political history news

Surprise, surprise: it was actually the Romans who came up with the predecessor of the Swiss Army knife around 200 AD. Their version was made of silver and had an iron blade. Apart from the knife, it sported a spoon, a fork, a retractable spike, a spatula and a tooth-pick. What did they use the spike for? Probably to extract meat from snails. And the Spatula? Perhaps to poke cooking sauce out of narrow-necked bottles. And some have suggested the pick with the tiny spoon on the end could have been used to remove earwax.

While many similar folding knives have been discovered from antiquity, those were mostly made of bronze and are much less elaborate. But this one has a complex design and is made of silver, which suggests it is a luxury item. It probably served as a useful gadget for a wealthy traveler or a higher ranking soldier to show off, but since silver is a soft and pliable metal, it was not really intended for heavy use.

It seems that the Fitzwilliam Museum, where the object is displayed in the UK, has restored it to its old splendor since the above photo was taken:

This is a second attempt (see first one here) to grasp the absurdity of these two interlinked ideologies without showing dead bodies or fighting armies. Instead, I used some rarely published photographs that I find extremely fascinating.

British sailor removing the leg irons off a slave, late 1800s.

Ku Klux Klan at the carnival in Canon City ,1925.

World’s Highest Standard of Living – A Margaret Bourke-White Photograph,1937.

A rare color photo of Adolf Hitler which shows his true eye color (date unknown).

US Government mockups of how Hitler could have disguised himself, 1940s.

The last photo taken of Adolf Hitler as he overlooks the damage in Berlin,1945.

A German soldier returns home only to find his family no longer there, Frankfurt, 1946 – by Tony Vaccaro

A girl who grew up in a concentration camp draws a picture of “Home” while living in a residence for disturbed children, Poland, 1948.

Black children looking in on a whites-only playground, Mobile, Alabama 1956.

African girl in human zoo, Belgium 1958.

Black man drinking at white only fountain, ca 1964 – by Cecil Williams.

Nelson Mandela keeps his fists raised after he was sentenced to life imprisonment, June 1964.

Demonstrator at the Harlem Peace March to end racial oppression carries an anti-war sign, 1967.

The child of a KKK member approaches black state troopers, 1992.

Sources of photos: Imgur, Reddit

This is an attempt to grasp the absurdity of these two interlinked ideologies without showing dead bodies or fighting armies. Instead, I used some rarely published photographs that I find extremely fascinating.

Farmers waiting for the opening of a slave fair in St. Louis, Missouri (1852).

Flogged slave showing his wounds (1863).

Slave torturing devices. The collar may have been used to prevent him from escaping through narrow openings, like windows, etc. (1863)

Swastika women’s ice hockey team (1916). (As the date of the next post suggests, they didn’t use the swastika as a nazi symbol.)

Adolf Hitler’s designs for the nazi symbol (1920).

Mussolini is greated with a giant letter M in a small village in Piemonte (1928).

Message for Churchill on a German bomb during the Battle of Britain (1940).

A Canadian Soldier searches Jacob Nacken, the tallest soldier in the German Army, captured at Calais (1944).

A German Rail Wolf destroying rail tracks in Italy (1944).

Soviet soldiers with Hitler’s globe at the end of WWII (1945). (Why are they pointing at the US…?)

Segregation in North Carolina (1950).

Paula Hitler, Adolf Hitler’s only sibling alive at the time (1954).

A sign warning white residents in Johannesburg during apartheid times (1956).

Holocaust survivor lady bonking a skinhead on his skinhead (1985).

The Blitz was a devastating period of aerial bombing by Nazi Germany on London and other British cities during World War II. From September 1940 to May 1941, more than 40,000 civilians were killed and over a million houses were damaged or destroyed by the Luftwaffe.

But even in the midst of chaos and destruction, some Londoners showed remarkable resilience and courage. One striking example is captured in this old photo of people browsing books at a bombed-out library in 1940.

The library was part of Holland House, a historic mansion in Kensington that was owned by the aristocratic Holland family. The house was hit by 22 incendiary bombs on September 27, 1940, and was largely reduced to rubble.

Holland House was never fully restored after the war. Only a few rooms and sections of the library survived and were later converted into a youth hostel, while most of the grounds became a public park.

The library remained as a ruin until 1952, when it was demolished to make way for an extension of the park. Some of the books and artworks were salvaged and donated to museums or libraries, while others were lost or destroyed.

Yet, despite the danger and the debris, some avid readers continued to visit the library and look for books to read. The photo shows them casually walking among the ruins, holding books in their hands or under their arms, as if nothing had happened.

Here’s a colorized version of the photo.

It has been suggested that the photo was staged to combat the psychological effects of the Blitz: “the Germans may have tried to destroy our books, our buildings – the symbols of our civilization – but we are still reading.”

Either way, the photo is a testament to the power of books and reading to provide comfort, escape, and inspiration in times of crisis. It also shows how some Londoners refused to let the war disrupt their normal lives and culture.

A visual war-time testament to the English cool.

Sources: 1, 2, 3

Motorcycle chariot racing was extremely popular during the 1920s and 1930s. The chariots were made from wine barrels with automobile wheels attached to them and with motorcycles in front and “charioteers” wearing roman era inspired costumes. Go Caesar, go!

These photos were taken in the 1950s during a routine military expedition in Chukchi Peninsula, Soviet Union. It is uncertain whether the peninsula has more people or polar bears. The climate is very severe, and in winter the temperature falls below 40 C degrees below zero (-40 Fahrenheit), leaving polar bears and their cubs starving and freezing.

The soldiers serving in the district didn’t turn their backs on the starving animals and started to feed them every now and then. And they fed them with what they had in abundance – condensed milk. They would open a can and give it to the bear who would lick all the milk out of it then feed her cubs with it. It isn’t surprising to see condensed milk be given away to bears, because unlike some stuff that was rationed in the USSR,  condensed milk was available in unlimited amounts. It was a common dessert in the army too, not only among polar bears.

The ultimate Donkey Kong story from when I was young, well younger. In 1985 it played in my little little hands like a charm.

Thanks to Jason Pruett, we can now say that all the presidents of the United States have a face. But do they really? Did they make a difference? (Click to enlarge)

This postcard from ca. 1912-1915 shows the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans as two women kissing each other with the Panama Canal between them. It tells the fascinating story of the construction of the canal, one of the world’s great technological achievements, in numbers. A very expensive kiss that was…

Ever wondered how humans have managed to say goodbye to America’s giant trees without all those petrol-powered chanisaws? Well, it was defintiely a different life, and different trees to fell.  Can you find the bear?

THE END