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: AP
May 28, 2008
The Vatican unveiled the largest and most luxurious of the pagan tombs in the necropolis under St. Peter's Basilica on Tuesday after nearly a year of restoration work.
A family of former slaves built the Valeri Mausoleum during the second half of the second century, when Emperor Marcus Aurelius ruled. It is one of 22 pagan tombs in the grottoes under the basilica.
The newly restored tomb was shown to media Tuesday. Visitors can have a guided tour of the grottoes by appo
Source: Salon
May 28, 2008
In remarks he made on Memorial Day, Sen. Barack Obama reached back to some old family history. "I had an uncle who was one of the, um -- who was part of the first American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps," Obama said. "The story in our family was that when he came home he just went up into the attic and he didn't leave the house for six months." (Video follows at the bottom of this post.) There was just one problem with this story: American tr
Source: NBC News
May 28, 2008
Source: Yahoo News
May 28, 2008
Egyptian archaeologists have
discovered what they say was the ancient headquarters
of the Pharaonic army guarding the northeastern
borders of Egypt for more than 1,500 years, the
government said on Wednesday.
The fortress and adjoining town, which they identify
with the ancient place name Tharu, lies in the Sinai
peninsula about 3 km (2 miles) northeast of the modern
town of Qantara, Egyptian archaeologist Mohamed Abdel
Maksou
Source: KC Johnson in the New York Sun
May 28, 2008
[Mr. Johnson, a professor of history at Brooklyn College, is the Fulbright Distinguished Chair in the Humanities for the 2007-2008 academic year.]
On March 24, 1968, President Johnson telephoned his ambassador to the United Nations, Arthur Goldberg. The previous few weeks had been among the most difficult of Johnson's presidency. In late January, the Tet offensive undermined public support for the Vietnam War. In early March, Johnson barely edged longshot Eugene McCarthy in the New Hampshi
Source: Time
May 27, 2008
Raoul Wallenberg was the diplomat who would appear like a phantom in Budapest, handing out the Swedish passports that saved some 15,000 Hungarian Jews from being murdered by the Nazis. But Wallenberg had no such help himself on January 17, 1945, when he was taken into custody by the Soviet forces that had liberated Budapest. The Swedish diplomat was never heard from again, and Moscow would later report that Wallenberg had died in Lubyanka Prison in 1947.
But in the 63 years since hi
Source: History Today
May 27, 2008
Guy Fawkes has been named as the most famous Briton in a survey of schoolchildren. The poll of 1,000 UK children was carried out by the London Dungeon and also tested the historical knowledge of the 10-14 year-olds. 97% knew the correct details about the Gunpowder Plotter while 96% were aware of Jack the Ripper, who came second in the poll. Winston Churchill was recognised by 82% of respondents while 67% identified Henry VIII correctly.
Source: Reuters
May 19, 2008
British sailor Philip Beale aims to rewrite a bit of African history by sailing round the continent in a boat built with the same materials he believes the Phoenicians used 2,500 years ago to make the same trip.
Built of Aleppo pine and using wooden dowels to hold it together, the 21-metre-long "Phoenicia" powered by wind and muscle will set out down the Suez Canal on Aug. 6 and Beale aims to complete the 15,000-mile clockwise journey 10 months later.
"Th
Source: WaPo's The Fix (blog)
May 23, 2008
Update: The Sioux Falls Argus Leader executive editor Randell Beck has just released a statement in regards the controversy caused by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's (N.Y.) comments about the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.
Here's Beck's statement:
"The context of the question and answer with Sen. Clinton was whether her continued candidacy jeopardized party unity this close to the Democratic convention. Her reference to Mr. Kennedy's assassination appeared to fo
Source: Politico.com
May 27, 2008
Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan writes in a surprisingly scathing memoir to be published next week that President Bush “veered terribly off course,” was not “open and forthright on Iraq,” and took a “permanent campaign approach” to governing at the expense of candor and competence.
Among the most explosive revelations in the 341-page book, titled “What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception” (Public Affairs, $27.95):
Source: AP
May 27, 2008
Germany unveiled a memorial Tuesday to the Nazis' long-ignored gay victims, a monument that also aims to address ongoing discrimination by confronting visitors with an image of a same-sex coup
Source: http://www.allheadlinenews.com
May 25, 2008
Lovers of historical homes and buildings could be tested on how much they truly appreciate authenticity, that is, if they are interested in buying a Georgian style home that was recently put on the market, because it comes complete with a human skeleton entombed in the basement.
When the home was built in the Georgian era, part of the basement was found to be the remnants of a Roman burial chamber. Workers built around it, and today the skeleton is visibly entombed in an archway.
Source: New Zealand Herald
May 27, 2008
A New Zealand archaeologist has uncovered an untouched "time capsule" of Maori life almost 200 years ago.
The remains have lain hidden beneath the impenetrable undergrowth of the Poor Knights' northern island, Tawhiti Rahi, since December 16, 1823.
On that day, or in the few days prior, a raiding party from Northland's Hikutu hapu landed at the island's only safe landing spot - choosing a time when the island's Ngatiwai iwi chief and men were off on their own
Source: Independent (UK)
May 27, 2008
"I feel like I'm taking care of a herd of cows," says Bill Huber as he gently nudges his pick-up truck along muddy, gouged-out tracks to check on his precious charges, scattered through the woods. "Every day there's something to be done. A problem with a drill pipe, a bearing to replace, or something wrong with a pumping jack."
Which is not surprising, given that some of the venerable contraptions in question first started to extract oil a century or more ago, an
Source: Independent (UK)
May 27, 2008
A wealth of new information about the way of life of early man in the eastern Mediterranean, long before the invention of the wheel, is likely to be uncovered after the startling discovery of a cave inhabited by hunter-gatherers between 20,000 and 40,000 years ago.
Workers constructing a sewage line through a forest in northern Israel stumbled across a large cave containing stalactites and strewn with discarded fragments of prehistoric tools and the burnt bones of animals which have
Source: Reuters
May 23, 2008
History has not been kind to Rezso Kasztner.
He saved more Jews from death in the Holocaust than any other Jew. His reward was the accusation that he sold his soul to the devil and assassination by Jewish extremists.
But Kasztner's reputation may be about to be restored, more than 60 years after he negotiated a "blood for money" deal with an armed, drunk and often ranting Adolf Eichmann to save Jewish lives in exchange for cash, jewels and trucks.
Source: http://www.canada.com
May 25, 2008
"Such an act cannot be held to belong to civilized war. It is an outrage against humanity calling for, and will receive, the universal execration of mankind."
- Gazette, Saturday, May 27, 1865
By early 1864, the U.S. Civil War was starting to swing decisively against the Confederacy. In desperation, a well-respected doctor from Kentucky, Luke Blackburn, hatched what he called "an infallible plan directed against the masses of Northern people solely to create de
Source: http://www.wgal.com
May 25, 2008
The Gettysburg Country Club may be getting a little smaller.
Board members said they may consider selling land to the National Park Service because the club is facing foreclosure.
Current and former board members will be responsible for $30,000 in back taxes if the foreclosure goes through.
Source: The Age (Australia)
May 25, 2008
Ninety-two years ago, Australia reeled as news filtered through from the World War I battlefields of France that 5,533 diggers had been either killed, wounded or taken prisoner in one night.
Of the 1,719 Australian diggers who died during the notorious Battle of Fromelles against some very well-prepared German forces in July 1916, the bodies of 170 were never found.
However, those diggers who have remained missing for more than nine decades have never been forgotten.
Source: http://www.news.com.au
May 25, 2008
THEY play golf on the dunes behind the invasion beaches these days. The thwack of golf balls and cries of the gulls carry on the brisk breeze to tourists idling by the pool at the Hotel Mercure Omaha Beach.
It could be any beachside hamlet on any part of the holiday coast overlooking the English Channel -- except it isn't. It's Normandy, scene of one of the bloodiest battles of World War II.
We were savouring a bowl of steaming mussels, surrounded by the chatter and cla
