Blogs > December 31, 2007

Jan 1, 2008

December 31, 2007



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN 2008 WATCH:

  • Allan Lichtman on"In presidential politics, Iowa still packs a wallop":"With African-American and Hispanic voters less than 5 percent of its electorate, Iowa is 'completely unrepresentative of the country,' argued American University political historian , calling the caucuses 'a media obsession" with predictive benchmarks that don't predict.'" - St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 12-31-07
HNN STATS THIS WEEK:
THIS WEEK IN HISTORY:This Week in History:

  • 12-31-1879 - Thomas Edison gave the first public demonstration of an electric incandescent lamp.
  • 12-31-1946 - President Truman officially proclaimed the end of hostilities in World War II.
  • 12-31-1961 - The Marshall Plan expired after distributing more than $12 billion in foreign aid.
  • 01-01-1863 - Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
  • 01-01-1908 - The ball signifying the New Year was dropped for the first time at Times Square in New York City.
  • 01-01-1914 - The world's first airline, St. Petersburg Tampa Airboat Line, starts operation in St. Petersburg, Florida.
  • 01-01-1959 - Fidel Castro and his revolutionaries took over Cuba and toppled Fulgencio Batista's regime.
  • 01-01-1975 - John Mitchell, H. R. Haldeman, and John Ehrlichman were convicted of obstruction of justice in the Watergate affair.
  • 01-02-1492 - Muhammad XI, the leader of the last Arab stronghold in Spain, surrendered to King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I.
  • 01-02-1788 - Georgia was admitted to the Union as the 4th state.
  • 01-02-1905 - The Russo-Japanese war ended.
  • 01-02-1923 - The African-American town of Rosewood, Fla., was burned by a white mob./li>

  • 01-02-1935 - The Bruno R. Hauptmann trial began for the kidnap and murder of the Lindbergh baby.
  • 01-02-1959 - The first spacecraft to fly by the Moon and also to orbit the Sun, Mechta (Luna 1) was launched by the USSR.
  • 01-02-1994 - Rudolph Giuliani is inaugurated as New York City's mayor.
  • 01-03-1521 - Martin Luther excommunicated by Pope Leo X.
  • 01-03-1777 - George Washington defeated Cornwallis's forces at the Battle of Princeton.
  • 01-03-1833 - Britain seized control of the Falkland Islands.
  • 01-03-1870 - Construction of the Brooklyn Bridge began.
  • 01-03-1920 - The New York Yankees acquired Babe Ruth and so began the" curse of the Bambino" that haunted the Boston Red Sox until 2004.
  • 01-03-1947 - Congressional proceedings were televised for the first time.
  • 01-03-1959 - Alaska became the 49th state in the United States.
  • 01-03-1967 - Jack Ruby, the man who shot John Kennedy's assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, died.
  • 01-04-1885 - Dr. William W. Grant of Davenport, Iowa, performed what is thought to be the first appendectomy.
  • 01-04-1896 - Utah was admitted as 45th state in the United States.
  • 01-04-1904 - In Gonzales v. Williams, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that citizens of Puerto Rico are not aliens and can enter the U.S. freely.
  • 01-04-1951 - During the Korean War, North Korean and Communist Chinese forces captured the city of Seoul.
  • 01-04-1965 - President Johnson outlined his"Great Society" in his State of the Union address.
  • 01-05-1914 - Henry Ford introduced the $5-a-day minimum wage.
  • 01-05-1925 - Nellie Tayloe Ross became the first woman governor of a state (Wyoming).
  • 01-05-1972 - President Nixon ordered the development of the space shuttle.
  • 01-06-1540 - King Henry VIII of England married his 4th wife, Anne of Cleves.
  • 01-06-1759 - George Washington married Martha Custis.
  • 01-06-1838 - Samuel Morse gave the first public demonstration of the telegraph.
  • 01-06-1912 - New Mexico became the 47th state in the United States.
  • 01-06-1919 - Former president Theodore Roosevelt died in Oyster Bay, N.Y.
IN THE NEWS:
REVIEWED AND FIRST CHAPTERS:

  • Drew Gilpin Faust: Old lions, overseas talents eye bestseller lists - Boston Globe, 12-31-07
  • David Anderegg: Ridicule That's Getting On Our Nerds NERDS Who They Are and Why We Need More of Them - WaPo, 12-30-07
  • Robert Dallek: A Year of Books Worth Curling Up With - NYT, 12-28-07
  • Avi Shlaim: The lion king - Haaretz, 12-27-07
  • Jay Winik: THE GREAT UPHEAVAL: AMERICA AND THE BIRTH OF THE MODERN WORLD, 1788–1800 Named one of Providence Journal's The books we loved in '07 - Providence Journal, 12-30-07
OP-ED/LETTER TO THE EDITOR:
BLOGOSPHERE:
PROFILED:

  • David Smith:"Librarian to the Stars," The Library’s Helpful Sage of the Stacks - NYT, 12-31-07
FEATURE:

  • Your Grandfather's War In a virtual world of fantasy and science fiction, realistic videogames set in World War II are ever popular. But is this a good way to learn history? - Newsweek, 12-28-07
  • Building on historical lore THERE'S LIMITED TIME LEFT TO STUDY CLARK COUNTY'S INDIAN OLD FIELDS - Lexington Herald Leader, 12-30-07
INTERVIEWED:
QUOTED:

  • Ron Barkai on"Kids who can't read in school, grow up to be college students who can't write":"Most of them suffer from the same problem, they are unable to write. They cannot put together a sentence and present a coherent argument in print... In Israel, pupils don't learn how write. In France, for example, they give this issue tremendous attention. If you graduate from high school, you know how to write an essay and how to organize conflicting arguments about any given subject. In Israel, students begin to learn in university what they should have mastered in high school."- Ha'aretz, 12-27-07
EXHIBITIONS / NEW WEBSITES:
SPEAKING EVENTS CALENDAR:

  • Jan 10, 2008: National Archives Hosts Public Symposium on Slave Trade Act Thursday, January 10, 2008, 9 AM - 5:30 PM William G. McGowan Theater, National Archives Building Constitution Avenue between 7th and 9th Streets, NW, Washington, DC. - UrbanMecca.com, FL, 12-9-07
  • Jan 14, 2008:Timothy Naftali: Author of GEORGE H.W. BUSH, American Enterprise Institute Washington, DC, 5:30 PM
ON TV:History Listings This Week:

  • PBS:"Andrew Jackson: Good, Evil and the Presidency" Wednesday, Jan. 2 at 9 p.m.
  • C-Span2, BookTV: In Depth - Author Nell Painter, Sunday, January 6, from 12-3 PM ET - C-Span2, BookTV
  • History Channel:"American Eats," Marathon Tuesday, January 1, @ 2-6pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"The Universe :Mysteries of the Moon," Tuesday, January 1, @ 9pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Modern Marvels :Christmas Tech," Tuesday, December 25, @ 7pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"The Hunt for John Wilkes Booth," Wednesday, January 2, @ 2pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Battlefield Detectives :The Civil War: Antietam," Wednesday, January 2, @ 4pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Horrors at Andersonville Prison: The Trial of Henry Wirz," Wednesday, January 2, @ 5pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Modern Marvels :Civil War Tech," Wednesday, January 2, @ 6pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Modern Marvels :Guns of the Civil War," Wednesday, January 2, @ 7pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Lost Worlds :Secret U.S. Bunkers," Wednesday, January 2, @ 9pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Seven Wonders of the World," Thursday, January 3, @ 2pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Cities Of The Underworld :03 - London's Lost Cities," Thursday, January 3, @ 6pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Lost Worlds :Al Capone's Secret City," Thursday, January 3, @ 11pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Decoding The Past :Secrets of the Dollar Bill.," Friday, January 4, @ 11pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"The Plague," Saturday, January 5, @ 6pm ET/PT
  • History Channel:"Ku Klux Klan: A Secret History," Saturday, January 5, @ 8pm ET/PT
SELLING BIG (NYT):

  • Tom Brokaw: BOOM! #3 -- 7 weeks on list - 1-6-08
  • Geoffrey C. Ward: THE WAR #12 -- 12 weeks on list - 1-6-08
  • Joseph J. Ellis: AMERICAN CREATION #15 -- 8 weeks on list - 1-6-08
  • David Halberstam: THE COLDEST WINTER #31 - 1-6-08
FUTURE RELEASES:

  • The Great Experiment, by Strobe Talbott (S&S, Jan.). How mere tribes became great nations.
  • James J. Sheehan: Where Have All the Soldiers Gone?, (Houghton, Jan.). The rejection of violence after World War II redefined a continent. Europe chose material well-being over war.
  • John Dickie: Delizia!: The Epic History of the Italians and Their Food, January 8, 2008.
  • Mark Puls: Henry Knox: Visionary General of the American Revolution, February 5, 2008.
  • Fidel Castro: Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography, February 5, 2008.
  • Brian McGinty: Lincoln and the Court, February 15, 2008.
  • H. David Stone: Vital Rails, February 28, 2008.
  • John Fea: The Way of Improvement Leads Home: Philip Vickers Fithian and the Rural Enlightenment in Early America ( U of Pennsylvania Press), February 29, 2008
  • James Donovan: A Terrible Glory: Custer and the Little Bighorn - the Last Great Battle of the American West (REV), March 24, 2008.
  • Scott McClellan: What Happened, April 28, 2008
DEPARTED:


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