Opinion - The Korea Times

FRIDAY, May 9, 2025

1754-First newspaper cartoon in America-divided snake "Join or Die" 1941-British intelligence at Bletchley Park breaks German spy codes after capturing Enigma machines aboard the weather ship Muenchen 1951-Air raid on Chinese positions at Yalu River 1955-German Federal Republic (West Germany) joins NATO 1956-War Reparations and Peace Settlement between Philippines and Japan was finally signed at Malacañang Palace under Magsaysay administration 1981-The Motherland Monument at 62 m (203 ft) high is opened in Kyiv, Ukraine in ceremony attended by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev 1989-Journalist petition Chinese government for freedom of press 2004-Chechen president Akhmad Kadyrov is killed in a land mine bomb blast under a VIP stage during a World War II memorial victory parade in Grozny, Chechnya 2005-Liberal commentary website The Huffington Post is launched

May 8, 2025

THURSDAY, May 8, 2025

1660-English Parliament proclaims Charles II, King of England and invites him to return 1835-First installment of Hans Christian Andersen "Fairy Tales" published by C. A. Reitzel in Copenhagen, Denmark 1895-China cedes Taiwan to Japan under Treaty of Shimonoseki 1902-Mount Pelee on the French overseas island of Martinique erupts, wiping out the city of Saint-Pierre, killing 30,000 and leaving only two survivors 1945-V-E Day: World War II ends in Europe after Germany signs an unconditional surrender 1980-World Health Organization announces smallpox has been eradicated 2007-A new Northern Ireland Executive is formed with Ian Paisley (Democratic Unionist Party) as First Minister and Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin) as Deputy First Minister

May 7, 2025

WEDNESDAY, May 7, 2025

1429-English siege of Orleans broken by Joan of Arc and the French army 1906-Advertisement for Nobel's Dynamite in the German newspaper "Deutsch-Südwestafrikanische Zeitung"Nobel's Dynamite 1867-Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel patents dynamite in England, the first of three patents he would receive for the explosive material 1912-Columbia University approves plans to award the Pulitzer Prize in several categories, after establishment by Joseph Pulitzer 1915-RMS Lusitania sunk by German submarine off the southern coast of Ireland; 1198 lives lost 1945-Unconditional surrender of the German Third Reich to the Allies signed by General Alfred Jodl at Rheims, Northern France 1952-The concept of the integrated circuit, the basis for all modern computers, is first published by Geoffrey Dummer 2017-Emmanuel Macron wins France's presidential election, defeating Marine Le Pen

May 6, 2025

TUESDAY, May 6, 2025

1527-Spanish and German Imperial troops sack Rome, ending the Renaissance. Charles III, Duke of Bourbon is killed in the assault removing any restraint for the victorious soldiers. 1626-Dutch colonist Peter Minuit organizes the purchase of Manhattan Island from Native Americans for 60 guilders worth of goods, believed to have been Canarsee Indians of the Lenape 1889-Exposition Universelle (World's Fair) in Paris opens with the recently completed Eiffel Tower serving as the entrance arch; the lifts in the tower are not ready, intrepid visitors need to climb 1,710 stairs to get to top 1937-German airship Hindenburg explodes in flames at Lakehurst, New Jersey, killing 35 of the 97 on board and 1 on the ground 1941-Joseph Stalin becomes Premier of the Soviet Union, replacing his foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov 1994-Channel Tunnel linking England and France officially opens 2017-84 abducted schoolgirls released in exchange for Boko Haram suspects in Nigeria

May 5, 2025

MONDAY, May 5, 2025

1260-Kublai Khan, grandson of Genghis Khan, becomes ruler of the Mongol Empire 1893-Panic of 1893 causes a large crash on the NY Stock Exchange 1941-Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie returns triumphantly to Addis Ababa 1955-West Germany is granted full sovereignty by its three occupying powers 1965-First large-scale U.S. Army ground units arrive in South Vietnam 1980-Siege at Iranian Embassy in London ends as the SAS and police storm the building 1981-After 66 days on hunger strike, 26-year-old Provisional IRA member and British MP Bobby Sands dies in Prison Maze. Nine more hunger strikers die in the next 3 months.

May 4, 2025

FRIDAY, May 2, 2025

1945-Battle of Berlin ends as the Soviet army storms the capital, forcing German commander of the city general Helmuth Weidling to surrender 1945-More than 1,000,000 German soldiers officially surrender to the Western Allies in Italy and Austria 1949-Arthur Miller wins a Pulitzer Prize for his play "Death of a Salesman" 1982-Falklands War: Argentine cruiser General Belgrano is sunk by British submarine HMS Conqueror, killing more than 350 men 2008-Cyclone Nargis makes landfall in Myanmar killing over 130,000 people and leaving millions of people homeless 2011-Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks and the FBI's most wanted man is killed by U.S. special forces in Abbottabad, Pakistan

May 1, 2025

THURSDAY, May 1, 2025

1707-Acts of Union comes into force, uniting England and Scotland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain 1753-Publication of "Species Plantarum" by Carl Linnaeus - the formal start date of plant taxonomy adopted by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature 1840-"Penny Black", the world's first adhesive postage stamp issued by Great Britain 1886-U.S. general strike for 8-hour working day begins 1924-German automobile manufacturers Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft and Benz & Cie begin their first joint venture (later merge into Mercedes-Benz) 1931- Empire State Building opens in New York City - world's tallest building until the World Trade Center in 1970 1948-North Korea proclaims itself Democratic People's Republic of Korea 1956-A doctor in Japan reports an "epidemic of an unknown disease of the central nervous system", marking the official discovery of Minamata disease 2007-Christopher Hitchens publishes his bestseller "God is not Great" making a case against organized religion

Apr 30, 2025

WEDNESDAY, April 30, 2025

1871-The Camp Grant Massacre of Apache Indians in Arizona Territory is committed by white and Mexican adventurers, 144 die 1880-The Metropolitan Museum's new premises opens at its current site at Fifth Avenue and 82nd Street designed by Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey 1904-Ice cream cone makes its debut at St. Louis World's Fair invented by Ernest A. Hamwi (independently of other claimant Italo Marchiony in NY) 1945-Adolf Hitler commits suicide along with his new wife Eva Braun in the Fuhrerbunker in Berlin as the Red Army captures the city 1945-Red Army opens attack on German Reichstag building in Berlin 1961-Premier Fidel Castro of Cuba receives Lenin-Peace Prize 1977-Human rights group Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo begin protesting at the forced disappearances of thousands, under the military dictatorship of Jorge Rafael Videla, in Buenos Aires 1985-"Shoah," French documentary about the Holocaust, directed by Claude Lanzmann, starring Richard Glazar and Raul Hilberg, premieres in Paris 1989-World Wide Web (WWW) is first launched in the public domain by CERN scientist Tim Berners-Lee 1996-U.S. P

Apr 29, 2025

TUESDAY, April 29, 2025

1429-Joan of Arc arrives at the siege of Orleans 1639-Mughal Emperor Shan Jahan founds his new capital city Shahjahanabad (modern Old Delhi) 1661-Chinese Ming dynasty occupies Taiwan 1769-Scottish engineer James Watt's patent for a steam engine with a separate condenser enrolled (Patent 913) 1834-Charles Darwin's expedition sees the top of the Andes Mountains from Patagonia 1852-First edition of Peter Roget's Thesaurus published in Great Britain 1975-Vietnam War: US begins to evacuate its citizens from Saigon in Operation Frequent Wind in response to advancing North Vietnamese forces, bringing an end to US involvement in the war 1992-Jury acquits Los Angeles Police Department officers on charges of excessive force in the beating of Rodney King; the decision sparks massive riots in the city

Apr 28, 2025

MONDAY, April 28, 2025

1611-Establishment of the Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas, The Catholic University of the Philippines, oldest existing university in Asia and largest Catholic university in the world 1796-Armistice of Cherasco between Sardinia and Napoleon Bonaparte at Cherasco, Piedmont gives France territories of Piedmont, Savoy and Nice 1939-Adolf Hitler claims German-Polish non-attack treaty still in effect 1952-Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Commander of NATO 1967-Muhammad Ali refuses induction into army & stripped of boxing title 1986-Soviet TV news program Vremya announces a nuclear accident at Chernobyl nuclear power station, 2 days after the event 1989-Iran protests sale of "Satanic Verses" by Salman Rushdie 1994-Aldrich Ames, former CIA officer and his wife Rosario plead guilty to spying for the Soviet Union and Russia 1995-Gas explosion in South Korean metro, 103 die 2001-Millionaire Dennis Tito becomes the world's first space tourist

Apr 27, 2025

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