Mostrando resultados por autor "Charles Rivers" en Todas las categorías

On Wednesday, March 28, 1979, 36 seconds after the hour of 4:00 a.m., several water pumps stopped working in the unit 2 nuclear power plant on Three Mile Island, 10 miles southeast of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

The Babylonians were one of the earliest of history's great ancient civilizations, and the most famous Babylonian of them all was Hammurabi, who came to the throne as the first king of the Babylonian empire around the beginning of the 18th century B.C. Hammurabi had a long and fruitful reign that saw him consolidate most of Mesopotamia under his control, but he's best known today for Hammurabi's Code, one of the earliest known code of laws in human history.

It almost goes without saying that Westminster Abbey is one of the foremost sites in Europe when it comes to being steeped in history. Dating back to the reign of William the Conqueror and the Norman conquest, Westminster Abbey has traditionally been the site of royal coronations, royal weddings, and royal burials, and anyone who enters can instantly feel that they are walking in the footsteps of some of the most influential figures in history, from Henry III to Queen Elizabeth I.

A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history's most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees? In Charles River Editors' American Legends series, listeners can get caught up to speed on the lives of America's most important men and women in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known.

Erwin Rommel remains one of the best remembered generals of World War II and history at large, despite the fact he was on the losing side, and he was defeated at the most famous battle of his career. Heinz Wilhelm Guderian was one of the most respected commanders and theoreticians of World War II. Albert Kesselring was undoubtedly a gifted commander, but one who served at a time when the German military was tainted with the evils of Nazism.

Andy Kaufman never liked to call himself a comedian, so it's a testament to his skills and routines that he is nonetheless considered one of the late 20th century's most famous comedians. In fact, Kaufman's eccentric style and theatrics made him one of the most unique performers of his era, whether it was doing a song and dance routine or staying in character to the extent that nobody could tell whether he was being himself or not.

Olaudah Equiano challenged the image of the unconscious African beast with such intellect, philosophical refinement, public presence, and elegant writing that standard British perceptions began to unravel. It is rational to assume that with his emergence as a respected world traveler, abolition of the slave trade was pushed forward by an incalculable number of years. Within his life, Equiano was to become the first Black British politician.

In 1941, with the dark star of Nazi conquest in the ascendant over Europe, German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler continued seeking fresh ways to expand the Third Reich's domains. Two strategic issues occupied Hitler's immediate attention: dealing with Britain and the Soviet Union. Hitler and Goering disagreed fundamentally on the next steps to be taken, and Hitler's ideas naturally won out over the Reichsmarshal's objections.

The French Army crumbled swiftly under the powerful blows delivered to it in 1940 by Adolf Hitler's Wehrmacht. Launching a massive feint into Belgium to lure French armies and the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) away from the actual point of attack, the weakly protected Ardennes Forest, the Germans struck past the Maginot Line. In a lightning campaign, panzers punched through to the coast, dividing Allied forces with a steel cordon across France and forcing the evacuation of the BEF from the port of Dunkirk.

Shortly after World War II, Congress' House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) began investigating Americans across the country for suspected ties to communism. The most famous victims of these witch hunts were Hollywood actors, such as Charlie Chaplin, whose "un-American activity" was being neutral at the beginning of World War II, but at the beginning of the Cold War, many Americans had the Red Scare.

In the manner that Samuel Colt broke open the single-shot tradition in hand weapons, Oliver Fisher Winchester and his celebrated rifle shared the title of “the gun that won the West”. In the arena of portable arms, these two men dominated much of the technological and promotive aspects of 19th century weaponry, alternating between resisting and collaborating with rivals.

When the Spanish came into contact with different tribes in the Southwest, they were so intrigued by the structure of the communities that they gave the natives the name Pueblo, a term they used to measure certain sizes for their own settlements. Thus, while most Americans have heard of the Pueblo and Navajo, many remain unfamiliar with distinctions within the tribes.

How did things progress from that story in the Bible, with a Jewish girl giving birth to the Messiah of Israel in a manager in the city of Bethlehem, to the modern colossus that is the Christmas holiday? How did Santa Claus, the Christmas tree, the snow sleighs, the presents, and family reunions become the distinctive features of the holiday if none of them were there at the beginning? The answers can be attributed to a chain of events, characters, oral traditions, artistic works, and an assimilation of local folklore.

When American archaeologists discovered a collection of cuneiform tablets in Iraq in the late 19th century, they were confronted with a language and a people who were at the time only scarcely known to even the most knowledgeable scholars of ancient Mesopotamia: the Sumerians.

The Wild West made legends out of many men and women through the embellishment of their stories, but it was Buffalo Bill Cody who truly brought the Wild West to life and provided the images that people still associate with the 19th century West today. Though he had a long career that spanned service in the Civil War, trapping, and even a stint with the Pony Express, Buffalo Bill eventually became synonymous with his world-famous Wild West Show.

Was he "the greatest human being ever to occupy 10 Downing Street"? Or a man whose "brilliant but unsound judgement resulted in detrimental consequences for Britain and for the world"? Nearly 50 years after his death, debate still rages over Sir Winston Churchill's contribution to history. Indeed, now that wartime nostalgia has mostly washed away, in Britain in particular the views on Churchill are more divergent than ever.

The most famous woman of the Wild West was also possibly the most colorful and mysterious. "Considered a remarkable good shot and a fearless rider for a girl of my age", Calamity Jane claimed to be a veteran of the Indian Wars, a scout, and the wife of Wild Bill Hickok, all on the way to becoming a dime novel heroine.

While performing, Louis Armstrong appeared lost in a reverie. It was a condition that imbued his performances with a kind of mythical flair, as if one were watching a man consumed by a moment of transcendence.

The Great Migration was the name coined for the mass movement of African-Americans north of the Mason-Dixon line in the years following the Civil War and the abolition of slavery. The enormous promise of emancipation proved to be illusory for the majority of Southern blacks, whether free or formerly enslaved, and as a result, hundreds of thousands made use of their fundamental freedom to leave. This resulted in a “push” away from the South, caused by ongoing discrimination, punishing Jim Crow laws, and increasing violence directed at blacks by whites.

Among all the Native American tribes, the Iroquois are some of the most well-documented Native Americans in history. Indigenous to the northeast region of what is now the United States, and parts of Canada, they were among some of the earliest contacts Europeans had with the native tribes. And yet they have remained a constant source of mystery. The name "Iroquois", like many Native American tribal names, is not the name the people knew themselves by, but a word applied to them by their enemies, the Huron, who called them Iroquo (rattlesnake) as an insult.