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The series #StarTrek had its network première on #ThisDayInHistory in 1966. It presented an idealistic and #socialist-inspired dream of a humanity without #capitalism or #racism. Whilst now close to its #postscarcity vision in technology, we still let oligarchs steal everything.

The oldest continuously-inhabited city in the #UnitedStates was founded on #ThisDayInHistory in 1565 by #Spanish admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés. #StAugustine anchored the colony of #Florida and retains numerous landmarks & cultural sites from centuries of Spanish colonial rule.

The US #PledgeOfAllegiance by #FrancisBellamy was first published on #ThisDayInHistory in 1892, and has had several revisions since. The very notion of pledging #loyalty to a country founded on #PoliticalDissent and #FreeSpeech is absurd, and few countries in the world do this.

#Populist #Vermont Senator #BernieSanders was born on #ThisDayInHistory in 1941. His stated politics have always been #centrist, not #socialist, seeking reform of #capitalism instead of its destruction. That he was called "#FarLeft" shows how little Americans know their history.

#SSRex, the greatest #ItalianLine #OceanLiner, was lost on #ThisDayInHistory in 1944. Tucked away during #WorldWarII for safety, the #BlueRiband winner was stripped by Nazis in 1943 so her Italian crew anchored off shore. Allied bombers turned her into a flaming, capsized wreck.

Following failed revolts on #Crete calling for union with #Greece, #Ottoman rule grew more repressive and pogroms broke out. In the #CandiaMassacre, #ThisDayInHistory in 1898, up to 800 Greek Christians and 14 British soldiers were killed, accelerating the end of Ottoman control.

Cuban meteorologists correctly predicted the storm would threaten Texas. U.S. officials disagreed. Technology was limited, but human decisions made the consequences far worse.

theoffkeybard.com/bards-desk/h...

#ThisDayInHistory #History #AmericanHistory #Weather #Texas #BardsDesk

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On #ThisDayInHistory Tupac was shot in Las Vegas 💔

American labour militancy is not dead yet. On #ThisDayInHistory in 2011, longshoremen of #ILWU blockaded a non-union EGT terminal in #Longview, #Washington. Facing #police attacks, the next day they stormed the facility, damaging rail cars, cutting brake lines, and dumping grain.

The #MountainMeadowsMassacre, a #Mormon atrocity of the #UtahWar, began on #ThisDayInHistory in 1857. 120 settlers of the #BakerFancher wagon train, moving to #California from Arkansas, were killed by the #NauvooLegion & left for the animals. Only one perpetrator faced justice.

Union General #WilliamTecumsehSherman, having conquered #Atlanta, ordered its evacuation in 1864 on #ThisDayInHistory, and for all government and military structures in the city to be torched. 40% of the city was burnt down. Sherman's successes helped ensure Lincoln's reëlection.

#RMSLusitania of #CunardLine began her maiden voyage from #Liverpool to #NewYorkCity on #ThisDayInHistory in 1907. The use of plaster in her interiors gave her a brighter, airier look than her wood-panelled sister #RMSMauretania, and #Lusitania was popular until her loss in 1915.

#TheBlitz was an eight-month campaign of heavy aerial bombardment of Britain by the #Nazi #Luftwaffe. It began on #ThisDayInHistory in 1940 with a 56-day run of bombings against #London. In total more than 43,500 people were killed by it, but the campaign failed in all its goals.

#BlackSeptember, a civil war in #Jordan, began on #ThisDayInHistory in 1970. It was a response to a #PLO-led state-within-a-state, wherein many #Palestinian-peopled parts of the country defied Amman. Heavy fighting went on for months, with the #PLO finally expelled to #Lebanon.

The last known #thylacine, called the #TasmanianTiger & #TasmanianWolf, died on #ThisDayInHistory in 1936, alone at the #HobartZoo. A #carnivorous #marsupial, humans hunted it to extinction, and its peculiar evolutionary history contributes to regular hopes for a cloned revival.

On this day in history in 1757 American Founding Father, the Marquis de Lafayette was born.

Read more about the Marquis de Lafayette in our blog:
buff.ly/3BinwRU

Pictured is Lafayette's portrait as it hangs in the Second Bank of the United States Portrait Gallery.

#thisdayinhistory

#Slavery never ended, it moved to #prisons, and #Black men were routinely sentenced to farm or mine labour in awful conditions. In 1913 in #Richmond, #Texas, on #ThisDayInHistory, 12 were packed in a tiny cell for 16 hours for not picking #cotton fast enough; eight of them died.

American #anarchist #LeonCzolgosz shot and fatally wounded US President #WilliamMcKinley on #ThisDayInHistory in 1901, propelling #TheodoreRoosevelt into the #WhiteHouse. #Czolgosz was radicalized by the financial #PanicOf1893, and opposed #McKinley's pro-business imperialism.