
It was the National Security Agency that uncovered a 1973 plot to bomb New York City, a scheme since linked to a terrorist who is nearing release from prison, according to government documents and interviews.
Khalid Al-Jawary, a Black September terrorist, placed two car bombs along Fifth Avenue and one near Kennedy Airport. The attack was meant to coincide with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir's arrival in the city. The bombs failed to detonate, and Al-Jawary quickly fled the count
Source: Scott Jaschik at the website of Inside Higher Ed
February 2, 2009
When Southern Methodist University decided to go ahead with plans to become the site not only of President George W. Bush’s presidential library, but also an affiliated policy center, some historians feared a distortion of the historical record. The Dallas Morning News reported that a recent addition to the Bush Presidential Center’s Web site isn’t doing anything to reassure scholars about even-handedness. To understand the “legacy” of the Bush administration, the center links to the Web site no
Source: AP
February 2, 2009
WASHINGTON – Chocolate for your sweetheart this Valentine's Day? Folks may be surprised to know how far back chocolate goes — perhaps 1,000 years in what is now the United States. Evidence of chocolate was been found in Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, N.M., the earliest indication of the tasty substance north of Mexico, Patricia L. Crown of the University of New Mexico and W. Jeffrey Hurst of the Hershey Center for Health and Nutrition report in Tuesday's issue of Proceedings of the National Acad
Source: AP
February 2, 2009
It's one of the most familiar Bible stories.
Saddened by the wickedness of man, God directs the righteous Noah to build an ark for his family and two of each species of animal.
Together, they ride the ark through 40 days and 40 nights of torrential rains that God unleashes upon the Earth. And when the waters subside, Noah and the animals return to land.
"That seems almost like a fairy story," said archaeologist Randall Price, who is director of L
Source: http://www.charleston.net
January 24, 2009
It is one of the largest and most important battlefields in the country, a place where the scattered relics of war have lain hidden for more than a century.
But soon, some of the secrets of Charleston Harbor might finally be revealed.
The South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of South Carolina has been awarded a grant from the National Park Service to map the wrecks hidden beneath the water, the sand and the silt.
Source: http://fredericksburg.com
January 31, 2009
The so-called "Wilderness Wal-Mart" in Orange County is catching grief from both North and South--and elected officials on both ends of the political spectrum.
U.S. Rep. Ted Poe, a conservative Republican from eastern Texas, has expressed to Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott his "profound disappointment" about the giant retailer's plan to build a Supercenter beside the Civil War battlefield. In a letter written last week, he urges Scott to give the matter "immediate re
Source: http://fredericksburg.com
January 26, 2009
The Wilderness battlefield may gain another new neighbor.
A landowner next to Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park proposes to build medical offices and a wholesale nursery on part of his property across from the Civil War-era site of Wilderness Tavern near the Spotsylvania-Orange county line.
Dr. David Pagan, a dental specialist who lives on a 146-acre farm on State Route 3 beside Fox Chase subdivision in western Spotsylvania County, wants to develop
Source: NPR
February 2, 2009
Skin has changed color in human lineages much faster than scientists had previously supposed, even without intermarriage, Jablonski says. Recent developments in comparative genomics allow scientists to sample the DNA in modern humans.
By creating genetic "clocks," scientists can make fairly careful guesses about when particular groups became the color they are today. And with the help of paleontologists and anthropologists, scientists can go further: They can wind the cloc
Source: Rasmussen Reports
February 2, 2009
Just 11% of U.S. voters think America should apologize to Iran for “crimes” against the Islamic country – one of the prerequisites demanded by the Iranian president before he will agree to meet with President Barack Obama.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 73% oppose such an apology.
Obama in an interview last week with al-Arabiya, a 24-hour Arabic language satellite network, offered to end nearly 30 years of bad relations with Iran if the Midd
Source: WaPo
February 2, 2009
This just in: Martha Washington was hot. Or at least hotter than we thought.
Our image of the mother of our country, vague and insubstantial as it is, is drawn from portraits painted after her death showing a frumpy, dumpy, plump old lady, a fussy jumble of needlework in her lap, wearing what could pass for a shower cap with pink sponge rollers rolled too tight underneath.
But today, 250 years after Martha and George tied the knot, a handful of historians are seeking to
Source: LiveScience
January 31, 2009
To honor their gods and goddesses, ancient Greeks often poured blood or wine on the ground as offerings. Now a new study suggests that the soil itself might have had a prominent role in Greek worship, strongly influencing which deities were venerated where.
In a survey of eighty-four Greek temples of the Classical period (480 to 338 B.C.), Gregory J. Retallack of the University of Oregon in Eugene studied the local geology, topography, soil, and vegetation - as well as historical ac
