History Is Important

Jennifer | 29 | she(her) | B.A. in History | This is my side blog and will only fixate on history | Expect a lot of history jokes |

[thisdayinwwi]

World War I football kicked across Somme by Surrey men

A football kicked across no man's land during the Battle of the Somme is on display in Surrey.

[ltwilliammowett]

SS Sultana at Helena, AR, on April 26, 1865, a day before she was destroyed (x)

On 27 April 1865, 3 of the 4 boilers of the Sultana, a paddle steamer on the Mississippi, exploded. She was launched in 1863 in Cincinnati/Ohio. About 1800 people died in the explosion, the date was quickly forgotten because the day before the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes-Booth was shot by US Sergeant Boston Corbett, on 14 April Lincoln was shot, and on 9 April General Lee surrendered to the Union troops.

An engraving of the Sultana explosion, published in Harpers Weekly, May 20, 1865. An estimated 1,800 people died in the explosion and ensuing fire — more than died in the sinking of the Titanic. (x) 

The newspapers were full of these headlines, only nobody cared about the shipwreck except the relatives of the dead and injured. The dead were not civilians but released prisoners of war from the Civil War who were on their way home. Only very few survived this disaster.

[historical-nonfiction]

The Man Who Enabled Millions To Read

Louis Braille began losing his sight at three years old, due to an accident with a toy that struck him in the eye and which became infected and spread to his other eye. By age five, Louis was completely blind. It was 1812 and there was nothing that medicine could do for either eye.

He was lucky though and was able to attend one of the first blind schools in the world, the Royal Institution for Blind Youth in Paris. There, Louis was exposed to the “night writing” method invented by Captain Charles Barbier of the French Army. It was a series of dashes and dots intended to be read by soldiers when putting on a light might be dangerous. But the night writing system was rather complicated and difficult to use. It did, however, inspire Louis to try and make a better system on his own. By the time Louis was 15 years old, he had trimmed Barbier’s 12 dots into six and had found 63 ways to use a six-dot cell in an area no larger than a fingertip. Braille, the system still used around the world, had been born.

Just to finish off Louis’ story – his life did not end at age 15! He published his own system in 1829 and added symbols for both mathematics and music. He went on to have a number of publications about the new reading and writing system, and in 1833, Louis was offered a full professorship where he taught history, geometry and algebra. He also became an accomplished cellist and organist. Unfortunately his invention was met with skepticism by the public. It was not even taught at Braille’s alma mater, the Royal Institute. Due to a persistent respiratory illness he was forced to give up teaching and move back to his hometown at age 40.

In 1852, Louis Braille died, just two days after his 43rd birthday. He would never know how widespread his invention would become. Today there are over 250 million people with visual impairments, who are able to access the written word thanks to Louis Braille.

[summoneryuna]

when ur economy has flourished, the empire has hospitals, everything is advanced, and your people know what basic hygiene is so u throw a math party with ur buds and discover algebra in the process.

[feminysticism]

Remarkable Muslim Women

Sayyida al Hurra (1485-1561), was a queen of Tétouan in 1515-1542 and a pirate queen in the early 16th century. She is considered to be “one of the most important female figures of the Islamic West in the modern age”.

Pari Khan Khanum (1524-1576) was a Safavid princess. An influential figure in the Safavid state, Pari Khan Khanum was well educated and knowledgeable in traditional Islamic sciences such as jurisprudence, and was an accomplished poet.

Kösem Sultan (1589-1651) was one of the most powerful women in Ottoman history. She was one of the prominent figures during the Sultanate of Women.

Umm Kulthum (1898/1904-1975)  was an internationally renowned Egyptian singer, songwriter, and film actress active from the 1920s to the 1970s.  She was known for her extraordinary vocal ability and style, and she was one of the greatest and most influential singers of the 20th century. Umm Kulthum is considered a national icon in her native Egypt and is dubbed as The voice of Egypt and Egypt’s fourth pyramid. Umm Kulthum remains as the most revered legendary Arab singer.

Sabiha Gökçen (1913-2001) was the first Turkish combat pilot and possibly the world’s first fighter pilot.

Meena Keshwar Kamal (1956-1987)  was an Afghan revolutionary political activist, feminist, women’s rights activist and founder of Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), who was assassinated in 1987.

Betty Shabazz (1934-1997) was an American educator and civil rights advocate.

Ibtihaj Muhammad (born December 4, 1985) is an American sabre fencer, and a member of the United States fencing team. She is best known for being the first Muslim American woman to wear a hijab while competing for the United States in the Olympics. She earned the bronze medal as part of Team USA in the Team Sabre, becoming the first female Muslim-American athlete to earn a medal at the Olympics.

[celtsoffate]

Not animu but I had to share this gem

[astrodidact]

[aenariasbookshelf]

See that picture above? That’s a close up of my great grandmother’s immigration papers when she first came to the US back in the early 20th century. But my great grandma’s information isn’t the important part here. The important part is that line in the middle there about how they arrived in the country.

And how ‘stowaway’ is a legitimate, valid option to select.

So yeah. They absolutely just showed up, and that part of immigration history needs to be talked about a lot more.

[drek-odradek-deactivated2022031]

REMINDER THAT TRAVEL VISAS AS WE KNOW THEM TODAY WERE INVENTED IN THE 1930S TO KEEP JEWISH REFUGEES OUT OF COUNTRIES THAT DID NOT WANT AN ‘INFLUX’ OF THEM, THEREBY FACILITATING THEIR GENOCIDE :)))))

read What is A Refugee for more history. Educate yourselves.

[history-and-stuff-and-things]

[history-and-stuff-and-things]

[queenotrera]

History wants so badly for Cleopatra to be beautiful. Like they can’t conceive of Rome being intimidated by anything less

[terpsikeraunos]

because being a linguist, fleet commander, and powerful ruler doesn’t matter, only her looks

[destroymales-deactivated2023032]

Her Arab contemporaries raved about her being very interested and knowledgeable in the sciences.

She completely reformed the system in Alexandria, and Egypt at large; making it much more of a functional powerhouse. 

She did what 300 years of her ancestors couldn’t: Managed to get the support of both the Greek AND Egyptian subjects she ruled.

There is a sculpture that has been identified as her, through comparisons to coins minted under her rule, that proves beyond a doubt that she wasn’t particularly beautiful.

It isn’t that people just happen to believe it by mistake. Rome was fucking terrified of her and painted her as a vapid, scheming, beautiful, sex obsessed queen to discredit her to their people. She was a threat, and that was how they handled it. The unfortunate thing is that that is the most surviving record of her. A smear campaign against one of the smartest, most powerful women in human history. 

[jinxmyride-deactivated20161103]

This is a woman who became her father’s co-ruler at nearly 14 years old in order to train for her actual ascension to the throne, who was forced to marry her own siblings in order to keep her power, and it’s widely believed that she poisoned them so she could rule alone. She’s a Pharaoh who led Egypt into a new era of wealth, who went fearlessly into war to protect her rule and Egypt’s independence from the Roman empire, a woman who took her own life rather than face being raped and tortured by her conquerors, knowing full well that she was leaving her surviving children in their uncertain mercy. Cleopatra is one of the most interesting, morally ambiguous, complexing historical figures we have and the media has turned her into a tantalizing sex object for the male gaze.

Even after Cleopatra died her influence on those around her lived on: her daughter, Cleopatra Selene, was the only child of Cleopatra’s to live to adulthood, and she became queen of Mauretania along with her husband Juba and it’s believed they married for love, which was extremely rare for that time period, especially among nobles/the upper class. Not only did she grow up in the house of her mother’s worst enemy and technical murderer, but she still went on to become a queen who possessed an equal amount of political power as her husband, even having her face minted on coins on the opposite side of his likeness, showing they were equal rulers.

Cleopatra and her influence on history, and her daughter’s legacy, have both been brushed aside in favour of the sexy Cleopatra visage. It’s bullshit. Egyptian mythology is interesting and vivid, and full of powerful women and it’s bullshit that we take some of the most powerful women in Africa’s history and try to turn them into fashion icons or sluts who only ruled through toying with men. 

[luthienmuse]

I LIVE FOR PEOPLE TO KNOW THIS, people still refuse to believe that a woman can/could have achieved anything without beauty or fucking magical powers  

[totallyradicalblog-blog]

Always reblog

[hating-alison-ashley]

I’d never heard about her daughter before. That’s cool.

They should make another movie about her with an actor who actually looks like she did and mae it obvious in the script how good she was at being pharoah.

[radfemcubana]

So you can put a face to the name. This is what scientists believe she actually looked like. In my opinion she was probably much darker. But those are the coins and busts that were made of her and that’s what you should think of. Curly hair, a hooked nose, a woman who did EXTRAORDINARY things. You don’t have to be beautiful to accomplish greatness.

[radfemcubana]

Since this post seems to be offending people I wanna just try to word what I meant more carefully.

First, I believe that the whitewashing of Cleopatra’s image was wrong and racist obviously.

Second, she was whitewashed to be a palatable sex symbol in order to erase her accomplishments as a strong intelligent woman.

Third, we should learn what she looked like. It’s important to put a face to the name that broke entire countries.

Fourth, given what we know she looks like, in today’s society with our Eurocentric beauty standards (which I do not agree with) she would be considered ugly specifically because of the features our racist beauty standards consider ugly. It is the reason she has been whitewashed in order to maintain a sex symbol status. These features which have been ERASED and wrongfully so are mainly her curly hair, her hooked nose, and her darker olive toned skin.

Fifth, while it is a common message to say “everyone is beautiful!” that is touted as progressive language, from experience, I have learned that people over and over again telling me the features society calls me ugly for are actually beautiful don’t actually make them so. Nor is it a helpful message because beauty should not be the ultimate that we as a society strive for. WOMEN CAN BE GREAT AND IMPORTANT EVEN IF THEY ARE CONSIDERED UGLY BY SOCIETAL STANDARDS.

Please stop arguing over which women are actually pretty and which women aren’t because it doesn’t matter. Tear down the whole system and understand that beauty is not important. It’s a subjective experience. Stop saying women are beautiful when you mean that women matter.

[radfemcubana]

I would really appreciate it if you guys reblogged this version because literally everyone wants to be upset for no reason.

[ekjohnston]

*puts on archaeology hat*

The nose in question is referred to in statuary analysis as the Ptolemy Nose. They all had it. The entire dynasty, from Ptolemy I Soter on down, and they were usually carved with it, because: it was a mark of the family.

[thisdayinwwi]

Forgotten Heroes: Algerian Muslims Are Our Comrades in Arms

Some historical researchers, have spent five years working tirelessly to establish just how many Muslims contributed to the allied cause in the Great War.

[wwisuggestions]

Lose half your family to the fighting whilst working your fingers to the bone in a factory, only to be told by a jumped-up self-declared ‘Voice of the Lost Generation’ that your entire gender lacks the emotional depth needed to understand his entirely unique form of suffering, despite the fact that four years earlier the little tosser was going around saying you were all much too emotional to be given the Vote.

[hiddenwwi]

Machine gun posts like this surround the perimeters of large French Forts near Verdun, France. They are accessed via long tunnels that lead back to the fort. Many of the design motifs the we have come to know in the Star Wars movies were inspired by WWI.

[ultrafacts]

Source Click HERE to Follow the Ultrafacts Blog!

[vancity604778kid]

ALICE ROOSEVELT WAS HARDCORE. “She was known as a rule-breaker in an era when women were under great pressure to conform. The American public noticed many of her exploits. She smoked cigarettes in public, swore at officials, rode in cars with men, stayed out late partying, kept a pet snake named Emily Spinach (Emily as in her spinster aunt and Spinach for its green color) in the White House, and was seen placing bets with a bookie. 

[optimysticals]

So what I’m reading here is, she was a Roosevelt?

[catsuitmonarchy]

Well I have a new hero.

[khoshekh-yourself-deactivated20]

Her whole wikipedia article is gold

“When her father was governor of New York, he and his wife proposed that Alice attend a conservative school for girls in New York City. Pulling out all the stops, Alice wrote, ‘If you send me I will humiliate you. I will do something that will shame you. I tell you I will.’”

“Her father took office in 1901 following the assassination of President William McKinley, Jr. in Buffalo (an event that she greeted with “sheer rapture.”)“

“During the cruise to Japan, Alice jumped into the ship’s pool fully clothed, and coaxed a congressman to join her in the water. (Years later Bobby Kennedy would chide her about the incident, saying it was outrageous for the time, to which the by-then-octogenarian Alice replied that it would only have been outrageous had she removed her clothes.”

“She was dressed in a blue wedding dress and dramatically cut the wedding cake with a sword (borrowed from a military aide attending the reception)”

“When it came time for the Roosevelt family to move out of the White House, Alice buried a Voodoo doll of the new First Lady, Nellie Taft, in the front yard.”

“Later, the Taft White House banned her from her former residence—the first but not the last administration to do so. During Woodrow Wilson’s administration (from which she was banned in 1916 for a bawdy joke at Wilson’s expense)…”

“As an example of her attitudes on race, in 1965 her African-American chauffeur and one of her best friends, Turner, was driving Alice to an appointment. During the trip, he pulled out in front of a taxi, and the driver got out and demanded to know of him, “What do you think you’re doing, you black bastard?” Turner took the insult calmly, but Alice did not and told the taxi driver, “He’s taking me to my destination, you white son of a bitch!”

“To Senator Joseph McCarthy, who had jokingly remarked at a party “Here’s my blind date. I am going to call you Alice”, she sarcastically said “Senator McCarthy, you are not going to call me Alice. The trashman and the policeman on my block call me Alice, but you may not.”

[mewjounouchi]

I love this woman.

[distractedbyshinyobjects]

WOMEN WHO NEED FUCKEN MOVIES.

[wolf-the-whumper]

I WOULD WATCH THIS SHIT 20000X OVER

[henryclervals]

Women in the First World War (IWM Archives)

A woman tram driver // WAAC recruiting sergeant and assistant talking to potential recruits in Trafalgar Square // Eight female painters at work on various sections of the exterior of the District Railway, Hammersmith // Woman trolley driver at Liverpool Street Station // Conductess London General Omnibus Company // Two female bag fillers use two short poles to assist a female coke heaver //   Woman Army Service Corps driver // Two women foresters grind an axe

[greatwar-1914]

Red flags fly over German U-boats in Kiel.

[bantarleton]

I didn’t realise at first that I was looking at actual First World War footage. Then I was like “oh.” 

Comes out October 16th.