A regular Avocado feature chronicling how historical events shaped our current political and cultural climates
On December 29, 1890, the Indian Wars climaxed with the Wounded Knee Massacre, where the 7th US Cavalry killed 300 members of the Miniconjou and Hunkpapa Lakota. The massacre’s immediate causes were the government’s decision to dissolve the Great Sioux … Continue reading History Thread: The Last Ghost Dance
On November 24th, 1965 General Joseph Mobutu formally seized power in the Republic of Congo. Mobutu was a member of the Ngbandi people, long looked down upon by Congolese as a backward agrarian people. During the ’50s, he served the … Continue reading History Thread: A Brief History of Mobutu’s Zaire
Few poets achieve lasting fame or cultural impact: in that sense, at least, Ezra Pound deserves notice. The abrasive, brilliant writer from Philadelphia made his mark in the literary salons of London in the 1910s, in Paris during the “Lost … Continue reading History Thread: The Madness of Ezra Pound
On August 30, 1945 two American war corespondents entered Tokyo. The Second World War still hadn’t formally ended – Douglas MacArthur accepted Japan’s surrender two days later – but Clark Lee of International News Service and Harry Brundidge of Cosmopolitan … Continue reading History Thread: The Making of Tokyo Rose
Part One here. As 1868 dawned, Andrew Johnson grew bolder and his adversaries, increasingly frustrated. Washington life fell into a dismal pattern, observed French journalist Georges Clemenceau, that yielded only deadlock and chaos: At each session [Congress] add a shackle … Continue reading History Thread: The Saturday Morning Massacre
Andrew Johnson was a stubborn man. From his hardscrabble childhood in North Carolina, when he escaped from indentured servitude; as an unschooled Tennessee tailor who taught himself (helped by his wife Eliza) to read and write, developing a taste for … Continue reading History Thread: Andrew Johnson’s Dignity
On 7th June 2020, the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square, London was decorated by protestors during an anti-racism demo. The painted message claimed that Churchill was a racist … and they are absolutely right. Winston Churchill was a … Continue reading Was Churchill Antifa?
On June 19, 1954, Senator Lester C. Hunt of Wyoming walked into the Capitol Building with his arms full of boxes and papers. A Capitol police officer recognized Hunt and offered his assistance; Hunt handed the officer a .22 caliber … Continue reading History Thread: Nightmare in Lavender
Today’s History Thread marks the anniversary of Joseph McCarthy’s humiliation at the Army-McCarthy hearings. The present author has written about the Red Scare several times in the past, but has only glancingly touched on Tailgunner Joe. McCarthy enjoyed a four … Continue reading The History Thread Has No Sense of Decency
A few weeks ago I devoted a History Thread to the Kent State shootings of May 4, 1970. Just eleven days later, on May 15th, another campus shooting shocked the nation. While Kent State remains widely known (enough to inspire … Continue reading The Jackson State History Thread
Yesterday was the 50th anniversary of the Kent State shooting, one of the most traumatic moments of the Vietnam War era. I’ve previously written around it (writing articles on Nixon’s decision to invade Cambodia and the backlash to the shooting … Continue reading The Kent State History Thread
In 1849, rumors of untold riches across the ocean reached China. In California, or Gold Mountain as the Chinese knew it, the discovery of gold initiated a massive influx of settlers from across the globe. “Good many Americans speak of … Continue reading How We Got Here: Chinese America’s Fight for “Simple Justice”
Sixth in a series of articles on McCarthyism and the Red Scare; see Parts One, Two, Three, Four and Five. By any standards, Ruth A. M. Schmidt was a remarkable woman. Born in Brooklyn in April 1916, Schmidt became interested … Continue reading How We Got Here: Ruth Schmidt Browses the Washington Bookshop
Of all of Richard Nixon’s men, Tom Charles Huston remains the most elusive. The lanky, bespectacled ideologue from Logansport, Indiana entered politics at an early age. At age 24, he chaired America’s largest conservative organization; at age 28, he became … Continue reading How We Got Here: The Education of Tom Charles Huston
Part Five in a series: see parts one, two, three and four. On March 7, 1949 the biggest trial of the Red Scare began. Four hundred New York City policemen formed a barricade around the Foley Square courthouse, where eleven … Continue reading How We Got Here: Blacklisting Was Our Business
Part Three in a series; see parts one and two. Robert Stripling was concerned. HUAC’s chief investigator didn’t trust Whittaker Chambers, their star witness in the case against Alger Hiss, feeling that even now he’d withheld some crucial evidence, for … Continue reading How We Got Here: The Fall of Alger Hiss
Part two in a series on McCarthyism and the Red Scare; part one here. Ironically, the House Committee on Un-American Activities owed its existence to a congressman who spent years on the Soviet payroll. Samuel Dickstein, known to the NKVD … Continue reading How We Got Here: The Passion of Whittaker Chambers
In August 1945, a nondescript thirty-seven year old woman entered the FBI office in New Haven, Connecticut. It was, or should have been, a momentous occasion. The Second World War was finally ending, with Germany obliterated and occupied and Imperial … Continue reading How We Got Here: Elizabeth Bentley, Queen of the Red Scare
On February 4, 1919 the Seattle Union Record, a union publication printed by Harry Ault, issued an explosive call to Seattle’s workers. After months of agitation and tensions, it summoned the city’s workers to perform something virtually unknown in the … Continue reading How We Got Here: Revolution Comes to Seattle
Like most politicians, William Warren Scranton disclaimed interest in politics. “I never intended to make public political life a career,” he said, shortly after stepping down as Governor of Pennsylvania in 1967. But Scranton was that rare politician whose reluctance … Continue reading How We Got Here: William Warren Scranton and the Principled Timidity of Moderate Republicans
When Orlando Letelier awoke on September 11, 1973, he was Minister of Defense in a democratic Chile. By nightfall, he was a prisoner and his country a dictatorship. A red-haired, chain-smoking economist and diplomat who’d spent two years as Ambassador … Continue reading How We Got Here: The Wrath of Pinochet
