ON THIS DAY: 30 March 1867 – The United States signed the Alaska Treaty of Cessation and purchased Alaska—586,412 square miles—for $7.2 million (equivalent to $129 million in 2023) from the Russian Empire. The name Alaska is derived from an Aleut-language word meaning ‘the mainland.’ During the early 1700s, Russia established a colonial presence in … Read more
The Great Escape is one of history’s most famous prison breaks. Seventy-six Allied airmen made an audacious bid for freedom from Stalag Luft III, a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp, during the Second World War. The Nazis built this maximum-security camp 100 miles from Berlin, intending for it to be escape-proof. It was designed to house captured … Read more
Roman Emperor Constantine I issued a decree declaring Sunday a civil day of rest. He called Sunday the ‘venerable day of the sun’. The impact of this decree ensured that markets and public offices were closed on Sundays, though rural populations were permitted to work in their fields. Sunday was sacred to Christians as the … Read more
21 women and 18 men were found dead at 18341 Colina Norte in Rancho Santa Fe, California. All were members of a cult named Heaven’s Gate, and they had committed suicide by drinking vodka laced with phenobarbital and apple sauce. The cult leaders, Peep (Marshall Herff Applewhite) and Bo (Bonnie Lu Nettles), were convinced that … Read more
In Saigon, Vietnam, a celebration was organised to commemorate two sisters who, in 43 AD, led an uprising to banish their Chinese occupiers. The Trưng sisters hailed from a tribal, Lạc Việt aristocratic family in a district that is now part of modern-day Hanoi. When Trưng Trắc’s husband was executed for opposing the Han regime, … Read more
An advertisement appeared in The Times asking for an oyster dealer ‘who does not wash his hands in the same water as the oysters, and who is not fronted when civilly asked to wash them before he uses them to open the oysters’. Nowadays we associate oysters with champagne and luxury. But in the nineteenth century they … Read more