This day in history...

On May 29, 1453, Ottoman forces under newly crowned Emperor Mehmed II capture the city of Constantinople. The fall of its capital city spells the end of the Byzantine Empire and nearly 200 years of war between the two rival empires. Historians believe Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI died leading a counterattack during the final assault on his city. Constantinople remained in control of the Ottomans until its empire fell following WWI.


On May 29, 1851, former slave Sojourner Truth addresses the Ohio Women's Rights Convention. Two anti-slavery newspapers reported on Truth's speech, but neither transcribed the full text. One of the papers reported Truth repeating the mantra "Ain't I a woman?" throughout the speech, but the article contained numerous errors, leading some historians to question whether Truth actually used that phrase, for which she has become famous. Nevertheless, Truth's speech that day is considered a benchmark moment in the early history of the women's rights movement.


You've heard of soccer hooligans, but May 29, 1913 gives us the birth of ballet hooligans. Its the debut of Russian composer Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, in Paris, commissioned by impresario Serge Diaghilev for his Ballet Russes. Diaghilev promised a cutting edge performance, but the audience - the cream of Parisian high society - hated it from the beginning. The music was "strange", the choreography was completely non-traditional, and the story, depicting a pagan celebration including a virgin sacrifice, was downright decadent. The audience rained hoots and catcalls throughout the performance; the reaction so prevalent that one newspaper reporter described it as becoming part of the performance itself. At least 40 patrons became so unruly they were escorted from the theatre. Stravinsky would subsequently rework the orchestration and today, The Rite of Spring is seen as profoundly ahead of its time. (New York Times headlines on the event)

 

On May 30, 1868, the first nationally recognized Memorial Day observance is held at Arlington National Cemetery. President James Garfield spoke, after which the 5,000 in attendance decorated the graves of about 20,000 Civil War veterans. Many local communities around the country have claimed to be the first to recognize Memorial Day; in 1966, President Lyndon Johnson designated Waterloo, New York as the official first Memorial Day city, because they had held an annual, citywide observance every year since 1866. In 1971, Congress designated Memorial Day a national holiday, to be observed on the last Monday in May.

 

On the night of May 31, 1921, thousands of white citizens of Tulsa, OK flood into the Greenwood District, known as the "Black Wall Street" and perhaps the most affluent predominately-black neighborhood in the country. Over the next 24 hours, an area of roughly 35 city blocks is virtually burned to the ground, including dozens of businesses, a school, a hospital, a dozen churches, and about 1200 homes. Around 300 people are killed and 800 injured. What sparked what is now called the Tulsa Race Massacre was an altercation between a black man and a white female elevator operator in a downtown office building. No one knows what really happened, but the woman screamed, the man fled and was later arrested. A white mob descended on the jail hoping to pull him from the jail, but failing that, headed for Greenwood. In 1996, a state commission recommended that reparations be paid to survivors and descendants of the victims, and commissioned a memorial to the massacre.


On May 31, 1902, the Treaty of Vereeniging brings the Boer Wars to an end. The British had seized Dutch colonies in South Africa nearly 100 years earlier, but did not get along well with the native Boer (also known as Afrikan) population. The Boers cleared out and formed their own republics in neighboring tribal territory in 1933, and lived peacefully with their British neighbors until gold and diamonds were discover in the 1860's. Conflict and eventually, full scale war followed, with the British crushing Boer resistance. The treaty established a British military government over the Boer states, which were granted autonomy in 1910.


On May 31, 1279 BCE (the date is estimated by Egyptologists), Ramesses II becomes third Pharaoh of Egypt's 19th Dynasty. Ramesses is considered by many to be the greatest of the Egyptian pharaohs, building cities throughout the nation and launching numerous military campaigns throughout northeast Africa and modern day Syria. His reign lasts 66 years. His tomb was discovered in 1881 and is now displayed in the Egyptian museum in Cairo. In popular culture, he is the subject of Shelly's classic poem "Ozymandias" and is portrayed as the pharaoh who resists Moses' efforts to free the Jews from slavery in the classic film The Ten Commandments.

 

On June 1, 1942, the Liberty Brigade, an underground Warsaw newspaper, publishes the story of a young Jew named Emanuel Ringelblum, who had escaped from the Nazis at the village of Chelmno. His is a horrific tale; he had been pulled from the hundreds of Jews being transported "for slave labor" to the Polish village of Chelmno and placed on corpse detail. Jews arriving at Chelmno were told by SS troops (white coated to lend the appearance they were doctors) that they would be disinfected before being transported to a work camp. Stripped naked, the Jews were herded into a van, 50 to 70 at a time. They were then asphyxiated by diverting carbon monoxide from the engine into the van, which then transported them to a mass burial site. The Liberty Brigade story is the first word spread to the public of what will be termed the "Final Solution" by the Nazis. Unlike Auschwitz and other camps where Jews were separated into those who could work and those who couldn't, a ticket to Chelmno was an automatic death sentence, with an estimated 360,000 being gassed in the "death vans."


On June 1, 1494, the following notation is made in the Exchequer (treasury) Rolls of Scotland: "To Friar John Cor, by order of the King, to make aqua vitae, VIII bolls of malt." Brother Cor is a Tironensian monk of the Lindores Abbey, and although it is not mentioned as such in that simple journal entry, this is historically considered the first mention of Scotch Whiskey. Like other forms of whiskey, scotch is made from malted barley, wheat or rye. To be officially considered scotch, it must be aged for a minimum of 3 years in a barrel made from oak. There are currently about 135 distilleries making Scotch in Scotland. The original Lindores Abbey meanwhile, was burned down by marauders centuries ago, but a new distillery was built on the site in 2017. They have chosen to age their scotch for 5 years, and will be taking orders for their first product later this year.

 

On June 2, 1919, followers of Italian anarchist Luigi Galleani detonate 9 homemade bombs in 8 U.S. cities. The targets are officials or agencies that supported anti-sedition laws or the deportation of immigrants sympathetic to Galleani's cause. None of the intended targets were killed, though two bystanders died. Among the targets was U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, whose home was significantly damaged. That bomb also damaged the home of his across-the-street neighbor, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt. The future president and his wife Eleanor had left home moments before the explosion. The bombings helped fuel the Red Scare of the next three years, and more than 600 immigrants were deported, including Galleani, who directed a deadly bombing of NYC's Wall Street a year later from his new home in Italy.


On June 2, 1953, 27-year old Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor is crowned Elizabeth II, Queen of England, succeeding her late father, King George VI. Thanks to television, it is the first time all British subjects have the opportunity to witness a coronation, and it is also the first major event to be televised world-wide. Still going strong at age 95, Elizabeth is both the Empire's and the world's longest lived and longest reigning (68 years) monarch, the world's oldest and longest currently serving head of state, and the longest serving female head of state in world history.


On June 2, 1962 in Santiago, Chile, the host team and Italy battle in a group match of the 1962 FIFA World's Cup. Battle is the right word; the match has been nicknamed "The Battle of Santiago." Bad blood between the two nations started a few days before the match, when a pair of Italian news writers published an article that started by calling Santiago a "backwater dump," and then got nasty. Chilean newspapers quickly responded with well chosen slurs of Italy. The feud quickly spilled onto the football pitch; the first foul was called 12 seconds into the match. By game's end, police had to intervene in fist fights between players four times, yet only two players were ejected. One player suffered a broken nose, another was kicked in the head. The BBC called it "the most stupid, appalling, disgusting and disgraceful exhibition of football, possibly in the history of the game." Oh, and Chile won 2-0. Coincidentally, the two nations were grouped together again in the following Cup in '66, but that match was played without incident. (Italian player Giorgio Ferrini is escorted from the pitch by police after his ejection)

 

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On June 3, 1864, General Ulysses S. Grant leads the Army of the Potomac into a bloodbath at Cold Harbor, VA. Grant had been pursuing Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia for weeks, resulting in a series of furious but indecisive battles. When (on June 1) Grant's scouts seized a key road intersection at Cold Harbor, just 10 miles from Richmond, he sent word to his corps commanders to prepare for a full scale assault. But the key to his assault, Gen. Winfield Hancock's corps, was delayed, causing Grant to postpone the attack for a day. This critical decision gave Lee the time to entrench, and when Grant finally attacked on the 3rd, his army suffered 7,000 casualties in about an hour. Lee's losses were about 1,500. Grant learned his lesson; he withdrew from Cold Harbor and his next engagement with Lee, at Petersburg, was a 9-month siege that took the fight out of the Rebs once and for all.


On June 3, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signs the National Defense Act, which effectively organizes state militias into a National Guard. The term had been around since colonial times; the Marquis de Lafayette frequently used it when referring to the militias that made up much of the Continental Army. The NDA formalizes the concept, giving the federal government authority to call the National Guard to active duty as a reserve for the regular army. It also orders state units to organize along the lines of regular army units, provides for formal training of officers, sets a budget for paying Guardsmen for training and drilling, and establishes the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) to prepare high school and college students for service.


On June 3, 1943, dozens of sailors stationed at the U.S. Navy Reserve Armory in Los Angeles take to the streets, beating anyone they see wearing a zoot suit (a wool suit characterized by baggie pants and an oversized coat). Over the next week, the Zoot Suit Riots result in countless injuries (thankfully, no deaths). The riots were sparked by a confrontation between sailors and zoot suiters on May 30 that resulted in a sailor being beaten. While there was certainly a racial component sparking the confrontations - zoot suits were popular with young black and Mexican-American men - there was also patriotism sparking the anger. The manufacture of the suits had been banned the previous year to save wool for military use, and wearing zoot suits was seen as unpatriotic.