I love this site. It’s from The History Channel, and it’s called — oddly enough — “This Day In History.” It’s full of fascinating historical tidbits, and I thought it might be fun to share some with those of you who don’t subscribe to the site. So off we go into August 18th . . .

1227: Genghis Khan dies. Yes, The History Channel sometimes does go back 800 years (or more). The Great Khan, as he was sometimes called, was a Mongol leader who inherited his title when his father died. By his teens, he had “grown into a feared warrior and charismatic figure who began gathering followers and forging alliances with other Mongol leaders . . . Using an extensive network of spies and scouts, Khan detected a weakness in his enemies’ defenses and then attacked the point . . .” [The History Channel, “This Day In History, August 18, 2024.]

So, he was a latter-day Alexander the Great, and an early version of The Terminator, The Creature From the Black Lagoon, and Yevgeny Prigozhin, all rolled into one. Awesome!

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1590: Roanoke Colony found deserted. Imagine leaving home for three years, then coming back and finding everyone — every last person — gone. Without a trace. That’s what happened to Governor John White of Roanoke Island (in present-day North Carolina), the first English settlement in the New World. Despite various theories, no clue was ever found as to where they had gone, other than the word “Croatoan” inscribed on a wall; and no remains were ever found. Personally, I’m thinking E.T. may have come to visit and taken them home with him. But I can’t prove that, either.

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1920: 19th Amendment ratified thanks to one vote. And about time! This was the amendment that gave women the right to vote — and even then it passed the House of Representatives by the skin of its teeth. Had I lived in those times, I know I would have been out there, marching with those suffragettes. Let the men stay home with the kids for a few hours, and see how they like it!

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1988: A Seattle judge involved in a sex scandal dies by suicide. Ironically referred to as “The Honorable Gary M. Little” (the proper title for a judge), this guy was anything but honorable. Evidence pointed to his having sexually exploited juvenile defendants who appeared before him, and — in his earlier life as a teacher — some of his teenage students as well. Who needs details? Not I. Suffice it to say, he did himself in on August 18th, the night before the Seattle Post-Intelligencer was to release a revelatory article detailing his alleged crimes.

Interesting footnote: Judge Little was found lying in a pool of blood outside his chambers, just three floors below the jail cell where his father, Sterling Little, had hanged himself in August of 1947 after being arrested in connection with a burglary investigation. Clearly, a family that never understood that actions have consequences.

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1991. Soviet hard-liners launch coup against Gorbachev. This was a man who literally changed the face of history, as well as the map of his own country. He brought his nation — then the Soviet Union — from the horrors of Communism to the hope of Democracy; but he didn’t quite get the details right. Some of his own people (Boris Yeltsin first among them) felt he wasn’t moving quickly enough; others (hard-liners led by Gennady Yanayev) were determined to maintain the status quo. On this date in 1991, Yanayev’s people staged a coup, placing Gorbachev under house arrest at his summer home in Crimea, and attempting to take over the “White House” — the seat of the Russian Parliament in Moscow. But Yeltsin stepped in — or, more accurately, stepped up onto a tank — and saved the day. The coup ended after three days, and some of its instigators were arrested; others committed suicide.

But Gorbachev’s reign had been weakened, and he resigned on Christmas day, handing the reins of office to reformer Boris Yeltsin, who carried on (largely in a rather jolly drunken stupor) for the remainder of the 20th Century, when he was succeeded by . . .

Heaven help us . . . it’s Vladimir Putin!

Proving once more that not all stories have happy endings.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
8/18/24