Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Plunges into History
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FABULOUS FACTOIDS
Thanks to modern technology and a little thing called “DNA,” scientists proved that Anna Anderson was definitively not the Grand Duchess Anastasia.
Russia’s Catherine the Great? Not really Russian. She was actually born a minor German princess, a.k.a. Princess Sophie.
“Let them eat cake.” —Marie Antoinette
When a procession of Parisian paupers marched on Versailles in October, 1789, Queen Marie Antoinette reportedly scoffed, “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche,” which was translated as “Let them eat cake.” The quote was widely reported to showcase the Queen’s callousness and to highlight just how out of touch with the sufferings of the people she was. But the quote is extremely suspect. In fact, it appeared in a publication by Jean-Jacques Rousseau more than 20 years before it was ascribed to the Queen. Additionally, brioche can refer to a type of bread that was served in the Royal household. So, the quote that was intended to make the Queen look bad was in fact, if she said it at all, meant in charity, not callousness.
Some believe that the Scottish rite of Freemasonry was founded by the Knights Templar.
TALKING ’BOUT THE TITANIC
* * *
In 1890, a young immigrant traveled from Russia to New York in steerage—the cheapest ship space there was. Years later, a more elegant ship would bring young David Sarnoff to the attention of the world.
When his family moved to America, David Sarnoff—future chief executive of RCA and NBC—spoke not a word of English. When he was 15, his father died and it was up to David to support the family, which he did by selling newspapers and doing odd jobs. He even set up his own newsstand. See? He was already a media guy.
SERENDIPITY STRIKES
One day, while looking for a newspaper office, young David wandered into a telegraph company. They were looking for a messenger boy. Why not, said Sarnoff. He got the job and taught himself how to use the telegraph machine.
In 1906 he became an office boy for another company, the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America. By 1908 he was a junior wireless operator for Marconi. A few years later, he was promoted to run Marconi’s New York City wireless station.
RADIO SILENCE
Sarnoff was at his station on the top of the Wanamaker Building early in the morning of April 15, 1912. Meanwhile in the North Atlantic, a chilling Morse code signal flashed out: “CQD, CQD,” the general distress call for ships at sea, “Come Quick Danger.” (This was before the days when everybody used “SOS.”) The chief radio operator on the ship Titanic sent a more specific message next: “Come at once. We have struck a berg.”
THE GOOD NEWS, THE BAD NEWS
The message was picked up by another ship, the Carpathia, which sped to the rescue. They took on board all the survivors they could find. Then someone—and no one ever found out who—broadcasted a message that all the passengers had been rescued and that the Titanic was being towed to port. The world breathed a sigh of relief. Hey, no rush to get there, everybody’s okay.
When Stalin became general secretary of the Communist Party, it was just a menial position.
THE OPERATOR PULLS THE PLUG
On the Carpathia, the wireless operator tapped out the names of survivors. Then his transmission went dead. He’d shut down his station and wouldn’t communicate with anyone—not even the Navy cruisers that President Taft sent to the scene. You’re wondering why, right?
SHOW ME THE MONEY
In those days, ship wireless operators weren’t employees of the shipping line, but of the Marconi telegraph company. An investigation later discovered that Guglielmo Marconi himself, the “father of wireless” and owner of the telegraph company, had ordered radio silence on the Carpathia. It seems that Marconi had guaranteed The New York Times an exclusive story, and wanted to make sure they didn’t get the news from anyone else. Meanwhile, The White Star Line, owners of the Titanic, insisted that everybody had been rescued. In fact, only about 700 of the more than 2,200 people who had been on the Titanic had made it.
GETTING THE TRUTH OUT
Faint ship-to-ship radio signals were still sending each other the Carpathia’s list of names. The young man on top of the Wanamaker Building picked up the signal and heard the news that some survivors had been rescued, but that no more were expected. He passed the list of names on, and they were picked up by other wireless operators from coast to coast. Sarnoff stayed at his station for 72 hours, passing on information to the world. For many people, it was the only valid source of news about the disaster. The media loved the Sarnoff story, and made a hero of the young immigrant.
SARNOFF’S BRAINCHILD
David Sarnoff stayed on when Marconi became Radio Corporation of America (RCA). Eventually, he got them to pay attention to his radical notion that radio waves could be used to bring music directly into homes. RCA started manufacturing and sending music to the “Radio Music Box,” the worlds’ first home radio. It marked the beginning of a long and successful career in radio and television broadcasting.
In his youth, Pol Pot learned to be a radio operator in Paris.
THE KING WHO STOLE THE CONGO
* * *
How nearly a million square miles of valuable African real estate came into the hands of the king of tiny Belgium. Somebody should have slapped his wrists.
Leopold II (1835–1909) was king of the Belgians. Confined in the borders of his little kingdom, he dreamed of vast colonial empires. During the late 1800s, expansionist European powers were claiming African territory as fast as they could. No country could be great, Leopold, decided, without overseas colonies. As a young man, he was fascinated by the history of the Netherlands, a small country whose far-flung possessions in the Far East made them rich and respected. Leopold wanted the same future for Belgium. Too bad the Belgian people weren’t interested.
A KING-SIZED DILEMMA
Belgium wasn’t wealthy, and the Belgians had higher priorities than dumping scarce resources down some tropical hole just so their king could feel like a big man. Fretting at his subjects’ lack of vision, Leopold contemplated ways to create his own empire.
A KING-SIZED ATTENTION GETTER
News reached Europe that explorer Henry Morton Stanley had just appeared at the mouth of the Congo River, after an unprecedented multiyear safari across Africa. Stanley originally achieved international fame by finding Dr. David Livingstone in the vastness of central Africa (and he always denied saying the famous line “Dr. Livingstone, I presume.”). Livingstone had not been lost at all (he knew exactly where he was), but Stanley’s African exploits thrilled the Western world. And Stanley’s trek down the Congo attracted the rapt attention of the king of the Belgians.
A SCAM FIT FOR A KING
Leopold decided that the Congo was just the place for his empire. Why, the mighty Congo River had the potential to be an African Danube or Rhine! This big waterway slicing through the interior of the continent was perfect for extracting raw materials out of the jungle and shipping finished goods to thousands, perhaps millions, of new African customers. Leopold quickly formed the International Association for the Congo to cover his personal ambitions behind a corporate curtain. Then he hired Stanley to return to the Congo and negotiate treaties with local chiefs along the river.
The name of the Soviet propaganda newspaper, Pravda, means “Truth” in Russian.
A KING-SIZED THEFT
Time was of the essence. During the late 1800s, expansionist European powers were claiming African territory as fast as they could, and Leopold’s European rivals also had their greedy eyes fixed on the Congo. The French were moving in from the north, and the Portuguese were restless in the south. Meanwhile Stanley traveled the river, meeting and signing treaties with the local chiefs. These Congolese chiefs were just being polite to Stanley. They had no idea that their mark on Stanley’s papers would make a distant king believe he had the right to control their territory.
KING CON
Once Leopold had conned the Con
golese, he had to con his European friends and enemies. He offered himself as the perfect compromise candidate to prevent a nasty superpower conflict over central Africa. He declared that the Congo would be a free trade zone open to the merchants of all nations. The British were satisfied; they certainly preferred Leopold to the French. The Germans were happy with anyone who wasn’t British or Portuguese. The gullible Americans believed that the king wanted the Congo to be a state ruled by Africans.
As for the influential missionary lobby in all nations, Leopold swore to them that he intended to Christianize the Congo. He promised he would suppress the Arab-dominated slave trade that still existed there. The proper forces aligned behind him, and at the Berlin West African Conference of 1885, the Western powers gave the Congo to King Leopold.
KING CON GETS THE CONGO
In July 1885, Leopold declared himself sovereign of the Congo Free State. He had done what no other imperialist had managed to do, create his own personal colony. Over the next 23 years, Leopold sat in his comfortable palace in Brussels and exploited nearly 900,000 square miles of central Africa. Great for Leopold. Not so great for the Congolese.
Czechoslovakia, a Communist country, was the only one ever attacked by the Warsaw Pact.
THE MONARCH OF MISERY
Leopold created a freebooting army of European officers and African soldiers to enforce order and suppress rebellions. The king quickly forgot his promise of free trade; he declared the Congo his personal land, and the natural resources his private goods. The most valuable commodity to come out of the Congo was rubber, so Free State agents organized forced-labor collection by Africans. Failure to meet rubber quotas resulted in beatings with the chicotte, a nasty whip made of hippo hide. Worse, a lax rubber collector might have his hands cut off as an example to others that might refuse to make enough profit for the king’s colonial government.
A HEART OF DARKNESS
In the late 1890s, reports of government brutality began to slip out of the jungles. British and American groups, particularly missionaries, investigated Leopold’s Congo and discovered it was thoroughly rotten. The Congo Free State had become a savage organization that existed only to loot the Congo’s natural resources by threat and violence. The brutal regime inspired Joseph Conrad’s chilling classic Heart of Darkness, a story of the dehumanizing effects of power.
A KING-SIZED EMBARRASSMENT
The horrors in the Congo embarrassed the Belgian government in Brussels. Though there’s reason to believe Leopold didn’t condone the savagery of his agents, his rule allowed that savagery to flourish. In 1908, the Belgian government annexed the Congo Free State, removing the colony from the hands of the king. In 1909, Leopold II died, perhaps from shame.
AN UNHAPPY IRONY
In 1960, the Congo won independence from Belgium. Five years later, an army colonel named Mobutu took power and ruled the nation for 22 years, one year less than Leopold. Mobutu created a personal kingdom called Zaire. His government exploited the country’s wealth and funneled it into his pocket. In May 1997, he was finally overthrown. Four months later, Mobutu died. Sound familiar?
Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping both died of complications from Parkinson’s disease.
MR. JENNER AND THE MILKMAID
* * *
No, it’s not the story of a romp in the hayloft, it’s about an old disease and an old wives’ tale. . .
The first recorded mention of smallpox was by the Chinese in the twelfth century B.C. By the eighteenth century A.D. it was still one of the world’s most dreaded diseases; it left scars and could blind and/or kill its victims.
THE MILKMAID IN QUESTION
In 1770s England, the only people who’d nurse smallpox patients were those who’d survived the disease and, therefore, couldn’t catch it again. A teenage surgeon’s apprentice, Edward Jenner, found out that the woman who was nursing one of his patients was also the man’s milkmaid.
THE OLD WIVES’ TALE MEETS. . .
She told him that even though she’d never had smallpox, she was immune to it because she’d had cowpox. (Cowpox affected cows and sheep; it also made people ill, but it was a mild disease compared to smallpox.) Jenner reported this to the surgeon, who told him not to listen to worthless old wives’ tales.
. . . THE SCIENTIFIC APPROACH
But Jenner started to keep track of what happened to people who’d recovered from cowpox and were later exposed to smallpox. The milkmaid was right. Jenner eventually published a pamphlet stating that inoculations with cowpox would save people from dying of smallpox. Years of ridicule later, his ideas were accepted, and Jenner is now known as the inventor of vaccinations. Smallpox has been nearly wiped out, and countless lives have been saved with vaccinations—a word that’s derived from the Latin word “vacca,” meaning “cow.”
Charles Lindbergh was actually the 61st person to fly across the Atlantic.
THE REAL LADY GODIVA
* * *
What is it about Lady Godiva that keeps our interest through the centuries? That she was against taxing the poor people of her town?
That she had the courage of her convictions? Of course not. It’s because she went out in public with no clothes on.
THE IMPORTANCE OF REALLY LONG HAIR
Most of us are familiar with the story: Lady Godiva was concerned that her husband was taxing the people of Coventry too much and she told him so, over and over again. Finally, he said something like, “Sure honey. I’ll lower taxes when you ride naked through the marketplace on your horse.”
It was a bit of luck for Lady Godiva that extremely long hair was in style, because she decided to take her husband up on his dare. With her private parts covered only by her long tresses, Godiva climbed on her horse and rode through town. The punchline is that Lord Godiva was so impressed by her daring that he abolished all taxes.
WHAT’S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?
Historians object to the story for a variety of reasons. First, Godiva’s story wasn’t written until 200 years after the fact by someone who, for obvious reasons, wasn’t there at the time. And second, the “marketplace” didn’t exist yet; the town was more of a settlement, and the main street was just a dirt road in the 11th century, when the famous ride was supposed to have taken place.
What historians do know isn’t much. Lady Godiva did exist and lived near Coventry. Her given name was Godgyfu, which means “God’s gift.” Not to be outdone in the Olde English name department, her husband was named Leofric. He was the earl of Mercia and a very powerful political figure. Godiva was a real Lady Bountiful, too. She and her husband built and endowed the monastery around which the town of Coventry grew up.
WHO STARTED IT
The first written mention of the story comes from Roger of Wendover, a historian and 13th century monk—but not one of the Lord and Lady’s well-endowed monks. He describes the ride-that-never-was in detail:
Before founding the Boy Scouts, Robert Baden-Powell had been a spy in South Africa.
Whereupon the countess [sic]. . . let down her tresses, which covered the whole of her body like a veil, and then mounting her horse and attended by two knights, she rode through the market-place, without being seen, except her fair legs.
Without being seen? That’s not the way we heard it.
WHAT ABOUT TOM?
The other version of the legend says that, out of modesty, Lady Godiva asked the citizens of Coventry not to watch her while she took her ride. But one man—Peeping Tom—couldn’t resist. The punishment for his impudence was severe. He was struck blind on the spot. Which probably taught him a lesson. Or would have if he’d existed in the first place.
The story of how Tom came to be is pretty silly. Some 16th century mischief-maker salvaged a wooden statue of St. George from the monastery when it closed down in 1539. He stuck the statue in a window that overlooked the now-famous marketplace. When anyone asked who that was at the window, the jokester replied, “That’s Tom. He’s peeping at Godiva.” How surprising is
it that a legend about a naked woman would expand to include a guy peeking at her?
THERE SHE IS, MISS LADY GODIVA
The city of Coventry has been holding Godiva pageants for more than 300 years. The main event is a reenactment of Lady Godiva’s famous ride. The first pageant, held in 1678, starred a maiden in a pink bodysuit and a very long wig. She was accompanied by costumed ladies-in-waiting, city officials, trade guild floats, and those universal parade stalwarts, the fire brigade.
The pageant continued annually until 1854, when an event that some people had been dreading—and others had been hoping for—happened: a truly naked woman on a horse crashed the pageant. Pandemonium ensued, and the pageant was suspended for eight years.